"What couldn't wait until I was free? Didn't I tell you I've been swamped these past few—holy shit?!"
Floor B7 of the shelter.
The instant Yin Fang reluctantly stepped out of the elevator and onto Floor B7, he froze in his tracks, his jaw slack.
After a long daze, he turned his neck stiffly toward Chu Guang, who was standing beside the terminal with a smile, and stammered in utter disbelief, "...This is the shelter you manage?"
Chu Guang nodded.
"Clearly, yes."
Seeing him nod so nonchalantly, Yin Fang almost choked.
"Then why didn't you bring this out sooner?!"
Chu Guang's expression turned slightly complicated.
*Damn it, you think I didn't want to? But what was I supposed to do when that first Administrator wouldn't hand over the keys?!*
Explaining that was far too troublesome, and knowing Yin Fang's obsessive personality, the man would interrogate him endlessly. Taking a few seconds to concoct an excuse, Chu Guang cleared his throat and said offhandedly, "...I forgot the password to this floor. Only remembered it recently."
Yin Fang stared blankly at Chu Guang, his face virtually screaming, *Do you honestly expect me to believe that?*
Chu Guang had no intention of elaborating, though. He smoothly steered the topic away. "Could you do me a favor and take a look at this equipment? What level of technology are we looking at?"
Yin Fang inhaled deeply and took a full minute to compose himself before speaking.
"...Put it this way. If an ordinary survivor settlement got their hands on this manufacturing equipment, as long as they weren't stupid enough to use it for peeling apples, they could skip all the way from the early Industrial Era straight into the Information Age without breaking a sweat!"
Chu Guang looked slightly underwhelmed. "Just the Information Age?"
"...I said an *ordinary* survivor settlement. But are we an ordinary survivor settlement?!"
Yin Fang looked at Chu Guang incredulously, unable to hold back his exasperation. "Not only do we have an enormous industrial zone, but we also have a systematic scientific research and archaeology apparatus with hundreds of experts dedicated to it, plus a city-grade fusion reactor! I'm not even counting that thousand cubic meters of nuclear fuel and the archives stored in this database. Just the Information Age? Are you kidding me? We could build another Ideal City on this wasteland—"
At that point, Yin Fang cut himself off. His gaze toward Chu Guang shifted from exasperated reprimand to profound astonishment.
He whispered under his breath, "Good grief... it was true all along..."
Chu Guang furrowed his brow slightly. "True?"
"I remember you saying that you wanted to build a new Ideal City on these ruins. I thought you were joking..." Yin Fang swallowed hard, his eyes shimmering with excitement as he murmured like a man caught in a waking dream. "You weren't joking. You were serious!"
Watching the entranced Yin Fang, Chu Guang's hesitant expression grew rather subtle.
So that was what he meant.
He really did seem to remember saying something like that...
To be frank, though, that had just been an empty promise tossed out on a whim—perhaps an improvised line during a speech when he got carried away. What was more, once his people actually visited Enterprise territory and saw what the legendary Ideal City really looked like, he hadn't felt shameless enough to brag about it again.
Up until today—even right up until Yin Fang said those words—Chu Guang hadn't seriously thought such a day would ever come.
Even so...
"When have I ever lied to you, my friend?" Chu Guang's face settled into an earnest, solemn expression as he looked at the awestruck scholar. "Just as you said, we don't just have a massive industrial zone, a cadre of outstanding researchers, a giant reactor, and a surplus of nuclear fuel and technical reserves that goes without saying... Most importantly, we have you."
"Me..." Yin Fang's face flushed crimson, his voice trembling with stammering excitement.
"No need for modesty. I trust that with your experience and expertise, and your deep knowledge of the Era of Prosperity, you understand far better than a shelter Administrator like me how to unlock the full potential of these facilities. I believe you can lead us into that era to see it for ourselves, rather than merely clutching relics and reminiscing."
Looking at Yin Fang, whose weathered face had turned a deep liver-red, Chu Guang patted him on the shoulder and said with heartfelt gravity, "I leave it in your hands!"
...
In the real world.
Inside the Niuma Group chat.
Discussions regarding Version Beta 0.6 of *Wasteland OL* had spilled from the forum into the players' private groups.
Compared to the goofy chatter of random netizens, veteran players from the earliest versions still preferred hearing Brother Fang Chang's insights.
Departing from his usual routine, however, Fang Chang paid little attention to the fruiting body nurturing system that had taken the forum by storm. Instead, his focus landed squarely on the most inconspicuous line in the patch notes.
"...To be honest, rather than that fruiting body system, I'm way more curious about what Floor B7 actually is."
Ye Shi: "I thought you'd say you were more curious about what bugs Ah Guang fixed this time. (funny)"
Lao Bai: "Haha, Ah Guang would never tell you that."
Fang Chang: "I'm being totally serious here. No kidding."
Jieyan: "Floor B7? Wait, isn't Floor B6 the lowest level of the shelter? (stunned)"
Fang Chang: "Sigh, none of you read the notes carefully. The highlights of Beta 0.6, besides the fruiting body system, include a massive number of ruins across Qingquan City's downtown core, and then Floor B7 of the shelter, which I just mentioned."
As for Planet Gaia, Fang Chang had automatically tuned it out.
An empty pie dangling five light-years away had virtually nothing to do with the current version's main storyline. Even if players actually managed to reach it, it would probably just be a few flat textures slapped on the screen.
Carving it out as a separate bullet point in the update was almost certainly Ah Guang doing it for the meme rather than practical gameplay.
He knew Ah Guang all too well!
Floor B7 of the shelter was entirely different.
As the starting shelter present since day one, its floor-unlocking progression had always been intimately tied to the Alliance's advancement!
In fact, every single time a new floor unlocked, it brought a substantial overhaul to the entire game's mechanics.
He had every reason to believe this time would be no different.
Yet curiously enough, although the patch notes mentioned unlocking a new floor, he had logged on earlier and tested every operational elevator in the shelter, only to find no way to reach it.
That made it even stranger!
Seeing that bastard Fang Chang tease them without getting to the point, Ye Shi's curiosity was piqued. "So what do you think Floor B7 is? (curious)"
Fang Chang: "Skipping the still-locked Floor B5, Floor B6 is a biology laboratory. I have good reason to suspect Floor B7 is either a physics or engineering laboratory, or at the very least a facility related to them!"
Kuang Feng: "A physics lab... I feel like putting something like a particle collider inside the shelter wouldn't make much sense. Plus, pure theoretical research offers terribly low returns given the unique conditions of the wasteland."
Fang Chang: "I agree with your assessment. And from a game-design perspective, a physics laboratory can hardly impact the player experience directly. Therefore, I'll make a bold prediction: Floor B7 must be an experimental or manufacturing facility related to engineering, particularly machinery fabrication!"
Brother Scrambled Eggs: "You're getting too deep. My head hurts. Just tell us how it affects gameplay. (bitter smile)"
Jieyan: "+1"
Fang Chang: "Do you remember all that high-tech gear pulled from the gacha in earlier versions?"
WC Really Has Mosquitoes: "*Hiss*, wait, I think I see what you mean! Are you saying... all that gear was actually manufactured on Floor B7?! (delighted)"
Fang Chang: "Exactly, and the probability is extraordinarily high! If nothing unexpected happens, starting from Beta 0.6, those out-of-print god-tier items that previously required gacha pulls will gradually be downgraded. They'll be made available for limited purchase to mid-tier players, or even depreciated into common white-tier shop gear sold by NPCs."
Ye Shi: "Holy shit?!"
Lao Bai: "For real? (surprised)"
Spare the Blade: "6666!"
Scavenger Lv99: "Hahahahaha, Brother Guang is a god! You bastards finally got nerfed! This cut feels amazing! (dying of laughter)"
Ye Shi: "Pfft, what are you getting excited about? No matter how cheap high-end gear gets, a guy like you with less than five points in Intelligence still can't use it! And once my Gauss rifle becomes commonplace and even total noobs are running around with one, won't you scratch-and-claw melee guys be even more useless? Who's the one really getting nerfed here?"
Scavenger Lv99: "Holy shit?!"
Spare the Blade: "Turns out the clown was me all along. (funny)"
The group members reacted in every imaginable way to Brother Fang Chang's meta predictions.
Some gloated, some cried out in dismay at the thought of their net worth shrinking, some munched on popcorn to watch the drama, and others simply didn't care.
Fang Chang remained quite philosophical about it.
He understood full well that in any game, as patches rolled forward, yesterday's god-tier equipment turning into common trash was only a matter of time.
Especially during closed beta testing, the operators had far more critical duties than pampering the gameplay experience of a handful of early testers—namely, fleshing out all the game's systems to be as complete and robust as possible.
Catering exclusively to a minority of players was simply unrealistic.
Fang Chang: "Looking at it from another angle, this isn't necessarily a bad thing. In previous versions, the ceiling of our combat power came either from shelter hand-me-downs or battlefield salvage from other survivor factions. That was enough to bully the locals, but objectively speaking, there was still a massive gap compared to veteran factions."
"Once the old god-tier items become mass-market gear, new god-tier equipment is bound to appear. Personally, I think that's something worth looking forward to. (funny)"
...
Floor B7 of the shelter had not yet opened to players, so Fang Chang's predictions regarding Beta 0.6 remained mere conjecture.
Nevertheless, quite a few perceptive players had already noticed the NPC shop quietly expanding its inventory.
The most prominent example was the Hummingbird drone.
Previously unavailable through any purchase channel, it was now listed on the official website. Any player with Citizen-level contribution could buy one, capped at a single unit per person, priced at just 10,000 silver coins—equivalent to a Type 5 "Light Cavalry" exoskeleton.
Compared to the Alliance's domestically developed Y-series drones, the Hummingbird boasted superior optics, agile maneuverability, and exceptional stealth, functioning like a miniature reconnaissance satellite darting through the ruins.
Of course, to protect other players' privacy, privately owned drones were banned from flying in safe zones above five meters, restricted solely to serving as follow-cam recording devices.
Beyond that, the Administrator's Nitrogen Power Hammer was now available in the NPC shop as well!
However, its price was steep. Reportedly due to intricate manufacturing processes, it cost a staggering 200,000 silver coins—nearly matching a Gauss rifle!
Indeed, the NPC shop even stocked pre-war Type 20 "Needle" Gauss rifles—the very same model the Administrator always carried at his side!
This weapon stood a cut above the Type 15 "Python" Gauss rifle Ye Shi loved so dearly. Not only did it feature an unconventional barrel-less design, but it also boasted the absurd capability of firing stray nails and scrap metal scooped up off the ground!
While a hammer requiring power armor to wield might give buyers pause, the Type 20 "Needle" sold out almost the moment it hit the NPC shelves, clearing well over a hundred units!
That single piece of equipment alone absorbed twenty million silver coins back into the Alliance's coffers in a single day. Chu Guang grinned from ear to ear and promptly ordered Xiao Qi to queue another production batch to restock the shelves.
Although Fang Chang's prediction of limited-edition items becoming common white-tier gear had not yet fully materialized, the transition of legacy god-tier weapons toward standard equipment had quietly begun...
...
Meanwhile, in the Qingquan City Eastern Ecological Reserve.
A ravenous mutant hyena crouched in the shadows of the forest, glaring greedily at a gnawer bobbing its head not far away.
While non-Constitution-type players could not consume gnawers directly, that rule clearly did not apply to scavengers like mutant hyenas, roaches, and vultures.
Winter had just ended, leaving most mutated creatures starved. Even if slime mold fruiting bodies tasted vile, the scavengers had no choice but to use them to fill their empty bellies.
Confirming there was no threat, the hyena let out a low snarl and sprang forward like an arrow released from a bowstring, lunging toward the gnawer.
Right then, however, an event occurred that the beast would remember for the rest of its dog days.
The gnawer, which had been standing there like an utter dullard, suddenly snapped its neck around, gave the lunging predator a bizarre smirk, and delivered a swift, vicious kick.
Having never encountered a gnawer with such agility, the caught-off-guard mutant hyena took the blow squarely in the gut. Whimpering, it tumbled across the dirt.
What followed stunned the creature even further: the notoriously dim-witted gnawer produced a pistol out of nowhere!
Seeing human weaponry appear in the hands of a gnawer, the mutant hyena abandoned all thoughts of food. Terrified out of its wits, it scrambled to its feet and turned tail to flee.
Gripping the pistol, the gnawer raised its twig-like arm, aimed unsteadily at the fleeing hyena, and pulled the trigger with a sharp *bang!*
Unfortunately, the shot missed entirely.
The bullet grazed past the sprinting hyena and hissed into the thick undergrowth, vanishing from the gnawer's line of sight.
Refusing to give up, the gnawer gave chase in the direction the beast had fled, popping off several more rounds until the magazine clicked empty.
Yet frustratingly, the gnawer's physical Strength was pathetic—likely somewhere between 2 and 3—and its follow-up shots drifted nearly straight into the canopy.
With its quarry gone without a trace, the gnawer reverted to its mindless stupor, standing frozen in place without moving a muscle.
From a clump of bushes nearby, three players stood up cursing, brushing the mud from their trousers and shaking off leaves and grass clippings.
"Motherfucker! This thing is useless!" Silver Dad stepped forward, snatched the pistol from the gnawer's hand, and holstered it on his hip.
Using these creatures as meat-shield fodder might work, but counting on one to hold a defensive line on its own was purely delusional.
*Maybe I should buy something pricier?*
He couldn't help wondering whether he should invest in a Crawler or a Tyrant to test the waters.
Silver Sword shot him a mocking glance. "Is it possible that you're just trash?"
Silver Dad bristled immediately. "Bullshit! Would I ever miss at that distance? Go slot a biological prosthetic yourself and see. Controlling this thing is ridiculously hard!"
Silver Shield sighed, chiming in to mediate. "The main issue is our low Intelligence. I heard some fresh Intelligence-types can already command these things to charge forward with rifles."
He shook his head in resignation. "Sigh, you guys screwed us over! Back when we picked sequences, you insisted on fighting over Strength. Look at us now—total bottom-tier scrubs."
Silver Sword sputtered indignantly. "Have you got no shame? Who was the one who changed their mind at the last second?!"
Silver Shield's expression instantly turned awkward.
He had just remembered that the one who had abruptly changed his mind had indeed been him...
Sensing the stiff atmosphere, Silver Dad cleared his throat. "Alright, alright, stop bickering. That's ancient history. Give your daddy some face, will you? If worst comes to worst, we can always take the path of mechanical ascension—"
Silver Sword: "Piss off! Who's your son—ptui, I'm your daddy!"
Silver Shield: "@#$%!"
The Silver Corps' squabble was merely a minor interlude within the ecological reserve.
Judging by feedback threads on the Beta 0.6 patch across the forum, most players who had adopted fruiting bodies were enjoying a thoroughly delightful experience.
For Intelligence-type players who had reached Level 20 or even Level 30, the Beta 0.6 update had practically liberated their hands!
Take In Debt God, for instance.
Upon learning that red-eyed, white-haired succubi were nowhere to be found, he generously slapped down ten thousand silver coins to purchase one hundred and twenty gnawers, arming every single one with a cheap pipe rifle bought by the kilo.
While gnawers lacked the mental capacity to aim properly, what they lacked in accuracy could be compensated for with sheer volume of fire!
On top of that, he had bought a sturdy chair, lashed two rebar poles to it to fashion a litter, and assigned four gnawers to carry him around.
Parading his sprawling entourage of gnawers through the eastern outskirts for half the day, he finally tracked down an unlucky mutant grizzly bear.
Without hesitation, In Debt God lined up his subordinate gnawers in a neat row, leveling their pipe rifles at the beast.
"Fire!" he shouted in glee.
The grizzly bear, its right paw pinning down a hyena captured from who-knew-where, had not even grasped what these gnawers were doing before a blinding barrage of muzzle flashes erupted. In the blink of an eye, both it and the hyena were riddled into sieves by a volley of 7mm rifle rounds.
Watching the mutant grizzly collapse with a resounding thud, its carcass riddled with bloody punctures, In Debt God let out a manic, inflated cackle.
"Gwahaha! I'm a one-man army, baby!"
Standing nearby, Construction Site Boy and Bricks watched the insufferable showoff. Despite his envy, he couldn't resist a sour jab.
"Give me a break. With that ragtag mob of shrimp soldiers and crab generals, a single dump truck could flatten your entire crew."
He was a Strength-type.
Though he had scraped together ten points in Intelligence, reading the tear-soaked cautionary posts from other Strength-types on the forum had made him abandon all aspirations of becoming a summoner.
Noticing the sour grapes, In Debt God merely chuckled, unbothered. "Pfft, what do you know? You think I'd stand still and let you run me over? Minions, show your skills! Let's broaden this country bumpkin's horizons!"
The moment the words left his mouth, In Debt God squeezed his eyes shut, his brow furrowing so tightly he looked severely constipated.
As direct neural connections clicked into place, the gnawers standing in formation began scrambling over one another under his direct control, stacking up like circus acrobats in the open clearing.
Construction Site Boy and Bricks stared, flabbergasted.
*Holy crap!*
*Are they doing an Indian military motorcycle routine?!*
Watching the gnawers perform circus stunts in the distance, Brother Edge wore a rather subtle expression as he turned toward Brother Mole beside him.
"...I can't shake the feeling that Ah Guang is using us to train AI."
Brother Mole chuckled softly.
"Sounds exactly like something Ah Guang would pull."
Even so, what did it matter?
It was a game.
As long as it was fun, who cared!
In just this short span, his mind had already conjured at least ten wild, ridiculous exploits he could pull off using these fruiting bodies.
Unfortunately, with the Tide having just concluded, the Alliance was entering a period of peaceful development. To safeguard the gameplay experience of lifestyle players, large-scale wars were unlikely in the near future.
Putting those wild ideas to the test would have to wait until the next expansion...
Chapter 643