The amount of work accomplished in the afternoon was nearly triple that of the morning.
A full fifty-odd logs of varying thickness had been hauled by the players with ropes and the handcart, dragged up to the perimeter wall of the sanatorium.
Honestly, the players' performance exceeded Chu Guang's expectations.
Each log was between eight and ten meters long, with the longest even reaching twenty meters, and more than half were as thick as a thigh.
Chu Guang tallied them up: two thousand contribution points in total.
Among them, Fleeting White Horse had achieved the greatest results, single-handedly racking up 800 points. Gale Force 8 was probably the most pitiful; his clone was unsuited to athletic exertion, possessing only the physique of an ordinary person, and after toiling all day, he had earned only 300 points.
As for what this stuff was useful for?
Chu Guang had not figured that out yet.
The shelter was broke as hell right now. He had only two lollipops left in his pocket; he used to have a compressed biscuit too, but he had already scarfed it down.
After pondering it back and forth, he merely told the players that in addition to a three-day waiting period, reviving required spending revival coins.
And revival coins had to be purchased with contribution points.
Although the "purchasing power" of contribution points was somewhat meager, the players did not seem to mind much.
After all, this was the closed-beta stage, so a lack of game content was completely understandable. As long as accounts were not wiped, hoarding more currency meant they would always find somewhere to spend it once the game officially launched.
Furthermore, contribution points had no physical form—they were just a number that could currently only be checked by logging into the official website after logging off.
Although Chu Guang also wanted to follow Boulder City's example and produce some tangible coins you could see and touch, he had no choice; conditions in the shelter were far too harsh, and he couldn't even scrape together the materials to "mint coins."
He could hardly hand out chips to the players.
While those were the hard currency around Qingquan City, he barely had any left himself.
Besides, giving them chips directly would be useless; the players couldn't very well head off to survivor settlements to trade on their own anyway.
The only reason he could communicate with the survivors was that his soul had transmigrated here, leaving his head stocked with the language of this world.
Meanwhile, the clones used by those players were completely blank slates, lacking even basic mental faculties, let alone any inherited memories.
The language used by the survivors around Qingquan City was the Human Alliance Common Language.
This tongue was entirely distinct from the languages of any nation or ethnic group in the real world, bearing at best only slight resemblances to Chinese in grammar and pronunciation.
In the future, Chu Guang would consider developing a translation tool to resolve communication between players and "NPCs," and redesign the distribution system and economy while he was at it.
Just not right now.
...
Having finished taking stock of the day's results, it was getting late.
Chu Guang glanced up at the slanting sun on the horizon, his eyes narrowing slightly.
Night was approaching.
"Respected Manager, I noticed our outpost doesn't have electricity," Fang Chang stepped forward and said. "Why don't we find a way to get a generator?"
That was a good question.
Unfortunately, it was completely useless.
"We don't have a spare generator," Chu Guang said, looking at him. "Do any of you understand that field? Or have electrician skills?"
The players exchanged glances.
"Can't we just run a wire up from underground?" Student Ye Shi asked a rather moronic question.
"We don't have a line that long. Furthermore, the shelter's power supply isn't infinite. Even if it worked in the short term, the long-term issue would remain unsolved, and it would sow even greater hidden hazards."
Here, Chu Guang paused.
"It's getting late. We should head back."
To the players, "heading back" naturally meant "logging off."
Although it wasn't completely dark yet, it was already five in the afternoon, meaning dawn was fast approaching back in China in the parallel world.
Without realizing it, they had spent so much time in the game world. When they snapped back to reality, lingering yearning was written across all their faces.
It felt like there were still so many places in this world worth exploring.
However, they had jobs during the day and couldn't stay here forever.
...
Inside Shelter 404.
Watching the players lie back down inside the incubation pods, Chu Guang pondered whether he should try recruiting some idlers who didn't work during the day.
Or perhaps players in other time zones.
Otherwise, as soon as night fell, he was the only one left in this massive outpost, which was hardly ideal from a security standpoint.
"I'll keep sleeping in the shelter tonight."
Unless necessary, he really didn't want to go back to that "doghouse" on Bet Street.
Just as Chu Guang was wondering what to do next, Xiao Qi came over to his side.
"Master."
"What is it?"
"The physical examination reports for the clones have been updated. Would you like to take a look?"
Chu Guang hesitated slightly.
"...Physical examination reports?"
"Mm-hmm! Every time a player logs out normally, the incubation pod scans the clone inside, records its physiological functions, extracts a certain quantity of embryonic stem cells for backup, and logs the gene sequence development progress—"
"Hold on, what the heck is a gene sequence?"
Hearing this unfamiliar keyword, Chu Guang felt as though he had missed some crucial piece of information.
Faced with the manager's query, Xiao Qi answered nonchalantly.
"Haven't you noticed? The clone used by each player is synthesized from different DNA. The gene sequence is simply the serial number for the different DNA."
Chu Guang followed up immediately, "Then what is development progress??"
"The DNA of each sequence was meticulously designed. Regrettably, however, we have not completely mastered the mysteries of life."
"Not all traits from genetic information achieve full expression. It's just like how an athlete's child is more likely to become an athlete, yet isn't born as an athlete right out of the womb."
"The so-called development progress refers to the degree of dominant expression of specific segments within the gene sequence, usually indicated as a percentage."
"For instance, reaching a development progress of 100% means all performance aspects of the organism have drawn infinitely close to the design limits of the genes, attaining the most perfect state... But that is practically impossible."
"At present, the four gene sequences we have activated all have development progress between 0 and 1%. Research indicates that continuously stimulating survival instincts and training the physical body will raise this value."
If "gene sequences" were understood as classes, then "development progress" was roughly analogous to levels.
A gene sequence oriented toward strength enhancement was like a "Barbarian" in D&D rules, innately possessing greater strength and biased toward increasing the strength stat.
Take "Fleeting White Horse," for example.
The other players were all fairly normal, but he had thick body hair and a massive build, clearly not looking like an ordinary human.
Holy crap.
These clones—or rather, the players—could actually level up!
And there was even a talent mechanic!
Something this badass, and he was only finding out now!
Looking at Xiao Qi explaining so casually, Chu Guang couldn't help but say:
"Why are you only telling me something this important now???"
Xiao Qi replied aggrievedly, "Didn't you tell me not to speak up out of the blue? I was originally planning to tell you right at the start."
Chu Guang: "..."
This little rascal...
Was definitely doing this on purpose!
Chapter 9