Ch12 - Rust City

The three of them chose a coffee shop to rest in. The owner was a beautiful little hen wearing a floral apron and enthusiastically asked what they wanted to eat.

Li Yinhang was numb. If the NPC was a humanoid creature then she might be surprised by the courtesy. She took out her points and naturally asked, “What would you like to eat?” 

Li Yinhang was good at calculations and planning but she wouldn’t forget to pay. She clearly knew she was an ordinary person. Apart from winning the 3km championship at a school sports event in which the physical education department didn’t participate, she didn’t have much capital to use in this game.

She couldn’t rely on her low points. After hugging the thighs of a bigshot, she would just put up both hands and wait for someone to take her with them. She had to do her best to survive in order to not go straight to the bank of heaven for re-employment. Fortunately, compared with the essential oxygen, the cost of food was much lower.

Jiang Fang and Nan Zhou also had a sense of measure. Nan Zhou ordered a cream cake worth 15 points and Jiang Fang ordered black coffee worth 15 points, both of which were the cheapest items on the menu. She pondered over the menu before finally asking Miss Hen for a glass of white water on the grounds of buy two, get one free.

Nan Zhou continued to study his game panel while waiting for the snack to come. The Easter egg had called out the function of the world channel and also displayed the new rankings page. 

“This is the single player rankings.” Jiang Fang reminded him. “There is the team rankings next to it.”

Nan Zhou hummed and opened the tab labeled ‘team.’ The number one player on the single player list was Eternal Life – Zhang Yi.

The number one team on the team list was called ‘.’ It was just a full stop. There was no name suffix and it was just a symbol.

There were simple notes next to the rankings. In short, the single player rankings counted an individual’s points while the team rankings counted the team’s points. The rankings for both were calculated separately so there could be two firsts.

Nan Zhou made a simple calculation. In this way, the following situations might eventually appear regarding the game’s rankings:

A team won and one of the team members had the highest number of points in the single player ranking.

A team won while a player who didn’t form a team won at the same time.

A player won the single player rankings but this person belonged to another team that wasn’t the team with the highest points. 

There were three simple endings but due to people’s changeable hearts, there were bound to be countless changes and undercurrents.

Nan Zhou swiped a few times, saw the scores of the players on the two rankings and came to a conclusion. “The scores at the top aren’t much different.”

Jiang Fang added, “On the single player rankings, a large gap starts from 28th to 27th place. Meanwhile, it occurs at 8th place on the team list. The main reason should be the difference in the number of instances passed.”

Li Yinhang held the water and listened to their analysis eagerly. “Then… are we too far behind?” 

Nan Zhou simply answered, “Not much.”

Jiang Fang supplemented the information for Nan Zhou. “Since the game depends on the rankings to determine the outcome, it will definitely have a balance mechanism.”

Li Yinhang wondered, “For example…”

Jiang Fang had a good temper. “For example, if the game keeps bringing in new people then what will happen when the game is ultimately decided?” 

We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.

Li Yinhang thought about it and felt she understood a bit. In this game, if there was no balance while fresh blood was constantly injected, the people who came in later were destined to be cannon fodder. There was no possibility of overturning things. They might not have even played two instances before the game was decided. They would be competing in loneliness.

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Ol Tlctjcu tfjgv atlr. Rba bcis vlv rtf offi obgaecjaf obg atf qfbqif ktb frmjqfv atf vlrjrafg yea rtf kjrc’a gfmbcmlifv jybea tfg bkc yjv iemx. “Efjiis?”

Nan Zhou told her, “I’m guessing.” 

Li Yinhang, “……”

Nan Zhou added, “Not only will there be a limit to the number of people, there will also be a limit to the number and choice of instances.”

Li Yinhang had learned well. “Is this also a guess?”

Nan Zhou nodded. “Yes, it is a guess.” 

Li Yinhang, “……” Pretty.

Jiang Fang quickly got his meaning. “You are worried that we will eventually be forced to play a PVP knockout match? Or that the number of instances will actually be limited?”

Both of these were likely. It was because the setting of the game must be balanced. Only in this way could there be a minimum competition value. Otherwise, if the number of people was unlimited and the number of instances had no end then the game would never finish. It was inevitable that the early players would lose their advantage and the latecomers would take the lead.

Obviously, the players with points currently at the top had such worries. In case the number of instances was limited, it was naturally necessary to seize the time to grab the instances before the newcomers who weren’t thoroughly familiar with the game. This was why there was the phenomenon where the players at the top were biting at each other’s score and no one was left behind. 

Nan Zhou responded to Jiang Fang’s possibilities.

“I don’t know.” Nan Zhou’s speech was clear and cold. “Enter an instance and try it first to know the situation.”

Li Yinhang gulped. She finally understood why the three ‘ghost’ players were so eager to take risks to score points. It wasn’t just to earn the points for oxygen.

She listened while swiping her fingers. She was obviously invoking a function on the panel. Nan Zhou noticed her movements. “What are you looking at?” 

Before Li Yinhang had time to answer, she heard Jiang Fang answer for her. “She is looking for someone.”

Li Yinhang, “……” She seriously suspected that Jiang Fang had opened a perspective cheat to look at her. In principle, couldn’t everyone only see their own game panel?

The moment Jiang Fang met her gaze, he seemed to fully understand her mind and gently explained, “Out of all the functions on the panel, the only one that can be changed so quickly without much thought is the rankings.”

He asked, “Who are you looking for? A friend?” 

Li Yinhang, “……”

She might choose to be a leg pendant with no emotions but she still felt that the smiling Jiang Fang was more frightening than the cold-faced Nan Zhou.

Nan Zhou kindly reminded her, “The rankings are too long.”

There were at least tens of thousands of names on the rankings list. There was also no guarantee that there wouldn’t be any duplicate names. Li Yinhang’s fingertip hovered over the page and sighed, “I know.” 

As they talked, the cake and coffee were served. She quickly dispelled her sad thoughts and sat up straight. “Let’s form a team. Add each other as friends first…”

Jiang Fang gestured to her and motioned for her to wait first. Li Yinhang followed his gaze. Nan Zhou wasn’t talking or playing with his panel. He concentrated on cutting the small piece of cake into five or six cream squares of a similar size. Then he ate them one by one with a fork.

Nan Zhou ate evenly and carefully while staring at the not-so-sophisticated cream flower in the corner. He took the fork and moved it, cherishing it. He kept this cream flower until the end and ate it in one bite.

Li Yinhang discovered for the first time that Nan Zhou had a hobby very close to normal people. She even felt a type of surprise like she was discovering a new world. She tried to ask Nan Zhou, “Would you like to have another one?” 

Nan Zhou put down his fork, took a tissue to wipe the corners of his mouth and thought about it. “It is enough.”

Her short time getting along with Nan Zhou let Li Yinhang know that if he said no, he really wasn’t being polite to others. She suggested, “Then add each other as friends?”

Nan Zhou hooked his feet around his chair and shook his hands twice. He seemed to be in a bad mood. He asked Li Yinhang, “Do you have enough oxygen?”

“I only bought enough for one hour. I will buy it again when necessary.” Li Yinhang spoke firmly. “What if there is a special offer day?” 

Nan Zhou, “……”

Jiang Fang, “……”

In a way, Li Yinhang was also a talent.

Nan Zhou suggested, “I have two corpses in my backpack. Do you want one?” 

Li Yinhang, “……”

She tried to make a final struggle. “…Can you just give me oxygen and not the corpse?”

“I tried it.” Nan Zhou answered. “They might be corpses but we can’t access anything on them. Items and points aren’t possible. I also can’t check their rankings and status from when they were alive.”

He raised his hand and withdrew the dagger he had placed in the third item slot. Only the sharp weapon already taken out by Qin Yadong before death became his item. 

Jiang Fang gave a more understandable explanation. “We can only use their passive skills that haven’t been exhausted.”

Nan Zhou nodded in agreement. It was clearly written in the note in the ‘oxygen’ column: This is a cumulative use item. After entering the instance, the oxygen consumption will stop automatically. After returning to the rest point, the oxygen consumption will automatically start. To put it bluntly, these three corpses could only be used as oxygen cylinders.

Li Yinhang didn’t pretend to be hypocritical and accepted the corpse Nan Zhou handed over. Then she immediately set about forming a team with them. After Nan Zhou sent the friend request, Jiang Fang was the first to accept. Li Yinhang was one step slower. Nan Zhou noticed that Li Yinhang had entered another name in the ‘note’ option after her name column:

“Li Bank.” 

Nan Zhou thought of her move to search through the names on the rankings and didn’t ask much. Li Yinhang set it up like this to make her name stand out. In this way, she could feel a type of peace if her missing roommate was still somewhere alive in this game.

In order to ease some of the depression in her heart, Li Yinhang adjusted her mentality and deliberately spoke in a positive tone, “Then from now on, we are friends.”

“Not friends.” Nan Zhou corrected. “We are collaborators.”

Li Yinhang, “……” She was slightly punched in the face but she accepted it well. She had always been shameless. This was tempered by a ruthless life. 

In the beginning when the newbie Li Yinhang finished the customer service observation training, she picked up her first call with vigor, intending to make a good start for her career. “I am very happy to serve you.”

The other person opened his mouth and said, “You are happy too early.”

Li Yinhang, “……”

From then on, she knew that there were species in the world she couldn’t have imagined. 

Jiang Fang noticed Li Yinhang’s faint embarrassment so he changed the topic. “Let’s decide on a team name.”

Then he turned to Li Yinhang. “Miss Bank, I’ll leave it to you.”

Li Yinhang, “……”

She suddenly thought of the strange team names she encountered during her university debate competitions. 

“We Are an All Talk Team.”

“Fierce Dragon Crossing the River Team.”

“There Is An Electrical Network in the River Team.”

“Pull the Electrical Network Team.” 

“Right Right Right Right Team.”

“What’s Wrong With CP Team.”

“Dear Dear, This Side Suggests You Leave Team.”

Li Yinhang held a straw and found that Jiang Fang and Nan Zhou were both looking at her while waiting for the name. She felt that she was under a lot of pressure. 

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Li Bank: At a loss.jpg