CHAPTER 5: CHAPTER 3: CALM DOWN, I KNOW THIS ROUTINE

"All tests completed."

"Troublesome, we’ll have to start from scratch and act it out again."

Lin Qi watched as Fang Zhen slowly dissipated into ashes on the ground, and couldn’t help but sigh, being an NPC is really tough. Then he glanced at the time displayed on his wrist and added a few words under Fang Zhen’s section in his notebook.

Limit time: 2 hours 23 minutes 14 seconds.

Body perception: Poor.

Overall evaluation: Kindergarten prep class.

"Without protection, this is roughly their limit time resisting pollution. Looks like it’s necessary to purchase some protective equipment." Lin Qi thought about the already scarce Bits he had, and his head started to ache.

The wilderness risks are not only from monsters but also from numerous areas polluted by radiation. Generally, without the ability to resist radiation pollution for five to six hours, it’s tough to survive in the wild.

Besides, those with keen body perception can survive long in the wild.

Such people, upon entering polluted areas, can quickly distance themselves and won’t be killed by prolonged exposure.

But players like Fang Zhen are clearly not in this category.

Previously, he borrowed a total of thirty thousand Bits from the Gorilla Gang. After buying weapons, paying back Luo Qi, and covering the Martial Arts Hall’s generator costs, there went 18,500 Bits.

Adding in the food and water to restore his body over these days, that cost another 495 Bits.

Moreover, the hospital costs 2,500 Bits monthly, amounting to 21,495 Bits.

Getting players to farm requires managing their daily food and drink, with a minimum daily consumption per player of one box of high-protein cookies and one bottle of water, costing about 3 Bits per person per day, which isn’t much.

With the money he has now, he could not only support ten players, but even twenty or thirty, with no problem even if they just stared at him dealing with those Gorillas.

But cultivating Blood Essence Rice is another matter.

Normally, planting one stalk of Blood Essence Rice requires an energy land area of 4 square meters. One stalk yields 10 grams of Blood Essence Rice.

To produce one pound of Blood Essence Rice, 200 square meters of energy land is needed.

To earn thirty thousand Bits a month, at least thirty thousand square meters must be cultivated in the wild. If divided into three crops, it would require ten thousand square meters each time, not subtracting the seed cost and water fee.

Energy lands in relatively safe areas of the wild are already scarce, and those near the city are mostly controlled by Chasing Light City’s major gangs, leaving only a few scattered bits that unknown numbers of black-market vagabonds fight over, making finding hidden energy land very difficult.

Places near the city are either very small or scattered, making cultivation easy to detect and hard to manage.

And far from the city, monsters are active, making trips risky, a single robbery would leave one without a place to cry.

Now adding the cost of more protective equipment, farming for profit puts players at even greater risk. If players die outdoors, the protective equipment is lost, yet without it, outdoor activities are challenging, a classic catch-22.

"Good grief! A set of used outdoor protective gear costs 3,000 Bits?" Lin Qi glanced at his watch displaying the item’s price and almost without hesitation, turned off his watch, feeling his eyes injured. Then he flipped through his notebook, "Looks like I’ll have to go with Plan B; though the death rate will be higher, at least it’s safe."

Black Obsidian Martial Arts Hall was originally the city center of Chasing Light City, but due to beast tides and various radiation pollution, it became the Abandoned Area.

Although most of the Abandoned Area is polluted, as the former city center, there are many underground energy ore veins even if they’ve long been depleted, the energy contained beneath is still abundant.

If one is willing to spend time and manpower to develop underground farming, despite many areas being unusable due to pollution, the profitable areas yield considerable returns.

At least personally, he sees its value, though less than outdoor cultivation, and slower.

"Next is the reward for motivating those players."

Thinking about this, Lin Qi couldn’t help but pat his pockets. As a founder of a game technology company, Lin Qi knows players’ minds well. Getting players to work for free is impossible, but offering decent rewards...

The whole world has nothing crazier or more diligent than players.

However, after searching for quite a while, he found nothing decent, especially being a Martial Arts Hall owner, he couldn’t be too stingy.

Just as Lin Qi was preparing to open his watch to look for second-hand items, his peripheral vision caught sight of elementary school textbooks scattered on the corridor floor.

Fitness Breathing Technique!

"Perfect! This is it!" Lin Qi directly strode over, picked up the half-used Fitness Breathing Technique, and nodded in satisfaction. "Luckily, players arriving in this world can’t understand the language. I just need to copy it and change the name to Shocking God Breathing Technique. If they can’t practice it well, it’s their talent’s problem."

...

In Fang Zhen’s live broadcast room, Fang Zhen stared at the Descent of High Martial icon displayed in the virtual pod, unable to snap back to reality for a long time.