Kingdom of Corrosion
Chapter 456 - 236 Hostility_2

Chapter 456: Chapter 236 Hostility_2

Maya was not good at acting, so she recited the lines she had thought of, "I’m fine, but I can’t speak for Lin Wu. However, as long as there’s loot, he seems tireless. And don’t hold a grudge against him, he’s just thinking about the mission."

Shadow shook his head, "What’s my status? How could I possibly haggle with some greenhorn? Here’s our new target: the cold storage plant. The cold storage plant covers an area of ten thousand square meters. I only have the basic layout, not sure about the NPC weapons and their locations. Armed personnel: 5-8."

Maya called out, "Lin Wu."

Lin Wu, holding a cup of latte, replied, "I’m here."

As Lin Wu approached the east side of the backyard where Maya was about to speak, the cup in his hand suddenly shattered, and Shadow next to him staggered back two steps, looking down at his chest to see blood gushing out nonstop.

Dashuang, on the eastern outpost, saw it clearly and cried out in horror, "Shadow, there’s a huge hole in your back."

As the words fell, Shadow fell back without a sound, becoming a corpse.

Maya had the quickest reaction. Full health Shadow being one-shot killed at an ally base definitely wasn’t something a player could do. It had to be an NPC seeking revenge. Recalling how the Alliance had listed the Meteorological Station as a hostile force, Maya spread her arms around Lin Wu to bring him down to the ground, yelling at the same time, "Shana, get down."

As Maya and Lin Wu fell to the ground, Maya received a system message: Subjected to invalid attack. After a quick understanding, Maya realized the message meant: A bullet had hit her. But since she was not a member of the hostile NPC base, the NPC wouldn’t inflict any damage on her.

Shana, whose combat awareness was far weaker, poked her head out from the tower and looked down, "Are you guys wrestling?"

"Get down," Maya urged urgently.

"Huh?" Shana instinctively turned sideways to look into the distance when a bullet flew past her from behind, hitting her shoulder. Dashuang watched, eyes wide, as Shana’s arm separated from her body. Somehow finding courage, she immediately pinned Shana down on top of her.

Maya called out, "Little Knife, Snow Egg, come here, protect Lin Wu to the plant, get Shana to the infirmary. We’re okay, it’s the Meteorological Station members who are in trouble."

Perplexed, everyone followed Maya’s orders, hustling to deliver Lin Wu and Shana to the designated places. Peanut climbed up the western outpost to join Dashuang in searching for the sniper’s position. But without Lin Wu and Shana showing themselves, the adversary sniper didn’t fire. Plus with no one hearing the shots, it indicated the sniper was at a considerable distance, invisible in the night.

Lin Wu only brought Silencer with him, which had a range of just over a hundred meters. Forest Wolf, being too heavy, spent most of the time lying in the Meteorological Station’s warehouse, which only base members could access. So even if they knew the sniper’s position, Lin Wu had no way to take out the sniper.

Could other players attack the Alliance NPC sniper? Unknown, as Maya had ordered everyone not to initiate attacks. After all, the Shadow base had many people; becoming enemies with the Alliance meant that even a casual assault could lead to many deaths. Perhaps this was the price to pay for earning Fortress honors. Today you kill me, tomorrow I kill you, what goes around comes around, fate is inevitable.

...

Outpost search, squad reconnaissance, drone patrols – an hour of efforts yielded no trace of the sniper. At that time, Lin Wu and Shana received a system message which roughly meant: as time passed, the Alliance and the Meteorological Station were no longer hostile.

Upon receiving the message, Lin Wu bravely stepped out and, sure enough, encountered no attacks. After Maya’s analysis, it appeared that members of the Meteorological Station had killed too many, including armed and ordinary NPCs, prompting the hostility from the Alliance. The solution, much like the old online games dealing with negative reputation, was to wait patiently and let infamy fade over time.

Complaining, Lin Wu said, "She’s the captain, so why is she fine, and I, just a hired hand, am being hunted down?"

Little White Rabbit replied, "The leader asked you to maintain order, but you killed someone in the process, so of course, it’s your legal responsibility that’s being pursued."

"Shadow did the killing." I didn’t kill that many, Lin Wu retorted.

Little White Rabbit explained, "Killing each NPC increases a corresponding hidden parameter, and once it reaches a threshold, organized NPCs will launch revenge. Revenge includes you personally and isn’t limited to members of your base; it depends on the NPCs’ judgment. Let me remind you, you’ve killed NPCs who issued missions, and you’ve killed NPC merchants. Just yesterday, you smoked out many NPCs."

"I was only responsible for setting the fire, the tires were sabotaged by Captain Maya," Lin Wu, wanting to win the case, decisively betrayed Maya.

"Tires themselves do not harm NPCs; it’s setting fire to the tires that does the harm. All NPC deaths within the shelter are directly related to you," Little White Rabbit pointed out.

Maya spoke up, "Lin Wu, ask it how the calculation is done?"

Lin Wu inquired, and Little White Rabbit replied, "The higher the parameters, the faster they drop; the lower the parameters, the slower the drop. The fewer people you kill, the higher the parameters you get from killing NPCs. The more people you kill, the lower the parameters you receive from killing NPCs. Players must discover other details on their own."

After relaying the information, Maya nodded and explained, "If you kill 100 people, you get 1000 parameter points, losing 10 points per second. But if you only kill 10 people, you get 200 parameter points, losing only 1 point per second."

Dashuang, puzzled, asked Shana beside him, "They’re acting so strange." First, Lin Wu is talking to the air, and now Maya is responding to Lin Wu’s soliloquy.

Shana said, "Lin Wu is filing a complaint."

Dashuang asked, "Is he complaining about the Alliance lacking martial virtue?"

Shana answered, "No, knowing him, he’s probably complaining about why the thugs are attacking him instead of attacking Maya."

Dashuang said, "Isn’t that, well, not great?"

"There’s nothing wrong with it. Don’t get me wrong, he’s a good person."

Dashuang seemed to understand, "Friend-zoned."

"What?"

"When a girl says a guy is a good person, it usually means the guy likes the girl, but the girl doesn’t like the guy."

Shana asked, "Where did you hear such theories?"

Dashuang shrugged, "It’s just how it is."

Shana patiently explained, "I mean Lin Wu is a very nice friend."

While they chatted idly, Little White Rabbit rolled out, and Stone instructed everyone to rest. He also told Lin Wu to take the next day off, first to wait for Nightmare to revive before making plans, and second, to shed some parameters. Privately, Stone discussed with Maya about letting Nightmare take over the nearby fire station and set up their base there. From then on, Nightmare would do all the killing.

Maya thought the cost was too high. If Nightmare died, the base would become useless, and the construction cost wouldn’t be retrieved. With 50 days left to the summer, they were only lacking 550 honor points, so they could afford to slow down the pace at which they attacked the Alliance Shelter.

...

The next morning at eight, Dawn broadcasted: "Regarding the queries from several players about the rule of unlimited ammunition at bases, a vote will take place. The voting period is 24 hours. If more than half of the players agree to cancel the unlimited ammunition rule, it will be abolished by the arrival of summer. In compensation, the base workshop will be able to produce ammo packs with cheap materials."

Dawn continued, "This change will not affect players who leave Hardcore Mode before the arrival of summer, but abolishing the unlimited ammo rule will significantly increase the difficulty of survival in Hardcore Mode. Therefore, we hope that our players, in a spirit of sacrifice, will not agree to abolish this rule. Thus, Hardcore Mode players will earn more points, and once they reach Earth, they’ll be allocated more resources."

When the broadcast ended, even Maya couldn’t help but curse Dawn. If it had been only the first part of the broadcast, the vast majority wouldn’t vote to cancel the unlimited ammo rule. But the second part changed the situation. It reminded all players that the Earth ’cake’ prepared was only so much, and those with more points would take a larger share, leaving less for those with fewer points.

Conclusion: Players who leave Hardcore Mode won’t earn any points. The longer Hardcore Mode players survive, the less cake non-Hardcore Mode players get.

According to market chat, 70% of Left County players had decided to leave Hardcore Mode before the summer, taking their earned points to Non-Hardcore Mode in order to thoroughly enjoy the game. The remaining 30% were half-hearted, without a comprehensive plan for their bases, and filled with uncertainty about the future.

Even after the abolition of unlimited ammunition, Dawn didn’t mention cancelling the siege rules, and that was absolutely bad news for Hardcore Mode players. From now on, they would have to produce ammo packs in the workshop and then convert them to various types of bullets. The amount of ammo spent in a single five-star siege was no small number. No matter how brave the players were, they still needed guns to face the Titans.

However, the Great Commander Stone had his own opinion: "This game has only just begun to get interesting."

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