This Game Is Too Real
Chapter 538: Countless Possibilities in the Future

Chapter 538: Chapter 538: Countless Possibilities in the Future

When Spielberg came to his senses, he found himself standing in a desolate corridor.

That X-16 had somehow used some method to evade everyone’s attention, leading him out of the prison and even taking the murderer’s corpse with them... and yet had not attracted the notice of a single person along the way.

After they left the prison, they entered an underground passage and walked a very long distance, then took an elevator, and arrived here.

Not far behind him was the elevator door, and the concrete floor beneath his feet didn’t have a single crack, while deep gray walls extended to his left and right, with warm-toned wall lamps inlaid in them.

The industrial design conveyed a solemn, minimalist yet elegant style, much like a palace corridor that fused with modernist aesthetics.

He had never been to this place before.

The X-16 who had been by his side had now disappeared, he didn’t know if it had "invisibly" hidden itself again or had completely left the place.

Feeling out of his depth, Spielberg swallowed and mumbled nervously under his breath,

"What the hell is this place..."

He hadn’t expected an answer, but a pleasant voice came from behind him.

"Inner City."

The sudden voice startled Spielberg, and turning around, he saw a stranger standing behind him, smiling at him.

"Inner, Inner City?!"

"Yes," the man nodded and continued with a smile, "And it’s the very heart of the Inner City, the Stone Building that is surrounded by countless skyscrapers."

"...Who are you?"

Spielberg looked at the man before him.

He wanted to know which dignitary had come to his rescue.

If it hadn’t been for that expert who could turn invisible entering his room in advance, he would undoubtedly be a corpse by now.

The man didn’t beat around the bush and answered in a light and cheerful tone,

"Yibers."

"Yibers..."

It was a familiar name.

Spielberg frowned and thought for a long time, his eyes suddenly widened almost bulging out, and his facial expressions changed along with it.

"Huge Rock Military Industry?! Are you that—"

"That’s right, the Chairman and President of Huge Rock Military Industry." Enjoying the expression on his face, Yibers replied with a smile.

Yibers!

The boss of Huge Rock Military Industry!

Giant Stone City’s undisputed second-in-command!

Spielberg’s heart shook tremendously; he swallowed unconsciously.

He could not fathom why such a prominent figure would take an interest in him.

How many was it now?

"Is it... you who wanted to see me?"

However, Yibers’s answer was beyond his expectations.

"My curiosity about you ended after the first time I saw you, the one who wants to meet you is another true personage."

Saying this, he walked forward, brushing past Spielberg.

"Come with me."

Looking back at Yibers’s retreating figure, Spielberg’s mind was as tangled as a ball of yarn.

It felt like riding on a train heading into the fog; even though the destination was near, the scenery outside was becoming increasingly incomprehensible.

What pained him more was that he had many questions but didn’t know where to start or even why he was standing there.

To unravel the puzzles in his heart, he swallowed and took a step forward to follow.

The two proceeded and quickly came to a wide door.

The door opened by itself.

Yibers led him inside.

Moving cautiously, Spielberg took a glance around.

The room was very clean, the mirror-like floor was free of dust, and there were no decorative items or furniture; it was as desolate as the solitary cell of a prison.

Except this place was spacious, incredibly so, far beyond the tiny, cramped single room.

The only light in the room came from a beam of milky white light pouring from the direct center of the ceiling. Apart from that, there were no other light sources.

Darkness surrounded him, like an abyss with no bottom in sight, also obscuring the boundaries of the room.

"...Where is this?"

Yibers didn’t answer. With a slight flick of his right hand, like a magician, he pulled out a remote controller from thin air, holding it gently before pressing a button.

The light in the center of the room instantly went out, and Spielberg felt as if he had plunged into darkness.

However, the darkness did not last for long.

The "walls" around him gradually lit up with a faint light and began to display clearer and clearer images, with more and more colors replacing the original black and white room.

It was only then that Spielberg realized that this was a "panoramic projection room"!

Similar things seemed to exist in the outer city where one could watch movies from the pre-war era, but tickets were usually shockingly expensive and beyond the reach of ordinary people.

This projection room seemed to outdo the one in the outer city; after all, he had heard that the one outside had only one curved screen.

But here.

From the walls to the floor, to the space overhead, even the surrounding air—every inch was filled with increasingly bright particles of light as if they had been transported to another time and space.

Buildings and streets started to emerge.

Then, the view widened outward, revealing the contours of the Giant Wall.

The surging crowds also gradually appeared on the streets, becoming more and more distinct, and the deafening shouts grew louder.

It dawned on Spielberg that what was being projected here was the outer city of Giant Stone City—the main thoroughfare leading from the Giant Wall Gate to the Inner City!

Shadows of fabricated people walked towards him.

Shoulder to shoulder, arms linked, they formed an endless stream. They were righteously indignant, filled with rage, shouting something in unison, marching forward with a disorganized but resolute step towards the soldiers in exoskeletons, power armor, waiting in solid formation.

It was as if they couldn’t see him.

Their gazes passed through him, piercing through his chest like a sharp dagger, pointing directly at the Inner City behind him.

Spielberg swallowed hard, and a ripple of terror suddenly surfaced within his bewildered pupils.

Of course, it wasn’t because of that simple rage. He had always stood with them, of course, knowing that their anger didn’t contain the slightest bit aimed at him.

Only a true coward would be afraid of the fury of ordinary people.

What truly terrified Spielberg was that in the midst of that teeming crowd, he saw himself lying on a clean white cloth—although the face was blurred with blood, there was no doubt it was his own corpse!

I...

Am I dead?

Spielberg numbly touched his own face, trying to find some bit of reality in this illusory world.

The wave-like clamor became clearer.

Faces of people grew closer.

He saw familiar faces, remembered their names, although he couldn’t name most of them, if he just called out ’comrade,’ they would respond.

Now, they were roaring.

"Fire!"

"Cowards!"

"Look into our eyes!"

His gaze shifted from the surreal yet vivid images, and Spielberg looked at Yibers in horror.

"...You fabricated my death?"

No wonder they didn’t let me say goodbye to my comrades!

These people faked my own death!

But why?

Yibers suddenly burst into laughter.

"Ha, ha, ha, why would I do such a thing? And when you say ’you guys,’ who exactly are you referring to? The one you met for the first time? Or someone you have never seen? Or maybe... some stranger with a Black Card?"

Spielberg’s face was a picture of confusion.

The laughter subsiding, Yibers gently said,

"You didn’t really see what happened, it’s just one of many ’possibilities’ a computer extrapolated... Of course, it was about to happen, maybe just one second away."

"I shall call it, ’Ending A’ for now."

Spielberg looked blankly at Yibers.

From the beginning, he couldn’t grasp what this guy was talking about.

"What do you mean?"

Unsurprised by his perplexity, Yibers continued casually,

"Aren’t you a storyteller? Then use that talent of yours. If I hadn’t intervened, and X-16 hadn’t entered your room ahead of time, you would have died in a horrible struggle with an assassin in prison—that’s entirely possible, after all, the assassin both wants you dead and not to die too quickly. It’s a pity those idiots all happened to find such a twisted individual."

"Then, seeing your twisted corpse, the angry workers seize the prison, lift you high, and all the settlement workers become comrades... In fact, you’ve already taken a lot of territory, like the prison. The prison warden won’t resist you at all; he might even silently stand with you."

Spielberg’s Adam’s apple bobbed.

"And then?"

He wanted to know what happened afterward.

"Next, as has happened countless times before," Yibers tilted his chin up nonchalantly and pressed the play button.

The image in the room continued to move.

After the crowd crossed the police line, a leader of the militia ordered gunfire. The bravest fell first, while those behind began to flee, the hesitant trapped between the dead and the cowards, and the innocent also started to fall.

The crowd suffered countless casualties, and the streets ran red with blood. Children crying over their parents’ bodies were taken away by young comrades. The cowards were indeed scared; they would rather kill one by mistake than let one go. After all, the seeds of hatred are invisible; once the gun sounds, they don’t stop.

The nobles soon declared the Workers’ Association illegal. The gates between the outer and inner city slammed down, and a large number of mercenaries were mobilized—or rather bought—to form a hunting party entering the industrial zone to catch members of the Workers’ Association. But the word ’worker’ isn’t written on the face, which makes them even harder to identify than the man-eating Looters, thus many tragedies ensued.

Some people who weren’t paid also joined the hunt voluntarily, using vigilante justice to take revenge on old enemies, or simply taking legal opportunity to rob finances, or just venting the desire suppressed by order. Everything not allowed on ordinary days, at this moment, was tacitly allowed by the nobles, because compared to a few rabid dogs, they were more afraid of ghosts they could neither see nor touch.

The first to die were ironically the lucky ones; they died bravely and gloriously. The fleeing cowards would regret not choosing a quick death.

By that point, to be alive was the real hell...

When everything ended, the outer city gates opened again, new survivors poured in to take the place of the outer city residents. The blood-stained streets had long been washed clean, and the inner city gates also reopened as circumstances dictated. No Waste Land Wanderer would care about the past of a settlement just as they rarely considered the future.

After two or three decades of stillness, everything would return to the starting point, as if nothing ever happened.

After all, most people on the Wasteland lived only about two or three decades, only the nobles might live a bit longer, but usually not much.

Having seen the continuation of Ending A, Spielberg’s lips trembled.

He couldn’t accept that this was their ending.

What he found even harder to accept was that such events had already repeated countless times.

No one had ever told him it would be like this!

He had to stop them!

There must be a better way...

"...You’re lucky because of my intervention, your comrades only suspect you’re dead. Although the amount of blood loss was certainly lethal, they didn’t see your body."

"The prison warden tried to persuade them to calm down, the murderer who listened to your stories roared about fighting the noble lords to the death, but your comrades didn’t trust either of them, after all, they have their own stances. Now, your fellows are still arguing about whether to press the button to destroy everything, to smash this broken mess completely."

Yibers admired the changing expressions on his face, and suddenly spoke,

"Is there a possibility that the assassin was actually sent by the Manager of the Alliance?"

"Absolutely impossible!" Spielberg replied without hesitation, his eyes fiercely determined, like a blazing torch.

Without contesting his judgment, Yibers continued methodically,

"Hmm, in our prediction, that probability isn’t zero; he only needs to pay a small price to get rid of the ’nuisance’ of Giant Stone City, right? Actually, I’m also curious why this possibility exists."

"According to my observation, that man isn’t averse to playing tricks, but he’s not good at that. His strengths are actually forthright strategy and duels. Theoretically, such a character wouldn’t stoop to assassination; there must be something we don’t understand that’s interfering with our ’probability.’"

Spielberg stared at him, asserting seriously,

"Machines aren’t omnipotent, maybe that machine of yours calculating probabilities is broken."

Assembly lines occasionally jam.

Even without tampering, machines will break down on their own from time to time.

Yibers suddenly let out a laugh.

"You’re right, of course, that possibility exists. And there’s also another possibility: the person in question isn’t Chu Guang, but someone else. After all, Giant Stone City isn’t the only survivor settlement on the Wasteland. Not to brag, but there are plenty eyeing the treasures we hold."

Armies, enterprises, academies... even Grand Canyon itself.

All the former members of the Post-War Reconstruction Committee kept an ancient oath, not because they had high moral standards, but because something endorsed that oath, turning it into a real contract.

Of course, after so many years, it was hard to say how much deterrent power that thing still had. Maybe the former rulers simply couldn’t be bothered with those roaches scratching a living out of the Wasteland. Deep down, they didn’t believe that this order, salvaged from the dustbin of history, could accomplish anything great...but that was another matter.

...

"We have deduced thousands of possibilities, not only the Ending A you’ve seen, but also this... let’s just call it Ending B," Yibers pressed the remote, and the scene changed, placing them at the doorway of a bar.

It seemed time had rolled back to the beginning of the month when Spielberg had just been arrested.

Watching Alec and Kent approach with the guards towards the crowd at the entrance of the bar, hostilities erupted nearly the moment they made contact.

They were like a keg of gunpowder, each person was

Two hundred people ferociously lunged at a mere dozen or so guards.

Kent was killed on the spot, Alec didn’t say a word and ran away, Phyllis fired a shot...and Spielberg himself seemed to have become the unlucky one again, his head blossoming with a bullet.

However, this time the casualties were contained within a limited range.

The sound of gunfire from the bar barely carried a few streets away. The workers knew a few brave young men had died that day, felt sorrow for their deaths, and even Wei Jia shed a few crocodile tears, but that was it.

People died in this city every day. Their deaths were no different from anyone else’s, and later, Mr. Hauser said on the radio that they were rioters, that they had killed a loyal young man named Kent, and slowly, some people began to think so too.

Giant Stone City successfully weathered the superficial crisis; the Looter would eat people to survive the winter, and it too, consumed some people, but with the utensils of the civilized. The death notifications were delayed, but the bombs were not defused; instead, they were buried deeper and in greater numbers.

The next crisis was uncertain to come, but it would surely be fiercer than this time, and it was bound to happen.

The reckoning would eventually arrive.

"This time... is there any difference?" Spielberg swallowed.

He couldn’t say whether this was a "good ending."

He died.

The first to unite, the Workers’ Association, sacrificed themselves.

But because of their deaths, the vast majority in the city survived...at least those innocent didn’t have to die.

The settlement wasn’t just home to those Mouse People doing cheap work; the bustling streets were also filled with many well-dressed gentlemen and ladies as delicate as water. Most of them neither had a Black Card nor oppressed anyone, and had even suffered life’s grievances, merely living an ordinary life on a less twisted settlement on the Wasteland.

Spielberg didn’t love those innocent people; after all, they had never loved him. He was willing to die for the Manager because he thought it wasn’t so bad, but those flashy types weren’t worth it.

But if he had to kill them, he couldn’t do it either. Because humans aren’t such rational animals; those who are always clear-headed are actually the minority.

"You might not believe it, but this branch known as Ending B, and the ’almost reality of Ending A’ that you just witnessed, have only a slight divergence."

"...What divergence?"

"Your spur-of-the-moment cleverness, it just so happened to save yourself as well."

Looking confused, Spielberg watched as Yibers smiled slightly and continued with the tone of a minstrel.

"A drunken Awakener Bol unbuckled his belt but didn’t humiliate Stephen and his family. Instead, he broke his own Black Card, turned around and united those who had been bullied by Stephen. In the ’probability’ corresponding to Ending B, you wrote a completely different story. You didn’t mention the Workers’ Association, but instead described in detail how Stephen’s wife and daughter fell into the abyss of ’happiness’ and how Stephen was anguished and desperate... Awakening gave Bol not only the power of revenge but also the adoration of the girls."

"Your fellow workers actually prefer stories like that," Yibers added.

Spielberg blushed; he had indeed conceived such a story.

After all, it was about to snow at the time, Lord Weijia fobbed them off with IOUs, and he was humiliated by Kent on the way home.

He was a coward, but cowards are not emotionless; he had been aggrieved and needed to vent his emotions.

But he hadn’t expected that the Ending A, where tens of thousands died, and the Ending B, where only a few dozen perished, were separated by just a few old newspapers.

"That’s it?!"

"Yes, that’s all. And... you actually wrote a bit like that, didn’t you? You just stopped writing in the end. Our calculations aren’t made up out of thin air; they need samples for deduction."

Seeing Spielberg’s flushed and stunned face, Yibers smiled and recited softly, as if reading a poem,

"...’Bol is an Awakener; he has the strength to do it, of course, no one can stop him’."

As Spielberg listened to someone else reciting what he had written, his ears reddened; it felt of course different from reading it himself.

He coughed violently to interrupt Yibers’s repetition.

"Enough! I get it! Don’t read anymore!"

Yibers smiled without malice and teased him further.

"It’s a pity my machine can’t calculate exactly how you would write, it just gave an abstract description... I’m actually quite curious about that untold story, why don’t you write it down when you have the chance?"

Still blushing, Spielberg said.

"Enough," he couldn’t believe his own words, "it’s just a lousy novel after all... I don’t think it has that much influence."

Seeing the disbelief in his eyes, Yibers whispered,

"Indeed, just a lousy novel, quite magical, isn’t it? Even though it’s just the story of ’Awakener Bol’, for the laborers seeing a ’book’ for the first time, his words and deeds almost became the guiding ideology of their actions."

"After all, most of their heads are like blank sheets of paper. They immediately believe whatever Haus tells them, and as soon as they find out Haus was lying, they immediately stop believing him. The simple notions of good and evil, right and wrong, are what most people think about every day, similar to a single-core CPU... Ah, you might not realize it, but you’ve done something remarkable, or rather evil. Even though it wasn’t solely your ’achievement’, posterity should give you a relatively objective assessment."

"Enough, I don’t care about that. Why do you want to show me these things... Neither outcome A nor B has actually happened, right?" Spielberg stared at the man in front of him, who seemed as mad as a hatter, and said nervously, "You were supposed to take me to meet someone, weren’t you? Hurry up and bring him here. After I meet him, I want to go back to my friends; they must be worried sick."

He began to fear the man before him.

Was this person really human?

Or was he like one of those X-16s, just something that resembled a human? How else could he still smile at such a crucial moment?

Spielberg didn’t know what "Uncanny Valley Effect" meant, but he could feel that genuine sense of discomfort growing stronger.

Yibers looked at the tense Spielberg with a smile and cheerfully said,

"Hmm, of course, that important figure is about to arrive. But he’s always late; the habit has stuck with him for quite some time, so don’t expect him to be punctual all of a sudden."

He paused, then continued,

"As for why I brought you here, that was his wish too. You might not comprehend that feeling... anyway, after watching so many repeats of the same movie, he’s almost fed up."

But this time was different from the past.

According to calculations, after entering the "Outcome A", the gates of the Outer City would close and never open again.

Just as the human body’s self-repair abilities have a limit, so does Giant Stone City’s self-repair threshold.

Once it exceeds that threshold, the settlement will enter a downward spiral. Usually, this doesn’t happen spontaneously but is caused by an unconventional external force.

In theory, that important person should not have interfered, as Giant Stone City has its historical mission, and completing it is a matter of honor.

All things go from life to death, and then from death to life; that’s the natural order. The fate of rising and falling is inescapable; where there’s a Prosperity Epoch, there’s bound to be a Wasteland Era.

It’s just a matter of time.

However, that important person was still too "compassionate," so he paused everything a second before the powder keg was set to explode.

They really lucked out with this one.

Yibers’s mouth curled into a smile.

Suddenly he remembered something and added,

"... Ah, anyway, the game is over, you lost. I’ve got an important meeting to attend, I can’t stay here with you."

After glancing at his watch, Yibers casually tossed the remote control to Spielberg, who awkwardly caught it, and Yibers smiled faintly,

"Have fun with it before he arrives; you can watch as much as you want. Maybe you’ll find the ending you’ve dreamt of hidden within?"

"Although in those endings, you and your friends are not the protagonists."

This projection room housed the countless "future possibilities" corresponding to different choices, calculated by computers,

As well as the various events that had occurred here over the past years...

These were all precious "materials."

Seeing the stunned Spielberg, Yibers teasingly asked,

"... By the way, do I count as a laborer too, a guy who worked unpaid for half a century and never received a penny?"

Spielberg was dumbfounded.

This was beyond his comprehension.

None of the people he knew had ever been such a unique case, let alone someone who could live for a century and a half, so he did not know how to respond.

Wait...

A century and a half?!

Spielberg stared at the man before him in astonishment, as if realizing something.

But Yibers did not give him time to think, seeming to assume he would not know the answer. He simply laughed heartily and disappeared from the room...

...

City of Dawn.

In the Manager’s Office of the Alliance Building, Cheng Yan reported to Chu Guang with a grave expression the disturbances occurring in Giant Stone City.

This disturbance was clearly a follow-up to the arrest half a month ago.

As Chu Guang had predicted.

Once a fuse was connected to the powder keg, there’d always be someone itching to light it, whether intentionally or not.

"That day, Spielberg returned to his cell as usual, and then there were sounds of a scuffle from inside. The Workers’ Association and the jailer rushed over, but they only found a pool of blood in the room, so much blood... Our embassy staff enlisted your residents to obtain the photos."

Chu Guang stared at the photos on the VM screen, his brows tightly furrowed, and suddenly raised his head to ask,

"No body?"

"It’s not just that there’s no body... Giant Stone City doesn’t even acknowledge his death. Instead, they claim he escaped from prison, and then changed their statement to say he was transferred. They have bigger troubles and no time to deal with this ’minor’ issue, even though it continues to ferment," Cheng Yan continued with a sigh, "After hearing about Spielberg’s plight, now over ninety percent of the workers in Giant Stone City have joined the Workers’ Association. They want to march to the Inner City to get an explanation."

Chu Guang frowned and asked,

"What are their demands?"

Cheng Yan continued,

"If Spielberg is dead, they want to see his body. If he’s still alive, the Inner City must hand him over."

A very simplistic demand.

And not at all unreasonable.

However, the nobles of the Inner City are now frantically busy with another matter, so it’s only natural they can’t hear these simple wishes.

"So, is he dead or not?"

"I’m inclined to believe he’s dead... after all, given the amount of blood loss, I don’t believe he could still be alive either," Cheng Yan cautiously expressed his judgment.

In his view, the nobles of the Inner City were indeed not smart, even a diplomat as inexperienced in these matters as himself knew to handle things more cleanly.

If they had simply made someone disappear without a trace, there might not have been such a great reaction. However, they insisted on doing something contradictory.

They didn’t want to leave a corpse, yet they made a bloody spectacle, and then regretted not having done this or that. Ultimately, their arrogance harmed everyone.

Of course, what the final outcome would be wasn’t for him, an outsider, to say, and what he saw might not be the whole picture.

The Alliance couldn’t decide how far things would develop.

Only Spielberg’s friends, those members of the Workers’ Association, had the power to decide what they would do next.

Chu Guang closed his eyes and pondered for a while.

He actually wanted that newspaperman to survive, otherwise, he wouldn’t have invited him to visit the Alliance. The story of Awakener Bol was born in Giant Stone City, but it belonged not just to this small settlement – many other survivors on the Wasteland, insignificant yet important, needed encouragement.

But one thing at a time; this was ultimately Giant Stone City’s own affair.

Suddenly, Chu Guang opened his eyes.

"I’ve actually been puzzled by something."

Cheng Yan asked, "What is it?"

"The lord of Giant Stone City," Chu Guang thought for a moment, "I initially thought he simply didn’t care about us, but it turns out he cares even less than that."

Cheng Yan frowned, trying to understand the Manager’s statement.

Suddenly, something occurred to him, and his eyes widened.

"Do you think there’s a possibility... that this matter is actually related to the City Lord?!"

There are many nobles in Giant Stone City, but only one City Lord. When referring to him, even the most arrogant noble would show some respect.

Theoretically, this settlement was run by an "omnipotent" individual.

"I don’t know," Chu Guang shook his head, "I’m just as puzzled as you are... Truth be told, so far, our plan has not only gone smoothly, it’s gone too smoothly, to the point where I’ve thought about slamming on the brakes several times."

Cheng Yan said in a low voice,

"Then... what do you think we should do now?"

Chu Guang thought for a moment and then said,

"I feel like something big is going to happen. Let’s get the embassy staff out first. Just take the Sleep Cabin and essential documents. I’ll arrange for personnel from the Home of the Refugees and some of the residents from the shelter to meet them at the Giant Wall Gate."

Giant Stone City is a good "Novice Village"; those diplomats are valuable talents trained through experience. They shouldn’t be lost for nothing.

Once a life is lost, the situation escalates further, and then it becomes even more difficult to reconcile.

Cheng Yan nodded, saying solemnly,

"I’ll get on it right away!"

Watching Cheng Yan leave, Chu Guang was about to call Luka and tell him the pre-emptive arrangements they’d made before could now be set in motion.

However, just then, the door that Minister Cheng had just closed suddenly echoed with knocks. The one entering was Old Charlie, the president of the Merchant Guild.

Seeing his solemn expression, Chu Guang didn’t waste words and went straight to the point, asking,

"What’s the matter?"

"Melvin, the president of the Giant Stone City Bank, would like to meet with you," Old Charlie reported truthfully.

Melvin?

Chu Guang wasn’t surprised that this guy wanted to meet with him.

He guessed that the Giant Stone City Bank was probably about to collapse too, and after thinking it over, the only solution left was to seek him out.

Chu Guang suddenly became curious about how Mr. Melvin planned to explain the recent bank run incidents in Giant Stone City and the issue with the city hall intercepting exported goods.

"When does he want to meet?"

Old Charlie said respectfully,

"He is already downstairs!"

...

At the Giant Rock City gate, where in the winters of previous years it would be deserted and piled high with snow, this year’s winter was unusually lively, like a festival.

From the entrance of the Hotel Wind From Afar to the Giant Wall Gate checkpoint, the path was nearly blocked by crowded stalls.

Merchants leading double-headed cows bustled back and forth, with mercenaries and travelers in strange garments mixed among them. These Wasteland Wanderers, like hyenas roaming the ruins, all sniffed the rotting stench in the air, eagerly crowding around for a share...

"...I can understand why grain, sausage, and jerky are in demand, but why is soap also so sought after?" Night Ten muttered softly as he passed by a stall and saw the big words on a sign.

Barter only for grain, sausage, jerky, soap.

Cash only for silver coins, Cr, and dinar.

Some stalls went even further, sticking chips onto a board with a red cross, indicating they would not accept that rubbish.

This wasn’t inside Giant Stone City, and most merchants here weren’t locals, so naturally nobody was going to fuss over how they operated.

Wild Wind glanced at the stall next to them and casually said,

"It has a long shelf life, is small and easy to carry, has steady demand, can address hygiene needs, and can clean anything. In times of scarce consumer goods, cheap and practical soap will be more popular than specialized products like shampoo and body wash, and also easier to price. After all... in the most extreme of situations, fragrance, brand value, and user experience won’t sell at a premium."

Night Ten scratched his head,

"That makes some sense."

If people don’t bathe for a long time, they’ll smell worse than livestock, and it’s not just about hygiene and sanity; on the Wasteland, exposing your scent is a dangerous thing.

Experienced hunters can track prey by scent, and some savvy merchants can also dodge danger by smelling the stench of corpses on looters.

"Wow, Uncle Wild Wind knows a lot!"

Jiujiu nodded energetically, her expression one of having learned something new, and Night Ten, hearing this, couldn’t help but burst out laughing.

"Hahaha! Uncle Wild Wind!"

Wild Wind shot a mortified glance at the siblings and shut his mouth. Old White, walking beside him, saw this and laughed, patting his shoulder,

"Don’t worry, brother. Let these youngsters have their fun for now. Give it a decade or two, and we’ll all be old farts."

Realizing she had misspoken, Jiujiu’s eyes darted around as she cheekily said,

"No worries! We don’t mix talk from inside and outside the game, and game characters don’t change, so in ten years you guys will definitely still be handsome young brothers!"

Old White was amused by her comment and laughed,

"Hahaha, if only our Night Ten had your emotional intelligence! Oh wait, I almost forgot, you two are family."

The easygoing Night Ten, who was just laughing a second ago, suddenly wasn’t having it.

"Damn it, since when do I lack emotional intelligence!"

Wild Wind coughed,

"Let’s just say you have it."

Night Ten: "Damn it! What do you mean ’let’s just say’?"

Old White: "Hahaha!"

The group continued towards the gates of Giant Stone City, joking and noisy, not resembling people who had come from the Wasteland.

But this time was different.

Since they were joined by Jiujiu, who had come to join in on the fun, the banter between the three guys was somewhat restrained, and out of embarrassment they avoided referring to each other as father and son, keeping their topics genteel and amiable.

These days, the dog managers of Bull Horse Group have been spending most of their time in Giant Stone City.

Fang Chang somehow got his hands on a huge pile of chips and, with the "great swindler" Fred’s cooperation, has bought up several factories that supply to Huge Rock Military Industry in a row.

Bull Horse Group was not just digging for equipment but was taking both people and equipment together.

Especially for some technologically skilled engineers and veteran workers, they didn’t just give a settlement fee to an individual but also helped the whole family get settled.

The generous terms not only moved those whose corners were being dug out but even the bosses who swung the pickaxes for them were envious.

And so far, all that Bull Horse Group has put out is just some increasingly worthless chips and a small amount of silver coins, that’s all.

Yes.

Although chips are getting less and less valuable, they are still the official money, and you still have to use chips to buy things in Giant Stone City.

Transactions for some bulk commodities and production materials are still accounted for with chips, and their prices have hardly risen.

You can even sniff out "discounts."

This is one of the typical symptoms of an overheated economic stage: although the prices of commodities continue to rise, the production materials for producing those commodities have entered a stagnation cycle ahead of time.

The cunning merchants of Giant Stone City are often very generous, willing to offer discounts, even drastic ones, for the quality assets in their hands, but as an exchange, they would often hint to the buyer, asking for an extra "tip" in Cr or silver coins.

For those stingy misers who only offer chips, nobody in Giant Stone City’s circle of cunning merchants would pay them any mind.

After all, nobody is a fool.

What real money looks like, the wise can still recognize it.

Compared to those Waste Land Wanderers who play dumb and try to score a bargain, the buyers from the Alliance show much generosity in handling these matters.

Therefore, the people the cunning merchants of Giant Stone City like most are the visitors from the Alliance.

Having finally squeezed through to the gate of Giant Stone City, Old White took out his chips, ready to pay the entrance tax, but was pushed back by a militiaman standing at the gate.

Old White frowned slightly and asked the man.

"What do you mean?"

The man said expressionlessly,

"There’s trouble in the city, we’re not letting anyone in today. I won’t stop you if you want to enter, but I don’t know when you’ll be able to leave."

He paused, then hinted ominously,

"If something happens inside, don’t blame us for not warning you."

Night Ten’s eyebrows raised.

What a joke.

Were they the kind of people who were afraid of trouble?

However, just as he was about to step in, Old White and Wild Wind pulled him back and even dragged him about ten meters away.

"Damn! Are you chickening out?!"

Looking at Night Ten with widened eyes, Wild Wind said calmly,

"Calm down... If my guess is correct, something big must have happened inside Giant Stone City."

Old White also nodded seriously.

"Yeah, Fang Chang mentioned this in the group chat before, the worst scenario might have occurred... We definitely have to go in, but at least we should find out what happened first."

Wild Wind asked, "Go to the official Forum to ask?"

Old White glanced around.

"Let’s split up, ask the nearby NPCs... Maybe there’s some news that other players haven’t dug up yet."

Seeing the two exchanging information, Night Ten was stunned for a moment.

"Wait a minute, what did that damn Fang Chang say again, how come I don’t know?"

Wild Wind rolled his eyes.

"Go through the chat history in the small group yourself!"

Jiujiu, who was standing beside her elder brother, didn’t speak, obediently standing to the side and listening quietly, her eyes, however, sparkled with excitement.

Well, well!

Looks like something big is about to go down!

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