Why the bug I wrote became a core gameplay mechanic?!
Chapter 481 - 464: Two New Endings

Chapter 481: Chapter 464: Two New Endings

"It was indeed a good ending, but it wasn’t completely satisfying.

The key issue was that it differed from the ending Zhuge Jun had originally anticipated!

At this moment, the game’s ending cutscene was shown: the rescue team arrived at Charlton City, they entered the Claridge Hotel, and saved the survivors there.

In another ending, player-controlled ambitious puppet craftsman Jim went mad, and the rescuers had no choice but to restrain him in a special jacket and take him away for treatment.

The other survivors all seemed normal, except a young girl whom the protagonist had once healed came to the cathedral to pray to the statues, as if still hoping the protagonist would return safely.

The rescue team also thoroughly searched the entire cathedral, but unfortunately, they found nothing, coming up empty-handed.

Thus, with the tolling of the cathedral bells, the rescue team left Charlton City with the survivors. In the future, Charlton City might be rebuilt, but its decline was clearly inevitable, as with the complete extinction of the Ancient Gods, the monsters that filled the streets and the crystals beneath the earth turned to ashes and disappeared without a trace.

Without the crystal energy and Blood Therapy, Charlton City, even if it were to be reconstructed and gradually recover, could never regain its past glory.

But regardless, the disaster was contained and did not spread worldwide, which was truly a silver lining amidst misfortune.

...

However, for Zhuge Jun, this ending was still difficult to accept, as it fell significantly short of his expectations.

Because he had believed that he had achieved the God-making ending!

Of the three endings not yet achieved, the God-making ending was clearly the most elusive one.

Yet in this God Slaying Ending he just experienced, the ultimate outcome was the protagonist’s death, which was quite unsatisfying to a certain extent.

Of course, in a similar worldview, it is hard for players to say definitively whether ’complete death’ or ’becoming a god’ is the better outcome, as becoming a god might also be a fate worse than death.

But all things considered, Zhuge Jun personally preferred the God-making ending.

"Damn it, why did the explosion happen at the end?

"Could I not devour all three authorities? Did that exceed the capacity of my body?

"This speculation seems reasonable, but if I hadn’t consumed those three authorities, I might have ended up with the Servant Ending.

"Perhaps there are other prerequisites to becoming a god?"

Zhuge Jun was perplexed, faced with two completely different choices.

One was to rewind the game to a point before the ending, continue exploring, and see if there were other factors that could affect the outcome; the second option was to start a second playthrough, beginning anew with a different route and playstyle.

Which method would more quickly lead to the true ending? Zhuge Jun was uncertain.

If it was just a matter of missing an important side quest or item, the first method would be better; but if it required some deeper prerequisites, like not lying too much or having already made the wrong choices in key side quests, then the only way to achieve a new ending would be the second method.

Zhuge Jun had no clue at the moment, and realizing it was getting late, he decided to rest first.

Perhaps after a good night’s sleep, he would find a new answer?

...

Meanwhile, Lilith was gleefully watching player discussions online.

So far, players had discovered four of the five endings.

One would think Lilith should be anxious because each new ending discovered meant that there would be less negative emotion and more positive emotion contributed by the players in the future.

But Lilith was not at all nervous; this all seemed to be within her plans.

"Heh heh, I’ll soon let you all understand what ’so near yet so far’ really means!"

Clearly, Lilith had considerable confidence in the fifth ending of "Blood of Lies" that had been kept secret.

By this time, the first batch of top players had already started sharing methods to achieve the two good endings of "Blood of Lies"— "Slaughter of God" and "Freedom Heart."

Relatively speaking, these were harder to achieve than the previous two bad endings but not overwhelmingly so.

The key to achieving the "Slaughter of God" ending lay in completing the game’s "Moon School" sidelines, killing the hidden third Ancient God Mel, and seizing Mel’s Heart of the Ancient Gods, resisting Sasla’s control, and eventually slaughtering the three Ancient Gods.

Afterwards, the player had to use their own body as a vessel to contain the authority of these three Ancient Gods.

These three Ancient Gods were in a cycle of repression: Ilonak repressed Mel, Mel could repress Sasla, and Sasla repressed Ilonak.

In this cycle of repression, the three authorities of the Ancient Gods would devour and annihilate each other, causing all the powers of the Ancient Gods to completely vanish.

All the monsters, zombies, puppet energy, and crystal veins in Charlton City had vanished, and the disaster naturally came to an end.

This was the outcome that Zhuge Jun had achieved before; clearly, there were many other players who had made similar attempts and had achieved this ending around the same time.

After all, though the Moon School was a hidden map, with a little bit of serious exploration, it wasn’t that hard to find.

The way to achieve the "Freedom Heart" ending, however, was completely different.

So far, only one player on the entire network had achieved this ending. According to him, this ending indeed required choosing a start that leaned towards puppets, but subsequently, when choosing lies, one had to make specific choices.

The so-called "specific choices" were neither about lying constantly nor always telling the truth.

Most players had treated the game’s Lying System as a "point allocation system," for example, pretending to be a mage required more lying, and playing a pure puppet transformation route required telling the truth.

At the beginning, this method of playing was indeed useful, as it could tangibly increase the benefits of specific development routes.

For instance, in the pure puppet transformation route, a player needed to replace all parts of their body with puppet parts to achieve an extremely high damage reduction rate, which allowed standing toe-to-toe with bosses.

In such cases, always choosing to tell the truth among all lie options could further improve the puppet-related upgrade effects, making it less likely to encounter mental issues, and even completely immune to certain mental attacks from the Ancient Gods and sect adherents.

That is to say, they became pure fighters.

But this player didn’t play in such a way; the options he chose were all from the heart.

In short, when faced with "social niceties," "villain’s probing," or "protecting others," he would choose to lie; but when encountering "good NPCs desperate to know the truth," he would choose the truth.

For instance, there was a good NPC who sighed about getting old and not being as healthy as before, and the player complimented, "You are still a strong Hunter." This was an example of "social niceties."

Like when Bazi inquired to probe for information, trying to change the boss’s form to harm others, the player would lie in response to such "villain’s probing."

Deceiving certain questionable NPCs by leading them into other dangerous areas to prevent them from harming others at the hotel was an act of "protecting others."

And some NPCs who had been searching for their relatives throughout the game, willing to pay any price just for the truth—when the player discovered their relatives had passed away, he would still inform them of the truth, rather than kindly conceal it, which was also a form of kindness.

In general, this player’s choice to lie or not did not stem from mechanical dogmatism but was a judgment based on the actual situation.

That is to say, decisions were made according to "human thinking characteristics."

In the beginning, many people thought this player was just busying himself for nothing, as lying and telling the truth seemed on the surface to be two mutually exclusive options, each corresponding to different directions of ability enhancement.

Playing both sides meant that neither developmental route could be pursued to the extreme, similar to haphazardly distributing points evenly when upgrading one’s stats, which was definitely problematic.

But it turned out this player was right, because the game’s Lying System actually had hidden attributes!

At the last moment, when the Puppet Craftsman Jim tried to control him, the player’s screen unexpectedly offered an option to freely choose whether to accept Jim’s control.

One could proactively choose to let go of everything, or to resist.

Of course, the player chose to resist, followed by another fierce boss fight.

Puppet Craftsman Jim was a special entity who could control various puppets to fight the player and, during the battle, would use many different methods to target the player’s puppet body.

At this point, the player’s human nature played a role, not only resisting the opponent’s mental manipulation but also counterattacking Jim with psychic assaults.

The battle was quite difficult for puppet players, but fortunately, they eventually won.

In this ending, how much of the player’s body had been modified with puppet technology wasn’t important; even if the whole body had been turned into puppet parts, as long as the player made the right choices regarding most of the lies, they could still maintain their heart.

However, compared to the "God Slaying Ending," the Freedom Heart ending obviously had more risks, but also more hope.

Because in this ending, Sasla had not been killed by the player.

Upon realizing that It could not control the player, Sasla fled in panic, thus preserving the power of the Ancient Gods.

The monsters and zombies were gradually cleared away, becoming more sources of crystalline energy. With this energy, Charlton City’s puppet industry and Blood Therapy industry could continue to exist.

The survival of the protagonist also proved that Charlton City’s technology could indeed grant humans eternal life in this way.

Of course, is he, who survived in puppet form and inherited all human memories, still the original him?

That is a rather profound philosophical question, and it’s probably hard to come to a definitive conclusion.

But regardless, such a successful case would inevitably attract the world’s wealthy who are eager for extended life to flock to Charlton City.

The disaster involving the Blood of the Ancient Gods had thus passed without too much danger, but when will the next disaster occur? When the next disaster strikes, will there be another powerful Hunter like the protagonist to turn the tide and save the world?

That is a very intriguing question indeed.

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