Why the bug I wrote became a core gameplay mechanic?!
Chapter 638 - 621: The Remaining Value of the Disciple

Chapter 638: Chapter 621: The Remaining Value of the Disciple

This plot completely caught Chen Tingquan off guard.

The Dual-Open Mentor came in a whirlwind and left fully loaded, leaving him alone in the chaos of the wind.

Now Chen Tingquan totally understood. The world of "Reverse Heaven" certainly emphasized the legal system, but it didn’t entirely focus on it.

The laws here were akin to those in slave societies; beating a slave to death was of course punishable, but not by life-for-life, instead, it was compensated with money.

In the game, paying players aren’t allowed to kill normal players at will.

The first kill, according to the law, costs one high-grade spirit stone, that’s $100;

And thereafter, each additional kill within the game time doubles the cost.

This initial $100 is already a huge sum for the vast majority of players, and if it keeps doubling, even wealthy players will feel the pinch.

Moreover, killing too many people will trigger divine retribution, directly turning the paying player’s physical body to ashes.

Of course, having one’s body turned to ash isn’t tantamount to account deletion, so the paying players won’t be completely bankrupt, but the loss should be similarly substantial.

There are two types of death in this game:

The first type of death retains the physical body, in which case a Resurrection Pill is all that’s needed, and that thing is quite cheap, just 100 low-grade spirit stones, only a dollar.

But if for various reasons the body is lost, such as encountering a heavenly tribulation, the body being turned into a puppet, or exploding for other reasons, then it’s impossible to resurrect with a Resurrection Pill, and one can only reincarnate.

In this instance, Chen Tingquan’s situation was just so: either transition into a Soul Cultivator in soul state and find a Ten Thousand Soul Banner nearby, or reincarnate.

"Gotta reincarnate."

"Damn it, shouldn’t those 100 middle-grade spirit stones go to me? My black-hearted mentor!"

For someone like Instructor Ding, who’s a big spender, he doesn’t really mind those 100 middle-grade spirit stones; after all, he just considers it the cost of buying a puppet.

The Erosion Spirit Heavenly Palace has exclusive techniques that can use corpses to create a Ghost General Puppet, but the corpse must be a player’s.

Killing someone else, Instructor Ding feels a bit embarrassed to do for the time being, since he is also a streamer and must be mindful of his image.

Just happened to accidentally kill a good brother A, might as well use the brother’s corpse then.

But what really annoys Chen Tingquan is that the money he rightfully earned ended up going to the Dual-Open Mentor! How does that make sense?

"Forget it, I’m going to reincarnate first.

"Wait up! We’ll sign this voluntary allocation agreement later, and you have to mine enough ores with me, or we’re not done today!"

Instructor Ding hurriedly nodded: "Don’t worry, Brother Quan, I’ll wait for you in the Barbaric World; just come find me after you reincarnate.

"I will definitely take you flying!"

...

Hitting the reincarnation button, Chen Tingquan was revived.

Only this time, he was not the same character as before, and a ’Reincarnated 1 time’ mark was added in the character interface.

All attributes reset to zero, and no flying sword in hand.

Initially, Chen Tingquan was thinking about how to return to Henggang Sect; he quickly realized he was overthinking because the Dual-Open Mentor the Alchemist Qian appeared before him.

"Disciple, this is the item Master has kept for you; take it and keep it well.

"Cultivation is inherently about going against the heavens, where a slight misstep leads to eternal doom; next time, be cautious and protect your physical body at all costs."

Hearing this, Chen Tingquan felt a rush of anger rising.

"Old bastard! What about the 100 middle-grade spirit stones you earned from selling my body! You’re just gonna pretend you don’t know, huh?"

That’s 100 middle-grade spirit stones, equivalent to $100! It’s nothing much for someone like Instructor Ding who’s a whale, but for a zero-spend player like Chen Tingquan, it could buy how many Nine Dragon Elixirs?

Then he carefully checked the dialogue options, and it really had something similar.

"Mentor, those 100 middle-grade spirit stones..."

After clicking this option, the Alchemist Qian’s face inevitably darkened.

"Ungrateful disciple! Didn’t you carefully read the content of that training agreement?

"Your ability to cultivate is an opportunity given by Master and Henggang Sect; your body naturally belongs to Henggang Sect’s assets; what does this compensation have to do with you?

"Hmph."

After speaking, the Alchemist Qian tossed all of Chen Tingquan’s items to the ground and then turned and left.

Chen Tingquan, somewhat baffled, picked up the items and did a quick inventory check.

Hmm, no issue, they were the same items from his previous backpack, including the flying sword he bought with a loan.

From this angle, at least the Alchemist Qian was fair, not pocketing any of his stuff.

Only his previous cultivation was completely reset, requiring him to cultivate anew.

"Sigh, I’m going to sit and meditate first."

As Chen Tingquan began cultivating again, he noticed his cultivation speed was considerably faster, even without Nine Dragon Elixirs, it’s several times faster than before.

It seems this game has a special catch-up mechanism after reincarnation to help players quickly return to their original state and power.

However, reincarnation does cost some resources, and the higher the player’s level, the harsher the loss.

While cultivating, Chen Tingquan pondered the words of the Alchemist Qian.

"The content of the training agreement...

"Darn it, I didn’t really look closely!"

Chen Tingquan hurriedly opened the system interface, found the training agreement, and clicked to view the specific content.

The agreement was lengthy, so previously, Chen Tingquan just scrolled to the bottom and signed it, barely looking at the details.

Now looking at it, the more he read, the colder he felt.

The agreement was indeed essentially a loan agreement, so Chen Tingquan interpreted it as a "Cultivation Loan." In short, it was borrowing from Henggang Sect to purchase various elixirs and cultivation techniques to cultivate.

But since it’s a loan, collateral is bound to be involved.

As a backcountry wildling, what could he use as collateral?

Obviously, it could only be his body.

So according to the agreement’s content, Chen Tingquan practically mortgaged his own body to Henggang Sect—any damage or death to his body, necessitating compensation by the killer Cultivator according to the law, would naturally be paid to Henggang Sect, with Chen Tingquan having nothing to do with it.

"This is a scam!

"Why is cultivation full of such tricks!

"I just wondered why Henggang Sect is so keen on recruiting poor disciples; turns out there’s profit to be made!

"Damn it, it all makes sense now!"

Reflecting now, Henggang Sect’s approach indeed aligns well with risk control principles.

If they only recruited poor disciples, while they could rely on laws to ensure disciples work off their debts, earning the interest difference indefinitely, it wouldn’t be entirely foolproof.

Because disciples may die, or players may flee, turning the loan into a dead loss, unrecouped?

To dodge this risk, Henggang Sect straightforwardly added collateral provisions to the Cultivation Loan, effectively securing ownership of these disciples’ bodies.

This way, whether killed by another Cultivator or if the disciple tries to flee, they can rightfully make another sum from the collateral, trying to squeeze every last value from these disciples.

Speaking from this perspective, not giving Chen Tingquan those 100 middle-grade spirit stones seems justified.

From the player’s standpoint too, such game mechanics appear more reasonable.

Whale players can’t kill normal players randomly; otherwise, ordinary players would quickly quit, collapsing the game environment.

But forcing whale players not to kill at all would be overly restrictive; punishment-inflicted killings are more flexible.

Could this penalty be given to normal players?

Of course not, because giving it would lead to exploitation.

Whether it’s purposely feigning accidents with whales during their AOE attacks or two players mutually forming honest agreements, exploiting system loopholes to profit.

Thus, funneling the money to the system serves as a deterrence, preventing pay-to-play players from killing recklessly, while stopping ordinary players from benefiting, eliminating the chance of exploitation.

Pretty reasonable, the only issue is...

Isn’t this setting too greedy!

Isn’t it still forcefully driving players to pay! Plus, all the benefits go to "Reverse Heaven" officials, with free players not even getting a sip; it’s really too much!

If "Reverse Heaven" would allocate these fines from freeloaders back to freeloaders, issuing some benefits to free players, it might make some sense.

But at the moment, Chen Tingquan hasn’t found any similar mechanism.

After cultivating for a while, Chen Tingquan finally managed to recover to about eighty percent of his former strength, with enough mana to use his flying sword.

"Time to find Little Ding! This guy used my corpse to craft a puppet; if he doesn’t compensate me with cold iron ore, we’re not finished!"

Chen Tingquan rode his flying sword and once again flew towards the Barbaric World.

...

Returning to the Barbaric World, Chen Tingquan smoothly teamed up with Instructor Ding.

During this time, Instructor Ding had already hunted a baby Steelback Dragon.

They both wanted to find another Nine Dragon vulnerable body, but clearly, those weren’t always available, and in the end, they had to settle for hunting some ordinary demon beasts.

According to the agreement, Chen Tingquan also received some scraps.

Moreover, he managed to dig up some cold iron ores during the process.

However, what Chen Tingquan didn’t anticipate was that while teaming with Instructor Ding, any ore he mined and any herbs he collected had to be allocated according to the original set proportions!

This made Chen Tingquan feel the pinch; after arduously mining a few dozen cold iron ores, he could only keep a few pieces, with the bulk going to Instructor Ding.

This game truly follows the principle of "take from the poor to enrich the wealthy"!

Clearly, whale players don’t particularly need these resources, but due to their formidable strength, they can still get the larger share as per the distribution agreement.

The strong remain strong; at this rate, the gap between them will only widen.

"Alright, let’s call it a day here; I need to head back and cultivate."

Chen Tingquan took stock of his gains and felt it about time to slip away.

Although he could only take a minor portion of the resources according to the agreement, he still acquired some demon beast materials, ores, herbs, etc. The accumulated cold iron ores were enough to hand in for Sect tasks.

Throughout the whole process, it was Instructor Ding wreaking havoc up front, while Chen Tingquan could only grit his teeth and watch from behind, full of envy.

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