Chapter 172: Chapter 128: A Gift for the Players (Making up for the three missed updates from yesterday)_2

“You’re welcome.”

Watching the First Under Heaven prison guard leave with the man on his back, Qiu Yu directly exited the game, and then slept for a while in the office.

The next morning, he woke up and took the day off, but he didn’t go home. Instead, he climbed into the VR gaming pod right in front of everyone and started playing again.

The project supervisor had never seen anyone play like this, dumbstruck by Qiu Yu’s astonishing moves, and then began flipping through the company handbook to check whether this constituted a violation of the rules.

Back in the gaming pod, Qiu Yu saw that his game character had been killed.

If a safe point wasn’t found, logging off in the game wasn’t safe.

Their bodies would remain in place, making it easy for others to pilfer their Silver Coin, and players vying for the title of the game’s top thief didn’t mind practicing their thieving skills on these players.

As he got up, Qiu Yu found out he had been dumped at Chaotic Grave Mound.

Pulling up the game log, he discovered that he had been whacked just a moment ago.

However, now his head had come back, the wounds on his neck were gone, but the initial copper coins in his pocket had also disappeared.

It was just fifty copper pieces, and since his backpack had nothing in it, dying wasn’t too painful.

Compared to fifty copper coins, Qiu Yu was truly looking forward to the benefits that might come afterward.

Now, the time had arrived to witness a miracle!

Walking into the cell, Qiu Yu saw the cell door open; players who had violated the curfew the night before had already gone, leaving only a few players who had logged off sitting vacantly inside.

The sickly-looking First Under Heaven prison guard was still drinking, but upon seeing Qiu Yu resurrected from death, he widened his eyes, his bowl of wine slipping from his grasp and crashing to the floor.

“Are you a person or a ghost!” exclaimed the First Under Heaven in surprise.

“I’m human. Alright, prison guard, it’s time to keep your promise.”

The First Under Heaven prison guard looked at Qiu Yu’s shadow and felt around with his hand, confirming that the other person’s body was indeed alive. He could only marvel at how big the world was and the variety of strange characters it contained.

Straightening his posture, he bowed respectfully to Qiu Yu, and then said, “Thank you kindly for your great grace and mercy, sir. I will thank you on behalf of my brothers. What would you like to learn?”

“That thing you did yesterday, where you folded a man into a Tetris shape without killing him, what’s it called?”

“Are you referring to the Bone Diverting Hand? It’s not easy to learn. I can teach you, of course, but whether you can learn it will be a matter of fate.”

While Qiu Yu was still contemplating how difficult it could be to learn, a dialogue box appeared before him: “The First Under Heaven prison guard wants to teach you the Bone Diverting Hand, do you want to learn?”

He decisively clicked ‘learn’, and Qiu Yu saw a new advanced skill added to his skill list. He couldn’t help but drag it to the quick skill slot and started to execute it in front of the prison guard.

The prison guard, watching Qiu Yu’s clumsy movements, looked at his own hands.

Although it was unrefined, the movements were indeed those of the Bone Diverting Hand.

But, I haven’t taught him yet…

Am I that amazing lately that I can teach martial arts to someone with just a thought?

Despite this, Qiu Yu had finally taken a First Under Heaven as a master. Now he could learn the other’s superior martial arts and had stepped into the top tier.

The thought of others still considering their own paths while he had already advanced to the front made Qiu Yu let out a chuckling ‘heh heh heh.’

Meanwhile, outside, members of the little game project team watched the VR pod emitting strange noises and began to ponder whether they should suggest to HR adding a new rule to the company policies.

That rule would be that employees who had taken leave must leave the company immediately. What was the meaning of taking leave yet playing games in the company!

We want to play too!

However, implementing a new regulation would take a month, and for now, they could only watch Qiu Yu chuckle ‘heh heh heh’ helplessly.

Unbeknownst to them, a week had passed.

After seven days of gameplay, the players had finished the initial phase of confusion and started to further integrate into this world.

The quick skill-learning system allowed players to rapidly acquire various advanced skills, but to catch up with those at the top, First Under Heaven, they still had a long way to go.

During these days, the planners were continuously adjusting the game content, while Wang Xiaoying was consistently gathering game data.

Following Fang Cheng’s request, she compiled information on players who had chosen different paths in the game, which could intuitively show the competition for different titles and calculate the likelihood of attaining them.

Looking at this intelligence, Fang Cheng noticed that some titles received almost no attention; even those who noticed them did not seek to complete them.

It wasn’t because the titles were too peculiar; it was simply that no one knew how to go about achieving them.

Even with a specific completion path provided, they were still unclear.

For example, The World’s Best Fortune Teller, a profession that required players to have an extremely deep understanding of the I Ching, Eight Trigrams, and Tao Te Ching, something Fang Cheng himself wouldn’t claim to be proficient in, let alone other players.

Separating these near-impossible titles, Fang Cheng decided to slowly achieve them himself to unlock the hidden treasure chests in the small world.

This process would also allow him to observe the players closely, understand what they wanted, and prepare for the next game development.

He didn’t believe he would fail this time. However, planning for a way out was always a good habit, which ensured that even in case of failure he would gain a lot of experience.

Realizing it was almost time to finish work, Fang Cheng clapped his hands and said to everyone, “Monkey has returned, and it’s time for us to have our reunion dinner, give Tian Xuan some team building, and then distribute the previous project bonuses and the year-end dividends.”

Though it sounded like a lot, it all boiled down to eating, distributing money, and then taking a holiday, returning to work in February.

But today, the surprise Fang Cheng had for them was far from small.

Looking at everybody, he continued, “Our studio mandates a yearly vacation every month, but you’ve never taken it, so let’s all take it together at the end of the year. Today is the 29th, and by adding in the annual leave and compensatory time off, it coincides with the Spring Festival. We’ll continue through to the Lantern Festival, so after dinner today, come back on the 26th of next month.”

Huang Ping, who had been ready for the worst, was dumbfounded, staring wide-eyed.

In other companies launching new games, which studio wasn’t on standby 24 hours, almost wishing their employees stayed in the company to fix bugs immediately.

If a game didn’t make money that was one thing, but if it did, they’d immediately work on DLC, trying to squeeze every last copper coin out of the players’ pockets.

But their boss was busy giving them a holiday and distributing money. How confident he must be in his own game!

He had thought about asking Xu Qingling to persuade the boss, but seeing her equally gloomy face, he knew she probably had tried already.

The boss’s will was nearly immovable, so they could only choke back tears and accept this month-long vacation.

With dissatisfaction towards Fang Cheng, the group ate their dinner tastelessly, then prepared to start a long winter break.

After dinner, everyone parted ways, Fang Cheng took Tian Xuan around the street corner, and the next second they appeared at his hometown.

Lying on her own bed, Tian Xuan held the card Fang Cheng had arranged for her, and the balance emerged on the card in digital form.

Looking at the seven-figure balance, Tian Xuan looked at Fang Cheng in confusion, not understanding the purpose of these numbers.

“This is currency, think of it as a form of merit among humans,” he said.

Hearing that this was akin to merit, Tian Xuan wasn’t very pleased.

Little Heavenly Way liked to accumulate merit, but did not like it piling up in her hands; she preferred it to circulate quickly, a notion that happened to align with Fang Cheng’s.

Looking at the digits almost reaching eight figures and feeling the merit owed regarding the players, she suddenly had a flash of inspiration and roughly knew what to do.

Under her will, every Mukuai received her request.

“Ask those players what they like. I want to give them gifts.”