Chapter 544: Ascension

Chapter 544: Ascension

Zheng Yichen absolutely needed Irene’s help to build the perfect Nightmare Realm… not to mention he wanted to embed the Nightmare Realm into the Magic Weapon Summoning Book as its carrier.

“Alright… considering you already owe me so much, I’ll let it slide again this time. I’ll remember it, and you can pay me back after I think of what I want.” Irene pulled over a chair, hopped lightly onto it, and sat down facing Zheng Yichen. Magic techniques… in her view, were far more valuable than simple magic itself.

Magic was already a set routine, but magic techniques at her level went beyond that groundwork, making them even more precious and worthwhile. Though she thought Zheng Yichen’s idea was quite good—to construct a special, “illusory” world.

Could this be considered… an alternative form of creation?

Well, describing it as creation seemed too frivolous, but it was almost the same. Zheng Yichen’s plan had plenty of detailed arrangements. Irene had looked through all those plans. Bringing story plots to life within Nightmare Magic was a great idea, but it involved a lot of technical design.

First was the issue of interactivity!

“Interactivity? That’s simple—just set some trigger conditions. After all, they ’re just NPCs…” Zheng Yichen explained what “NPC” meant to Irene before continuing with his plan. “That technical problem can be postponed. Once we have a new solution, we can do a major version update. Changing it later will be fine, since this is just the first game.”

“You figure that out yourself. The current Nightmare Magic isn’t suitable for your needs.” Irene thought for a moment before telling Zheng Yichen. He could handle the NPC issue on his own. After his explanation, Irene understood the temporary fix for interactivity. It basically involved setting trigger conditions for dialogue in advance. As long as those were triggered, it would work.

Nightmare Magic involved the mental aspect, so it could store information. As long as the magical structure didn’t collapse, the information inside wouldn’t disappear. What Zheng Yichen needed to worry about was it being cracked. Attention on the Creator never faded. So if he came up with this new playstyle,

it would undoubtedly attract a new wave of attention. Then, just like with the Trading Zone in the early days, it would draw a large number of covetous individuals, though those people eventually met their end. But avoiding being coveted before that required a lot of sacrifice… well, it was the troublemakers who died.

Thus, what Zheng Yichen made next would also inevitably be noticed and coveted. Even knowledgeable people might quickly realize it was Nightmare Magic… or something similar!

“Huh? Is there something better?”

“No, I mean the tier of Nightmare Magic isn’t suitable. High-level magic is complicated and could still be cracked through joint efforts. What you need is to ascend this magic.”

“…I can’t do it!” Zheng Yichen’s lips twitched. What a joke. He had only studied magic for a few years—a complete amateur… well, calling himself an amateur in front of this “girl” might still be boasting. Making him ascend even a low-level magic was excruciatingly hard, let alone high-level magic.

“So, I’ll do it, in the few days before Annie returns.”

Irene said it very calmly, as if it were an ordinary little thing. Zheng Yichen rubbed his forehead. With things like this, what could he say? He just accepted it.

Him? Before Irene completed the “ascension” of Nightmare Magic, he would go write the Script!

Thinking of the vast number of Earth novels, movies, and memories he knew, plus some works from this world, Zheng Yichen shifted his attention to the town and quickly pondered. Well, those memories were just too many. It wasn’t something he could fully organize and summarize in a short while.

Even though his brain was now a dragon’s brain, it was still a biological brain. Compared to those super-fast calculating computers, the gap was big… okay, it was really, really big. Results that computers could calculate and design in a short time would take Zheng Yichen much longer to achieve. Like typing in a novel and generating a virtual world…

There was no such machine in this world!

Zheng Yichen couldn’t make one either. So he could only design it like writing Scripts, one Script at a time. Well… first, he needed to create a vast enough space to hold everything, since he planned to keep adding new “Scripts.” So the capacity had to be sufficient. As for connecting the content? That wasn’t hard to fix. Tone down what was too high, raise what was too low, and leave the over-the-top parts as they were.

After all, it was a special “Nightmare game.” For the parts that were really hard to connect, it was even simpler—just integrate them into the Nightmare Realm design as separate instances. Plus, Zheng Yichen wasn’t worried about idle explorers. As long as he had time, their exploration speed wouldn’t outpace his rate of adding new “Scripts”!

In fact, he would welcome more explorers. For those explorers, Zheng Yichen would let them experience what true malice felt like… Of course, only taking wasn’t a sustainable approach. The basic design framework of Zheng Yichen’s Nightmare Realm was to incorporate the real state of the Otherworld. He wasn’t precise with the parameters, but Irene could handle that. In other words, beings who grew within the Nightmare Realm could also gain corresponding or certain levels of combat experience in the outside world.

Beyond that, under special circumstances, they could earn some “Reward Points.” With these hard-to-obtain points, they could exchange for special items from the Creator’s Armory. Zheng Yichen quickly brainstormed various plans. As for how they would turn out, he would refine them over time. The plan wasn’t fully formed yet, but having some ideas ready in advance would save him from thinking later when needed.

“Having Magic like this is truly wonderful!” Zheng Yichen gathered the draft papers piled before him and sighed. He slightly pulled back the curtain and glanced outside. Unnoticed, the sky was already bright. He took out the remaining Compass for a look. The Compass was still working. The remaining Derivative Witch was still alive. Hmm… so this Derivative Witch was good at hiding?

Zheng Yichen frowned and worried for a moment before picking up the Luopan and walking out. Loris was still unreachable, and he had no other options. Since he couldn’t find her, he just had to wait for her to come back. Fine, he should focus on his own part first. Since he intended to search for the Undying Witch’s remnants, he might as well put in a real effort!

Going head-to-head with clever people in schemes, Zheng Yichen wasn’t confident. But that didn’t mean there was no way. As long as he genuinely put his heart into it, without scheming factors, it wouldn’t be easy for others to notice something wrong, right?