Volume 3, Chapter 72 – A Letter to the Players of No- 1886

[A Letter to the Players of No. 1886.]

The hottest thread in the No. 1886 forum section at the moment.

It was already 1,689 replies deep.

The poster’s ID was [Xilou · Lord of Doomsday]. It was not an official thread.

“What an embarrassingly edgy name.”

Anran snarked, then clicked into the thread.

For a hot thread like this, as long as it was not one of those posts sharing “beautiful” or “handsome” NPCs, there was usually some information worth looking at inside.

Players were gradually beginning to play important roles within their factions. The more important the information they came into contact with, the greater the chance that Anran could obtain key intelligence.

“Hello, everyone. I’m [Lord of Doomsday], guild leader of Xilou Guild.”

So it was a player guild.

The official guild system had not been opened yet, but many long-established guilds had rushed into the game at the first opportunity to start pioneering.

Compared with solo players, guilds acted with clearer objectives. They had numbers on their side and could often seize excellent resources in the game.

And conflict between guilds was also an indispensable part of any game.

After introducing himself, Xilou · Lord of Doomsday began laying out his views.

Anran skimmed through it quickly and found it very interesting.

The whole thing started with a grudge between two major guilds.

Xilou Guild and San Diego Guild had built up bad blood across multiple games, and this time, by rotten luck, most of their members had once again been assigned to the same newbie planet.

They were both on Canyon Continent in the northern hemisphere of No. 1886. Although they were separated by several thousand kilometers, distance could not stop them from cursing each other out.

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If trading insults and flipping each other off were merely appetizers for saying fuck you, then after the faction system officially opened, stabbing each other in the back was the next stage of fuck you.

Xilou joined the Imperial side.

San Diego joined the Morningstar side.

Because of various faction missions, the two sides went from insulting each other on the forums to jungle skirmishes, trying every possible posture along the way.

Some time ago, Morningstar had been advancing in high spirits, and Xilou Guild, which belonged to the Imperial side, had not been having an easy time. San Diego Guild had mocked them fiercely.

This time, after a long buildup, the counterattack from Xilou Guild had arrived.

If the martial route wouldn’t work for now, then they’d go literary!

The pen was as sharp as a blade!

A scholar could kill the enemy too!

War correspondents are supreme!

That was Anran’s summary after reading the thread.

Most players felt the same way she did.

In the thread, Lord of Doomsday directly denounced all sorts of Morningstar atrocities. In vivid, emotional language, he posted piece after piece of information he had gathered from various places, including several short videos Zhou Jieyu had shot during the war in Twinmoon City.

“I already got the videographer’s permission!”

They fully illustrated Morningstar’s willingness to stop at nothing to achieve its goals, including killing civilians.

“This isn’t a proper resistance army at all. Rather than a resistance army, it’s a bunch of thugs. The officials were absolutely malicious to open a faction like this. Even though this is just a game, we should still loudly say no to this kind of organization!”

“…”

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“…”

Lord of Doomsday’s 1,324-character post resonated with many players.

A lot of players had only just entered the game. They did not really have very clear goals yet, and they did not care much which faction they joined, as long as there were quests to do.

But Lord of Doomsday’s exposé instantly tilted the balance for those players.

Any faction was fine, but people would naturally find the comparatively less evil side more acceptable.

The purpose of Lord of Doomsday’s thread was to weaken the number of players in the Morningstar faction as much as possible.

That was an indirect weakening of Morningstar, and weakening Morningstar meant weakening San Diego Guild.

Looking at the flood of replies, Lord of Doomsday let out a pig-like cackle.

“Hahahaha…”

He had specifically paid a ghostwriter to polish the article, and the writing was undeniably strong.

“That money was well spent!”

“You want to fight me? You’re still far too green, you fertilizer peddler!”

Lord of Doomsday laughed wildly.

As soon as San Diego Guild got the news, they immediately organized and rushed over to curse people out.

But no matter how furiously they raged, they looked pale and powerless in front of more than a dozen videos presented as evidence.

The evidence was ironclad. There was no whitewashing it away!

“Fuck, that bastard Doomsday is rotten to the core!”

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Tailu, the president of San Diego Guild, slapped the table in utter frustration.

“Anyway, the paid-poster work can’t stop. Also, hurry up and put together a detailed Morningstar-side guide and post it. This is still a game, after all. With something like that, we should be able to win back at least a bit of popularity.”

Tailu pondered for a moment. “That crude bastard Doomsday definitely couldn’t have written an article like this himself. Since you hired a ghostwriter, I’ll hire one too.”

[Illusion and Reality?]

Tailu planned to use that as the theme of his counterattack.

He irritably ran a hand through his short blond hair. Money was not a problem for him. His family was a tycoon in the fertilizer business.

The ghostwriter he hired would definitely be top-notch too. It was just that, on this subject, Morningstar was at an inherent disadvantage. He could only hope to drag things out and split the players’ attention a bit.

…

“What a slick move.”

“Now that’s refreshing. There are real heroes among the players too!”

“Too bad I can’t make a post, or I’d definitely give Lord of Doomsday a like.”

The gloom brought on by Gray’s news was immediately swept away.

Compared with Morningstar, Morton was just a kid brother.

Lord of Doomsday’s post would definitely deal a heavy blow to the Morningstar faction in the short term. For Anran, who treated destroying Morningstar as her main storyline mission, this could not have been better.

What was the most terrifying group in this world?

It was absolutely not those BOSSes standing at the peak of the world, nor the ruler of some colossal power, but the player population that was gradually beginning to bare its fangs.

In online games, there was no BOSS that players could not beat to death.

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Anran casually skimmed a few more replies, and then she suddenly spotted Zhou Jieyu.

Leading the Escape: “Thanks to the rich boss for buying my videos!!! I’ve still got lots of interesting videos here! Anyone who wants them can contact me!”

Emmm…

Anran froze for a moment.

Wasn’t Zhou Jieyu herself a rich kid in real life?

How had she started reselling videos in the game too?

In fact, when it came to this, Zhou Jieyu was also full of bitter tears.

Although her family had money, all of Zhou Jieyu’s allowance had always been in the hands of her big brother, Leading the Charge.

It was not as if she had never tried to resist, but her father had directly threatened to stop giving her spending money in the future, leaving her completely cowed.

Zhou Jieyu had even gotten crooked ideas. She quietly logged out and sneaked into Leading the Charge’s room, planning to take her allowance back, only to be caught on the spot by the nanny robot.

The more said, the more tears there were.

Anran did not know any of this. She only knew that Zhou Jieyu had money again!

Emmm…

That was good news.

The first to get rich should pull the later ones along. Yes, that was exactly how it should be.

With that thought, Anran returned home.

After having lunch with Aila, she plunged back into the workshop and began making the mechanical armguard.