Chapter 150-1: Fabricating a Backstory, Observing the Environment (1) |
Colorful Mist Coast, Evil Moon domain.
After wandering around the camp and finding that no players were paying attention to him, Earthmind turned and left.
The Black Tide player he created was already indistinguishable in appearance from normal players. He decided to conduct the next phase of intelligence gathering inside the Evil Moon domain.
According to battle record information, if players suffered casualties when fighting the Black Tide, they would take the initiative to merge with nearby teams.
He decided to join a player squad in this way to avoid too much conversation in the camp.
After all, his understanding of the player race’s culture and customs was very limited. Too much conversation would easily expose problems.
Only in the heat of battle would players reduce communication during contact.
Entering the Evil Moon domain, the Earthmind Evil Spirit searched for a contact target through the perception view of a projection clone, and soon locked onto a player squad.
Ten-odd minutes later.
Behind him, the raging Black Tide followed closely, with Evil Entity units continuously generated in the rolling black mist.
“Brothers, all my teammates are dead. Can you give me a spot? I am a spellcaster.”
The players locked in fierce battle with the Black Tide Evil Entities looked toward the approaching figure when they heard this.
The other party had used Armed Vehicles’ rendering to sport a bizarre blue hairstyle. His face was rather youthful, looking like a boy of about 18.
“Little brother, join directly. I will help you out.” The bearded middle-aged man in the lead shouted, released Vital Qi around him, actively approached, then grabbed his arm and flung him to the rear of the team to help him escape danger.
Mixed groups were very common in the Evil Moon scene.
Many fixed teams of players, when facing the Black Tide and suffering heavy member losses, would choose to merge with nearby player squads, maintaining survival through cooperation and continuing to gain sacrificial power income.
So the squad members did not think much of a spellcaster suddenly requesting to join.
Seeing himself easily blend into a player squad, the Earthmind Evil Spirit felt secretly pleased.
Countless failures had finally yielded success, giving him a strong sense of accomplishment.
Facing the Evil Entities surging forward, the Earthmind Evil Spirit condensed an Inkflame fireball and hurled it straight at the Black Tide.
The struck Black Tide Evil Entity instantly had raging ink-black flames ignite on its surface, and the on-hit reactions were perfectly simulated.
This was also a preset Earthmind Evil Spirit had planned in advance.
If there were only visual effects with no actual damage performance, the players would inevitably become suspicious during the battle.
So he took a two-pronged approach.
By controlling the Black Tide’s projection clones, he altered the performance effects of the Black Tide and Evil Entities based on the template player’s actions.
Offense and taking damage were both under his control, so naturally there would be no problems.
As for the damage presentation, he could precisely siphon off a portion of energy from within the Black Tide to create a weakened effect.
During the fierce fight, the Earthmind Evil Spirit would also shout lines commonly used by players in battle from time to time.
“Come on, brothers, the gains this wave are not bad.”
“The Earthmind bully is truly hateful to the extreme, costing me potions, bullying us when our numbers are low. Everyone must put him to the sword.”
“Good work, brothers, beat down the Evil Entity dogs.”
—
During this process, the Evil Eye atop the high tower would also provide real-time data guidance.
For example, he needed to pull out a potion to drink from time to time to match how players behaved in combat.
He could not be discovered because of issues in the details.
At first, Earthmind’s behavior did not make the squad’s players feel anything was wrong. They even felt the newly joined teammate was pretty good.
Not only was his damage output strong, he shouted passionately the whole time and worked very hard in battle, much better than those players who liked to slack off.
But soon, the members of the player squad noticed something off.
They found that although this player was fighting hard, he never sent a join request.
Free damage output while paying for his own potions?
This behavior was completely inconsistent with the normal logic of a player.
No matter how intense the battle, profit was always what players cared about most. Otherwise there would be no need to seek cooperation with nearby teams.
But the newly joined player stayed hyped the whole time yet never sent a team-up request. This behavior was very unreasonable.
More importantly, during the fierce fight they were using squad voice chat. Shouting directly was very inconvenient.
Thinking of the recent hot forum topic discussing the ‘Earthmind Infiltration Tactic,’ they immediately had a guess in their hearts.
“Qi Yuan, analyze him.” The captain at the front of the squad spoke in a low voice in the voice channel.
Hearing this, the female player standing beside the Earthmind Evil Spirit turned her head and glanced at him.
Analysis ability activated, information surged into her mind.
When she saw the analysis title [Black Tide – Player], the female player called Qi Yuan could no longer hold it in.
“Boss, the Earthmind Evil Spirit has mixed into our squad.”
“I knew something was off. What player doesn’t send a team request the moment they join. Sure enough, it is a Six-Eared Macaque kneaded out by the Earthmind Evil Spirit.”
“Boss, what do we do, take him out?”
“No. One more source of damage output means one less share of the split. Why kill an Earthmind Evil Spirit who is helping for free while paying his own potions. Keep him.”
“Right, do not kill. The Earthmind Evil Spirit mixing into our squad is to investigate player intel. He definitely will not let us be easily killed by Evil Entities. With him here, we have an extra layer of invisible protection. After all, the Earthmind Evil Spirit has died so many times. He finally snuck into a team, he will not let it go easily.”
The captain’s idea was immediately approved by the other teammates.
They had already seen players suggest on the forum before that they should not expose the Earthmind Evil Spirit and simply bring him along to fight Evil Entities.
They did not expect that a joke would actually happen to them.
Such a fine opportunity to freeload, they naturally did not want to miss it.
Having understood the pros and cons, the squad members began putting on Oscar-worthy performances, giving the Earthmind Evil Spirit encouragement from time to time.
For example:
“Brother, your damage is strong; good performance; nice.”
The responses from the player squad made the Earthmind Evil Spirit feel that this disguise was a success.
But he did not lower his guard. Knowing that players had a form of consciousness communication, there was still a possibility of exposure.
As time passed, the squad members gradually grew tired.
But just as they had guessed, the intensity of the incoming Black Tide was clearly weakening, obviously not wanting them to die here.
If this had been before the Earthmind Evil Spirit joined the team, they would not have found anything wrong with the change in Black Tide intensity.
After all, the Black Tide’s intensity would be adjusted according to the fierceness of the fighting in other areas. Sudden increases and sudden decreases were both normal.
But this time the Earthmind Evil Spirit was right beside them, and the reason for the weakening of the Black Tide’s intensity was self-evident.
This secretly delighted the squad’s players, and they did not even want to let the Earthmind Evil Spirit leave.
While retreating, they discussed this in the voice channel.
“Boss, the Earthmind Evil Spirit must be contacting us because it wants intel on the players. If we can never provide useful intel, it will definitely run. Hurry and think of a way to keep it.”
“How would I know how to keep it? Everyone brainstorm some ideas. Having a free spellcaster who pays for his own potions is just too sweet. I do not want to let it go either.”
“I have an idea. Since what the Earthmind bully wants is intel on the player race, then our value in its eyes is to provide intel. So we can make it work for us for free by gradually providing false intel.”
“Nonsense. The Earthmind Evil Spirit approaching us is definitely for intel. The problem is, what intel should we provide it? The intel must be attractive, and we cannot give it all at once. It has to be made into a serialized form and given out gradually.”
On how to keep the Earthmind Evil Spirit, the player squad launched a heated discussion.
But no matter what, they could not come up with a feasible plan. Failing to provide sufficiently attractive intel meant the Earthmind Evil Spirit would leave.
To solve this problem, the captain chose to post on the forum for help.
[We have run into a problem. I am on the forum asking the big shots for suggestions. I will reward 100 sacrificial power for any workable suggestion.]
Thread owner: Three Taels and a Pot of Wine
Content:
Recently everyone has been discussing whether we can trick the Earthmind Evil Spirit into working for us.
I have really run into this. It has been working for me for 3 hours already. The problem is how to keep the Earthmind Evil Spirit from leaving.
I need an interesting background story for the player race, as well as intel that sounds catchy. Everyone, please give some suggestions.
Comments:
Eating Steamed Buns Every Day: This is simple. What the Earthmind Evil Spirit most wants to know is definitely our players’ underlying heritage information and ability characteristics. From this angle, splice in content from real world myths and science fiction novels, and it will work.
Ultimate Pancake Researcher: Here is a reference direction for you, the myth template of the primordial wilds system. Take the various spell abilities in it, splice them together, and write a background setting that sounds intimidating. The Earthmind Evil Spirit will definitely not be interested in ordinary settings. Expand the primordial setting to bluff it and you will not go wrong. In short, the worldview must be grand, and the player race must be formidable.
Darkness Approaches: Hahaha, you really got lucky. You want the forum brothers to write a novel for you, right? A price of 100 sacrificial power is too low. I suggest raising it higher (gold-farmer hands-on-hips laughing.jpg).
Big Fish Likes Small Fish: Brother, listen to my advice. Do not splice myth-system templates. That obviously does not match the player race’s setting. You should construct a complete background system based on the abilities we use, with a setting similar to the Black Tide, a superpower spanning multiple worlds. Crank the style to the maximum. Use some phrases that sound intimidating. You can even combine the Ascension race, Soul Return race, Ancient God race, Ecstasy race, Mechanical Legion, and other factions with known settings, then fuse and utilize their settings.