Chapter 1527: Farm Life
"I don't know why, but the games they write just keep getting more and more brutal," Short Bangs said. As he was about to close the door, Lin Sanjiu raised her hand, and he quickly realized what she meant, reopening the door to show he had no ulterior motive. "I've been here for a long time, only Master Zhang and this woman," he pointed to the silent, shrinking woman in the corner, "have been here longer than me. The others from that time are gone."
"How long have you been here?"
"Five or six months, I guess. Without seeing the sunrise or sunset, it's easy to lose track of time," Short Bangs said, shaking his head. "The habit of communicating with each other was already here when I came. During this time, I've seen so many newcomers, those who couldn't hang on, were sent away, died in disputes... I've seen too much. I found that the longer I'm here, the more brutal the game content I come across."
He made a gesture, inviting Lin Sanjiu inside. His room had been remodeled to look like a forest cabin, with an entire glass wall in the living room. As Lin Sanjiu approached, she realized the cabin was designed to sit on a cliff, and looking out through the glass, her eyes fell on the forest beneath the cliff. A vague, pale mist hung over the dark green forest.
As she walked into the living room, the woman was quietly walking outside; Yu Yuan poked his head in from the door, and she immediately stopped.
"I'll wait for you at the door," Yu Yuan said expressionlessly. Lin Sanjiu nodded without looking at the woman again, who dared not run out or come in, and crouched near the door with a wooden face.
"This is my scenic window, and also the entrance to my game creation," Short Bangs explained. "From here, you can see an overview of the games I've written, the number of survivors, deaths, and other information."
In front of the glass wall sat a long couch. Beside it was a side table with a half-drunk beverage, its ring of moisture congealed at the bottom of the cup. Lin Sanjiu looked at the ring, imagining Short Bangs sitting there, sipping his drink, watching the games.
She walked over and sat down in the middle of the couch. The blood on her hands and body left dark red stains on the cushion, along with some sticky, unidentifiable bits clinging to the sofa.
Short Bangs' mouth twitched, but he said nothing.
"You'll see I'm not lying when you look at my games," he said, sitting down on the other end of the couch. "I really am different from the others. I've never even looked for game volunteers."
"Volunteers?"
Lin Sanjiu had almost forgotten the volunteers outside, leading posthumans into one death trap after another. They said they participated in game creation but weren't at the new game launches.
"Do you know about game volunteers? Ahem, no one is specifically trained in game writing, right?" Short Bangs said. "Designing a new game every week, over time, anyone might run out of inspiration. Sometimes, when game makers can't come up with good ideas, they'll seek outsiders' suggestions... Offering them small benefits, many people scramble to design games or run errands. The more idea contributors, the fresher the game, the more miserable the players."
The so-called small benefits probably meant exemption from a round of the game.
"In theory, I also need to design a new game every week, but I don't want to wrack my brains like them, thinking of ways to kill more people." Short Bangs shook his head and sighed, smiling. "So, I found a way around it. Besides using volunteers for some guiding, I've never sought volunteers. The new game I design every week is just a slight modification of an old game. When released, I connect it to the old game's environment. This way, theoretically, I release a new game every week, but in reality, it's just an ever-expanding old game, and a completely safe one at that."
This doesn't seem like something hastily made up to muddle through.
Since sitting down on something solid, the desire within Lin Sanjiu to burst into laughter uncontrollably had gradually subsided a bit. She gazed at the glass wall and the valley forest in front of her, feeling a little dazed for a moment, as if the misty fog over the valley were waves of a river, and she was floating on the water, swaying with the waves, waiting for the arrival of the shore.
"Show me," she said softly.
Short Bangs hesitated for a moment, raising a hand toward the glass wall. As he moved, lines of text and forms appeared on the glass wall, the background still the foggy grey-green forest.
"My game has no end." Short Bangs seemed to be seized by some emotion as the glass wall woke up, turning into a giant screen, and he became a little different. He straightened his back, his expression solemn, saying, "In my game, there's no 'win and get out.' As long as you enter and cooperate, you can live safely until you are teleported away."
Lin Sanjiu glanced at him, her face showing a touch of pity.
"As for the dangers they'll face after being teleported away, that's beyond my control. My abilities are limited."
"Show me what the game is first."
"Rather than a game, it's more like a place to survive." Short Bangs waved his hand, and the view zoomed in from the grey-green forest to a clearing in the woods. The nearest ring of forest had been chopped down to stumps; simple huts were neatly arranged on the plain, smoke wafting into the grey-blue sky.
A few posthuman-looking people crouched in the vegetable field behind the huts, their backs bent low, seemingly doing farm work. A woman holding a child and a basket of wild fruit appeared from the forest. If it weren't for their posthuman attire and occasional modern tools, Lin Sanjiu might have doubted what she was seeing, thinking it an ancient farming tribe.
"You see, her child was born in the collective farm," Short Bangs murmured in an indescribable tone. "It's a milestone victory for the collective farm... we fed the pregnant woman, ensured her health, and allowed her to give birth successfully... Even if the mother is teleported away in a few months, the child can live well on the farm."
Lin Sanjiu watched the peaceful farm in silence for a while and asked, "Why a farm?"
"Players in the game always have to do something, whether it's planting crops or raising chickens, all for points... it's in line with the game template," Short Bangs briefly explained. "Farming is the calmest, least likely to lead to bloodshed, and they can feed themselves."
"What are the points for?"
"Earn points by doing a certain amount of farm work each day and get corresponding rations... Feeding chickens earns fewer points, chopping trees more, the farm is fair, distributing according to labor."
Lin Sanjiu said nothing, just watched the farm for a while. Short Bangs seemed to be telling the truth; the field was indeed divided into sections by fences, likely allocated automatically whenever new players were added. But beyond that, there was no essential difference between old and new farms; all were equally peaceful. She observed the people in the farm, nearly all busy with farming, tending chickens and pigs, repairing huts... Ten minutes passed, and she didn't even hear anyone speak.
"I purposely set up the farm in the mountains, secluded from the world, to shield them from the influence of the outside game world; it's too dangerous out there," Short Bangs said with a sighed. "You know, when I had volunteers take players from the outside world to the mountains by bus, many were unhappy, feeling their lives had become primitive... But in reality, once they've lived here, they understand the value of this haven in chaotic times, and they're all very grateful to me."
"Do they know you?"
"Yes, I often speak to them through things like television broadcasts," Short Bangs said with a smile. "These things were written into the game when I created it, and every household can get one."
Compared to the other precarious games, having a roof over your head, beds to sleep in, food to eat, and companions might indeed be considered a rare haven. Lin Sanjiu slowly nodded and pointed at the screen, saying, "What's behind the vegetable garden? In that forest there, it seems like there's something."
Short Bangs squinted his eyes, looking in the direction of her finger for a moment.
"What? I don't see anything."
"Move the screen over; let me see."
As Short Bangs waved his hand, Lin Sanjiu stopped him.
"Not like that. Go back to the view of the farmstead from before, don't change the camera angle. Just push the camera in the direction I told you, straight into the forest."
The last screen change was like a movie transition, the previous image disappearing and flashing into the next one. It's hard to say whether it was precisely the place she had pointed to—in an unfamiliar forest, everything might look the same.
Short Bangs paused for a few seconds. He craned his neck, staring intently at the section of forest Lin Sanjiu had pointed to.
"Oh, I see what you're talking about," he said, rubbing his thighs. "So that's what you meant."
"What?" Lin Sanjiu leaned over, resting her elbow on her knee. She could feel a smile forming on her face.
"Ahem, there's nothing wrong with talking about it." Short Bangs shifted his position on the sofa, crossing and uncrossing his legs. "With so many people, there are bound to be some who commit crimes; it's quite normal. The people in the farmstead made a request to me about building a prison in the forest to detain those wrongdoers, and I agreed. By locking up the bad people, the good people can live peacefully."