Chapter 493: A Bewildered Baixiaosheng (Two-in-One)

This wasn't playing by the rules! Bai Xiaosheng immediately felt something was amiss.

Typically, when a traditional fantasy sage establishes an evil race in a world, don't they have mortals perform rituals to pray to evil gods, thereby converting them into followers and then bestowing power upon them in their dreams?

But what about an online game? An online game! What in the world is an online game?!

For the first time, Bai Xiaosheng's mind went blank. From the name alone, it bore no resemblance to anything stemming from traditional fantasy thinking.

“Online game,” Bai Xiaosheng asked, “Does anyone know what that is?”

“No idea.”“My lord, I don’t know.”“It sounds very new!”“If even Lord Bai Xiaosheng, the most knowledgeable person in the Three Realms, doesn’t know what an online game is, then it must be truly extraordinary!”

The surrounding Heavenly Emperor Evil Gods also looked bewildered.

He and those around him fell completely silent. After exchanging glances, he instantly vanished, saying, “Let’s go! We must see what kind of ritual this ‘evil race’ transformation truly is!”

They arrived at a young man’s home. In the small bedroom, there was an exquisitely ornate alchemy helmet, whose design seemed rather unusual.

It was a group of high school students, enthusiastically discussing something.

“Wow! They say it officially launches tonight at nine!”

“I’m so jealous, Peter, you actually got a spot! I heard only a little over a hundred people in the entire Human Southern Province got one, and apparently, some were distributed in the Half-Orc and Orc Kingdoms too!”

“They say nobles and royal offspring from the major Undead Empires, Human Kingdoms, Orc Empires, and Half-Orc Empires all have fixed slots, and then there’s a random drawing for us commoners... Peter, you actually got a slot! Doesn’t that put you on the same level as the most powerful descendants from across the entire world, from the Land of Potions?”

The students chattered excitedly.

Among them, a freckled boy beamed with pride, “Hahaha! Just luck, pure luck.”

Peter was a boy from an ordinary family; both his parents were regular employees at a town bus company. In this alchemy-industrial revolution era of Europe, they were considered very ordinary working-class people. The exquisite handheld game consoles crafted by alchemists were typically only for the children of wealthy families. Yet, he had suddenly received a beta test slot for this so-called online game, and Peter was absolutely thrilled.

This game was about to change his ordinary school life!

Amidst the chatter of his friends, the time finally arrived. Peter slowly put on the helmet and entered the game interface.

Virtual Reality

A beautiful, pale blue abyssal vortex appeared on the stunning interface, displaying a line of text.

Peter clicked the “Start Game” button, and a prompt immediately appeared:

“Do you wish to create an Evil Race character?”

“Yes!”

“Establishing dream realm. Creating a unique game character based on the player’s dream...”

Peter had an incredibly vivid dream. He dreamt of when he was eight years old, and his favorite puppy was stolen by a dog thief. He couldn't help but feel heartbroken for a long time, weeping for days. It was the most profound memory of his ordinary life.

“Creating...”

A black, eight-armed, tentacled dog-headed monster, like a cloud of mist, slowly materialized before him.

“Huh? Is this my character?” Peter’s eyelid twitched. It was too ugly, completely unlike his dream of becoming a handsome imperial general in a white cloak. How could he possibly compete with the powerful noble offspring from other nations looking like this?

But he pursed his lips and clicked to continue.

Please choose your faction:Evil God FactionGood God Faction

Peter thought for a moment and, quite calmly, chose the Good God Faction.

The screen gradually blurred. When he regained his senses, he found himself in an incredibly realistic, terrifying world, having transformed into the tentacled dog-headed monster.

“Where am I?” Peter was stunned.

This was already the Ruined World, established and modified by Mengmei herself. After all, it was her world to command.

Character Panel:Level: 1Character Traits: ??? (Please explore on your own)Experience: 0/100Combat Specialization: NoneCoordinates: Good God Novice Village

Peter was instantly dumbfounded by the text beneath his vision. He had no idea what it meant.

He quickly looked around. It was pitch black, filled with thick black mist. Yet, for some unknown reason, the octopus dog-headed character he controlled felt an inexplicable sense of familiarity in this space, as if he had returned home.

Novice Village.A large sign with these words stood above the village.

In the rudimentary black stone square, newly arrived players wandered aimlessly, chattering amongst themselves, clearly bewildered. In front of a house, a strange evil god sat in a rocking chair, with large words floating above his head: “NPC: Novice Village Chief, Miraki, Level 31.”

The naive Peter was also at a loss.

Why were there large words written above this monster’s head?

NPC? What ancient symbols were these? He couldn't understand them at all. This was too strange!

At this point, the differences between players became evident. Some reacted quickly, immediately rushing to interact with the Novice Village Chief. They seemed to gain some insight and enthusiastically ran out of the village!

“I’ll go take a look too!”

Peter was a bit slower to react, but he couldn't help but go and speak with the village chief.

“Hello, is there anything I can help you with?” he couldn’t resist asking.

The village chief looked at Peter, seemingly very practiced in his role, and said, “Oh, brave adventurer hero from another world! Our world is in crisis; in ten years, the world-destroying deluge will descend! As our savior, please save our world!”

Main Quest Triggered: Stop the world-destroying deluge in ten years and save the world.

Inside his mind... a voice appeared. What the hell?

He didn't immediately react, simply attributing it to the game’s settings.

“Senior, I’ll do my best!” Peter felt greatly encouraged by the word “hero.”

The customs of this foreign world were remarkably simple. The common hero online game tropes from Earth had an immense impact and novelty here. After all, what ordinary boy from an ordinary family wouldn’t wish to be a destined protagonist, to become a hero? Now, a village chief was asking for his help, respectfully addressing him as “Hero Sir!” His cheeks flushed with excitement.

Village Chief Miraki continued, “Brave youth, our small village in the Ruined World is shrouded in dense mist and unknown terrors, plagued by evil creatures. Please go outside and hunt five monsters to prove your strength!”

Newbie Quest Acquired: The Village Chief’s Trouble.

“Village Chief, I’ll do my best!” Peter was instantly overjoyed and ran off to hunt the monsters outside the village. Seeing this, the new players behind him also couldn't resist speaking with the chief, mimicking his actions.

Bai Xiaosheng was utterly stunned!

Can someone tell me what in the world all this is?

“My lord, what exactly is this...?” The surrounding Heavenly Emperor Evil Gods were also baffled.

“I still don’t know the profound meaning behind it. Let’s observe further.” Bai Xiaosheng said calmly.

Next, Bai Xiaosheng watched as the young man went outside the village and began to slay evil creatures.

However, as an ordinary person, even with the weakest evil god at his disposal, killing the simplest evil creatures was still very difficult because he lacked combat skills and the mindset of a strong individual.

Your character has died. Level reset to zero.

This line of text appeared before Peter’s eyes:

Standard revival time: eight hours!Revival mechanism as follows:1. If you concentrate and call upon your game character, you can accelerate the revival time!2. If you call friends to join you in calling upon your game character, you can slightly accelerate the revival time!

Peter saw the black screen and was immediately heartbroken. He still had to save the village; he couldn’t let down the village chief’s expectations!

He took off his helmet and said to his friends, “Guys, lend me a hand!”

To his friends, hearing his description, it sounded incredibly novel: completely realistic graphics? A hero? Saving the world? They immediately waved their fists and declared they would handle it.

Three hours later, his character revived.

He then enthusiastically went back to complete the newbie quest, dying several times, but eventually mastering the combat patterns and successfully slaying one of the evil creatures.

Level: 5/100

Peter’s face was flushed with excitement, filled with a sense of accomplishment. Having succeeded once, he began to completely eliminate the other monsters, killing five and successfully completing the quest, just about to marvel at his own strength...

World Announcement: Player Valiant Paladin has defeated a Level 8 Novice Village hidden boss above their level!

The village was abuzz with discussion.

“Too strong…”“That monster has already made it to the outskirts over there…”“The level leaderboard has been updated again…”

As native players, their discussions were very straightforward.

Peter quickly checked and found the level leaderboard. The top-ranked player, Valiant Paladin, was already level five!

“This person is terrifying! Everyone else on the leaderboard is a monster too. I’m already ranked 4591. Among ten thousand beta players, there are so many powerful geniuses! How long has it even been since it started? And they can even defeat stronger opponents! In real life, they must have had combat experience!” Peter felt a surge of urgency and quickly went back to the village chief to turn in his quest.

Hidden in the shadows, Bai Xiaosheng watched the entire Novice Village square in the distance, growing even more baffled!

He, along with the other Evil God Heavenly Emperors who were planning strategies to overthrow the major churches of the Demon Realm, stared at this bizarre scene. This newly emerged, peculiar evil race ritual – the online game – left them in a prolonged state of stupefaction.

Can anyone tell me what’s happening?

How long has it been, and the world has completely changed?

Isn’t this supposed to be an evil race? Isn’t it supposed to be a demonic race, similar to the Origin Demon God Medusa, bestowing power upon mortals to cultivate? These two are clearly of the same kind, but once in the hands of the Earth Mother, it’s completely different from Medusa’s orthodox style back then!

Levels, NPCs, novice villages, quests, leveling up...

He couldn't help but question reality, even deeply suspecting that if the Earth Mother had been beside Medusa back then and crafted the cultivation system for potion professionals for that demon god, it too would have turned into this bizarre style!

He was silent for a long time before he began to ponder, taking a deep breath. “This is the Ruined World... That helmet is an exceptionally powerful Fourth-Tier alchemical construct, extremely expensive to produce. To make ten thousand of them, simply for this seemingly basic, almost useless function, even the Saints would feel heartache, yet...

...it allows ordinary mortals to connect to the Ruined World in the void through dragon veins and enter it... letting the half-formed evil god in their minds descend in the name of a game character... It’s incredibly imaginative!”

This mode is very unique.

The physical body remains in a real-world room, while their evil god, or game character, slays enemies, fights monsters, and cultivates in the Ruined World?

So, this is... an online game?

Bai Xiaosheng continued to ponder, growing secretly astonished. Suddenly, he burst into laughter, “This cultivation method, an online game, is truly brilliant!!”

“Before, I considered that before reaching the Third Tier, the Evil Race couldn’t actively enter the Ruined World. We had to help them absorb various evil thoughts in reality, which was too slow... But this alchemy helmet completely bypasses that stage, allowing direct descent into the Ruined World!”

He had to admit, he greatly admired the Earth Mother’s innovation. The thinking of this ancient being, capable of establishing dragon veins, was truly astonishing! He could never have conceived of such a perfect method!

An online game!

It’s too perfect!

It’s simply a heaven-shaking, ghost-wailing, brilliant idea!

With this, they can promote universal cultivation to resist the world-destroying deluge in ten years!

This system is more complete than one could imagine: virtual helmets, NPCs, quests, novice villages, monster hunting, leveling up...

To achieve such maturity in such a short time, the Earth Mother is terrifyingly formidable!

“Furthermore, the Novice Village Chief and all the villagers are Miraki’s group! Miraki acting as village chief means drawing new Evil Race powerhouses into their sphere of influence... So that’s what the faction selection on the initial page meant?”

“Letting them choose which sect to join? And the level leaderboard, the reputation leaderboard... are those psychological incentives to encourage them to improve?” Bai Xiaosheng took a deep breath. “Then what about the currently empty equipment leaderboard? Are they also supposed to learn alchemy?”

“And what does the Spending Leaderboard mean?”

“As for levels, ten levels should be one tier! Twenty levels for two tiers... each is a significant threshold. Seventy levels, and one becomes a Heavenly Emperor!”

“On the other side, the Evil God Faction’s Novice Village should have Adrian as its chief, guiding newcomers to our Evil God faction!” He took a deep breath. “And we are these so-called faction NPCs.”

The surrounding Evil God Heavenly Emperors couldn't stop exclaiming in admiration.

Bai Xiaosheng suddenly declared, “Let’s go establish another novice village and guide more players to join our Evil God Faction. Then, we can lure nearby evil creatures that match their levels, allowing them to hone their combat skills and improve themselves.”

Bai Xiaosheng immediately entered the Ruined World, but he received another message: new novice villages were not allowed.

They were supposed to establish a game main city?

“What’s a game main city?” Bai Xiaosheng asked.

The Dream God replied, “A game main city is a city players enter after reaching Level 10, or breaking through to the First Tier, leaving the novice village. It’s also where they will operate in the Ruined World!”

Bai Xiaosheng took a deep breath and looked at the Delusional Witch Vinaqi beside him. “You find a place and establish this town. Beautiful women are always popular and will attract more players. After all, we rely on faith, and image is very important. Otherwise, the statues in those churches wouldn’t be so opulent and gilded...”

“Yes!” Vinaqi nodded.

Bai Xiaosheng took a deep breath and strode into the Evil God Faction’s novice village, only to find it nearly empty, with merely a handful of players, far fewer than the opposing side. A look of grim silence flashed in his eyes.

“My lord, what should we do? This is clearly...” a subordinate asked from beside him.

Bai Xiaosheng’s expression remained calm. After a moment of silence, he said, “This nascent Evil Race faction must be controlled... Since our side isn’t attractive enough, let’s create some incentives to make them choose our faction.”

Although he had no prior experience with such things, he was ultimately an extraordinarily intelligent individual.

“This won’t stump me at all.”

Soon, within half a day, large posters featuring the *Virtual Reality* game artwork appeared across various kingdoms, on church walls and bus stops, along with dazzling, enormous text:

“Choose the Evil God Faction: receive five thousand gold coins in reality and a Dragon-Slaying Saber in-game.”