Chapter 362: The Wage-Slave's Wage-Slave

The game room's main door slid open slowly, and a wave of sweat-tinged air rushed out.

The first to come out was the girl who had been holding an e-cigarette earlier; her silver-dyed hair was now a tangled mess plastered to her forehead.

Her eyes, originally done up in smoky makeup, were wide as saucers, her pupils still not recovered from their extreme contraction.

She braced herself against the doorframe and stumbled two steps, her knees visibly trembling, but upon noticing Lex watching her, she forced her spine straight and tugged at the corner of her mouth:

"It was alright… just so-so."

The moment the words fell, she unconsciously swallowed a mouthful of saliva, as if forcibly suppressing the churning in her stomach.

The boy in ripped clothing followed right behind, veins bulging on the back of his hand, his right hand gripping the safety bar in a death grip.

As he stepped through the game room's door, he stumbled, nearly crashing into the metal rack beside him.

"The effects were… pretty real, nice experience."

In front of his friends, he mumbled incoherently, yet his gaze couldn't help but dart back toward the game room, as if afraid something might suddenly burst out from inside, then he forced a calm tone:

"Just the sound effects were too loud."

Only his voice clearly carried a tremor as he spoke.

The last boy to come out was the most wretched; the back of his white t-shirt was soaked through a large patch, as if he'd just been fished out of water.

He didn't say a single word, just braced himself against the wall and gasped for air, his face deathly pale as if coated with a layer of paper.

His gaze was still somewhat unfocused, as though he remained immersed in the terrifying scene.

As if remembering something, the next second his legs went so weak he could barely support his body, wanting to squat down on the ground, but a companion jabbed him with an elbow.

His gaze shifted at this moment to the two friends watching him, and he immediately straightened his back sharply, stuck out his neck, and said:

"Not a bad experience, pretty interesting."

After saying that, he secretly shuffled half a step to the side, using his companion's body to hide his wobbling legs.

Lex stood behind the control console, watching the newly refreshed scare-value gain of +36 on the screen, the corner of his mouth curving up uncontrollably.

He cleared his throat lightly and pointed at the payment terminal beside him:

"Three of you, the total for this experience is 180 Star Points, just scan at the terminal."

The boy in cargo pants seemed to just remember this part, reaching into his pocket, his fingers fumbling around in his trouser pocket for ages before finally pulling out a personal terminal, mumbling "what's the rush" under his breath, though his eyes didn't dare meet Lex's.

Then he scanned it on the payment device; a "beep" payment confirmation sounded, and afterward, as if relieved, he grabbed his companions and headed straight for the door.

Lex deliberately pretended not to see their embarrassment and asked with a smile:

"Were you all satisfied? Would you like to try some other scenes?"

"No, no." The boy at the front waved his hands while backing away:

"Next time… we'll come back next time."

Then the three of them almost turned in unison, hurrying toward the door with quick steps, none daring to look back.

When they reached the door, the boy in the white t-shirt's legs went weak beneath him, nearly tripping on the steps, and only steadied himself with difficulty when his companions hooked his arms.

After the door slammed shut with a "bang," Lex turned his head to look at the screen.

36 points of scare-value couldn't buy any merchandise, but he was very satisfied with the preliminary test results.

He believed it wouldn't be long before this city's screams would come flooding in like the tide, paving his path toward the extraordinary.

To attract more customers to come challenge it, he decided to first set up a challenge ranking through the local network.

Having an idea, Lex immediately took action, his fingers tapping rapidly on the control console.

A new document popped up on the screen, the title he typed out as 【Hero Ranking Board】.

The ranking he wanted to set up wasn't about who cleared it fastest.

That would be too ordinary, and wouldn't squeeze out more scare-value.

There were surveillance cameras in the game, so he decided to observe the visitors' states through the cameras.

The acquisition of courage points could be calculated from factors like how long players stayed in the scene, the dangers they triggered, and so on.

For example, how many seconds they faced a monster head-on in the scene could earn them how many courage points.

The more courage points, the higher the ranking.

This setting was designed to poke at the competitive spirit of contemporary young people.

Next, some reward mechanisms could also be set up.

For example, the top ten on the weekly courage board could receive cash rewards.

Their names could also be hung in the most prominent spot in the venue, followed by a small line of text: The Bravest Warriors of Neon Harbor.

To enhance immersion, he also planned to bury several more surveillance cameras in the game room to automatically capture players' split-second reactions when facing horror.

When the rankings updated, a few "highlight moments" could be selected and posted on the board—of course, with mosaics to protect privacy.

What he wanted was to make them compete with each other.

Lex stared at the draft on the screen, grinning like a fox that had stolen a chicken.

He understood the young people of Neon Harbor all too well.

They'd rather tough it out while trembling than endure being called "chickens."

Even if it cost Star Points to challenge repeatedly, they had to move their names up the leaderboard.

The essence of this ranking board was a cage built from vanity and competitiveness.

Once they stepped inside, they'd willingly contribute wave after wave of scare-value for him.

He could even set up a group experience mode—for example, five people per team—and create a separate group ranking based on their performance.

But the most important thing was still the realism of the scene experience.

The stimulation brought by the Nightmare System's experience, which was indistinguishable from reality, couldn't be matched by drugs.

That immersive sense of horror would still send shivers down one's entire body, even knowing it was all fake.

The brain could rationally tell itself that this was just a virtual experience, that those blood-and-flesh monsters, those whispers echoing in the ears… were all fake.

But the body betrays reason, making the heartbeat accelerate uncontrollably.

This is the most terrifying aspect of the Nightmare System.

The scenes it generates are so realistic they bypass logical thought and directly stimulate the most primal instincts.

Like standing at the edge of a cliff—even if the railing is solid and reliable, your knees still go weak when you look down.

Reason, in the face of survival instinct, is fragile beyond resistance.

But once the experience ends and the challenger safely returns to reality, that post-disaster sense of collapse instead makes them feel an intense joy and thrill.

This feeling might be addictive.

Adrenaline surging, dopamine rebounding, endorphins easing pain… this process from extreme tension to sudden relaxation is like riding a roller coaster.

He kept refining the draft content, then opened the local network forum and saved the drafted content.

Next, he prepared to continue receiving a few more waves of visitors, then wait for word-of-mouth to ferment.

As long as players who experienced it went back to tell friends about their encounters, more and more challengers would come, attracted by reputation.

By then, the initial wave of popularity would essentially be ignited.

Besides customers, even competitors running similar venues probably couldn't resist sending people to probe the truth and try it out.

The only question was how to explain this technology.

The realism of the Nightmare scenes clearly surpassed any existing technology, making it hard for him to give a reasonable explanation.

But he didn't need to respond to this question at all.

This sense of mystery itself was one of the selling points.

The next day, Lex made a new sign for the venue, replacing the original "Illusory Dream."

The new sign used blue-purple neon tubes to outline the five characters "Nightmare Experience Hall," with the font edges deliberately designed to be jagged, as if chewed by something.

He also added a line of small text below the sign: Brave ones, dare to face fear head-on.

The provocative tone between the lines was ten times more direct than the previous billboard.

The day after the sign was replaced, the earliest to show up were a few teenagers with dyed green hair, their arms still bearing bruises from underground fighting arenas.

Most likely drawn by the discussion topic posted on the forum, or possibly recommended by the three previous players.

The moment they entered, they started clamoring:

"Open up your most brutal scene, bros here today want to see if it's really as scary as you brag."

For customers who came on their own, Lex naturally gave them a warm welcome, cheerfully opening Horror Scene No. 4 for them.

In less than half an hour, the game room's door was flung open, and the dyed-hair teenagers burst out pale-faced, one of them even vomiting in the hallway.

Glancing at the scare-value earnings on the monitor, Lex beamed with joy.

News about the Nightmare Experience Hall spread like wings in the following days, circulating among the young people's circles of Neon Harbor.

Some came with an attitude of disbelief, only to be scared by the "Me in the Mirror" scene into not daring to look in a mirror for days.

Some brought girlfriends to show off, but in the end it was the girls who dragged the paralyzed boy out of the game room.

Other small groups formed teams specifically to climb the rankings, fighting over the top spot, arguing fiercely on the forum with other teams, even arranging offline showdowns, asking Lex to serve as referee, competing based on the courage-value points in the rules.

On the local network forum, posts about the "Nightmare Experience Hall" quickly piled up into a tower of ten thousand floors.

Some analyzed the calculation patterns of courage values, some shared their feelings during the experience… but the most lively content was still the highlight moments.

On the real-time updated leaderboard, those pixelated moments of embarrassment always sparked heated discussion.

Some were scared into hugging their heads and crouching, some tried to force themselves forward only to find their legs soft as noodles, some swung fists at empty air… Lex's business was so good he needed to hire temporary workers to handle payment and cleaning.

And all he had to do was watch the scare-value numbers jumping on the backend every day—from the initial few dozen points, to several thousand later, then over ten thousand—grinning so wide his mouth couldn't close.

The scene space, because of its popularity, was also expanded using scare value, now able to accommodate over a hundred people for offline experience simultaneously.