Chapter 363: Mutual Support and Grouping, The Strange Players (Second Update)

Star Fall World.

Following New Cassini, the second city Wei Shan laid out, "Neon Port," has gotten on track.

The preliminary test of the agent model left him very satisfied.

The production models of the two cities also have an essential difference.

The underlying tone of New Cassini is the Survival Dilemma.

In this city that became half-ruined after the Endless Law Clan's invasion, residents face the reality of energy shortages and material scarcity the moment they open their eyes each day.

Their environment forces them to experience end-of-the-world survival every single day.

Challenging the Nightmare Trial Grounds is, in essence, for their survival.

To get rewards and ensure they and their families have clean water and food, they grit their teeth and endure the trials within the dungeons.

This willpower to risk everything for survival is like a layer of natural armor.

Since the cruelty of reality already exists, the terrifying experiences in the virtual scenes actually reduce the fear value yield.

But there are advantages as well.

The mechanism that allows exchanging for rewards keeps resident participation stable.

They will not give up the challenge easily; they will face their inner fears as much as possible.

The disadvantage is that forcing oneself to endure for survival greatly reduces the purity of fear.

It is like a group of survivors in a desert who are already at the limit of thirst and hunger; even if they can drink salt water, they will flock to it, as it at least temporarily relieves their current pain.

Therefore, the comprehensive fear value output of New Cassini is considerable, but the individual output is low.

The model of Neon Port is completely different.

This city, untouched by the flames of war, is materially abundant yet spiritually barren.

The youth's thirst for stimulation is already carved into their bones.

They enter the Nightmare Experience Hall also to pursue more stimulating experiences.

The mindset of coming for vanity and stimulation makes their tolerance for fear far inferior to the situation in New Cassini.

Without the shackles of survival pressure, their emotions are like an undefended dam; any slight disturbance in the virtual scenes can trigger towering waves.

The advantage of Neon Port lies in the extremely high individual fear value output; every heart-wrenching scream is worth the endurance of multiple New Cassini residents in the scenes.

But the disadvantage is also obvious.

Their enthusiasm comes quickly and leaves quickly; once a scene loses its novelty, it will recede like a tide, requiring Lex to constantly use new dungeons to maintain attraction.

And another benefit of the agent model is the agent himself.

Lex is a native resident of Neon Port.

He clearly knows what the youth chase, what they fear, and what kind of horror can precisely pierce their nerves.

There is no need for Wei Shan to expend energy researching local culture; the agent himself is the best horror scene calibrator.

This understanding of the current society and the personally experienced growth environment is far more useful than him checking data.

After granting scene editing permissions, it is equivalent to turning on the "auto-update" mode.

Lex will run the Nightmare Experience Hall better and better, bringing him more fear value revenue.

With an agent, he can completely be a hands-off boss.

From scene construction to dealing with challengers to updating horror dungeons... all is handled single-handedly by the agent.

This means nearly zero-cost content iteration.

He only needs to receive fear value and occasionally throw out some small toys from the Monster World, and Lex will willingly expand the market for him.

The agent model is, in itself, an experiment in delegating power.

The preliminary test was a huge success.

As for which specific model to move toward in the future, there is no need to make a decision yet.

He has plenty of time to wait and see which of the two models is better, or to keep both models.

The layout of the small world does not force a choice between the two.

But under the agent model, there are problems that need improvement.

That is, when the agent exchanges items from the Nightmare Shop, how to quickly send the exchanged items to the agent's hands.

He cannot stay in the small world at all times.

The Monster World is his main battlefield.

This is different from praying to the Painful Painful Minghun; players laying out end-of-the-world small worlds only need to hang a divine post in the small world.

Even if they do nothing, even while in the Monster World, they can still continuously obtain prayer power.

But the agent model he laid out is different.

He cannot estimate exactly when the agent will need to exchange rewards, nor can he stay in the agent's city at all times.

A solution that allows completely letting go of this problem cannot be found for now.

He plans to set a time in the future, for example, exchanging rewards on a specific day of each month.

Once the time is fixed, on that day he will teleport from the Monster World to the small world to distribute the exchanged rewards to the agent.

Having been in Neon Port for some time now, he needs to return to New Cassini as soon as possible to check the development situation there.

In terms of urban construction planning and resource allocation, there are still many affairs he needs to be responsible for and handle.

Through the full-speed flight of the vehicle flying skateboard, Wei Shan quickly returned to the city atop the ruins, New Cassini.

For the next two days, Wei Shan wandered around the city.

Checking the recovery of various facilities and the output increase of daily resources.

Unlike the agent trusteeship model of Neon Port.

As the behind-the-scenes manager of this city, he feels he has endless tasks to handle.

He had only just returned when he discovered a pile of trouble waiting for him.

The farmland to the east had been contaminated by radiation dust during the End-Law Tribe's invasion; the topsoil had hardened into grey-black clumps, so much so that not even weeds could grow there, let alone crops.

Merely scattering Monster World spirit soil over this kind of land would only treat the symptoms, not the root cause.

Spirit soil's function was to accelerate growth, but the grain that grew was tainted by radiation and utterly unfit to eat.

Faced with this problem, he chose to seek help from his own Shangcheng, purchasing a few purification tools.

He cleaned the land carefully, stripping out every last trace of energy radiation.

Once he was sure there was no problem, trouble came from the Gear Gang's side.

They reported that many pieces of engineering equipment couldn't be started at all because they were missing energy modules.

Although the energy-module factory was still standing, the prerequisite for resuming production was repairing the engineering facilities.

But without energy modules, there was no way to start up the mechanical equipment needed for the repairs.

With no other choice, Wei Shan could only buy energy crystals from the Shangcheng, then use his spiritual force converted into telekinesis to knead them into the size of energy modules and try to start the machines.

The result was that the energy output was too great, and a piece of mechanical equipment was instantly blown apart.

Wei Shan had no choice but to change his approach, look through forum materials, and study in detail the output efficiency of energy crystals.

Then he bought an energy-engraving knife from the Shangcheng, and with the Painful Painful Minghun of a Hawk-Headed Yao, carved three new energy tracks into the energy crystal.

Only then was the problem of the missing energy modules solved.

Even more troublesome was that many pieces of engineering equipment were missing precision parts.

In these ruins, there was simply no substitute to be found.

Wei Shan had no choice but to turn to the Arms Merchant Guild, spending money to buy back components made by players and install them.

When he ran into parts that truly couldn't be matched, he had to find a more professional, fastidious team — they were professional hand-crafting experts.

As long as you gave them Shou Shou Jili, they could solve many problems.

Many of this ruined city's problems had to be kept running by his transfusions of resources.

At least until industrial capacity was fully restored, he had to personally pitch in and assist with development.

Only once the entire city had fully entered a stable operating state could he extricate himself from it.

At dusk, he stood atop the half-repaired energy station, gazing at the scattered lights being lit by residents in the distance.

Those lights flickered on and off, like fragile fireflies, yet weighed on him more heavily than the neon of Neon Harbor.

Lex of Neon Harbor only had to worry about whether nightmare scenes were scary enough, whereas what he faced here were real, tangible survival necessities.

The one small consolation was that this city's scare-value output was twenty-eight times that of Neon Harbor.

Moreover, it was still in an explosive growth phase, so there was basically no need to worry about subsequent scare-value production.

A little hardship, a little exhaustion, but at least there was something to look forward to in the future.

Over the next two days, Wei Shan remained busy in New Cassini.

That day, just as he had finished the work at hand, a subordinate came hurrying in to report.

They said the Iron Hand Gang in the southern district had secretly skimmed part of the food and water that should have been distributed to the challengers.

Some residents who resisted had their arms injured in the beating.

Hearing this, Wei Shan was instantly furious.

Only after asking in detail did he learn that several similar incidents had already secretly occurred.

These little schemes kept bubbling up like foam in the tide.

The specific reason was not hard for Wei Shan to understand.

The gang leaders at the time still remembered his deterrent power, but the small bosses underneath had long been unable to restrain themselves.

They had never personally witnessed his methods outside nightmare scenes; perhaps they only saw him as a character who bluffed people with "dream-making," and felt that the city's operation couldn't do without them.

After all, clearing the ruins and maintaining order were, on the surface, all being done by these gang members.

To solve this problem, Wei Shan had his subordinate summon every boss and underling of the eight major gangs to the abandoned mining district in the city's eastern sector.

This time, he intended to settle the matter once and for all.

While waiting, the bosses and members of the eight major gangs arrived one after another.

Wei Shan stood in midair; every time his gaze swept across a face, it made the person lower their head.

Once all the members had assembled, his gaze turned toward a spot not far away.

A scrapped mining machine was parked there — a steel body over ten meters tall, rust-streaked, yet radiating an oppressive pressure; the ground its treads had rolled over still bore deep gouges.

At that moment, Wei Shan raised his right hand and pointed at the mining machine from afar.

Immediately, the teeth-grating screech of metal grinding rang out.

The mining machine's hard alloy shell, as though gripped by an invisible giant hand, caved inward in an instant.

Sparks burst from the twisted folds of steel.

The massive body of over ten meters shrank continuously as Wei Shan's five fingers slowly closed.

The treads, the drill bit, the cab were squeezed together as though crumpling a paper ball,

and the originally sharp metal edges were ground into dull, rounded curves.

Seeing this scene, every gang member's eyes went wide, and some even instinctively took a step back.

Wei Shan slowed the pace of the compression, letting the screech of metal grinding roar in every gang member's ears.

One minute later, Wei Shan released his hand.

The spherical metal ball, held aloft in midair, crashed to the ground with a heavy thud, making even the earth tremble.

After doing all this, Wei Shan turned with a smile to look at those pale-faced bosses:

"New Cassini is short on people to do the work, but it's not short on disobedient trash."

His gaze swept across every face:

"Now that I think about it carefully, I wonder — is your flesh and blood harder, or is the mining machine harder?"

Hearing these words, the members of the various gangs all felt their hearts go weak.