Chapter 522 [(*^▽^*)]
Neither of them were fools, and they absolutely could not say that they had switched sides to him so that they could leave alive in the end. "The villagers are dull-witted and lack humanity. If I were to side with them, it would be the greatest insult to someone like me."
Fu Qingqiu looked at Guo Xia and said, "Since that's the case, then go and kill a few villagers for me to see. If you kill five, I'll believe you."
Guo Chengzheng and Guo Xia were naturally fine with it. They had already been prepared to kill people beforehand, and they felt no guilt whatsoever about harming the villagers.
Although Guo Xia is an official, he can still harden his heart in dungeons; it's inevitable... Which player hasn't killed someone in a dungeon? Even if they were innocent...
Therefore, the official personnel who become players are basically sent to work in the Special Cases Administration Bureau, because their hands are stained with blood and they are no longer suitable for cases in the ordinary world.
Guo Chengzheng: "Don't worry, we will show you our sincerity."
As they were leaving, Fu Qingqiu added, "Oh, by the way, don't interfere with the village chief's family or the Fu family; they're the ones I'm saving for last."
The two agreed and quickly left. It seemed they should be able to return to the village before dark, but would they hide from the other players and reappear in the village tomorrow, or perhaps tonight...?
It was only then that Lin Leyou belatedly realized that there was a Qin Xingyu in the village. What if these two were unlucky enough to run into Qin Xingyu?
Qin Xingyu had no idea who the traitors were, and even if he did, he probably wouldn't give them any face. It was already quite generous of Qin Xingyu to give him and Xue Rui any face.
Forget it, he'd better keep an eye on things. As for the watch and notebook that Guo Chengzheng had brought to the altar, he hesitated for a moment, then put them away and tossed them into his stone coffin, placing them next to the brand-new admission notice. They looked quite harmonious together.
Xue Rui was looking at the players with some confusion. He hadn't expected them to change so quickly. After parting ways with Lin Leyou, he came to the village, and at first, the players hadn't changed much.
But not long after, these people actually started fighting amongst themselves.
Five players died, and two more left, leaving ninety-three players here. Ten new players huddled together, too afraid to join the argument, trembling as they hid in a distant corner.
Meanwhile, the eighty-three veteran players gathered together and kept arguing. Fortunately, they only argued and did not actually fight. If they had fought, they would have had to use items, which would have inevitably resulted in casualties.
The vengeful ghost boss is lurking nearby, and the villagers need their protection. If there are any casualties at this time, it will be very disadvantageous for the players.
Even if people absolutely dislike each other, they're just talking nonsense now, but...
"Since neither of us can convince the other, let's split into two groups."
The reason for this internal conflict is actually quite simple. One side wants to do the side quests along with the main quest, meaning they need to protect the villagers while completing the main quest, in order to get at least 100,000 or even 200,000 to 300,000 in side quest rewards. However, the other side wants to completely abandon the side quests and focus solely on the main quest.
After Guo Chengzheng and Guo Xia left, the conflict began to brew, and now the two sides are arguing fiercely. At the beginning, he was quite far away, so he was not very clear about who started it.
But things are definitely not going to end well now, though it looks like it will soon.
Xue Rui turned around and saw Lin Leyou had arrived. "What's wrong? Those players..."
"It's nothing serious." That's why he hadn't mentioned it to Lin Leyou beforehand using the black jade ring.
He simply said, "They had a disagreement and argued; it looks like they're going to break up."
Lin Leyou, "Disagreement?"
Xue Rui said, "Some people want to completely abandon side quests, while others feel that they should take side quests into consideration."
Lin Leyou: "How come these people can't even distinguish between primary and secondary matters?"
If it were him and Xue Rui, they would definitely stand on the side of completely abandoning the side quests without hesitation. After all, if it's not even clear whether the main quest can be completed, what good would it do to complete the side quests perfectly?
"Actually, this side quest is quite tricky. The reward is based on the success of the main quest, unlike previous side quests and hidden quests, which could be completed in advance even if the main quest was not finished, and the points could be calculated at any time."
Xue Rui said, "Indeed, these players who oppose abandoning side quests probably didn't realize this, or perhaps they did think of it but didn't care, believing they could definitely complete the main quest."
Lin Leyou: "Never mind them. Anyway, they're doing things this way to our advantage. It makes the mission easier, so why not?"
Xue Rui nodded without saying anything.
After much arguing, the players finally decided to let each player make their own decision and then form groups freely.
Players who had completely abandoned side quests gathered together: thirty-five veteran players and ten new players, for a total of forty-five players. Of course... they didn't take the new players seriously; their combat strength was equal to that of the thirty-five veteran players, which was a consensus among everyone.
The reason why all the new players choose to stand on this side is very simple: they are too weak. They are lucky if they can complete the main storyline, and they don't even dare to dream of side quests.
The remaining thirty veteran players need to take care of the side quests as well. In addition, eighteen veteran players banded together and said that they should focus on killing the evil ghost BOSS Fu Qingqiu first, and deal with other things after killing the evil ghost.
To put it nicely, they're just opportunists. Since they don't know if they can complete the main quest, they'll focus on the main quest first. If killing the ghost boss isn't too difficult, they'll go and support the side quests.
Lin Leyou, "He does have some brains, but not many."
"All the players combined are no match for us, not to mention now that there are two more traitors, and they still try to split us up under these circumstances."
Xue Rui: "It can be made simpler."
The two sat on a thick branch at the foot of the mountain, leaning against each other. From a distance, they looked like Zhong Wuyan and Fu Qingqiu, who had truly been together for ten years.
The players who have regrouped now have a clear goal. Those who chose the main storyline are already planning to storm the Evil God Temple, find the vengeful ghost Fu Qingqiu, and then fight him head-on to kill him.
Players who needed to focus on side quests were discussing how to gather all the villagers together when a piercing scream echoed through the village.
Under such a dim sky, the entire village seemed to be shrouded in endless crimson.
The player rushed to the place where the screams came from and found that the entire family had died, with corpses lying haphazardly on the ground.
"The vengeful spirit has already started its attack. We don't have much time left. The villagers absolutely cannot be allowed to be slaughtered by the vengeful spirit like this. If we don't do something soon, the side quest will really be gone."
"Let's look around and see if anyone else has died. Let's go check with the villagers first."
Soon, more and more villagers gathered, and the player found a relatively old man. "Old man," the player said, "the village chief is now dead. I hope you can temporarily take charge of the village, since you should be the most senior person in the village."
The old man hesitated for a moment, but nodded nonetheless. “Alright, but I’m just saying a few words. I can’t do anything with my old bones.”
"It's nothing. We just need to tell everyone to come out of the village. If they can't come out, then we need to check if they're still alive. We need to confirm how many people died last night."
The old man, his hands trembling as he leaned on his cane, nodded and turned to tell the people behind him what he had said. Although they weren't very happy about it, they wanted to confirm how many people were still alive in the village.
Although it was dark, it was still daytime, so the evil spirits shouldn't be out.
With more people handling the matter, they quickly checked the entire village. In the end, they tallied up the numbers and found that, excluding players, there were only 480 villager NPCs!
In other words, so far, including Chen Jian who died on the first day and the village chief who was hanged later, a total of twenty-eight people have died! That's quite a speed...
With so many people dying all at once, all the villagers were terrified and somewhat numb, but the bodies still had to be dealt with no matter what.
The village chief's body was taken down by the players and placed together with these newly found bodies. Now it's impossible to hold funerals for each of them, and no one even cares about holding funerals. What can be done?
“The bodies will rot and stink if we leave them here. Why don’t we find a place to bury them first, and if they can… if they can survive, we can give them a proper funeral.”
Upon hearing this, everyone readily agreed, "That's good, anyway..."
Anyway, it's already good enough that they managed to bury the people. Nobody's in the mood for that now. Of course, the villagers themselves were the ones who dug the pit, while the player was over there discussing with the acting village chief how to protect everyone.
"This isn't a good solution. Even if everyone stays at home or a few households gather together, it won't make much difference. If a vengeful ghost wants to kill someone, it's a piece of cake."
"Killing a person is as easy as strangling a chick; we should think of other ways."
The villagers were terrified. "We want to survive too, but what else can we do?"
Someone asked hesitantly, "Isn't it true that ghosts won't dare to approach if there are many people? Why don't we all just stay together? That way, even if ghosts come, we won't be afraid if there are many of us."
"But is there a place that can accommodate all of us?"
"How about we live separately in several houses that are close to each other? That way, if something happens, other people can come and help in time, what do you think?"
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