For the next period of time, the entire Phoenix City, and even the entire game world, entered a relatively stable period.
Although people infected with the virus are discovered every day and sent to laboratories around the world, there is less panic. Everyone is busy with their own work, striving to contribute more to Lilang and promote virus research and vaccine development.
Of course, there are some impacts. As more and more people are infected with the virus, fewer people are left outside. At the same time, more space must be created to house the infected, providing them with food and shelter, while also preventing those who come into direct contact with them from being infected. Furthermore, the relatives and friends of the infected also need comfort—not just players, but NPCs, who are even more panicked when faced with this situation, and cannot be ignored.
Yang Jia is still very busy every day, but he lives a fulfilling life every day.
Time slipped away, entering the depths of winter. Under the influence of the virus outbreak, other events in the gaming world seemed to have gone silent.
For example, up to now, all the cities under the jurisdiction of the eight major guilds in the entire Chinese region have been opened up, and the impact brought about by this is a significant increase in the number of human infections. At the same time, the underground passages seem to have undergone some changes, and even the number of times they have been used has begun to be restricted, and fewer people and supplies can be transported every day.
Yang Jia knew this was because the seal's power was weakening, even disappearing. Now that the entire Chinese region was divided into eight regions, the remaining seal's power was practically nonexistent and would slowly dissipate. Once it completely vanished, the barriers between the eight regions would also vanish completely.
By that time, perhaps inter-regional battles would gradually begin. After all, without this natural barrier, players would undoubtedly interact more and more, leading to more friction and clashes. It wouldn't be surprising if this eventually escalated into war.
Moreover, the power of the virus will explode completely by then.
Of course, this period of time should not be too short, because they must be given enough time to conduct research on the virus.
On December 3rd, six months after the launch of the game "Real," tens of thousands of people were infected throughout the game world. On that day, the Phoenix City laboratory finally synthesized the first virus vaccine.
This was a game world, so unlike in real life, there wasn't the need for repeated testing before use. Players' bodies were different from those of ordinary people, after all. However, Yang Jia didn't allow researchers to use the vaccine recklessly. After all, before the results were verified, any mistake could cause the virus to mutate.
Fortunately, this virus has gone through many trials from conception to completion, and finally it successfully controlled the virus in the bodies of the infected people.
After the infected patient recovered and was cleared of any health issues, the entire lab erupted in cheers. After all this time, there were finally results. Even Yang Jia and Li Bai were delighted. After all, they had been the two leading this effort, and now, with results to show for themselves, they could report to the others.
Yet Yang Jia remained quite restrained. She knew this was only the beginning. In reality, once a virus was contained, the disaster would be over. But this was a system-controlled game world. Once the initial virus was contained, it would quickly mutate and return with a vengeance. So, now was far from the time to celebrate.
So, while she joined in the cheers and celebrations, she remained awake. After the brief celebration, she began organizing the materials and teaching the manufacturing methods to her subordinates to mass-produce the vaccine, striving to cure all infected people as quickly as possible. At the same time, even though they knew the effect would be minimal, they still had to take precautions and get everyone vaccinated.
Everyone also knows that vaccine research is just the beginning, so we quickly got back to work.
Yang Jia originally thought that no matter what, the system would at least give everyone some time to breathe and rest, but he didn't expect that someone would be infected with the new virus that night and be sent to the laboratory.
Fortunately, this was not unexpected before, so the laboratory has not allowed the researchers to overdraw their energy, so it is not a big problem if they cannot rest now.
After settling this matter, Yang Jia went to find Bai Ting.
"Although the three continents in the game are not currently connected to each other, you should have a way to get news from there, right? What is the current progress of the other two continents?" Yang Jia asked Bai Ting.
Although major events occurring on the three continents were displayed in everyone's handbook, the content was brief and lacked further detail. As a leader, Yang Jia naturally focused not only on internal affairs but also on external developments. Because she was unaware of the real world, she had lost an advantage over others, and it would take her longer to make up for it.
Bai Ting nodded. "The three regions have been checking in with each other. According to the information we received, the other two regions were originally progressing very slowly, but because the virus broke out here, the system probably pushed forward the progress there in order to balance the progress. The virus has also broken out, just a little later than us."
Yang Jia nodded. This information not only revealed the progress of the other two regions, but also provided a glimpse into the principles of the system's operation.
Logically, Yang Jia's frequent failures to meet their original schedule led to the virus's premature outbreak, while the other two regions hadn't yet reached this stage. However, because the virus had already broken out in the Chinese region, the system simply controlled the outbreak in the other two regions as well. In other words, according to the system's logic, their progress must be similar; if not, it would force the situation forward!
This can also be considered good news for the Greater China region.
Although no one has stated it, competition among the three regions is bound to be fierce, not only in reality but also in the game. Yang Jia pushed the game world forward, causing it to deviate from the system's established path. This impacted the Chinese region, but the impact on the other two regions was even greater. After all, she held the initiative and could make some advance preparations, so the losses to the Chinese region were naturally minimal. The other two regions, on the other hand, passively accepted the outcome, and certainly had no time to react.
As a result, they will inevitably spend more time and lose more power during the subsequent virus outbreak.
Players will not die due to the existence of the virus, but the number of NPCs between the three regions is bound to change dramatically!
"Do you know the progress of virus research over there?"
"I know." Bai Ting frowned. "With the help of real-world data, their vaccine will probably be developed soon."
Bai Ting had barely finished speaking when Yang Jia sensed a change in her handbook. She took it out and flipped through it. Sure enough, the "Chronicle" page had new content: the Americas and Europe regions had both developed virus vaccines.
"I finally got away from them a little, but they caught up with me again," said Bai Ting.
Yang Jia relaxed a lot, and he looked at Li Bai, with a faint smile on his face.
Overall, this is a blessing in disguise. While losses in the Chinese region are inevitable, as long as the losses are smaller than those in the other two regions, they will still be able to maintain their advantage in the future. This is extremely important.
For the first time, Yang Jia discovered that his regional prejudice was actually quite serious.
Logically, as an awakened NPC, she should naturally consider the entire game world. However, perhaps because she lived in the Chinese region, or perhaps because of Li Bai's influence, she felt a stronger sense of belonging to the Chinese region and had little affection for the other two regions.
Since a fight was going to happen, the Chinese region naturally had the upper hand. So while she was heartbroken by the heavy losses incurred by the other two regions, she didn't feel responsible or pressured by it.
However, Yang Jia didn't think there was anything wrong with this. The gaming world wasn't a paradise; where there was conflict, there was bias. After all, she wasn't a saint, and the only people she wanted to protect were her compatriots.
"Why aren't you worried?" Bai Ting couldn't help but ask when she saw the expressions of the two.
Yang Jia said, "Because our advantages are still there."
"It's obvious that they will catch up with us soon." Bai Ting said.
Yang Jia closed the manual. "This is just superficial. Once we get the real data, we should be able to quickly produce a vaccine by simply copying the instructions. If we did that, we would be much faster than them. But I didn't do that. Instead, I asked the researchers to continue studying the virus. While referring to the data, they also conducted various studies to better understand the virus."
"I get it!" Bai Ting suddenly realized. "It's just like when we were doing math problems in school. We studied and figured out the answers ourselves, while they just copied the standard answers, only the results without the process. It seems like everyone can get full marks, but once the problem type changes or the difficulty increases, and there are no standard answers to refer to, we can find the solution based on the formulas and knowledge we learned, but they can't."
"That's exactly the point." Yang Jia couldn't help but laugh when she actually used mathematics to make a comparison. But he had to admit that the analogy was quite apt.
Real-world research data provides the standard answer, but there will always be a day when there is no answer. If we don't accumulate data from the beginning, the difficulty will increase exponentially. Failure to develop a vaccine in a timely manner will result in patients dying every day, causing devastating losses.
Bai Ting thought for a moment and said, "We all know this, so they wouldn't have guessed it, right?"
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