0042: Not Short of Cash

Boss Shi played "Legend" like a madman.

Never mind how much he had spent on equipment—he even had his own dedicated power-leveling team.

At first, he had hired only one power-leveler, but later he found the leveling speed insufficient, so he hired several more to take turns playing.

Since there was a power-leveling team, there had to be a team leader—effectively Boss Shi's "game secretary."

This game secretary had also started out as a power-leveler. His real name was difficult to verify; whenever he gave interviews, he liked to use the alias "Xie Ming." Later, he became an administrator for the "Zhengtu" development team.

For now, they would call him Xie Ming as well.

"Brother Ming."

"Morning, Brother Ming."

As Boss Shi's game secretary and the leader of the power-leveling team, Xie Ming arrived at the game office early in the morning.

He checked the equipment and gold obtained the night before, signed off on two power-levelers changing shifts, then turned on his computer and went to idle in chat rooms.

This life was boring as hell!

Since "Legend" had gone more than half a year without an update, Boss Shi's account had long since reached level 46, while reaching level 47 still seemed impossibly far away.

Boss Shi himself had gotten sick of it too and often failed to show up for half a month at a time. When he occasionally came to play, he would take the power-leveling team members out to PK. Once he had had his fill of cutting people down, he would log off and leave; if he got slaughtered instead, he would curse up a storm.

Often, both sides of a PK would get riled up and use overpowered cheats against each other in another round, frequently getting reported and banned because of the cheats.

Once, Boss Shi had even gone all the way to Shanda headquarters and personally asked Boss Chen to unban his account.

Xie Ming stayed in chat rooms until noon. After lunch, he returned, signed off on the power-levelers changing shifts, then lay down on the couch for an afternoon nap.

The two power-levelers on duty teamed up to kill monsters and level Boss Shi's character.

The other power-levelers did whatever they pleased. Some even went off to play "Journey to the West 2."

While bored out of their minds, they were also afraid Boss Shi would fire them.

After all, Boss Shi spent less and less time playing personally. Who knew when he might lose interest in "Legend" altogether?

The day dragged on until evening.

Xie Ming went to dinner with the idle power-levelers. When he came back to sign off on another shift change, one of the power-levelers who had just gone off duty said, "Brother Ming, "Legend of the Abyss" opens tonight. A lot of players have agreed to go over together."

"What's this "Legend of the Abyss"?" Xie Ming asked.

"You haven't heard of it?"

"Is it famous?"

"These past few days, lots of players in Legend have been talking about it. I even went to the forums and read the posts myself."

"..."

His subordinate's words made Xie Ming quite curious. After returning to his computer and logging into 17173, he soon found himself reading posts and laughing. He even joined the discussion and replied to several threads.

The posts resonated with him too.

His resentment ran even deeper than that of ordinary players. If Shanda kept refusing to update the game, Xie Ming might lose his job because of it!

"Brother Ming, let's go try it out together," one power-leveler said with a grin.

Xie Ming thought it over, then instructed them, "Those changing shifts at midnight, hurry up and get some sleep. Those currently on duty, keep grinding "Legend" properly. The rest of you can play "Legend of the Abyss" for a while."

The power-levelers had plenty of freedom. They could occasionally take leave when they had something to do, as long as they privately arranged for someone to cover their shifts.

Their computers were well-equipped and their broadband was fast. They quickly downloaded the game, chatting as they waited for "Legend of the Abyss" to launch.

Just as they entered the game, Boss Shi arrived.

And he reeked of alcohol.

"Boss!"

"Boss!"

"..."

The power-levelers all stood up to greet him.

The power-leveler operating the main account even gave up the computer and casually spun the chair halfway around.

Boss Shi plopped down into it.

Everyone else logged into "Legend," instantly changing from power-levelers into gaming companions.

Boss Shi was in a bad mood that day. The moment he entered the game, he started hacking at people everywhere, and the power-levelers could only follow along and hack away with him.

Boss Shi had already decided to sell Brain Gold and Golden Partner, and the final round of negotiations had just concluded a few days earlier.

Today, his startup partners had argued with him because they were dissatisfied with his stubborn insistence on doing things his way!

A dinner gathering ended on bad terms.

"Where's my booze?"

After hacking away for a while, Boss Shi flung aside the mouse and shouted.

Xie Ming hurriedly ran off to get red wine and glasses.

Later, Boss Shi came to enjoy sauce-aroma baijiu, but at this stage, he preferred red wine. He poured himself a glass of expensive red wine and, without even letting it breathe, gulped it down.

The power-levelers were so frightened they barely dared to breathe. They could all tell that their boss was in a terrible mood tonight.

The max-level player Boss Shi had cut down did not leave after dying. His corpse remained there as he cursed furiously, "Fuck your mother! Got the guts to fight me one-on-one?"

"Fuck off!"

Boss Shi typed back.

The other player kept lying there as a corpse and cursing. Boss Shi guarded the body and traded insults with him.

The power-levelers also ran over, forming a circle around the corpse and helping their boss curse out the enemy.

Unable to endure the abuse any longer, the other player snapped, "Fuck this shitty game, I'm done playing. I'm deleting my account right now and going to play Legend of the Abyss. Come chase me down and kill me again if you fucking dare!"

With that, the corpse vanished.

With no one left to vent at, Boss Shi leaned back in his computer chair and closed his eyes to rest.

The power-levelers did not dare speak. They silently sat at their respective computers.

After a while, Xie Ming noticed that the boss had fallen asleep. He fetched a blanket and covered Boss Shi with it so he would not catch cold.

"Brother Ming, what do we do?"

"You guys go play on your own. Don't make any noise. I'll keep watch here. No need to stay on shift—those of you changing shifts, hurry home and get some sleep."

No one knew how long had passed before Boss Shi woke up needing to pee.

He went to the bathroom, and when he came back, he did not play any games. Instead, he asked Xie Ming, "What do you think about me making games?"

Xie Ming replied, "Boss, I don't understand business. I only know how to play games."

Boss Shi said with a smile, "One day, I'll put together a game development team, and you'll be responsible for managing them."

Xie Ming said uneasily, "But I don't know anything about management either."

Boss Shi said, "You manage the power-leveling group pretty well."

Xie Ming did not know how to respond. He was quite expectant, but also nervous and unsettled.

Boss Shi was not acting on a whim; he had already formed a complete plan. After poaching a game development team, he would personally serve as the planner and come up with all those pay-to-win schemes from Zhengtu.

In another twenty-odd days, once he had straightened out the distribution of benefits within the company, Boss Shi would sign off on selling Brain Gold and Golden Partner. Then he would search everywhere for a development team and devote himself fully to making games.

Boss Shi finally noticed that something was off. Looking again at the chat window, he saw people discussing "Legend of the Abyss."

"This is hilarious. Even a private server can get lagged into a server crash."

"I just came back from 17173. The forums are really lively over there."

"I'm fucking awesome, keep the formation."

"I'm fucking awesome, keep the formation."

"Stop fucking spamming. This is Legend; if you want to spam, go play a private server."

"..."

Xie Ming said, "A lot of players have gone to play private servers. Those who can't get into the private server have gone to spam the forums instead. Some people aren't even playing the private server—they just go to the forums to watch the excitement."

Under Xie Ming's guidance, Boss Shi logged onto the forums.

He browsed the posts while listening to Xie Ming explain what had happened.

After a long time, Boss Shi stared at several popular threads and said, "There are signs that someone manipulated this. You wouldn't notice without studying it carefully. Whoever made this private server is definitely an expert."

Xie Ming asked in surprise, "These posts were deliberately manipulated?"

Boss Shi browsed for a while longer. "I'm not sure. Maybe it's just a coincidence. But it's too much of a coincidence. I don't believe things can be that coincidental. Did you download this private server?"

"We did," Xie Ming said.

Boss Shi immediately ordered, "Everyone who hasn't gone home, come in with me."

Half an hour later, Boss Shi—who had never played private servers before—was having an absolute blast in Legend of the Abyss.

It could not be helped. He had long grown sick of the official Legend server, which had not been updated for half a year. The changes in the private server felt fresh instead.

After Boss Shi and his power-levelers completed the quest to receive tickets, they eagerly headed off to farm the Abyss Dungeon.

The tickets received from the quest had a line of small text beneath them: Quest item, cannot be traded.

Near Old Soldier, many players were shouting, "Forming a party for Woma Abyss, solo players only, solo players only! Party players who steal equipment, fuck off far away~~~"

Boss Shi watched for a while, then said to Xie Ming, "Call them back to run the Abyss. I'll reimburse their taxi fares!"

A party could have at most ten people, but if they teamed up with strangers, there would definitely be disputes over looting equipment after killing the BOSS.

Xie Ming made several calls in succession. The power-levelers who had just arrived home hurriedly took taxis back to accompany their boss.

They played for nearly another two hours, raising everyone's levels and equipment. One boss, one group leader, and six power-levelers—a total of eight people—entered the dungeon.

They were directly teleported to a corner of Woma Overlord Hall.

There seemed to be an invisible barrier here. The rest of the area was densely packed with monsters, while this corner was exceptionally safe.

"Fuck, this place is full of Abyss-mutated monsters!"

"Take it slow. Mages, cast Fire Wall. Daoists, apply poison. Warriors and skeleton pets, get up front."

"The skeletons' levels are too low, and the Daoists only have level 0 Heal."

"I'm almost out of health potions and Sun Water!"

"We're dead, we're dead. Our levels are too low, and our gear is garbage. We'll probably need to replace everything with Abyss mutant gear!"

"..."

Before even half the monsters on the screen had been killed, Boss Shi's eight-man party had been completely wiped out.

Some of them could have used Return Scrolls to escape, but since the boss had already died, they could only stay behind and die with him.

Xie Ming opened his inventory and burst out laughing. "A minor monster dropped an entry ticket, and I picked it up! This run wasn't a loss—I've already earned back the ticket cost... uh..." He abruptly stopped laughing. "Boss, are we still going?"

Boss Shi was topping up QQ. "Recharge money, buy more tickets, and keep going! The monsters in here have a higher chance of dropping mutant equipment. Run it a few more times and we'll be fully geared in low-level mutant equipment. Remember to pick up anything with a red glow. If you can't hold on, return to town. Once our gear improves, we'll definitely be able to kill the Abyss Woma Overlord!"

This style of play really was only possible for people with money to burn.

When he had first started playing Legend, he had lost a PK match and gotten so mad that he immediately spent fifty thousand yuan on equipment.

"Recharge three thousand. My surname is Shi—get your boss over here." Boss Shi typed rapidly.