Exploiting Without Replenishing

"Draining the pond to catch all the fish" is a proverb meaning to do things only for immediate gains without considering the future.

But what if the environment resets the day after all the fish are caught? Just like a game refresh, with new monsters appearing every time you enter a dungeon?

Following this logic, the so-called corruption in dreams also seems to make sense.

Just like butchering a live donkey (Note ①), the tender and juicy meat is often the best part. But as the number of times the meat is butchered increases, the donkey's regeneration rate will slow down. At this point, the donkey can no longer provide tender meat, so it can only be killed.

This is probably why people in this dream world become numb and dull as they die more.

When this numbness accumulates to the point where it's difficult to provide enough [consciousness], the corruption mechanism will "reboot" the person. Just as a real person entering the Infinite City becomes Omen upon death, this world's reboot will completely drain all the [consciousness] of this consciousness, thus transforming it into a Weird Tale, that is, Corrupted Creatures.

Those who die completely lose this part of their consciousness permanently, but because reality and dreams are separated, their physical body in reality is still alive. So at most, they will experience headaches, lethargy, neurasthenia, and the like. Before long, they can log back in, and once they log back in, they are new donkeys ready to be slaughtered again.

Although this is merely Feng Xue's speculation based on existing information, considering that Ghost Hand believed he could be killed in a dream, this speculation is probably very close to the truth.

After all, he is a Weird Tale, Main Body is in his consciousness. If it were a regular death in a dream, that would be one thing, but if his consciousness is completely drained to form other Weird Tale, then he is truly dead. The seemingly protein-like body in reality would then be meaningless.

In other words, it's like canceling an online account. No matter how many years you've had the account, as long as you're alive in the real world, you can just register a new one.

But Feng Xue himself is a digital entity, and even if there is backup data after the account is deleted, the restored account is no longer his.

While this sustainable, exploitative, and brutal system might sound inhumane, from Weird Tale perspective, it's undoubtedly a brilliant idea. If you had to describe it, it's probably similar to the feeling a sweatshop evokes for capitalists.

"But thinking about it this way, there's no reason to lock down reality's technology!" Feng Xue looked out the window, somewhat puzzled, but when he saw the lights still bright in the dead of night, he suddenly understood—

So locking the tech tree was actually to help people sleep better!

Without Electric Light and with low productivity, humans could only work from sunrise to sunset (candles and lamp oil cost money). When cheap Electric Light became widespread, the time humans went to sleep was delayed.

With the advent of the information age, staying up late will likely become the norm.

From this perspective, it seems more beneficial to choose an agricultural era. However, without the electrification and industrial reforms, productivity is limited. Limited productivity means a limited population. The difference between 500 million people sleeping 12 hours a day and 5 billion people sleeping 8 hours a day is something even a primary school student can easily calculate.

"So they really did come out to take a look." Feng Xue couldn't help but sigh as she thought about this. Don't be fooled by how simple the structure looks; this senior must have experimented with many worlds to find the right proportions.

"Speaking of which, virtual reality games are essentially based on a similar architecture, but firstly, the number of players is less than the number of dreams, and secondly, players cannot maintain their vitality indefinitely like the corruption refresh mechanism. However, considering that players' consciousness can Supernaturalized bizarre phenomena, there might be a refresh mechanism involved as well. But in terms of the overall architecture, it can only be considered a low-end version, far less complete than the Dream System of this world."

Feng Xue took out her Little Notebook and jot down her inspirations about the world's structure. Suddenly, she understood why Infinite City would send advanced Weird Tale to other worlds where Weird Tale existed.

So, I've become an international student sent by an underdeveloped country to learn advanced technologies?

Feng Xue thought to herself, putting aside whether she, as an international student, was a traitor, the things she learned were definitely his anyway.

Although his moral compass forbids him from engaging in such acts of exploitation against all of humanity, the very structure of this world still offers much to learn from.

For example, there's that organization that, no matter how desperate the situation, will always pass on its experience as long as it doesn't go extinct.

Although the Dream Guardian are definitely opposed to the Weird Tale in terms of factions, their existence is essentially helping the Weird Tale preserve their last embers.

"If it weren't for the examples in this world, I would never have thought of supporting a secret force that was at odds with me..."

Feng Xue jotted down words like "hidden forces" and "villains" in her Little Notebook, while also planning how she would build such a force.

There's a saying that "enemies always know you better than friends," but in the realm of Weird Tale, understanding means the continuation of the flame. The flame that enemies preserve in order to defeat you becomes the key to your continuous revival.

"So Weird Tale are really interesting. Thinking about it this way, if the boss of a classic shonen manga had a Weird Tale core, then everything seems to make sense!"

Feng Xue felt his brain trembling, with endless inspiration bursting forth. He even had an urge to immediately find a purer world to experiment with it, but considering that "Jeston Lab" was still waiting for results, he decided to suppress his restless heart for the time being and put together this strange Weird Tale first.

Just as Feng Xue was jotting down his thoughts in his Little Notebook, at the top of the tallest office building in his small city, a dozen young men and women were sitting on the windowsill, meditating and practicing their internal energy in a posture that seemed as if a gust of wind could blow them off.

Logically speaking, even if there were truly Seeker of the Way of the Dao in this world who would be content to die for it if they heard of it in the morning, it would be impossible for so many immortals to gather in a small city within just a few days after their tribulation, in an era where information transmission was still very slow.

However, the Dream Guardian are ultimately an organization whose tentacles extend throughout the Dream World. After the information about cultivating immortality appeared, in addition to mobilizing their internal members, they also carried out some operations targeting ordinary people.

That is, a strong suggestion experiment.

After all, the problem between the Dream World and the Real World has existed in this world for decades. In the high-tech environment of the dream world, there is naturally no shortage of research on how to bring dream technology back to reality. Nowadays, the topic of cultivation has been ignited on the Internet (in the dream world). There are many people who want to cultivate in reality, but are troubled by their inability to command their real-world counterparts.

At such times, the Dream Guardian only need to devise a pretext to attract a large number of experimental subjects. By implanting the suggestion that "strive to cultivate immortality in reality" into them, even if only one percent or one in a thousand of these suggestions are affected, it will still stir up a cultivation frenzy. And in this frenzy, naturally more people will be unable to resist testing this method of Heaven Stealing Technique.

Given the existence of the "Fated Death" premise, the Dream Guardian feels absolutely no psychological burden regarding allowing others to cultivate and "Heaven Stealing Technique."

I won't die anyway, so I'll just steal it!

Fate has bound this world for so long, can't they turn the tables and squeeze fate out of them?

Note 1: Many delicacies are quite cruel. Forced ducks and fatty liver geese, which have been criticized by animal protection organizations for so long, are well-known examples. As for donkey meat, the history of this practice is even longer.

We have an old saying here, "cutting a nail off a live donkey," which describes doing something unwillingly. This is where the saying comes from.

There's even a saying, "Dragon Meat in the sky, donkey meat on the ground." The "Dragon Meat" here refers to Zhen Ji... oops, I mean hazel grouse, also known as the flying dragon, but it's protected now, and eating it is illegal.

As for donkey meat, if you've actually eaten slaughtered donkey meat, you'll find that it's not all that great. Real underground donkey meat actually refers to the practice of cutting meat from a live donkey, which means making a cut, but not eating the cut meat, and instead eating the tender meat that grows out.

Some people may have seen a donkey with many scars tied up outside a donkey meat sandwich shop. This is actually to tell customers that the shop is authentic and uses live donkeys.

In reality, most of these donkeys are just for show; they don't actually eat. They're just a facade. If you observe carefully, you'll find that this donkey might be in the South District this month, but next month, just when you think the donkey has been killed and replaced with another one, you might see it in the North of the City. After a few months, when things calm down, it will return to the South District.

To put it bluntly, it's just that several roasted meat shops take turns using it, since generally no one is so bored as to remember what a donkey looks like or where its wounds are.