Plants vs. Zombies for All: I Can Add Passives to Plants

It immediately perked up, its cannon-like mouth swiveling left and right as it curiously examined its surroundings—new friends Oxygen Algae and Starfruit, along with old friends... Puff-shroom, Cattail Kitty, Chomper, Toadstool...

"Bop?"

Peashooter called out to Starfruit, as if greeting it.

Starfruit... spun slightly faster, scattering a golden star that lightly brushed against it.

Sixth row, second column—

All 175 sunlight was poured into this spot... and Magic-shroom made its entrance.

The planting tile lit up, and a mushroom in a black tuxedo emerged from the glow.

Magic-shroom's cap... looked like a top hat worn crookedly.

Its stem was slender and straight, with a red magician's bow tie tied around its middle, making it look quite gentlemanly.

But this gentleman was anything but composed right now.

The instant Magic-shroom landed, there was a submarine beneath its feet... Outside, the seawater was black as ink, and the pale ocean light illuminated Magic-shroom's abruptly changing face.

Magic-shroom: Σ(°△°|||)

Its stem stiffened, and the entire mushroom seemed nailed in place.

Instinctively, it shifted its center of gravity toward its cap, desperately trying to stay farther away from 6-1, terrified of falling in.

(Magic-shroom: Mushroom isn't just afraid of heights... Mushroom is afraid of depths too...)

"Hahaha—"

Leaning against the console, Lin Yue could not help laughing when he saw Magic-shroom acting as though it faced a great enemy.

A god of war from the old era was actually afraid of water.

"You little thing, you're scared of water too?"

Magic-shroom glanced at Lin Yue, its little face beneath its cap filled with grievance.

A huge bead of sweat hung from the edge of its cap, glistening as it trembled on the verge of falling.

Magic-shroom: (◎﹏◎)

(Who's scared? Mushrooms aren't afraid of water! Mushroom is just... just not used to it! Right, it's an adaptation issue!)

Magic-shroom tried hard to look calm, but every time its peripheral vision caught the deep sea outside the observation window, its stem uncontrollably shrank upward.

Only after quite a while did Magic-shroom barely adapt to the undersea environment.

It still did not dare bounce around like it did on land—back then, it always hopped three times with every step. Now, it carefully shuffled along, testing the ground with its foot before every step.

(Magic-shroom: Mushroom... won't get swept away by the seawater if it jumps, right?!)

(Magic-shroom: It's okay, Mushroom is the best "mushroom.")

While Magic-shroom was still psyching itself up... Lin Yue had already finished editing its passive.

[Passive—Gambler—Judgment Successful]

Lin Yue jolted and immediately opened Magic-shroom's status panel.

The passive ability section had previously been blank, but lines of text were now appearing one after another, and they were even quite complex.

[Gambler]

[Effect: When Magic-shroom attacks, it randomly draws one card from a deck of playing cards each time. After drawing four cards in total, it summons different types of Zombies to assist in battle based on the sum of the four cards' values and their combinations.]

[Judgment Rules—]

[The total value of the four cards is below 18, and there is no special card combination: The effect does not trigger, and this round of draws is void.]

[Special Combination One: A Pair—Any two cards have the same value. Triggered effect: Energy +1, takes effect immediately.]

[Special Combination Two: Straight—The four card values are consecutive. Triggered effect: The number of Zombies summoned is additionally +1.]

[Special Combination Three: Four of a Kind—Four cards of the same value. Triggered effect: Summons one Gargantuar.]

[Special Combination Four: Small Joker + Big Joker—Both cards must appear together. A single one is invalid. When both appear, triggered effect: Summons two Gargantuars and two Football Zombies.]

Lin Yue read through it line by line, and with every line he finished, his eyes shone a little brighter.

Although the system had added a patch... if the four cards totaled less than 18 and there was no special combination... the effect would fail this time.

But... Lin Yue did not believe Magic-shroom's luck was that bad.

The design of this passive skill was too clever. It was not simply a powerful skill; it carried the nature of a gamble.

This was... the result of Lin Yue racking his brains for days.

Simply increasing the number of ultimate moves or mobility... could not produce an overwhelming effect...

On the contrary... the greater the requirements... the higher the ceiling.

Four draws, with completely random results. With good luck, a pair of jokers could clear the field in one go. With bad luck, it might fail to meet the trigger conditions for several rounds in a row.

But it was precisely this uncertainty that made Magic-shroom's potential ceiling terrifyingly high.

At the instant the passive judgment went through, Magic-shroom, which had still been afraid of the seawater, suddenly shuddered.

As if it had realized something?

Magic-shroom's stem straightened, its cap sat properly on its head, and its red magician's bow tie fluttered slightly in the current.

At the same time... the playing cards that would normally only appear when it attacked were now spinning around it.

Magic-shroom tilted its head, adjusted its black mushroom hat, and straightened the red bow tie at its collar.

Light gleamed in Mushroom's eyes. It was not the lively mischievous gleam it had on land, but the composure and arrogance of a Gambler sitting at the card table with a winning hand.

Magic-shroom: Σ(￣△￣;)

(Heh... the seabed? What does water even count for? Mushroom only wants to say one thing—)

Had Magic-shroom not been born, the path of gambling would be like an eternal night.

Horizontal inscription—

"...I'm about to draw a pair of jokers!"

Golden City... the Mastermind Behind the Scenes

Reality, classroom...

The atmosphere in the classroom stood in stark contrast to the chill of the deep sea.

Yet the students at this moment felt a kind of warmth that came from surviving a disaster.

The students who had withdrawn from the event sat in twos and threes at their desks. Some drank water, some lay on their desks to rest, and some quietly exchanged their experiences from the event.

Though most of them looked tired, they were generally in decent condition. No one was seriously injured, and no one was missing.

"Supervisor Luo is out."

Someone said it, and several pairs of eyes turned simultaneously toward a corner at the front of the classroom.

Luo Chen had appeared there at some point.

Leaning against the back of his chair, he did not look well. His lips were slightly pale, and the loose hair over his forehead was wet with sweat and stuck to his skin.

It seemed as though he had encountered something he could not handle...

"Brother Luo gave up too," a girl sitting in the front row said quietly, surprise in her voice.

In Happy Residential Community, over this period of time... everyone had always regarded Luo Chen as their pillar.

He was a supervisor, treated people kindly... and had been everyone's role model since high school.

Many had even speculated... that Luo Chen had awakened a talent.

So when they saw him like this, they could not help feeling uneasy—if even Luo Chen could not hold on, just how difficult had this event been?

Luo Chen did not speak. He merely... nodded at his classmates in confirmation.

His fingers unconsciously rubbed a scratch on the desktop while the final scenes of the event replayed in his mind.

He had encountered a Second-order Zombie.

Luo Chen's talent... had instead become a burden.

(Talent: Risk Hedging... the greater the risk, the better his luck would be afterward.)

The one thing Luo Chen had never expected was... that his talent would activate automatically after entering the event...

Just then, a rough voice burst from the front row, breaking the classroom's brief silence.

"Why?!"

Everyone's attention was drawn over.

Wang Yihang stood beside the podium, drenched from head to toe as though he had just crawled out of a water tank.

His face was red with fury, the veins on his forehead bulged, and one hand slapped the podium so hard that the chalk box jumped.

"The Zombie I ran into—a Third-order Zombie? A Third-order Zombie! Are you picking on me because of my strength?

I'm third-order... that's right, so the system assigned me a Third-order Zombie? I only broke through less than a month ago... Damn it!"

The more he spoke, the more agitated he became, until spit was flying from his mouth.

"My poor Squash—I just planted that Squash! It hadn't even had the chance to do anything before that Third-order Zombie rushed it and started biting it! It nearly got its skin bitten right off!"

By the time Wang Yihang got to this point, his eyes had actually reddened.

He truly felt sorry for his Squash.

Squash had been raised with quite a few resources. It was the main source of damage in his lineup, and even a single bite was enough to make him ache.

If not for... retreating in time, Squash would have had its skin bitten right off.

The students in the class watched their homeroom teacher act like this, wanting to laugh but not daring to.

They had thought their homeroom teacher was a serious guy... but now it seemed he was a total goofball!!!

Seeing... their homeroom teacher genuinely tear up over a Squash somehow made them feel both sad and amused.

Luo Chen did not laugh with them. His gaze slowly swept across the classroom.

Face after face passed before his eyes. Most of them were here.

A few had suffered minor injuries, but none were serious.

No one had died. That result was already a blessing.

But—after counting, four people still had not come out of the event.

Lin Yue, Bai Qingfeng, Zhao Lei, and Passerby A.

All four of their seats were empty.

As one of Happy Residential Community's first residents, Luo Chen had originally thought he was the leader.

Now, it seemed... these four might all be stronger than him.

For the first time in the event, he had felt true helplessness. It was not merely that he lacked sunlight, nor merely that the Zombies were too strong. At the root of it all, he had discovered he lacked something—luck.

Looks like it's time to take on some low-level missions, Luo Chen told himself.

He needed more real combat, more resources, and more experience.

Luo Chen... wanted to be more worthy of his identity as supervisor. After all... when the community's Zombie battlefield War Mode arrived, everyone would have to rely on him.

(War Mode: The supervisor controls the plant defenses of the entire community... and possesses top-level authority over deployment.)

First Federation—Golden City Grand Bathhouse.

Steam permeated the air above the enormous bath, hot mist rolling about and blurring the gold-foil patterns embedded in the ceiling into a hazy glow.

The edge of the bath was paved with milky-white natural marble. Soaked by hot spring water year after year, its surface had become as warm and smooth as jade.

A man soaked in the pool, his wet golden hair plastered against the back of his head, revealing an old knife scar at his temple.

Leaning against the pool wall, he rested one arm on the edge while holding a crystal wineglass. Amber-colored liquor sloshed in the glass, and the steam had drawn out an even stronger scent of alcohol.

A subordinate in a black uniform stood beside the bath, respectful in posture but unable to hide the gloating expression on his face.