Third Watch for Support: Alien: Covenant

Half-asleep, half-awake, Fang Yu thought of many things.

Upgrading from junior college to a bachelor's degree. Finding a job.

Losing his job. Taking out a small loan to learn programming.

Finding a job. Losing it again.

Years of this back and forth, approaching thirty, with nothing to show for it.

He still remembered that night, trying to improve his life by writing a novel in the dead of night, when he saw the system pop-up.

[Do you want to truly live? Do you want to understand the meaning of life?]

"Warning! Warning!"

"Warning! Warning!"

The piercing noise made Fang Yu's head throb!

The moment he woke, he clasped his hands together, ready to deal with any sudden situation!

"All crewmates, report to the outer hold immediately upon hearing the alarm. Repeat, all crewmates, report to the outer hold immediately upon hearing the alarm!"

The urgent urging left Fang Yu confused. He gently pushed open the hatch in front of him, tensed his body, and sat up!

After sitting up, Fang Yu looked around and found that the interior of the cabin was far more complex and chaotic than he had imagined.

The cabin was filled with people who had just woken from hibernation, their expressions dazed, their eyes revealing fear and unease toward the unknown environment.

Most of these people were strangers to Fang Yu. They wore identical white uniforms, clearly other crewmates on the ship.

On the cabin walls, rows of transparent nutrient solution tanks were neatly arranged, with human figures submerged inside.

These figures were missing limbs, clearly stripped of their ability to move. Their presence made the entire cabin's atmosphere even more eerie and terrifying.

The figures in the nutrient solution floated silently, like forgotten test subjects, their eyes hollow and vacant, as if they had lost all perception of the outside world.

Fang Yu felt a chill run down his spine. He realized these might be the Human Pigs made by those three bastards from the Farming Team!

He never expected that in the setting of Alien: Covenant, these Human Pigs would become such an existence.

Reasonable, yet tragic.

He stood up, carefully avoiding the crewmates who were waking up. Some of them were already beginning to realize their situation, their faces showing panic and fear.

The emergency alarm echoed through the cabin, red light reflecting off the nutrient solution tanks in an eerie glow, making the entire scene feel even more urgent.

"Not in the same cabin?" Fang Yu scanned the area and didn't spot the three bastards. He couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief.

Going up against three veteran Farming Team members who had survived at least four horror films at once—his chances of winning were zero.

He had originally planned to use the Substitution Technique to escape as soon as he woke up, but now there was no need to run.

No matter how big the ship was, it only had a few dozen small rooms.

Besides, he no longer had to worry about the Farming Team's three members attacking him.

Raising his wrist, Fang Yu saw the information displayed on the Samsara watch.

Time: 2104

Location: Covenant

[You are one of the 35 crewmates aboard the Covenant. Your mission is to bring 6,000 colonists to a habitable planet for colonization.]

[Each crewmate's life is worth 100 Reward Points. Bonus reward for clearing the mission is based on the number of surviving crewmates. Each crewmate death will deduct from your current Reward Points. If your points are insufficient upon returning to the plaza, you will be erased.]

Mandatory objectives:

[Enter the Engineer Planet]

[Witness the birth of the first Xenomorph]

[Protect the female lead, Daniels]

The original fifteen crewmates from the film had now become thirty-five!

This meant the difficulty of this horror film had reached an astonishing twenty-person raid!

And as fellow crewmates, the three members of the Farming Team were currently coldly watching the remaining newcomers wake up in another cabin.

Da Qiang spat. "Fuck! We have to carry this bunch of trash through a horror film? Is there any way to just kill them off first?"

"Qiang-ge, don't get mad." Er Niu was also grinding his teeth. "Our identities are all crewmates. There's no way we can make a move on these newbies in front of the female lead. And the mission is so complicated. Thirty-five people means thirty-five hundred points! My werewolf bloodline could get me another skill!"

"You only ever think about money! Have you thought about how hard a twenty-person raid is? Goddammit!"

Da Qiang punched the seat. "Why did Kayako's curse repair cost me seven hundred points? Losing an arm or a leg only costs ten!"

"Qiang-ge, thirty-five hundred points! Plus those three missions, maybe we can even kill a couple of Xenomorphs. We're gonna make a killing on this horror film!" Er Niu licked his lips. "If each of the twenty meat pigs can bring back three thousand points, how much would each of us get? Hahaha!"

The cold, venomous scorpion Meng Yao, who had been silent for a long time, finally moved.

Her dagger carved a deep white mark across the glass of the transparent protective pod as she snapped impatiently, "Pig brain!"

"What, what now? Why are you cursing me again?" Er Niu looked a bit defiant but didn't dare say much more.

"A twenty-person team dungeon—how high could the difficulty be?" Meng Yao vented by scraping against the glass with her fingernails, the screeching sound grating on everyone's nerves.

She lifted her head, sweeping her gaze over a burly tattooed man who had just woken up beside her, murder flashing in her eyes. "We have to find a way to leave these people on the Engineer Planet, or they'll definitely become containers for the Main God to hatch Xenomorphs!"

"Not bad!" Da Qiang praised. "No wonder you're the Sage of our team—you think fast!"

He leered at Meng Yao's black stockings with a sleazy look, then quickly averted his eyes elsewhere. "Then we'll ditch these newbies on the Engineer Planet!"

Er Niu looked confused. "Why throw them away? That's all 'money'!"

Meng Yao was furious. "Call you a pig brain, and you really are a pig brain!" She pinched the blade between her fingers. "High rewards come with high risks. Do you think it's easy to let this many people survive to the end? Last time, The Grudge nearly wiped the team! Only four of us were left from the Human Pig! There are too many team members—we can't farm them anymore!"

Er Niu pressed on. "Then what excuse do we use?"

"Damn it! Who cares about the excuse!" Da Qiang stood up angrily. "I'll point this Desert Eagle of mine at them, and let's see who dares to board the ship!"

His voice was loud enough to wake the other newbies who hadn't come to yet.

The Reincarnator members' two rooms were next to each other, and soon the newbies gathered together.

"One, two, three."

The chore of counting heads was handed to Er Niu.

Because of the mission, Er Niu couldn't just lay hands on the newbies, so he had to swallow his temper and maintain order.

"Eleven, twelve."

When Er Niu counted the last one, he paused slightly at the man grinning at him.

But he didn't react much, just finished counting and turned back.

"Thirteen." Er Niu finished the headcount and reported to Meng Yao.

Meng Yao was busy talking to the female lead, Daniels, at the moment and hadn't paid any attention to the team's situation. She waved her hand dismissively to show she understood.

Today is my birthday, o(╥﹏╥)o Third Watch begs for support. It's the end of the month—if you have spare Monthly Passes, toss one to Little Cola, please.