Player Reload

There are all kinds of 2D penguin images: the old children’s cartoon "PINGU," the WhatsApp penguin that keeps chasing you to top up Q Coins, and the cooing, gaga-smelling penguins.

But in the killing field environment, the staff-wielding penguin is only bound to the Teleportation Phone Booth. Maybe you also have to add the Toy Factory.

Zoo employee Li Cheng recalled his identity at the first instant; a shock thundered through his heart, but his face remained impassive.

With the corner of his eye he swept around, "So it’s Lord Penguin. Your name is long renowned; to see you today is my great fortune."

"Just call me Achili."

The penguin seemed to have guessed what Li Cheng was thinking, and spoke first: "Don’t worry, this is still the Crimson Cinema set. It’s only because the cinema itself is rather special that my Divine Sense can cross the killing field and speak to you directly."

"Is that so..."

Li Cheng’s thoughts spun rapidly. A dozen countries, dozens of guilds, had poured countless funds, manpower, and research resources into the killing field phone booths, yet none had figured out the basic principle behind the booths’ Teleportation.

The imitated Teleportation Arrays either couldn’t reach far enough, or the Consumption price was too high; some even had safety hazards, directly cutting the teleported person along the middle dotted line.

Even the Level 40 Side of Truth had mentioned privately in chat that he likewise couldn’t recreate the phone booth’s technology.

After a brief pause, Li Cheng weighed his words and asked, "Have you come to reclaim the Toy Factory?"

"Reclaim? No, no, no,"

Achili shook his head. "The Toy Factory’s mission is to wholeheartedly create joy, and judging from the way you handled Toy City, you did achieve that. You’re fully qualified to inherit the Factory."

With that, Achili raised his furry palm, and a miniature phantom of Toy City floated in his palm. Sakura Kinomoto, Dumbledore, and others stood on a high rooftop, waving from afar in greeting to Li Cheng.

"I–is that so."

Li Cheng felt a bit guilty. Call it a Toy Factory, but the stuff produced recently were all ball-breaking items,

like the [Steel Body Converter] that could turn him into steel and iron, with Infinite Strength, but guaranteed to develop rheumatism on rainy days;

the [Mother Nature’s Staff] that automatically won the love and worship of all nearby animals, including mites, flies, and mosquitoes;

the [Ouyezhi Nail Clipper], which could cut iron like mud, on par with a high-frequency cutting blade, but was only 6 centimeters long;

The reason for so many bizarre debuffs wasn’t always Li Cheng’s own twisted sense of humor, nor the Cylinder Machine Servants and Square Robot Servants being unreliable,

but rather the customers’ own Active requests.

Compared to an item with 60 points of effect, many customers would grit their teeth for an item with 80 points of effect and 20 points of side effects.

At critical moments, a single point more or less in item strength is the distance between life and death.

Raise it by a point and you can slaughter a thousand people—this really happens.

Achili withdrew his palm, his expression turning serious as he said, "Time is limited; the top level of Four Realms Mountain is already a complete mess. I’ll keep this short.

After this ’Song of Kings’ ends, the Level cap of your killing field will be adjusted to Level 50, but that’s not necessarily a good thing.

Raising the Level cap means Earth will find it harder to conceal itself and will attract more prying eyes, covetous gazes, and tests."

Li Cheng’s brows knitted tightly. He asked, "Tests—from whom?"

"Otherworld Players, Exotic Realm Summoners, and even challengers from downstream Parallel Earths."

Achili smiled and said, "You should have seen Native NPCs from Parallel Earth planes who became Players through their own effort or fortuitous encounters, right?

Earth Players can go to Native Worlds and run wild, leave behind a mess, and pat their asses as they walk away.

But Native NPCs can hardly smuggle themselves onto Earth.

The gap lies in the fact that there are more Earth Players, and in the killing field they occupy a greater share, being in an upstream, advantaged position.

In your terms, Earth is a main branch of the World Tree, while Native Worlds are offshoot twigs extended from Earth—weak by nature.

For High-level Players from Native Worlds, whether out of feelings for their Home or out of consideration for their own safety, they cannot accept a weak position.

Either they exert themselves, finding ways for their world to generate more Summoners, shedding that weak status.

Or they drag the Main World down to the same weak level as their own."

Native Summoners...

At these words Li Cheng instantly thought of Jiang Zhihui, the Shikigami user; the female scientist Oracle in a wheelchair; Obama; and the recently encountered Phase Change Demon.

He weighed his phrasing, then asked in a low voice, "My strength is limited. I don’t know what you need me to do?"

Mm... although Li Cheng’s power was already decent—if let loose he could use the Light Speed Elbow Strike + Mechanical Swarm + Alpha Snake Head + Forbidden Army War Car system to destroy a modern metropolis—

which basically earns him the label of "Human-shaped Calamity,"

compared with Achili the penguin, who could lay down Teleportation Phone Booths across the killing field and create the Toy Factory, he was still a fledgling with shallow qualifications.

Who knew whether the other was Level 50, Level 60, or something even higher—these few gadgets on his own body really weren’t worth coveting.

"Don’t belittle yourself. Even expanded to the myriad worlds, your leveling speed is considered fast. Otherwise the Toy Factory wouldn’t have chosen you as its master."

Achili gave a slight smile and said, "Two things. First, aside from me, others are also peering into Four Realms Mountain. You need to seal this segment of memory yourself and unseal it when the time is right.

Second, when you reach the top level of Four Realms Mountain and meet Michael, remember to tell her..."

The memory cut off abruptly. A buzzing filled Li Cheng’s mind; his four limbs and every bone felt as if ants were crawling over them.

It wasn’t that he’d inhaled too much second-hand Gray Rain smoke and was craving a cigarette, but that the memory seal was too tight—locked under eighteen layers of passwords—temporarily impossible to open.

The viewpoint returned to the present. Maxwell released a tethered fiber-optic drone, sending it through the Crimson Cinema fissure (located at the farthest stall in the men’s restroom, through the lid of the toilet tank),

and after confirming there was no danger on the other side, he laid cable through the fissure, set up signal base stations on both ends,

and finally placed a machine-gun sentry turret at the restroom door (equipped with a camera and AI image recognition; upon detecting a non-human target, it auto-opens fire and transmits the image via the station back to Maxwell’s phone).

With this, it was basically foolproof. Everyone stepped onto the toilet lid and, with a swoosh, jumped in sequence into the tank, passing through the fissure.

The ambient temperature dropped abruptly from 26°C to below zero. Under the drone’s lights, everyone could see that this was a subway platform.

A subway station designed specifically for Snake-men.

The platform was carpeted with twenty-centimeter-high turf, giving the scales enough friction so they wouldn’t slip;

in the vending machines assembled from wood and glass were eggs and vacuum-packed freeze-dried mice and freeze-dried frogs;

The bench along the wall had been deliberately designed in a water-lily-shaped circular seat, allowing Snake-men to coil up and sit. There were even children’s seats.

The overall style was both advanced and backward—obviously they already had vacuum-pack technology, yet they were still using incandescent bulbs.

"Achoo."

Mei Wenyi sneezed, hurriedly taking out a down jacket from her Backpack and putting it on,

Maxwell poked the thermometer frozen into the wall, releasing a small current that seeped into the wall. "Something’s off. The entire station’s temperature-control system has been frozen solid."

Snakes are poikilothermic animals, with a suitable temperature range of 25°C–30°C. So the subway’s temperature system could both heat and cool.

More than twenty below zero is unbearable for humans, let alone Snake-men.

"Uh... everyone, you need to take a look at this."

Don Juan shone his flashlight up toward the stairs leading out of the platform.

Dozens of Snake-man corpses lay there, frozen to death, frost covering their bodies, smiles at the corners of their mouths.