Chapter 436
Chapter 436: Version Update: The Time for Talent Enhancement Has Come!
As time passed, it was again the weekend, which meant that a new batch of players would enter Transia, serving Governor Murphy’s cause with fresh attitudes and abundant willpower.
However, today’s new player induction was different from before.
This time, those entering the game weren’t just players personally vetted by Murphy, but also included about 30 newcomers selected by player guilds.
They mainly came from Onboard Joy Stick’s Crimson Hammer and Sickle team and Typal’s Torrent Knights team, currently the only two player guilds in the Adventurer Guild that had reached level 2 and thus were granted the power of “independent recruitment.”
However, despite being called independent recruitment, these new players still had to pass Murphy and Tris’s “review” before getting their helmets to enter the game.
Although the review standards had been greatly relaxed compared to before, it was still enough to ensure this batch of new players also possessed some unique skills.
Walking in the shadows, Governor Murphy took out his worn pocket watch to check the time, it was 30 minutes before the new players would join.
He then picked up the core orb and asked Tris:
“My dear assistant Little Tris, is our update announcement for today ready?”
“My dear superior administrator Alpha, that document has been revised and is ready to be posted on the forum at any time,” Tris’s voice rang out from the orb with a hint of excitement and anticipation as she said:
“I’ve never tried such a large-scale spirit energy projection reshaping modification before, are you sure we can complete all this within 2 hours?”
“It cannot exceed 4 hours!”
Murphy said in a serious tone:
“This is 《Reality Realm》 first ‘server maintenance’ since its operation began, we must strictly control the time to demonstrate the development team’s strong technical capabilities.
Besides, we’ve done tests before, this task isn’t difficult. Post that document and let my little players prepare to log off.”
“Mm.”
Tris responded, and then an official update post appeared on the forum. Meanwhile, Murphy held the core orb and sent a message to all online little players in the form of a “server-wide announcement”:
【Attention respected game testers! 《Reality Realm》 will undergo its first server maintenance, server shutdown countdown 30 minutes! Please all testers immediately return to your nearest save point or choose a safe area to prepare for logout!
This maintenance will last 2-4 hours, please check the forum for specific upgrade maintenance information.】
“Damn!”
Dump Truck Iaido, who was leading a group of “administrative personnel” challenging Kudel in the Blood Vulture Halls team dungeon, cursed and said to the “pickup group members” with an annoyed expression:
“Retreat retreat retreat, can’t continue, let’s come back after the update.”
“Why does this damn game always do sneak attack updates, couldn’t they notify us a day or two in advance?”
Scholar Xiao Zhou was also quite unhappy.
He was just a few badges away from completing the Clan Guard armor set, encountering this really made his mood explode. However, “Ruthless Horseshoe Crab” next to him was more accepting.
This flamboyant man flipped his hair and consoled:
“The development team is still quite reliable, before they would update online and implement new features before we even noticed, today’s update actually requires server shutdown.
I think there must be something to this.
Stop complaining.
Quickly exit the dungeon and find a safe spot to log off, then go check the update content on the forum, it’s sure to be explosive.”
“Damn! There’s already a post on the forum!”
Medical Insurance Warrior Great Sion shouted from the side:
“This update includes human race talent enhancement and face customization feature implementation, I knew it, how else would they do server maintenance.
This is a big move ah, come on, let’s quickly go copy a more handsome face template online, then everyone can adjust their appearances.
We are warriors of Transia, it’s a bit weird to always have such shabby faces.”
“Damn! Your shabby look is your problem, don’t drag me into it, I’m very confident in my appearance okay?”
“One Punch to Destroy the Galaxy”, another member of their five-person team retorted:
“I’m young fresh meat level looks, very popular with the aunties at work.”
“Being popular with aunties doesn’t sound like a good thing no matter how you look at it? Tsk tsk tsk, such innocent words, come on, let’s go customize faces.”
The group wasn’t complaining anymore, they chatted and laughed as they exited the dungeon and headed straight for the Midnight Chamber to save and log off. Along the way they encountered other players rushing back from various places, also hurriedly finding stone platforms to lie down on and log off.
Currently there weren’t many save points, so the little players’ first reaction when looking for safe zones was to return to Crimson Citadel. It didn’t matter for those nearby, but those far away had to use “randomly dangerous” return scrolls to rush back.
“The Midnight Chamber isn’t quite enough anymore.”
In the lower level of the Crimson Halls at this time, Murphy hid in the shadows of the “spawn point” where new players would soon be born, watching his players rush back here from all directions to “play dead”.
He had thought this vast warehouse would be enough as an initial save point for players, but the rapidly evolving situation forced him to consider opening more save points to meet the players’ increasingly extensive range of activities.
The save points in 《Reality Realm》 weren’t anything special.
They only provided resurrection locations for dead players, so from this perspective, other save points didn’t need much decoration, they just needed to be safe zones.
“Morland Village, Bataxin City, 5 collective farms, Torrent Fort plus Ancestral Woods and Maginot Line should be enough to satisfy my dear warriors’ current activity paths across Transia.
Mm, can also set up a reputation save point at Hog’s Blood Claw Clan, only allowing binding resurrection service after reaching Friendly reputation.”
Murphy calculated thus, while keeping track of time to prepare for the “server-wide disconnection”.
The “Cancel Summon” function on the semi-transparent character card was ready to activate, with just one confirmation, all current players would be forcibly “kicked out” of Transia.
At times like this, Murphy would have a very special feeling.
To put it bluntly.
It felt like becoming a “deity” who held power over life and death, even arbitrarily dominating others’ fates, a single thought was enough to let these otherworlders experience extraordinary lives filled with joy, anger, sorrow and happiness.
But such overly arrogant thoughts could never affect Murphy for long, he quickly awoke from these boring fantasies.
He didn’t want to be any kind of deity.
Especially knowing that this world’s deities were tainted by the subspace and constantly faced the risk of being “corrupted”, becoming a deity was no longer something that would bring pleasure.
Although Tris’s previous speculation about “Spider Lady Avalon being the face that emerged after Avalon was corrupted” had no evidence, Murphy felt Tris’s thoughts should be correct, after all, combining with the glimpse of truth about the “Frontier Contract” extracted earlier from the Wooden Holy Grail was enough to make Murphy’s imagination run wild on this topic.
“Countdown 10 minutes.”
Murphy checked his pocket watch again, as more and more players hurriedly returned to the Midnight Chamber, he began activating the administrator system to check other players’ situations.
Meow King’s group was still recruiting and escorting mountain folk for “atonement” in the Saxony region’s forests, impossible to return anytime soon.
The Torrent Knights were fighting undead in Malo Town, they chose to log off in a nearby safe zone under the protection of Miss Becky’s family knights.
As for those “agents” scattered in the Foul Swamp, Murphy didn’t need to worry about them, their survival abilities were outstanding even among T1 players.
Administrative profession players mostly logged off at their respective farms.
Of course there were also some “greedy” fellows still dawdling in dungeons hoping to finish the BOSS before logging off.
Murphy shrugged, feeling these guys definitely couldn’t make it back to safe zones within 10 minutes, so their “deaths” were probably set in stone.
Preemptively mourning for them.
Then, Administrator Alpha opened the “Race Template” page that was separately opened in the administrator system. The template collection progress under various human races had now reached 100% except for Barbarians and Calum Dragon Descendants.
After reaching 100% collection rate, an “Apply” option appeared after these templates.
This meant Murphy didn’t need to change races one by one for his little players, he just needed to select and apply these templates after everyone logged off, and when the little players next logged into the game they could freely choose their races.
It must be said, even though he had the administrator system for several months now, Murphy was still shocked by its “intelligence level”. Although there wasn’t a smart AI assistant to remind him, the current level of global control still solved many many troubles for Murphy.
Logically speaking, just changing races wouldn’t take 2-4 hours, the real time-consuming part was opening up the “face customization” feature.
This thing could be completed by Tris through spirit energy projection reshaping “offline”, but when little players changed races their body types would also change due to different bloodlines chosen.
This meant the system “threw in” a face modification, Murphy tried it privately these past few days and found this thing could actually “import” appearance templates from external sources.
The specific operation was importing a portrait image through the personal information management page on the forum, then implementing it on each player’s spirit energy projection through the administrator system’s calibration.
Murphy remembered there wasn’t this function on the forum before, but then he realized that perhaps as he unlocked various hidden achievements in Transia step by step, it would unlock corresponding functions for him as the forum administrator on the forum.
And most annoyingly, this kind of “forum function” unlock wouldn’t pop up obvious prompts, Murphy had to find and activate them himself on the forum pages.
Just like last time when little players were making third-party platform apps offline, Murphy also frantically searched around the forum pages before discovering this damn thing actually had third-party data interfaces.
Murphy guessed the reason forum function development had no prompts was probably because this damn thing’s designer felt that a host who could handle an “otherworld crossing system” should find developing new forum “functions” to be a piece of cake.
Hey!
Don’t choose to be lazy at times when you shouldn’t be lazy!
You bastard!
The vampire lord complained bitterly, he clutched his pocket watch counting down, and at the moment time reached zero, GM privileges activated, all players active in Transia logged off simultaneously.
Except for Pants Stripping Demon Ah Feng.
His situation was special, Murphy didn’t dare expel this guy’s finally stabilized spirit body back to his physical body, to avoid some irreversible losses.
As players were kicked from the game, Murphy’s senses suddenly quieted down.
He emerged silently from his hiding place, looking at the fellows lying sprawled across the Midnight Chamber, shrugged, then chose to implement several human race talent templates, a grey progress bar appeared before Murphy’s eyes.
It would take about 45 minutes to complete implementation.
Therefore from this perspective, Murphy’s “server maintenance” wasn’t deceiving the players, his “server” body indeed needed an upgrade.
“They’re arguing fiercely in the forum, little Murphy.”
Tris, this witch who had long lurked in the forum, reported like a “war correspondent”:
“They’ve started fighting in the threads, currently battling endlessly over which human race’s talents are powerful, just like a group of combative young lions.
Little Lumina jumped out to draw hatred again, proud of being the first half-elf in every word.”
“She actually still thinks this is a good thing, such a stupid yet adorable little player.”
Because implementing new functions through the administrator system brought Murphy some mental pressure, he randomly found a stone platform, pushed Vomit Sauce who was snoring on it to the ground, sat down himself to catch his breath and sighed:
“Becoming a half-elf means Lumina will have to make a difficult choice when advancing the silver trial, she must choose one between her human and elven bloodlines to pursue power atavism.
And no matter which she chooses, it means saying goodbye forever to the other half of power.
Although I haven’t yet entered that level, I can understand what a painful process this must be, to forcibly tear away half of oneself from one’s own body.
Too cruel.”
“That’s just a choice that must be made based on pure power, Murphy, it’s not forced purification.”
Tris corrected:
“If Lumina doesn’t want to give up either bloodline power, she can actually choose to undergo silver trials for both races simultaneously, this will undoubtedly weaken her potential release and limit achievements she may attain in the future, but won’t affect her pursuit and steps on the path of power.
After all, even the weakest silver rank is still silver rank.
If she can walk both bloodline paths simultaneously and enter gold rank, no one would mock her mediocrity in terms of power.
This ‘server update’ is a great thing for your warriors, although they themselves may not understand these potential changes.
However only by clearly knowing where one comes from can one know where to go.
Only after they have racial talents and specific races from different sources can they obtain that mysterious ancient power from before the epoch during the trial of advancing from black iron to silver.”
“Yes, the issue of potential progress bar releasing too slowly has become a toxic topic in the forum, every time it appears it triggers terrible discussions.”
Murphy sighed and said:
“Now that we’ve finally supplemented their missing racial talents, their silver path has finally gotten on track, but what I’m thinking now is, Tris, do you think before the Black Plague breaks out, can our first silver warrior be born among our warriors?”
Tris was silent for a long time.
After nearly 30 seconds of silence, she finally said:
“It’s been at most 5 months since they entered Transia, and you’re already expecting the appearance of the first silver warrior.
This growth rate is too exaggerated, Murphy.
The emergence of many black iron warriors can still be explained by this place having outstanding talents and rapid growth brought by intense battles, however when your territory starts producing silver warriors on a large scale, the attention of the entire continent will be drawn here.
This is a risk that could shake the current power system of the continent.
After all, 3,000 silver warriors appearing in one place… such an outrageous story never appeared even in my most arrogant dreams.”
“Outrageous? No, not at all!”
Murphy narrowed his eyes in the darkness and said:
“When I have 100 silver warriors, all threats to Transia’s existence will retreat.
When I have 500 silver warriors, Lord Payne will have to consider our opinions when making decisions, and old Edward won’t dare bark in front of us.
When I have 1,000 silver warriors, Marshal Loren and his King Louis will start seriously considering whether he should apologize and atone to the people of Transia.
When I have 3,000 silver warriors, the Wolf Queen will obediently return the Kafhoka Plains to us. And when tens of thousands of silver warriors under my command strike out in all directions, I won’t even need to speak anymore,
Even just a cough would be enough to make the entire continent tremble.
Tris, if I tell you that I’m actually not worried about the series of outrageous events that Dusk will trigger in the future would you think I’m bragging?”
“No, I’ll always believe even your most arrogant statements, but the problem is, you can’t command ten thousand silvers with a black iron body.”
Tris snorted and said:
“And I think your warriors’ power upper limit may be closely related to your power growth, so I have to ask when do you plan to start your own silver trial?
Don’t think I don’t know, Murphy!
You’ve already mastered at least 5 advanced sword arts and trained them to master level, at your current level you can already start the silver trial.
Although your weak progress in spirit energy is despair-inducing, your foundation has been built extremely solidly, plus you have enough source blood in hand, this is enough for you to complete the silver trial within 3 months!
What exactly are you still waiting for?”
“I have two professions, Tris, I can’t always be scolded by you as ignorant…”
Murphy complained:
“So after I advance the final two vampire advanced sword arts to master level, I need to start focusing on practicing summoner skills, and incidentally look for inspiration for my third profession.
I recently suddenly realized I’m very interested in the secrets from before the epoch, and uncovering those secrets might help me better understand the truth about this world.
So, Tris, can you lead me into history, to become an excellent historian like you?”
“Hmph~ you can never leave me, right?”
“Mm, indeed, please teach me, Teacher Tris.”