Chapter 52 52 The First Issue of Badger Under the Moon

Chapter 52 52. The First Installment of Badger Under the Moon

The new players logged in at the end of the old players’ playing time today, so neither Happy Stick nor Bull could bring their good friends and sisters to “practice” for a long time.

They could only tell the newcomers as much as they could about the settings and gameplay of this hardcore game before they got off the line, and urged them not to go to their deaths.

This game’s death penalty is indeed a bit heavy.

However, when they saw the budding newcomers holding tattered weapons, wearing tattered squire armor and rubbing their fists in anticipation, the veteran players’ hearts welled up with an unsettling premonition.

Perhaps the “tragedy” of the bionic snail is about to repeat itself.

“Don’t worry about it, Stick.”

Before going offline, Meow Meow reassured a worried Happy Stick:

“You can’t understand this game until you die once, they are still using the mentality of playing a normal game here, something will definitely happen, even if you have accounted for everything, there will always be all kinds of accidents in such a hardcore and real environment.

Just look at how even the so resourceful Lumina can die from a slip of the foot speaks volumes.

It can’t be stopped!

Relax, it’s only three days, we can still catch up with the end of Cadman City’s activities, and your fellows need time to practice leveling, I got blood bottles from Lord Murphy, so let’s brush the secret vault copy together tomorrow?”

“Good, make an appointment to go online tomorrow.”

Happy Stick sighed.

He had pulled in too many people this time and found himself a bit out of control, in his heart he felt a bit out of control but soon he came back to his senses and looked at Brother Woo Meow in surprise, asking:

“Where did you get the blood vial? Is it the kind that opens the seal of the secret vault? Why don’t I have one? Good for you Woo Meow, you received a hidden quest and ate it alone, right?”

“No, it’s not a quest.”

Whimpering proudly touched the dirty psychic energy pack at his waist and whispered:
“Lord Murphy got a total of three blood vials, gave one to me, one to Niu Niu, and one probably reserved for the five guys on the ‘night shift’.

I suspect it might be a player perk given after the goodwill is brushed up?”

“Shit! Still really licking NPCs, huh?”

Happy Stick had a “I’m a man of honor I’m not going to be a licking dog” look on his lips, but after seeing Brother Woo Meow get a tangible benefit, his heart started to turn.

But this guy was quite cunning.

He knew that Brother Meow Meow and the group of students had been circling around Lord Murphy, and their favorability must have already flown up, so he would become a beggar on his knees if he went over there now.
No way!

Can’t be underestimated!
I have to lick another NPC. Uh, no, can you call this licking a favor thing?

It’s part of the game mechanics. If you don’t like it, don’t play.

With such thoughts, Happy Stick got offline in the safe zone of the male players-only shack, and as the picture of the game world dimmed, the immediate future switched almost seamlessly to the VR live view mode of the game helmet.

Instead of immediately removing the helmet, Stick habitually took a spin on the forums.

As a former -professional, he had gotten used to collecting some scattered information from various channels, and might just find some surprises. A few minutes later just as he was about to take off his helmet and go for a run outside, he suddenly realized that there was an additional post in the forums, and it was instantly pinned and even spiked almost as soon as it was posted. The post was…
“Blanch! Don’t PY trades even avoid people anymore?”

Happy Stick spat out, then clicked on the post before realizing that there was a reason why this post had been spiked and topped.

It was strangely named “Badger Under the Moon”, with “Issue 1” labeled at the end, so it looked like it was intended to be a series.

As for who wrote it, you can tell by the name.

“Yo, brothers and sisters who are still fighting in Cadman City, everyone roars, here is your dear Brother Badger, in view of the fact that new players entering the game may encounter a variety of problems, so I decided to summarize the game information that I have collected so far, to give you a solution.

First of all, the background of the game!
Real Otherworld is set in a magic-like super-medieval background world, why is it called ‘super-medieval’?

Because not only does this world have psychic powers, but it also has a very cool fantasy engineering, or steam engineering, element to it.

My queer friends and I found steam-powered mechanical refrigerators, automatic sweepers, kitchen-assisted machines, and even motorcycle-like three-wheeled walkers in the ruins of Cadman City, and we spent a bit of time ‘exploring’ their inner workings (actually dismantling them, but let’s just hope their owners don’t jump out of nowhere to get us in trouble).

All in all, we were able to determine that those strange looking things weren’t just made with a plausible decal, their inner workings follow certain mechanical principles.

Pictured below.

Pictures, pictures, pictures.

After seeing these internally sophisticated to the point of being scary contraptions, everyone should have a clearer understanding of the game world they are currently in.

Technology exists here, albeit not in the same way we perceive it.

Therefore, for those who have chosen the ‘Gunner’ profession, don’t be discouraged, maybe in the future you’ll really be able to use a super-advanced steam sniper to take the head of a boss with a single shot from 800 miles away, smh.”

“Shit!”

Seeing Badger named himself in the post, Happy Stick immediately raised his middle finger in front of his eyes.

However, after looking at the unintelligible pictures that Badger had posted, he still agreed with this “steam engineering” speculation.

Since the game has given the gunner profession transfer, there must be corresponding game content will be unlocked in the future, the current difficulties are only temporary, the future and tomorrow are bright.

Hey, the good times are ahead.

Stick encouraged himself so, and then continued reading:

“Then, onto our current main NPC, Lord Murphy and his ‘harem group’.

Lord Murphy’s background is from the fringes of the Blood Vulture Clan in Cadman City, and according to the details we’ve been able to pry out of our new NPC, Madame Tris, he was picked up and transformed into a vampire by Madame Tris in the middle of the city in the fall/winter of Era 1109 of the game’s time.

He was only 18 years old at the time, but had already seen so much suffering on earth that he was determined to change the damn world.

In other words, our wise, handsome and handsome Lord Murphy is actually a ‘vampire baby’ who is 19 years old on the surface, but is actually only 1.5 years old.

However, he is very displeased with all kinds of barbaric atrocities in this world, and is convinced that there exists a way to eliminate all the cruelty and darkness of atrocities, and for this reason, he has deeply researched the art of Otherworldly Summoning and gained unprecedented success!
He summoned us!
Fearless warriors from the Otherworld, and invited us to participate in his grand plan, the contents of which he presumably couldn’t even tell us himself (presumably the development team hadn’t coded it yet).

Based on Lord Murphy’s past words and attitude, he should have wanted to develop obscenely and grow slowly with our assistance, however the sudden disaster in Cadman City has shattered his plans.

This has directly led to his current actions becoming more proactive and purposeful.
Well, I didn’t say that, it was the words of Ms. Miriam, the director of the survivor camp.

I’m just summarizing them.

Apparently, Lord Murphy represents the player’s faction power in the game, and he’s bound to use this opportunity to permanently break away from the Blood Wyvern Clan or rebuild the New-Blood Wyvern Clan!
This is because according to the little bit of information received from Missy Femis, the current Blood Vulture Clan in the background of the game has been all ga-ga’d up in this attack. So Badger makes the irresponsible guess that after the special event ‘The Last Night of Cadman City’ is over, the players may be in for a period of peaceful development, and our true newbie village will most likely be built with the current city ruins and survivor camps as the skeleton.

What do you mean, a real hardcore game?

Even the players have to build their own fucking newbie village! Now that’s what I call top stream torture alright!
The current major NPCs are going to be the centerpieces of the player factions, so getting on good terms with them is absolutely essential.

This brings us to the central point of this post.
Regarding goodwill!
What can be confirmed at this point is that there is a hidden goodwill system in the game, which is evident in the different attitudes Lord Murphy treats us veteran players and new players who are new to the game.

Our current guess is that the three players with the highest favorability ratings from Lord Murphy would be Woo Meow, Cow, and Lumi.

Here, I want to name and criticize Pigeon Treasure, this waste of space!
Although he was also one of the two players in the first round of testing, he had wasted a good opportunity, causing his impression in Lord Murphy’s mind to not be as distinct as the three mentioned above, but that wasn’t a big problem!

It’s because after several days of Badger lurking and observing, I’ve discovered the secret of good feelings.

Our current NPCs all have ‘hobbies’!

For example, the white-haired NPC Maxim favors combat and favors warriors, fighting alongside him or actively sparring with him can effectively increase goodwill, and there’s also a dialogue option for ‘Challenge Mode’.

I chickened out and didn’t try it.

But I suspect it’s supposed to be a more realistic deathmatch mode.

That’s why Maxim’s goodwill is best swiped by fighting him.

Miss Miriam leans towards rationality, favoring fair trade and the collection of knowledge items.

Our squad found a copy of A Brief History of Transylvanian Vampires in the city, an old book in hardcover, and it was collected by Miss Miriam for 2 gold coins, although we were definitely ripped off but it didn’t stop Miss Miriam from being happy.

So it’s certain that finding precious books is definitely one of the ways to brush Miss Miriam’s favorability.

In addition, she’s currently the survivor camp supervisor, so if she’s willing to go and help out and complete the camp’s non-combat tasks, she should be able to raise her favorability as well.

However, Miss Miriam’s positioning amongst the current NPCs was actually quite awkward.

It was obvious from her attitude that she had a distaste for vampires, and she had been a fringe figure in the current plot development, so it would be mercifully easy to brush up on her favorability.

The next thing to say is the main event!

The ‘three rich loli’ Miss Phineas and the ‘beauty witch’ Mrs. Tris.

The former had been identified as the daughter of the current Blood Vulture Clan Chief, the Blood Vulture Clan’s Blood Princess.

The latter was even more remarkable, it was certain that she was Lord Murphy’s kin character, and most importantly, she was currently the only character that clearly had an intimate relationship with a mainline NPC.

It’s certain that Lady Trish’s role may even be higher than Missy’s in the subsequent plot, if Lord Murphy really chooses to break away from the Blood Vulture Clan’s newly opened power.

Missy’s three no character think old players have been very familiar with, simply put it is an arrogant rich loli, cold and scratchy character, always high and mighty, you do not say a word bad to be severely reprimanded the kind of guy.

However, her favorability enhancement method is unexpectedly simple.

My companion Meowshark found the relics of several vampires in the ruins, and then took them to Onii-chan and got her thanks, so the most effective way to raise favorability at the moment is to go ‘digging up graves’, err. I mean searching the ruins for anything related to the Blood Vulture vampires.

Also, Missy is a very professional psychic and a good teacher, so if you can discuss some psychic issues with her in a humble manner or find some psychic tomes to offer, you should be able to raise your favorability as well.

As it stands now, Missy’s reputation is basically a must-have for players who aspire to go the caster route.

It’s because she’s the only one who will explicitly teach players psychic energy techniques.”

“This guy looks unreliable, but he turned out to be unexpectedly powerful!”

The Happy Stick who saw this immediately gave this post a like.

To summarize such a set of reputation and favorability related posts at the current stage of the game just 10 days after opening, it was evident that this Badger guy had indeed noticed many unrevealed details in the game and also gave his own analysis.

This alone made Brother Stick feel good about Badger, who wouldn’t love a guy who is reliable and willing to work hard?
He grinned, adjusted his gaming helmet to the “Eye View” mode, letting the VR interface hovering in front of his eyes go semi-transparent, and then walked to the balcony as if he was wearing a motorcycle helmet, lit a cigarette for himself, and continued to check out the last part of Badger’s post.

This part was simple:
“Lastly, let’s talk about the favorability boost regarding the ‘Beauty Witch’ Lady Tris, on a side note, Lady Tris is the most titillating character I’ve ever seen in the game, no one should have any objections to that, right?
Compared to the arrogantly prickly Missy and the borderline Miriam, Lady Tris has just made her debut, but the way she treats the players can already be considered spoiled, second only to Lord Murphy’s enthusiasm.

There is a prerequisite to brushing up on Mrs. Tris’s personal reputation, and that is that you must first complete the round of twelve-ring quests she gives you to gain her initial trust.

These twelve-ring quests are completely randomized.

The seven of us on the team were given seven completely different quests, but none of them were difficult enough to find everything in the city ruins.

Here comes the next point!
Lady Tress was once so badly injured that she needed strong alcohol to numb the pain, so the main way to increase Lady Tress’s goodwill was to deliver alcohol!

Yes, you heard that right!

The highest level of goodwill boosting is just so plain and boring.

This wasn’t Badger’s personal conjecture, it had been verified!
Pigeon Treasure, that imperial control, spent five hours finding almost forty bottles of various fine wines in the ruins of Cadman City and gave them to Mrs. Tris before going offline, and guess what?

Not only did Lady Tris praise Pigeon Treasure’s wisdom and passion, she even gave a physical reward!

A copy of the Alchemist’s Handbook, written in her youth (at least 350 years ago).
Pigeon Treasure is now the first Alchemist Apprentice in the game.

That’s right!

There is a ‘skill book’ setting in this game!

That handbook can be read carefully to change to a secondary profession of Alchemist, and most importantly, it’s not a disposable consumable that can be read over and over again to improve skill proficiency.

The only unfortunate thing was that that book could not be lent to others without the permission of Mrs. Tris, it could basically be regarded as a binding.

Of course if Pigeon Treasure is willing to risk zeroing out her goodwill to try and PY it privately with another player, then forget I said it.

This game is very free.

But it does have a set of rules that we don’t see binding us, and the fact that they aren’t hard and fast rules means that we can cross those lines whenever we want, provided that we can afford to break them.

Ha, that’s all for the first installment of Badger Under the Moon, I hope it helps new players, bye bye guys, we’ll see you in the next installment!

As for whether there’s a second installment or not it’s up to you all to catch up, bye~”

(End of chapter)