Chapter 1171: Chapter 70: The Tower
"Log into the Game Square and have a try?"
Li Ang tilted his head and glanced at Wang Congshan. The two detached from the real world, logged into the Game Square, and met up at the Immaculate Furnace.
Along with a crowd of players in bizarre outfits, they headed towards the Sky Arena.
As soon as they stepped into the Sky Arena, Li Ang felt the surroundings change. Before him appeared a large number of ordinary people and the machinery they carried, while the scene outside the Sky Arena windows turned into a raging sea.
"As the update log said, the Sky Arena is now overlapping with the real world..."
Li Ang silently pondered, glancing around, noticing those ordinary people wearing uniforms from organizations like the Global Occult Coalition, clearly planning to use the update mechanism to allow ordinary people to directly obtain player qualifications.
"Private duels are still prohibited in the Sky Arena.
Each layer of space has increased, allowing for hundreds of arena battles to take place simultaneously.
The death protection mechanism has been removed, meaning participants might die at any time during the arena battles,
and the higher the level of the arena layers, the richer the rewards for winning.
Also, whether ordinary people or players, those entering the Sky Arena from the real world will return directly to the real world upon leaving. Those entering from the Game Square will return to the Game Square upon leaving.
That means the Sky Arena can’t be used as an efficient teleportation point to the real world."
Li Ang thought casually, as he and Wang Congshan found a seat in the Sky Arena.
The update mentions that now until a month later, when the Commander’s Battle officially begins, is known as the "off-season,"
All player progress in the Sky Arena layers will be reset, and everyone will start anew,
and after the Commander’s Battle officially begins, the progress made by players in this one month will be reset again.
This "off-season" period is essentially for players to adapt to the new version.
(Rewards obtained from the Sky Arena during the off-season will not be retracted.)
"Waiter, could you please bring me this set meal?"
Li Ang snapped his fingers, calling over a waiter in a yellow uniform—a restaurant on the Game Square was still operational, having developed an app and delivery system, issuing spatial storage devices shaped like lunchboxes to each delivery person.
The device itself is quite large, and the dishes placed within individual compartments are kept warm and fresh.
Additionally, the audience seats in the Sky Arena have an "isolation" attribute,
so that even eating strong-smelling foods like snail noodles, stinky mandarin fish, garlic, chive dumplings, durian, or fishy-smelling herbs at your seat won’t affect others.
Wang Congshan wasn’t hungry, so Li Ang ordered himself breakfast, eating while waiting for the arena contestants to enter, "People in Old Yin City, you know how it is, it’s like this every morning. Hey, let me tell you, it’s quite authentic."
Wang Congshan glanced at the stewed pork Li Ang was holding, and her eye twitched as she said, "Which dimension’s Yin City people eat this stuff for breakfast? I think your taste is getting heavier."
"Is it heavy? I think it’s fine."
Li Ang pursed his lips, casually rubbing two fingers together, releasing Swamp God Power, causing a large bunch of cilantro to grow between his fingers.
Under Wang Congshan’s speechless gaze, he chopped the cilantro into segments and tossed it into his bowl.
"My Boyfriend of Ten Years Turns Out To Be In Vegetative State?"
Inexplicably, this light novel-style book title flashed across Wang Congshan’s mind, and she quickly shook her head hard to clear away the chaotic thoughts.
"You’re not wondering if I’m a plant person, are you?"
Li Ang seemed to have noticed Wang Congshan’s expression and said earnestly, "Don’t worry about that. A few days ago, I halved myself just to take a look at the cross-section of my waist and abdomen, and there were no dendrochronology rings inside.
So I’m definitely not a plant person."
Wang Congshan was accustomed to Li Ang’s strange rhetoric and rolled her eyes, "If you were, wouldn’t you just cut your own head off to prevent top dominance?"
"No, no, that way I’d be just like Xing Tian, wouldn’t I?"
Li Ang shook his head, "Xing Tian’s no good, he never thinks before he speaks, can’t be around him."
"He’d need a brain for that."
Wang Congshan habitually retorted when suddenly, a slight commotion arose in front of the audience.
The first challenger appeared.
"Oh? Has someone already completed the procedures to enter the Sky Arena?"
Li Ang finished his breakfast cleanly, put away the bowl and spoon into his sodium ring, rubbed his palms, and looked down at the stage.
The first contestant wasn’t a player, but an ordinary person,
a white man in his thirties, burly, with slicked-back blond hair, wearing multifunctional tactical attire equipped with standard individual gear, assault rifle, pistol, grenades, flashbangs, etc.
"Judging by the uniform, he should be an employee of the European Heavy Industry Group. Maybe he was a soldier or mercenary before."
Li Ang thought nonchalantly, as there’s no shortage of professional soldiers fighting for money in today’s world,
large organizations like the European Heavy Industry Group have enough resources to train elite soldiers—or cannon fodder in extraordinary wars—in a short time.
The professional soldier named Sveck quickly prepared with the help of his team members and stepped onto the arena,
yet the Sky Arena didn’t match him directly with an opponent, instead displaying the words "searching for a matching target."
"Hmm..."
Li Ang squinted his eyes,
Realizing simultaneously that other players were applying to compete, but the Sky Arena didn’t match them with Sveck.
"It seems that after the update, the Sky Arena prefers to match evenly skilled opponents.
This way, it protects those of relatively low skill, players, or ordinary people trying to change their fate through the Sky Arena.
It also prevents one-sided battles from occurring in the early layers."
Li Ang nodded,
and soon Sveck’s platform responded, with a bizarre creature resembling a cheetah with antlers on its sides appearing in front of him.
At the same time, the name of the matching opponent, [Halifax], was projected above the platform.
"Not an earthling player..."
Wang Congshan frowned slightly. Although her skills were far less than those of Li Ang sitting beside her, she had seen quite a lot under the tutelage of Li Ang and the Special Affairs Bureau, and her judgment was sound.
Now, this cheetah-like strange creature didn’t ascend the platform from below,
but appeared directly out of thin air on the arena.
"Is it a fighting puppet created by the Sky Arena itself?
Or as the update log mentioned, is it a creature from another world also participating in the Sky Arena competition?"
Wang Congshan felt a vague sense of unease,
and the surrounding audience became aware of this, their expressions taking on a grim cast.
On the arena, Sveck’s expression was serious, holding an assault rifle at the ready,
waiting for the countdown appearing in the sky to reach zero. He opened his tactical helmet analyzer without hesitation, scanning the body structure of that strangely shaped leopard-like creature,
while raising his rifle to fire at the opponent.
Ta-da-da.
The muzzle of the assault rifle burst with red flames, and a series of bullets hit the arena’s floor tiles.
The leopard-like creature moved swiftly on the arena, evading all bullets with agile movements, rapidly approaching the human soldier.
Sveck acted decisively, stopping the ineffective shooting,
raising his hand to detach two grenades and a metal circle from his tactical gear.
He threw the grenades at the leopard and pulled the string on the metal circle, throwing it in front of himself.
The leopard-like creature charged forward, ignoring the flames, heat, and shockwaves from the grenade explosions, yet stopped abruptly just as it was about to reach Sveck—
The metal circle Sveck threw emitted strands of metal wire, weaving an electrically conductive net around Sveck, isolating the inside and outside.
This item was clearly invented by European Heavy Industry Group,
Sveck stayed inside the electric net, swiftly dismantling several parts from his tactical gear to modify the assault rifle on site.
The leopard-like creature, after observing the electric net for a few seconds, quickly made a decision,
it suddenly turned, its two hind limbs clawing at the ground, its nails digging up a large chunk of tile, throwing it towards the electric net.
Though the metal wires forming the electric net were strong, they inevitably bent and deformed under the impact of the stone block,
Sveck saw this and immediately pressed a button on his tactical gear, preemptively canceling the electric power, retracting the metal wires back into the iron box.
While avoiding the stone block’s impact, he raised the modified firearm, pulling the trigger at the leopard.
Sss!
The assault rifle released a burst of extremely cold gas, enveloping the leopard, causing the phrase indicating an attack hit to appear instantly above its head.
The leopard’s movement speed visibly slowed down, its eyes glimmered, seemingly assessing the current situation, and then without hesitation chose to surrender and withdraw from the match, disappearing directly from the arena,
leaving Sveck standing alone in place.
"Hmm?"
Li Ang frowned slightly,
the updated version of Sky Arena still used the original rules of calculating scores based on attack hit counts and intensity.
That leopard-like creature was only hit once, losing one point, far from losing the match.
Yet it chose to surrender and withdraw from the match directly.
"As expected, is it a creature from another world participating simultaneously in Sky Arena?"
Li Ang silently remarked: "If it were a puppet manufactured by Sky Arena, it would definitely fight to the death, trying its best to kill the opponent.
This creature named [Halifax] chose to surrender so decisively,
merely realizing it couldn’t defeat Sveck, choosing to concede early to minimize losses—anyway, this is only the first level of Sky Arena, even if surrendering randomly won’t incur much loss..."
On the arena, Sveck looked at the spot his opponent disappeared, his expression slightly dazed, walking off the arena thoughtfully under the call of his companions from the European Heavy Industry Group.
Such scenes kept happening on the first level of Sky Arena,
where many low-level players and ordinary soldiers signed up for the arena competition.
Most of them were matched with "companions" on Earth,
only a few matched with either puppets created by Sky Arena or obviously non-Earth creatures.
Soon, the first death occurred.
A soldier from the Japan Islands’ Anomalies Investigation Bureau was caught directly by a shaggy demon ghost by the neck, not even having time to surrender, and had his head torn off, dying on the spot.
Sky Arena has a surrender option, allowing one to avoid all subsequent damage once surrendering,
but if under control effects, with unclear mind, unable to make a surrender decision, then one becomes a slaughter target.
The audience silently watched the elite soldier’s corpse fall onto the arena as the demon ghost disappeared from sight.
As more and more people entered the arena, casualties continued to rise, but no organization chose to stop immediately.
On arena number nine, a mercenary from the French Foreign Legion injected himself with a werewolf potion, transforming into a robust werewolf,
but this did not stop him from having his limbs torn off by a two-meter-high Giant Rat Monster.
On arena number fourteen, a soldier from the Israeli IZO Company barely had time to inject himself with a Genetic Elixir before being paralyzed on the spot by needle stabs from the cannibal plant opposite, turning into a pool of blood instantly.
On arena number thirty-six, an esper from the Voodoo Black Witch Clan was incinerated to ash by a player from Scorching Wind.
...
Li Ang watched the continuous appearance of casualties on the arena, shaking his head, said to Wang Congshan: "For these organizations, currently, the lives of elite soldiers are far less valuable than the player’s qualification.
An elite soldier only needs to be trained with relatively ’cheap’ costs like training grounds, equipment, instructors, Genetic Elixir, etc., to be quickly cultivated,
while player qualification and the special materials offered each time one ascends in Sky Arena are difficult to obtain through conventional means."
"..."
Wang Congshan pursed her lips slightly, not speaking.
"The era’s environment determines moral standards,
if I’m not mistaken, human society on Earth will become even more fragmented in the future."
Li Ang continued, "In the old era, human physiology, psychology, population distribution, race, culture, countries, economy, society, etc., were all directly or indirectly governed by geographical and natural conditions.
Now, with The Portal, humans are directly or indirectly governed by The Portal World.
Forces possessing advanced portals and colonizable worlds can maintain isolation, uphold relatively high moral standards.
While forces possessing low-level portals or no portals, their morals will plummet.
They will, like African Warlords, abduct ordinary people, inject them with Genetic Elixirs, force them to become warriors, enter Sky Arena for challenges to gain player qualification.
They might also promote cloned human technology on a large scale, employ Chimeric Beast Technology to build their own camps.
Because not doing so means losing advantages, falling behind in competition with other forces, even being directly wiped out.
Life will soon become valueless."
Feeling somewhat listless, Li Ang stood up from his seat, gazing out of the Sky Arena’s window,
only saw warships from different countries anchored on the turbulent sea,
further away were more cargo ships, loaded with materials and personnel, approaching the island where Sky Arena was located.
[Fell asleep at the computer desk yesterday....]
