This bug is amazing!

Chapter 278 Major Version Update

late at night.

Instead of returning directly to the villa, the two chose one of Ji Yi's nearest properties.

This is a relatively upscale residential area. Ji Yi owns a 140-square-meter apartment here, and all the household items inside are brand new, ready for immediate occupancy.

In this respect, I must commend Gu Hong. In addition to providing the room directly, he also considered many other aspects and made very thorough preparations.

"I've already given you the door lock code. You can come anytime you want, and pick a room you like."

As Ji Yi spoke, she then made a gesture of retrieving something from a distance.

Ji Yi took out a pair of flip-flops.

"Wow, what luck!"

It's past midnight now, and the player arrival data has been refreshed again.

"Never mind, I'll just put it on inside."

With a thought, fashion effects covered his sneakers.

Ji Yi has almost gotten used to her bad luck.

It's fortunate that he was preparing to enter the instance; he didn't care about the actual data.

"I'll stay in this room."

Xie Jiayi pointed to the master bedroom.

"As for Mr. Giba, if you insist on sharing a room with me, you can sleep on the floor."

"."

Not so much.

Ji Yi pointed to the second bedroom: "Then I'll stay in this room."

Xie Jiayi seemed to want to say something, but when she opened her mouth slightly, no sound came out.

Come to think of it, she seems to have become much more reserved since she was exposed.

If it were Miss Cat, she wouldn't be so embarrassed.

"OK, let's wash up and go back to our rooms first, then get into the game. See you in ten minutes."

"Ah."

As a white light flashed before his eyes, Ji Yi saw the familiar game space.

Immediately, a huge "Version Update Announcement" popped up.

"what?"

The pop-up window in front of me was filled with dense, lengthy text.

Furthermore, there are many glossary entries; clicking on them reveals even more subcategories.

Instead of looking at it right away, Ji Yi first sent a message to Xie Jiayi:

"Wait a few hours."

"do what?"

"Check the update announcement."

"."

Seeing that she hadn't sent any more messages, Ji Yi closed the chat window, rubbed his chin, and studied it carefully—this was one of his professional habits.

This update is far more comprehensive than the last one; it's a major version update.

First and foremost, the biggest change is the number of players.

Previously, each time the game recruited new players, it was a small-scale recruitment across the country, with a total player count of only a little over 100,000. The initial death rate was extremely high, and only a few tens of thousands of players survived.

In a country with a population of over a billion, a number of tens of thousands of players is extremely rare.

This landscape is about to change.

Last night, Super Dimension Games directly recruited 200,000 new players. Although 10% of the population died for various reasons, it still added 180,000 new players.

And this is just the beginning; there will be a second and third batch of new players later.

"It's going to get lively from now on."

Ji Yi continued reading.

The next point addresses the issue of a significant skill gap between new and veteran players.

The first change is an increase in the experience gain multiplier for all difficulty levels. Starting immediately, leveling up will be much easier after players clear dungeons.

In addition, items such as double experience cards have been introduced and can be purchased directly from the store.

"Damn, all the version bonuses went to the existing players and new players. I joined just before the big update, and I haven't enjoyed any benefits at all."

What was the point of Ying urging him to level up quickly? New players will soon break his record of reaching level 20 fastest, right?
Ji Yi was very unhappy.

So he opened the shop and spent 10,000 game coins to buy a double experience card.

Continue reading for the latest updates.

Ji Yi's brows furrowed immediately.

The updated version finally allows for PVP combat.

Now, multiplayer games also have death penalties; dying or even failing a mission will result in losing at least one level.

Why "at least"? Because the game has also updated a series of equipment and items specifically designed for PVP, which can increase the penalty for the opponent's death.

"Now it's impossible for players to unite as one. They will inevitably fight each other like warlords, which will eventually reveal all the ugliness of human nature. The root of this game is rotten."

Having already known the inside story of the game, Ji Yi wasn't surprised that things had progressed to this stage.

I just didn't expect this day to come so soon.

It seems that Shadow's advice earlier was somewhat useful.

At least Ji Yi now has the strength to stand on her own two feet and protect herself.

The next point is about the boundary between games and reality.

Currently, the random refresh of items and skills in reality every day is in the testing phase and will only last for two weeks.

After the testing is completed, the game data will be implemented in reality in a relatively stable state.

The update announcement has already clarified the information about "Arrival Rate". It will gradually increase over time, and will be initially set at 10%.

In short, the character's numerical attributes and skill effects will be cumulatively enhanced to the player's physical body at a rate of 10%.

For example, if a player is a strongman in real life, their base strength value would be 6 points in the game.

So, assuming he adds 20 points to Strength in the game, 10% of that, or 2 points of Strength, will be added to the player's real-world physical attributes, giving him 8 points of Strength.

While this level of increase may not make players superhuman, it is enough to allow ordinary people to reach a level surpassing the pinnacle of human capabilities.

Furthermore, the arrival rate will increase over time, players will become stronger, and their impact on reality will become increasingly significant.

"I wonder how the cognitive barriers imposed by the game will distort the consciousness of ordinary people by that time, or what."

"After a certain stage of development, will ordinary people become aware of the existence of the player community?"

If such a day ever comes, it will probably be a time when modern technology can no longer threaten players.

It's important to understand that modern high-tech weapons are extremely advanced, and most players are unable to cope with them; guns and cannons alone are enough to kill.

Of course, even the top few players cannot withstand modern technology head-on. After all, even a lone goose could not survive a nuclear bomb.

Therefore, rather than saying that cognitive barriers are protecting ordinary people, it's more accurate to say that they are protecting the safety of players.

Scrolling down further, another intriguing piece of content appears:
"Players above level 60 will be restricted in reality and will not be able to exert combat power beyond level 60."

[This is the real protection for ordinary people. Do you think Earth would still be safe if players reached level 80 or 90?]

The Data Eye suddenly popped up.

“You’re still here,” Ji Yi stretched. “You’re so inconspicuous, I’d completely forgotten about you.”

【hehe. 】

I think you shouldn't keep the lady waiting too long. Perhaps you could focus on the more important parts?

Suddenly, some entries lit up on the announcement panel in front of me.

I almost forgot, since the advent of data analytics, finding information no longer requires the arduous task of manually searching.

It can only be said that it has been offline for so long that Ji Yi has quickly gotten used to it.

In the [Hidden Village] dungeon, if he has the Eye of Data, he won't have to rack his brains, and the difficulty can be reduced by ten times.

After pondering for a moment, Ji Yi checked what good news the Data Eye had marked for him. "Balance Adjustment Notification"

Below is a long, densely packed list of content.

"392. The legendary skill [Death Rewind] has been weakened, reducing the number of uses from 2 to 1, and its data has been locked, making it unaffected by any 'restriction removal' or 'quality upgrade' effects."

"."

This is fucking targeted, isn't it?!
Scrolling further down, you can see that the various balance adjustments are numbered in the tens of thousands, some buffs and some nerfs.

Most of them have nothing to do with Ji Yi, so I simply scanned them and folded the category.

When Ji Yi scrolled to the bottom, she saw the new mode.

In addition to the five modes: [Single Player Dungeon], [Multiplayer Dungeon], [Permanent Dungeon], [Tower of Magic], and [Multiplayer Arena], a sixth mode has been added: [Infinite Arena].

"By depositing any item, item, or game currency, you can be matched with another player who has paid an equivalent amount of chips. The two players will then engage in a battle, and the winner will take all of the loser's chips."

This is a pure combat mode; you can either match with other players or create a room and invite others.

Furthermore, to encourage competition, with high risk and high reward, and to prevent players from using it as a practice field, there is a minimum value threshold for the chips. As the level increases, the threshold for chips will also increase.

"I originally wanted to exploit a bug and try out a game coin, but it turns out that the starting requirement is a high-quality item."

Ji Yi stroked her chin thoughtfully:

"How should I put it? The mechanisms that encourage player conflict are too mild. Are we slowly boiling a frog in water, and then gradually increasing the intensity later?"

Overall, it's hard to see that the ultimate goal of Hyperdimensional Games is to create a battle royale game with a scale of millions of players.

"Let's try out the Infinite Arena mode later."

Further down, you'll find updates to the leaderboards.

The two lists that were originally under the 【Climb the Magic Tower】 project have now been categorized into a separate 【Rankings】 category. This was done because more ranking categories have been updated.

Upon seeing this, Ji Yi immediately clicked on the [Rankings].

The subcategories include [Level Ranking], [Battle Power Ranking], [Magic Tower Ranking (Single Player)], [Magic Tower Ranking (Double Player)], and [Arena Ranking].

Ji Yi clicked on the first [Rank Ranking].

[Rank 1: Anonymous Player LV.23]

[Rank 2: Anonymous Player LV.22]

[3rd Place: You can win even if you play with your feet LV.22]

[4th Place: Drunkenly Holding a Lone Goose LV.21]

[Rank 162: Ji Yi LV.21]

[Rank 163: Schrödinger's Cat LV.21]

[Rank 348: Anonymous Player LV.21]

[Rank 349: Anonymous Player LV.20]

(Note: The list only shows the top 500 players. Players of the same level are ranked according to their experience points.)
"The number of people who have completed the second job advancement has already exceeded three hundred."

When Ji Yi checked the Magic Tower rankings earlier, only the top forty players had reached level 20.

Logically speaking, so many people shouldn't be able to be promoted several levels in such a short period of time and then smoothly change jobs.

"There is only one possibility: a considerable number of high-level players have never actually played the Magic Tower, or out of caution, they have not reached the level required to enter the leaderboard."

The reason is easy to guess: self-preservation.

In this game, excessively showcasing one's personal abilities may not be a good thing.

Some people would rather forgo a small reward than reveal their names to the public.

"So that's why they introduced the anonymity feature. At least they did something decent."

Immediately, Ji Yi also set her ranking to anonymous.

"The power ranking should be determined based on actual performance."

Opening the [Battle Power Ranking], the name "Drunken Wanderer" is prominently displayed at the top.

Ji Yi's personal information section is marked with the words "Undetermined List".

According to the details, it seems that you need to demonstrate your combat prowess in the dungeons after the update before you can be ranked.

Although Ji Yi had a record of fighting Gu Hong one-on-one, it was a long time ago and the data was not recorded.

The fastest way to get on the leaderboard seems to be simply to enter the [Infinite Arena] and play one game.

"It's good that the list hasn't been finalized yet; I don't want my name to be on it."

Ji Yi set up each leaderboard to be anonymous.

Feeling comfortable now.

After reading through the key updates, which took Ji Yi a little over half an hour, he immediately sent a message to Xie Jiayi:

"I've already made my selection, let's team up."

Miss Cat didn't reply, but not long after, the other party sent an invitation to a two-player dungeon in the Magic Tower.

Click to accept.

[Entering the instance]

[Instance Name: Bravely Climb the Demon Tower]

[Dungeon Size: 2-player raid]

[Mission Objective: Climb the Tower]

[Limited Time: None]

[Difficulty: Unknown]

After the white light passed, a familiar scene appeared before my eyes.

This is a vast grassland, and the magic tower should theoretically be located in a crevice in the ground not far ahead.

But now, the so-called "tower" seems to have actually appeared.

On this vast plain, a towering tower that pierces the sky becomes the only iconic sight in the field of vision.

“It has been updated to look like this since the last time I came to climb the tower.”

Miss Cat's voice came through.

She changed her voice in the game, so it's hard to recognize her as Hsieh Chia-yi just by hearing her voice.

It's estimated that some kind of item that changes the character's appearance was used; the quality is at least perfect.

Ji Yi turned her head and looked at Xie Jiayi.

She is 1.7 meters tall, slender, and has excellent body proportions; her long legs are almost as long as Ji Yi's.

Although his face isn't particularly handsome, you get used to it.
"Leaving the lights on seems acceptable."

Xie Jiayi tilted her head: "What?"

"nothing."

She didn't press further and continued:
"Have you noticed that these updates and changes give off a rough and unreliable feeling?"

Ji Yi nodded:

"Hmm, judging from these gods, they probably don't have experience organizing games. I guess they'll be more efficient next time."

"next time?"

"Like a second part or something."

"...That kind of thing probably doesn't exist."

The two chatted casually as they walked to the foot of the tower.

Although the towering tower seemed far away from where they were just now, they only walked for a few minutes before it was right in front of them.

As the two stepped into the dark and empty tower, the screen suddenly went black.

[Loading the Magic Tower.]

Current floor number: 1

'Tsk tsk tsk, the transition is as rough as ever.'

Ji Yi thought to herself.

'Could this really be something an evil god implanted into the game system?'

(End of this chapter)