Cultivating in Online Games

Chapter 8 – Array expert

“Meoww.” The black cat revived on the spot, flexing his curled-up paws and revealing soft paw pads.

The visuals of Nine Heavens were very beautiful, even when it came to a character’s death. A female human character would make a graceful turn on the spot, then sink to the ground, her dress spreading around her, drops of blood staining her clothes like blossoming crimson flowers. Not even a speck of dust would touch her face as she calmly closed her eyes, shedding a single tear, as if she were experiencing a painful dream she could not wake from.

The male characters died a little less beautifully and a little more heroically.

As for the non-human characters, like this cat, his limbs and body curled up, and a ray of sunlight from out of nowhere (moonlight or starlight at night) illuminated his tiny body, making the cat seem peaceful yet a bit pitiful.

“I lost two levels,” the black cat said, checking. His eyes gleamed. “After feeding on an NPC, I gained 4 levels, and after dying, I only lost 2 levels. I’m turning a profit! And I can just find somewhere away from Tanye Temple. I’m going to be the number one player on the leaderboard in no time, hahahahaha!”

Laughing, he leapt up, hopping off of Qingyue and Aotian’s shoulders and heading in the opposite direction from Tanye Temple. However, when he passed Dugu Zhuo, he found himself grabbed by the scruff of his neck again.

Dugu Zhuo had given the cat advice in order to confirm the connections between the game world and his own. He hadn’t wanted to raise a yao who ran wild feeding on people’s vital essences.

“What’re you doing? Let me go!” The black cat bared his fangs and flailed his claws, trying to attack Dugu Zhuo, but his paws were too short and Dugu Zhuo was holding him in the perfect position, in the cat’s blind spot. No matter what he tried, he couldn’t touch Dugu Zhuo.

“The easier the path seems, the greater the price will be,” Dugu Zhuo said indifferently.

Stealing vital essence was indeed an easier path of cultivation than absorbing moonlight, but the yao might be doomed when facing heavenly lightning. Plus, if the cat wanted to freely cause chaos in the human realm, did he think the righteous cultivators weren’t going to do their jobs? Before he met with a lightning tribulation, he would be ganged up on and killed by the righteous sects.

Dugu Zhuo didn’t explain these things. After all, he wasn’t certain whether or not the game would follow the same rules as the cultivation world. He just didn’t want harm to come to these NPCs because of his suggestion. That would add to his sins, and someday he would have to face retribution.

“Who cares about some price?” the black cat said. “I just need to leave Tanye Temple. Let me go! If you don’t, you’re gonna regret it!”

Seeing physical attacks weren’t going to work, the black cat started to consider other methods of attack.

After using his Beguile ability once, a skill description had appeared. Opening it, the black cat found that the skill could be used against NPCs, players, and bosses alike, only restricted by level.

As long as the target was a human and the difference in level was no more than 10, they could all be Beguiled without distinction. The only exceptions were Buddhist cultivators, who had strong wills, or people who used the Clear Mind Spell.

Right now, the highest level on the leaderboard was just 16, so the human who had him in his grip right now probably wasn’t more than level 10. The black cat made his decision and activated his Beguilement. Sticking his tail up, he meowed at Dugu Zhuo, his large eyes looking cute and pitiable. His long tail swept across Dugu Zhuo’s wrist.

Beguile was an area-of-effect skill which would affect players within one meter, getting stronger the closer the player was. The area of the technique would also increase with level.

With the black cat’s soft meow, Qingyue and Aotian who were standing around watching also became affected. Qingyue liked cats in the first place, so the effect was strongest against her. She grabbed Dugu Zhuo’s arm and said, “How could you hurt the kitty? The kitty’s so cute!”

Long @ Aotian also, acting like he was possessed, opened his fan and brandished it at Dugu Zhuo. “Release that cat!”

Seeing the technique was working great, the black cat gave another “meoww”.

So it turned out that he could use this technique to make players protect him. The yao race was not bad!

Watching the black cat’s behavior, Dugu Zhuo scoffed.

As a sword cultivator, one needed to achieve unity with their sword, so their will had to be as unwavering as a blade. Otherwise, there would be no way to make a powerful sword submit to them.

Not only was his will far stronger than that of this level 3 yao who hadn’t even reached embodiment, but even if a yao immortal tried to beguile him, in Dugu Zhuo’s eyes, some coquettish yao wasn’t worthy of tying Ye Zhou’s shoelaces.

Dugu Zhuo reached out and grabbed Long @ Aotian’s fan. While under control, Long @ Aotian’s speed and strength were both halved, so taking his weapon was a simple feat.

With two slaps of the fan against Qingyue and Aotian’s foreheads, both of them came to their senses. Rubbing her bright red forehead, Qingyue said, “Huh? I feel like I lost control of my character for a minute!”

“You want to level up so badly?” Dugu Zhuo said to the black cat. “I’ll help you.”

“Meow! How come you weren’t controlled?” the black cat shouted. “Are you a human? What do you wanna do?”

With the cat in hand, Dugu Zhuo walked into the Tanye Temple grounds and entered the transport array to the Karmic Forest. He tossed the cat into a group of beasts. “This area is suitable for players below level 10. Enjoy yourself.”

“What is this place? Why are the monsters so horrible-looking?”

Seeing a beast come at it, the cat raised a claw and scratched it across the forehead. He saw a very long HP bar appear above the beast’s head, which displayed a -1.

A yao’s attack strength would vary depending on their starting species. If someone were to roll a bear or tiger yao, they wouldn’t get the Beguile ability, but their starting attack power would be very high. This cat yao, on the other hand, stood no chance against these beasts.

Underneath their attacks from all sides, the cat started to lose health.

Everyone was still at low levels right now. They hadn’t left the starting village and unlocked any new maps, so when they died, they could only choose to revive in the same place. If they logged off, they would still log on in the same location.

Dugu Zhuo kicked down a few bamboo stalks and placed down a Misdirection Array. Someone who was unfamiliar with this array would have a lot of trouble escaping, being misdirected by illusions to keep wandering in circles in the same place.

“There are many beasts in here, so you should have no problem reaching level 10,” Dugu Zhuo said. He made a gesture for the cat to help himself, then left the Karmic Forest.

Qingyue and Aotian: “…”

They heard the cat yowl piteously as he barely hung on to his health under the monsters’ continued assaults.

“Isn’t that a bit harsh?” Qingyue asked as they left the Karmic Forest. “Even if he logs off, he can only log back on in the same place, and there aren’t any other revival points for him either. Beguile doesn’t work on monsters. How is he going to escape the forest?”

“He only needs to wait for night.” Dugu Zhuo looked up to the sky, assessing the time based on the sun’s position. “Right now, it’s the sixth ke of Youshi[1]. By Haishi, when the moon rises over the trees, yao will be able to increase in strength tremendously by absorbing spiritual energy.”

“…When’s Haishi?” asked Qingyue.

They knew what the sixth ke of Youshi was, since the jade slip for game controls would display the time in the bottom right corner, which could be swapped between game and real time. While the real time displayed was 18:30, the game time showed Youshi, sixth ke.

“Zi, Chou, Yin, Mao…” Aotian knew some fundamentals about the Heavenly Stems and Earthly Branches and started counting on his fingers. “Around 9 pm, I guess, two and a half hours later.”

“Hopefully he doesn’t get so mad he doesn’t log on for the whole night, or he’ll never escape,” Qingyue said sympathetically.

She might’ve felt bad for him, but she didn’t intend to save him. After all, the black cat had Beguiled them first, and if Dugu Zhuo hadn’t resisted control, they might all be fighting each other right now. A punishment like this didn’t amount to much. Plus, the cat had already been given a favor. Dugu Zhuo had even told him about a good place to level up, so what did it matter if he died a few times?

“How come you use the twelve shichen to tell time?” Long @ Aotian said. “It took me forever to convert!”

Dugu Zhuo had worried about his identity being exposed earlier, but now that he had witnessed so many odd behaviors from the players around him, he was less concerned. “Isn’t this more fitting to the game?” he said casually.

“It does suit it really well. You’re quite sentimental,” Aotian said, accepting Dugu Zhuo’s explanation naturally.

“Since you know how to convert between times, let me test you a little,” Dugu Zhuo said. “What’s nine in the morning?”

After counting on his fingers, Long @ Aotian said, “The end of Chenshi and the beginning of Sishi.”

“Twelve in the afternoon.”

“The fourth ke of Wushi.”

“Three in the afternoon.”

“The end of Weishi and the beginning of Shenshi.”

“Six in the afternoon.”

“The fourth ke of Youshi!”

“Stop asking, please,” Aotian said, making a begging motion with his hands. “You’re killing me.”

Dugu Zhuo now knew what times Ye Zhou would be online and mostly understood the modern timekeeping system based off Aotian’s answers, so he stopped tormenting Aotian.

“You seem to know a lot,” Qingyue said. “We’re all low-level players, so how come you know so much?”

Thinking back to how Ye Zhou had made conjectures about the VR game based on the PC edition, Dugu Zhuo answered, “I guessed based off the PC game.”

Dugu Zhuo wanted to look around the village next to Tanye Temple, in order to find out more about the game, but after just a few steps, he got a system notification. 

[Ding! For eliminating evil and helping the people, you’ve gained 1 Righteousness Point.]

[Ding! You’ve created an array. A blank jade slip has been sent to your storage item. Please name your array and record it according to system guidelines, then submit it for approval. After approval, the array can be offered to other players in an exchange.]

Dugu Zhuo paused in his steps, analyzing these two notifications.

Previously, when he slew those beasts, the system had commended him for “slaying monsters” and given him spirit stones, experience, herbs, a useless sword form, and so on. This prompt, however, had suddenly popped up saying “eliminating evil and helping the people”, and rewarded him with “Righteousness Points”, so it was something different.

He wasn’t doing anything right now, just walking down the street, so why was he rewarded?

Unless…

Dugu Zhuo glanced back at the Karmic Forest. The cat should’ve died once about now.

“Why’re you stopping?” Long @ Aotian said. “Also, where are you going?”

“What’s a Righteousness Point?” Dugu Zhuo asked instead of answering.

“I don’t know,” Long @ Aotian answered. “They weren’t in the PC game.”

Since the cat had stolen the vital essence of a human NPC, he could be seen as a danger to the “people” of the game. Dugu Zhuo had tossed him into the Karmic Forest to die, so that could be considered eliminating evil, and thus he had received a Righteousness Point.

As for what use the points were, they couldn’t tell right now.

Dugu Zhuo set aside his questions for the time being and retrieved a blank jade slip from his storage item. He didn’t look at the system’s guidelines, instead recording the instructions for the Misdirection Array into the jade in a fashion familiar to him.

A ray of light shone out, displaying a “submit” button in midair. Dugu Zhuo pressed it, and now had to await the game company’s approval.

Taking his two tails, Qingyue and Aotian, he left the area of the Tanye Temple and arrived at a bustling little village. He walked all the way to the village’s outskirts, where he saw a familiar tea shack, one that exactly resembled the one with outrageous prices at the foot of the Canglan mountain range.

Dugu Zhuo was walking toward the tea shack when a voice rang out from the sky.

“Announcement: Dugu Zhuo has created the <Misdirection Array>, which has now passed system approval. Dugu Zhuo has received the title ‘Array Expert’.”