I Am the God of Games

That being said, the reality was that they were playing different games and Angora himself was quite confused with the other Players as well. In fact, what he knew was no more than what the other townsfolk knew.

They were all believers of the God of Games as far as Angora could tell, but their brains seemed to be wired differently from his own, and appeared to be very concerned with the rewards called ‘XP’ and ‘items’ while he himself did not. More importantly, there were many Players who had been injured in the fight against the legion of bones, but not only were they not in a hurry to receive medical attention, they were having a jovial time with their other companions.

Still, like the other Players, Angora had received Xi Wei’s notifications about the version update of the System.

Apart from more building blueprints being unlocked, there was now a new page called the contribution shop. Now, Angora would be able to assign commissioned quests such as hunting, housing maintenance or farming to Players. While Players would accomplish the quests and receive XP and game coins, Angora would be able to see their different contribution levels.

Then, as their contribution level rises, Angora would be able to receive new quest clearance to distribute commissioned quests of higher levels from the contribution shop.

When Players completed their commissioned quests (which is really help to carry bricks in the starter village), Angora’s own yield points would also increase in his Overlord System and unlock new buildings, whereas the matter of workers manning the buildings could be handled by assigning it to the Players. The prosperity level of the town would in turn rise, and when his level as lord rises, he would obtain an even larger fief to build more buildings…

In other words, with enough players, the cycle of mutually benefit would continue for a long time!

Moreover, Angora also free a free unlock in his System’s storage—the Lifestone, a building that could be constructed without charge.

He built it in the center of town.

At first, Angora imagined that the Lifestone would merely be a replica of a mountain, but when it was finished, he found that it was a crystalline rhombus-shaped stone hovering in the air. Beneath it was a curious spell formation that kept flickering just like a fountain.

The system manual also indicated that it was a ‘wonder’ and only one could be built in each town.

Once any player died in the wildlands, unable to revived through spells or if their corpses unrecoverable, they would be brought back to life here, in the Lifestone three days later (in reality, they would be revived beside the Lifestone they were tethered to—untethered Players would be revived beside the nearest Lifestone).

Angora had been surprised by the fact that the Players could be revived, but soon realized that he was simply less experienced as the other Players had seemed to gotten used to that.

Perhaps they now neither fear being wounded or dying was because of the infinite counts of resurrection.

That was precisely why in the townsfolk and Angora’s own perspective, the Players were behaving like psychos.

A point in case was the fighter Marni, who died fighting multiple skeleton warriors at once. When he was brought back to life by Eleena the saintess-in-training, however, he did not realize that the blades that killed him were still stabbed into his back, and was instead excitedly flipping through his System (although Angora could not see it, he could guess what he was doing).

Marni then cheerfully exclaimed, “Finally, level three! Wait, why do I have three bleeding statuses?! My HP is dwindling… oh, I’m dead.”

With those words, his blood gushed out and he fell into a pool of it, dying instantly and peacefully.

Still, the other players did not feel sad at all, but were instead laughing and saying things like ‘Marni’s dead, you bastards!’, stirring a pleasant atmosphere amongst themselves.

Then, when Marni was revived again, he appeared much more dejected.

“Silly me,” he mumbled. “I only know that killing monsters can help with leveling up, but not that dying loses XP. Damn it, back to level two…”

For his part, Angora was of the opinion that he was a Player as well and might have the ability of being revived. But in the end, he did not have the courage to have someone stab him to death to test it, which was why he simply kept the question of whether he could be revived in his own mind for now.

Meanwhile, the Players’ arrival in starter village had been beneficial. The once dilapidated houses were quickly repaired and there was no lack of help on the farm. If anyone had any trouble, they could just give a shout and there would be Players at hand to help.

The once gloomy town hence became a little lively, and the great snow that winter seemed to have in store did not quite douse the warm passion of the Players as they roamed about and explored.

Nonetheless, not all was well and good—in the very least, Angora himself was almost annoyed to death by the other Players who relentless looked for him, hoping to add to their reputation as well.

It would have been acceptable if it was only one or two, but with almost two dozen people coming to him day after day, never leaving him alone even when he was asleep or having a toilet break, Angora felt the immense pressure. In fact, he felt insomnia and constipation slowly taking him ill.

In the end, he had to grit his teeth and adjust his plans, unlocking and building the notice board to finally set himself free.

Moreover, the Players’ arrival also exerted pressure on the town’s initially sufficient food reserves. It was fortunate that Angora discovered that the bone powder that dropped from killed skeleton revenants would significantly reduce the time needed for crops to mature, and after acquiring them from the Players, Angora finally and successfully resolved the town’s food shortage issue for an entire year.

Meanwhile, the unnamed town had changed entirely with the construction efforts of the Players. The poor town which was once less than a village began to look the part.

In fact, Marni, leader of the merchant group gave out some of his daily necessities which he intended to sell for free to help develop the town. In exchange, he was given priority selection for the daily brick-carrying quests, hence making it to the top group and earning the title ‘Brick-Carrying Boss’.

That being said, the Players still had a limit to their patience when it came to a dull lifestyle. They certainly were not themselves after experiencing the excitement of leveling up…

One day, the Players gathered together, crowding around a party of five with the highest levels: Eleena, Edward, Joe, Gou Dan, and Marni.

All of them had earned enough game coins and reputation to purchase the Miasma-Clearing Torch from Angora as they began the ‘Outskirts—Valley of the Tragic Dead’ mission.

Jessica, who had been on the same team with Eleena was staying in town because other players’ were heavily insisting that she stay, because it was only herself who was running a cleric support route and Eleena the saintess-in-waiting who could cast Revive. If both of them were to fall in the Valley of the Tragic Dead, none of them are getting brought back to life for the time being…

All the Players then escorted the frontline team to the entrance before finally stopping.

“Well, we’re off!” Marni stepped forward, and as everyone looked on enviously, boldly held his torch and stepped into the purple miasma.

[Player Marni Wilf has died. Reviving in 71:59:59.]

Every other Player was speechless.