Chapter 1: Starting Over from the Beginning

Chapter 1: Starting Over from the Beginning

Chapter 1

The electronic clock jumped to 13:14, while on the laptop desktop, the download progress bar for the Nine Provinces client slowly crawled past 52%.

Ying Long opened the white plastic bag containing her takeout and struggled to pry open the flimsy plastic lid. The aroma of sour-and-spicy rice noodles wafted out, making one's mouth water. Unfortunately, today was October 1st, and her roommates had all gone home for the holiday. There was no one around to tempt with the food, which was such a shame. This rice noodle shop was one of the best sources of carbohydrates near the university district.

She had not eaten this particular taste in nearly five or six years.

Ying Long sighed with emotion, quickly snapped apart the chopsticks, picked up a mouthful of rice noodles, and stuffed it into her mouth.

The bone broth paired with chili, the rice noodles thoroughly infused with flavor, the fresh and numbing sensation stimulating her taste buds, a satisfyingly sharp and exhilarating pain. She ate five or six mouthfuls in a row before freeing one hand to move the mouse and click open the announcement related to the Nine Provinces open beta, reading through it word by word.

As a veteran Nine Provinces player, apart from the two years when she had quit, most of Ying Long's leisure time had been thrown into this game. She knew the game inside out, so even if she did not read the announcement carefully, it would not matter much.

But she still read the nearly three-thousand-word announcement from beginning to end with great care.

Nine Provinces was an online game developed by Dream Studio and operated by Hound Company. The official publicity claimed it was a groundbreaking work of its era, but nobody believed it. Ying Long felt that perhaps the officials themselves were just blindly exaggerating. They simply had no idea that they had actually predicted the future.

Who could have expected that this game would really become a part of the history of online gaming?

At the very beginning, the mainland version of Nine Provinces was still a traditional keyboard-and-mouse game during its open beta. After the cloud servers were connected, the versions continued to evolve and it was renamed Claim the Throne, with the English name The Crown. It passed the strictest review, became a globally unified cloud-server game with no latency, and integrated the PC and mobile versions. By the time of its tenth anniversary, it had already been paired with virtual headsets and entered the era of VR online gaming. Its daily revenue ranked among the top three games worldwide, making it arguably the biggest gaming IP of all.

It collaborated with Hollywood to produce an adaptation series, while merchandise raked in money like crazy. Collaborations with Hanfu clothing, milk tea shops, museums, and the like were all routine and hardly worth mentioning. It even collaborated with luxury brands, with handbags getting joint-branded editions. She had always suspected that if things continued like this, it would be difficult to bring the matter to a close without building an entire game-themed entertainment city.

However, those were matters ten years in the future.

The Nine Provinces of the present had only just begun its first open beta and had only released its first expansion, Hundred Schools of Thought.

Ying Long carefully read through it. There was not much content in the video, which mainly introduced the game's background.

The Son of Heaven of Zhou died, the various heroes rose together, and the feudal lords fought endlessly, all wanting to unify the Nine Provinces. At the same time, different schools of thought flourished everywhere. The Confucian School wrote books and debated the Dao, the School of War rushed to the front lines, the Mohist School advocated universal love and opposition to aggression, the School of Medicine saved the world and practiced medicine, the School of Yin-Yang deciphered celestial phenomena, the Legalist School carried out reforms and promoted the law, the School of Diplomacy traveled throughout the realm, and the Daoist School pursued tranquility and inaction, completely ushering in the era of the Contention of a Hundred Schools.

The player's character belonged to one of the Hundred Schools. The Eight Great Schools were the eight major sects, while there were also two special professions that could be obtained through class advancement: Thief and Assassin, making ten professions in total. Every profession had different skills and talents, and players could freely choose their direction of development. The degree of freedom was extremely high.

As a veteran player, Ying Long naturally had her own ideas about what profession she wanted to play and how she would play it well. There was no need to worry about that.

What she was seriously looking for was an easter egg.

—During the sixth anniversary, a post had exploded across the forums. It contained an indistinct recording that vaguely said someone had taken one hundred million from the game. It caused a sensation immediately after being posted, and then the entire post was deleted. Strangely, although the post kept getting deleted, the officials never issued a denial. Most people thought it was fake, while others said it was true. The truth and falsehood of the matter even made it onto the trending searches, triggering discussion throughout society.

The officials were probably pressured into it, and eventually admitted that the matter really had happened: a player had found the game's "Imperial Seal" and received a prize of one hundred million.

The collective uproar online and offline was enormous, and everyone had something to say. Yet even by the time she was reborn, nobody had figured out exactly what had happened, or why it could make the game company willingly pay out the money while remaining so secretive about it afterward.

Since this matter had not come from nowhere, anyone who missed this opportunity would be a fool.

One hundred million.

Just thinking about it made her heart race.

Unfortunately, even the very first opening-day announcement did not mention the Imperial Seal anywhere. She could only turn the page regretfully and study the various benefits available at launch.

Every game inevitably had some form of spending. Nine Provinces did not require a subscription card, which was why it had attracted a huge number of players ever since its trailer was released. But if one wanted to play a game well, having no money simply would not do. A poor female university student could only seize every bit of free benefit she could get her hands on, laying the foundation for a tiny advantage.

Bind an exclusive secret code to receive medicines and food.

A limited 168 package containing rare cosmetic items and a mount, limited to 888 packages.

Just looking at this introduction, did it not completely resemble those web games where "register and receive the Dragon-Slaying Saber"? Players were not fools. Everyone was afraid that Nine Provinces would claim not to require subscription cards, only to find countless different ways to fleece them.

Spend money? At least wait until the game launched and see how things went!

Whose money had been blown in by the wind?

But Ying Long pulled out a recharge card without hesitation and topped up her account with 350 yuan in advance.

Today's 168-yuan package would become 1,688 yuan a month later. After playing for three months, an account with identical equipment attributes but limited-edition costumes and mounts could rise in price by 3,000 yuan. Ten years later, reissued rare cosmetics from the first year would fetch more than 100,000 yuan, and even then they would be nearly impossible to buy.

Pay attention: this did not mean that Claim the Throne was a game centered around cosmetics. Quite the opposite. Cosmetics were the only things in the game that could be obtained simply by spending money. And if a game could make its players rich simply through cosmetics, the quality of the game itself naturally could not be poor.

Back to the point, each account could only purchase the 168-yuan package once. She had no choice but to register two accounts and buy one separately on each. As for why she did not buy more...

Her living expenses would be gone, and the packages would be sold out.

Even poor people could only move mountains one ant at a time when trying to make a speculative profit. It was truly miserable.

Switching back to the game interface, the download progress slowly climbed to 89%.

Sigh, Nine Provinces from ten years ago still needed a client. She really was not used to it.

Ying Long hurriedly ate her lunch, quickly finishing off the rice noodles.

She packed up the takeout container and threw it into the trash, rinsed her mouth, poured herself some tea, and the computer popped up a notification saying, "Download complete."

Game loading!

She leisurely wiped her mouth and waited for the animation to load.

Flames burned across a scroll, and the map of the Nine Provinces continent appeared one section at a time. Thick ink dripped into water, revealing the silhouette of the dying Son of Heaven of Zhou. Beacon fires rose everywhere, metal weapons rang, and the common people fled and wandered from place to place. The chaotic era began from that moment.

In the next instant, the thick ink spread apart, revealing the initial scene of a stream and a thatched cottage.

[Please select a server.]

Ah, right. Before the globally unified server, there were still separate servers. Uh, which one had been the most popular back then?

Oh, right. "Ruler of the World."

[Please select the sect you wish to join.]

Ying Long clicked on the School of Medicine. Its representative model was a graceful and beautiful long-haired woman.

[Please customize your character.]

The mouse slid across the screen. Face Model No. 2, long eyebrows, red lips, a high ponytail hairstyle, average height. The modeling from ten years ago was not as realistic as virtual VR, and even the texture of the skin was completely unique, but it had plenty of charm, and the level of detail was not bad either.

[Enter ID.]

Her fingers danced lightly across the keyboard: Exquisite Apothecary.

This was the ID she had registered ten years ago. It had an intensely old-fashioned feel, and she had changed it later, but the one she had the most emotional attachment to was still this one.

Since she had returned, she would let this identity be reborn as well.

Ying Long pressed confirm and officially stepped into Nine Provinces.

As a disciple of the School of Medicine, her starting point was called the Valley of the Medicine King. An NPC stood in front of her, and clicking on the NPC allowed her to accept the relevant quest.

[Senior Sister of the Valley of the Medicine King: You're a new disciple, aren't you? I'm a disciple of the School of Medicine, Pinellia. From now on, I'll be taking care of you! First, familiarize yourself with the sect. Deliver this letter to the senior brother doing his morning lessons.]

[Accept Pinellia's quest?]

Ying Long did not even look at the contents. She quickly accepted the quest and began the process every character had to go through: deliver a letter to the senior brother and receive 1 point of sect qualifications; the senior brother taught her how to meditate; then deliver the poison she had prepared to the senior sister and receive another 1 point of qualifications; learn a set of introductory techniques; and then go fight rabbits.

After killing the monsters, the senior sister would give her a bottle of medicine, letting her know how to take medicine to recover health and internal energy, commonly known as healing and restoring mana.

Ying Long did not even look at the story. She quickly completed the tutorial quests in the beginner's village, and two icons lit up in the skill bar.

No need to bother with them. Continue with the main quest. After the senior sister made her gather medicinal herbs, grind them, and practice on wooden training dummies, she would give her the most basic equipment.

Coarse cloth clothes, coarse cloth trousers, hemp-rope straw shoes, and a weapon.

There was nothing much to say about the clothes and such. In the early stages, they all increased the character's defense and health, ensuring that the character could survive for as long as possible. Weapons, however, were where Nine Provinces was most distinctive.

In ordinary games, sects had weapon restrictions, with dual-weapon sects appearing occasionally. But Nine Provinces was very particular about this. People chose weapons rather than weapons restricting people. Characters could equip all weapons, while it was martial techniques that restricted weapons. Furthermore, people had two hands, so there were two weapon slots: one main weapon and one secondary weapon. The public cooldown could be fast or slow, which was just as reasonable as a person having a dominant hand and a non-dominant hand.

The School of Medicine was a healing sect, and the senior sister first offered weapons that could also provide healing—the needle and the ribbon.

Games were simulations of reality. Just think about it and you would know: acupuncture and moxibustion had the best healing effect, while the ribbon had greater range and could cover a larger area. The needle represented fast, powerful single-target healing, while the ribbon represented slow, weak group healing.

The senior sister would explain the above information in detail. Whether players bothered to research it depended on whether they had the patience. When most people saw this distinction, they would naturally want both.

Could they? Yes.

But if you chose both, you would miss the new quest issued by the senior sister—Go take a look at Senior Brother Yellow Vine!

Ying Long had fallen for this before. She had directly chosen both because children were the only ones who made choices! Later, she learned how much of a trap it was. Fighting monsters with the needle and ribbon would make you question your life. Other sects could complete a quest in half an hour, while the School of Medicine had to spend more than an hour grinding through it, greatly delaying the time it took to leave the beginner's village.

At the very beginning of the server, level was everything.

She decisively chose the option that most players would not choose—

["No need, thank you, Senior Sister. I'd like to look around a little more."]

[Senior Sister: All right. Perhaps you should go take a look at Senior Brother Yellow Vine.]

A new quest popped up.

Ying Long quickly accepted it and ran to find her senior brother.

The senior brother needed some poisonous scorpions and chicken blood. He gave Ying Long two choices—

["A weapon that feels good in your hands will help you. Choose one of the following weapons."]

This time, the weapon choices that appeared were throwing knives and poison sacs.

The throwing knives had a relatively fast attack speed and average damage, while the poison sacs had high damage but a long casting time.

She chose both.

The senior brother gave her both, and she equipped them all.

"Click."

A sound effect indicated that the equipment had been successfully equipped.

It was nothing more than a simple click, yet Ying Long smiled.

Nine Provinces had always been famous for its open-ended gameplay. But when she first started playing, she had chosen the mainstream healing role and soon became the guild's number-one healer. Then she grew tired of it and switched to poison medicine. Unfortunately, she could only play after work, and neither her time nor money investment was substantial, so she had not developed much expertise.

Now that she was starting over from the beginning, she did not intend to play support anymore. No matter how well one played support, dealing damage was simply more satisfying.

And when it came to playing a damage dealer, what could be more interesting than a profession that could heal?

A profession that could both deal damage and heal, once mastered, was practically invincible.

—How attractive was the word "invincible."

She was merely an ordinary girl. Her family was ordinary, her appearance was ordinary, and the only thing she possessed was a tiny bit of talent in games. Unfortunately, she had once wasted the only advantage she had. Although she loved it, she had achieved nothing remarkable.

That was also the role games played in the lives of ordinary people: a pastime, a form of entertainment. In any case, they could never be a means of making a living.

But things were different now.

Nine Provinces had a bright future. With a little more effort put into managing one's affairs, even an ordinary person could earn more than ten thousand yuan a month. The income of top players was even more substantial, with annual salaries in the millions being small potatoes.

Not to mention that somewhere, somehow, an astonishing fortune was still hidden.

Opportunities for ordinary people to change their fate were few and far between. Both luck and talent were indispensable.

Ying Long swore that she would seize it.