"Am I dreaming right now?"
This inexplicable thought popped into decadentdude's head, and his companions seemed to be having the same doubts. They stood gaping, their mouths open so wide you could fit a basketball inside them.
During the course of their entire gaming career, they had never seen anything like this before—
It should be noted that raising one's reputation level was an extremely difficult task. They were Stygian players, so they naturally started with a "Good" reputation. But even so, it was incredibly difficult to raise their reputation to "Friendly," the next level.
If was already so hard for them, then it would be unimaginably difficult for a Yggdmillennia player!
A Yggdmillennia player who had a "Friendly" reputation with the Stygian Night Kingdom's forces?
In your dreams!
Deep down, the four top tier players began to question everything they thought they knew. Still, Ye Kong didn't seem to have any intention of letting them off the hook.
Then...
Ye Kong lifted up his right hand and raised his middle finger, and he spat out a single word to the dumbfounded Stygian players—
"Idiots."
Humiliation!
He was flagrantly humiliating them!!!
This instantly infuriated the four Stygian players, who lost their cool. Their eyes widened in anger, and their faces grew twisted in rage!
"You!"
The Sorcerer - princesskaho was so angry that her lovely eyes were spitting fire. Just by her name alone, one could infer that she was a girl with an arrogant princess-like attitude. Normally, she had no shortage of suitors to choose from, so how could she bear such an insult?
"I'm going to murder this guy!"
Princesskaho raised up her staff at once and prepared to chant an attack, but she was stopped by decadentdude, who stood next to her.
"Don't be impulsive!" decadentdude advised her. "We can't do a thing against him with the Stygian Army watching. His reputation level is higher than ours, so if we initiate an attack, not only will our reputation score drop, but we'll also be attacked by the Stygian Army!"
Listening to decadentdude's advice, princesskaho regained her composure. She shot a fierce glare at Ye Kong, but dared not do anything else.
"He's right. We can't attack him!" Using their shared party communications channel, the Berserker added, "That guy is just trying to rile us up. Don't fall for his tricks!"
"Hmph! This guy is really too devious!" Princesskaho gritted her teeth, but she had already lost her nerve to attack. If she attacked the player, they would be the ones who would suffer.
"Demon Realm" had very polished settings in place for the game's reputation score and aggro mechanics. For example, Ye Kong, decadentdude, and the rest now had a certain reputation level with the Stygian Night Kingdom's forces, and in this case, Ye Kong's reputation level was higher than the others'.
If decadentdude, princesskaho, and the other two players were to initiate an attack against Ye Kong in front of the Stygian Army, the Stygian Army would attack them, since they were programmed to protect their "allies."
The underlying reason for this was that the group of mobs in the Stygian Army was originally from a city in the Stygian Night Kingdom. They were essentially the same type of mobs as the soldiers in Qingmu Town, and were responsible for protecting the NPCs inside the city. Hence, attacking one of the Stygian Army's "allies" in front of them was akin to attacking one of their friendly NPCs in the city. Needless to say, the Stygian Army would execute a "PK punishment."
What could they do when this group of Stygian Army troops had the settings of "city guards"?
Of course, the same rules applied to Ye Kong. He couldn't initiate an attack. Otherwise, he would also receive a "PK punishment" from the Stygian Army.
However, because Ye Kong's reputation level was higher, his punishment for committing a PK would be slightly more lax. He wouldn't be killed on the spot, but he might be driven out of the region for a while, and would only be allowed to return after a period of time. It was the same as the punishment for committing a PK inside a city.
"Demon Realm" actively encouraged PK activities, but only in wilderness maps. For towns and cities, where peace was paramount, Demon Realm had a strict system of management. It used high level guards and the reputation system to restrict PK activities inside the walls of these settlements.
"Looks like they didn't fall for it."
Ye Kong watched his counterparts put away their weapons, and he thought to himself while shaking his head, "As expected, the real top tier players are completely different. They're much more capable than those half-a*sed closed beta testers.
"Even though I've been rubbing it in their faces, they're still able to resist my provocations, which shows they're not entirely stupid."
Thinking this, Ye Kong sighed to himself. "They were qualified enough to join the 'Stygian Night Invasion' story event. They must be alpha testers at least, and they're probably equipped with some good stuff. Who knows, they might even have equipment that can fill my empty slots.
"It's such a shame. I wanted to borrow the strength of the Stygian Army to finish them all off."
As they saw the way Ye Kong looked at them, like a hunter watching his prey, decadentdude, princesskaho, and the others felt a jolt of fear. Deep down, they were relieved that they hadn't acted on impulse. Otherwise, they would have been buried six feet under by now.
"You guys, stay cool. His level is LV2."
The always cool-headed Assassin - blackgoat noticed the information above Ye Kong's head, and immediately warned the rest of his party. "Even if we decide to take him down with us, we might not be able to kill him! Don't forget, the Stygian Army will intervene!"
The four Stygian players were now all at LV1, their experience levels already hovering around 90%. Since they were a level below Ye Kong, their attacks against Ye Kong would be subjected to a fixed reduction in damage—This was the effect of "Level Suppression."
Blackgoat, decadentdude, and the others didn't have any equipment with an "Ignore Level Difference" attribute!
Due to this fact, they didn't have the courage to instantly kill Ye Kong. If they tried to kill him and failed, they would draw the attacks of the Stygian Army, and would end up compromising themselves instead.
The Berserker swallowed his anger, choosing to ignore his opponent.
"Let's go! We shouldn't get involved any further with that player!"
Logically speaking, players who chose classes like the Berserker generally had more explosive tempers, and tended to choose the hard approach over a more peaceful resolution. However, he really couldn't do it the hard way this time. Not only was Ye Kong's reputation level higher than theirs, but more importantly, his character level was higher!
They didn't even have the chance to end it with "mutual destruction"!
The four Stygian players could only slip away from Ye Kong dejectedly.
At the same time, another doubt lingered in their minds—
"This player - lacuna, how did he get to LV2 already? The game just started half an hour ago. He's leveling up way too quickly..."
The four of them were Server Load Test players, and aside from 1st Test players, no one else understood Demon Realm better than they did. Even so, when they saw lacuna's level, they felt an inexplicable sense of "pressure."
It was the kind of pressure they didn't even feel from the 1st Test players...
.....
"That bunch really knew how to behave."
Ye Kong's eyes followed them as they departed. Then, he shook his head and said, "There's too few of them. Only four Stygian players in the whole Qingmu Town is a far cry from what I remember from last time.
"According to what originally happened, the number of players mixed in with the Stygian Army should be in the double digits..."
It seemed that Ye Kong really had no self-awareness as the "culprit" of this incident—If he hadn't triggered the start of the "Stygian Night Invasion," would there only be four Stygian players coming to Qingmu Town?
It was because the event started a quarter of an hour early that a large number of Stygian players didn't make enough progress in time. As a result, they missed their chance to join in the "Stygian Night Invasion" story event.
Of course, the "Stygian Night Invasion" story event wasn't limited to Qingmu Town. Even in the original timeline, the group of Stygian players invading Qingmu Town were just a small portion of the Stygian Night Kingdom Server's population.
Faced with this scenario...
Ye Kong sighed with some "sorrow"—
"Ahh.
"I really wish some reckless fellows would come and make the mistake of attacking me..."