Lucas was very puzzled.
What did he mean?
"I know you all have questions. It doesn't matter. Listen to me now, and you will make sense of everything," he said.
Lucas just couldn't get the impression out of his head that things were amiss, yet he didn't know just what was amiss.
"This is the first beta test of Minecraft Online and you are one of 10,000 people being given the chance to join in this."
The voice continued, "To show my appreciation for your enthusiasm, I, the creator god, Notch, have decided to give rewards to the top ten players in the gold coin rankings at the end of the one-month beta test."
The announcement caught the eye of every player.
"Players who rank sixth to tenth will each receive a reward of 200,000 dollars," Notch announced.
At this, excitement swept through the crowd.
Two hundred thousand yuan! That was a substantial amount of money, and getting paid to play a game was an irresistible prospect.
"The players ranked fourth and fifth will each receive a reward of 500,000 dollas," Notch continued.
"Third place will get one million!"
"Second place will receive two million!"
Then, with a teasing smile, Notch paused, clearly building suspense before revealing the grand prize.
Everyone held their breath, eagerly anticipating the final number.
"The winning person gets ten million dollars in cash. and a random enchantment book!"
Upon hearing the ten million yuan prize money, the crowd's gasp was one of pure astonishment.
No one could ever have thought the prize money would be so big.
In the game, most of them did not even focus on the magical book with that kind of prize money.
But not Lucas. He silently speculated, *An enchanted book crafted by the creator god himself must be extraordinary—surely at least level five in power.*
"As for where gold coins come from," Notch explained, "you don't need to worry. As long as you're active in the game, you'll earn gold coins. They appear randomly, so it depends on your luck."
He continued listing the activities that could yield coins:
"Mining, farming, raising livestock, brewing potions, fighting monsters."
Then he changed his tone a notch, becoming grave.
"Even killing other players."
The players stirred uncomfortably as he elaborated, "Minecraft Online does not prohibit player-versus-player combat. But you need to think this through wisely."
During this beta phase, every player would be able to respawn only three times.
Once the respawn attempts for a player were exhausted, that player would not be able to log in again until the game's next public beta.
A groan of frustration suddenly came from someone in the crowd. It was one of the players who had been struck by lightning on the city wall earlier.
These unlucky players had already lost one of their three lives, even before the game had officially started.
Lucas quickly looked at his status bar. In addition to the ten standard hunger bars and ten health bars, there were three flashing dots above the zero-level indicator.
Those, he realized, were the three respawn opportunities.
Interestingly, these dots were only visible to the player himself-he could not see the status bars of others.
"And if you kill another player," Notch added,
"50% of their gold coins will drop. Anyone nearby can pick them up."
The more Lucas listened, the more alarmed he became.
This was not just a game-it was a battlefield, a test of human nature at its core.
While most would probably want to play nice, some would no doubt attack others, hunt them down, and steal their coins to get up the rankings.
Indeed, compared to mining or fighting mobs, which were rather laborious, attacking other players for their gold coins seemed like an easier way to gain wealth and glory.
"To check your gold coin ranking, just use the 'money' command," Notch concluded.
"So regarding the rest of the content in the game, let's just say you need to figure it out. I hope you all enjoy yourselves. See you guys in a month!"
Notch's figure disappeared.
Seconds later, a system announcement was heard across the square:
"Random Teleportation will begin after three seconds. Players prepare yourselves."
Before Lucas could fully process what had just happened, a flash of white light enveloped him and the scene before him disappeared.
In an instant, the square was empty.
Notch reappeared shortly after, now standing before a massive screen displaying the statuses of all 10,000 players.
He checked the time-it was already late afternoon, and night would soon fall.
Most players still wandered around aimlessly, engrossed by this alien world and completely ignorant of the dangers the night had in store for them.
Smirking slyly, Notch discreetly changed the game difficulty to Hard from Normal.
Satisfied yet, he had it set to Nightmare-a custom mode he himself designed.
"I wonder how many of them will survive the month," he muttered with a sneer curling his lips.
As he scanned the screen, one player caught his attention.
"Ah, ah, what's this little guy? He's pretty sharp," Notch said, zooming in on the screen as he watched Lucas, who was already making good progress.
At that moment, Lucas was in a birch forest surrounded by many trees.
His first activity after landing was to punch three logs with his bare fists—a motion so ingrained in seasoned Minecraft players it was almost instinctual.
He quickly turned the logs into birch planks, then into sticks by using the simple crafting table included in his inventory.
With four planks, he made a proper workbench, which he installed at his feet to make a wooden ax and pickaxe.
Taking the ax, he retrieved the workbench and resumed chopping down the birch tree above him.
Lucas had been playing Minecraft for so long that he had developed certain compulsive habits, though he wouldn't consider them extreme.
He simply couldn't leave trees half-chopped, coal unmined, or grass untrimmed near his base.
But compared to his mother's level of compulsion, his quirks were trivial.
One time, late at night, he and his father played games past midnight.
The next day, Lucas came home from school to find that the mountain behind his tiny base had disappeared.
His mother, with her obsessive nature, had spent the entire night digging it out.
She even filled dozens of storage boxes with the stone she excavated.
That memory made Lucas question how far human determination can push someone, and then he realizes his habits just might be something that's running in the family.
As he glanced at the setting sun, anxiety crept in.
The westward sky grew darker with the signaling that night was near.
Without defense equipment, Lucas knew that he had to do this as fast as possible because night time is when things start getting worse.