Chapter 14: Everything Was Not Over!

Translator: Daoist6fubtiW

It only took half an hour, and this game reviewer was utterly criticized.

At this moment, he was still excitedly talking on the phone with the sponsor, having completed the game in just half a day.

Today, he wrote a review at the fastest speed, and the sponsor must be very satisfied, right?

He had quite a few fans in the gaming community, and his fanbase was much larger than that of the “Digging for Ascension” developer.

“Sponsor, are you satisfied with the result this time? I actually played the game and was very careful not to die and start over,” the reviewer said smugly.

“I managed to endure and defeat the King’s Hand in the end.” At this point, he couldn’t help but sigh.

If it wasn’t for the money he received this time, he genuinely wanted to give the game a good review.

The weird little items during the final boss battle had indeed been helpful.

Aside from that, the game had smooth controls, and the whole combat experience was exhilarating.

He even wanted to experience how other weapon combinations would fare in battles.

“How dare you ask me for money?” Yogame’s contact person looked at the received messages and his face turned black.

“We wanted you to point out the flaws and even the shortcomings based on a genuine game review!”

“Yeah, that’s what I did according to the request.” The reviewer’s eyes were full of confusion. He genuinely wrote it according to his own thoughts.

In his opinion, the various types of equipment were high in combination, but for a simple game like this, they felt somewhat burdensome.

“You can see for yourself. Remember, we signed an agreement, and this review was entirely your choice. It has nothing to do with us,” the contact person said and hung up the phone.

The reviewer felt a sense of foreboding and quickly opened his phone. He immediately saw over 99 replies.

This is bad!

The reviewer immediately realized that this review must have gone wrong.

Because if he was right or fair in his review, most players would just take a glance at what he wrote and not bother replying.

In this situation, it meant that he wrote something incorrect, and it had to be very wrong for so many people to reply.

He clicked on the reply page and, after reading its contents, his vision went dark.

Was it not a real completion?

The completion was just the beginning of Cell 1?

Because he wanted to write a real player’s review, he didn’t look up any information before playing.

He felt that this way, his mind would be free from the influence of others.

As a blank sheet, when playing a game for the first time, he preferred to fill it with his own experiences.

The information he found online indicated that after defeating the King’s Hand, players would obtain an Origin Cell. After that, players could adjust the difficulty by changing the number of Origin Cells at the starting point. Under different difficulty levels, besides differences in monster health and damage, there were additional settings to increase the player’s difficulty.

After Cell 1, there were Cell 2, Cell 3… up to Cell 5.

Every player who had reached the later stages mentioned that they were tormented to the point of mental confusion, and they crazily discussed various weapon combinations and argued about which one was the best way to play the game.

And what about himself?

He had only played Cell 0, not even paying attention to the storyline due to rushing.

After defeating the King’s Hand, he had given the game a negative review.

He quickly deleted this review and wrote a new article apologizing, stating that he had only played a part and didn’t realize there were more levels ahead.

He thought this would put an end to the matter.

Little did he know that the game companies he had previously cooperated with sent him letters to terminate the collaboration.

According to these game companies, this game reviewer was not rigorous enough when reviewing games.

The reviewer’s back was sweating, and there was only one solution in his mind.

He had to completely complete the game and write a most authentic player experience review.

He reopened his computer and entered the game, looking at the screen of Cell 1, he couldn’t help but gulp.

Just now, he had read what others said.

If Cell 0 was to deceive players into playing, then Cell 1 was the beginning of suffering.

Even for Cells 1 and 2, they still approached them with a simple attitude, only until Cell 3 started.

The enemy’s health, attack power, and danger significantly increased to the point of being quite dangerous for newcomers. Enemies with teleportation abilities appeared, and levels began to feature diverse enemies.

The way the recovery pool appeared was the same as in Cell 1, but it would only restore one gulp of a health flask, so players had to learn how to allocate their health.

By Cell 4, the enemy’s health, attack power, and danger greatly increased, nearly reaching nightmare level. In this difficulty, there were no more recovery pools, and players could only buy food or potions from the shop or find them scattered around.

By Cell 5, it was hell on Earth. Some hardcore players had reached this stage and were constantly screaming in pain.

By this point, the enemy’s health, attack power, and danger had increased significantly. Epidemics spread across the entire island, contaminating some of the food with bacteria. Whenever players were hit, they would be infected.

Even accidentally eating contaminated food would result in infection, and a gauge would appear on their health bar. If the gauge was full, they would continuously lose health until they died. To reduce the infection level, players needed to drink water or eat fresh food.

As the plot progressed, players came to realize that the greenish algae attached to the headless corpse in the ending of Cell 5 was not just a fugitive from the underground prison.

But as the plot developed, everyone discovered that the greenish thing was, in fact, our protagonist and also the King in the story.

After defeating the King’s Hand at the end of Cell 0, players could see a man wearing a purple robe and a crown sitting motionless on the throne. His chest was inlaid with a red crystal.

That was the philosopher’s stone that stirred people’s grievances.

That admired King, talented in both civil and military affairs, had one major flaw—arrogance.

After unifying the empire, his ambition began to swell, and he pursued the elusive eternal life.

Coincidentally, at this time, the collectors revealed a method of immortality to the King, and they began their research on the Elixir of Life, artificial beings, and the philosopher’s stone…

So, the King started sending people to mine the red crystals in the caves to craft the philosopher’s stone. However, the caves weren’t just filled with red crystals; they also contained poisonous gas and monsters.

Mining was the most laborious and thankless job on the island, with many people being crushed to death by falling rocks, suffocated by poisonous steam, or killed by strange creatures…