Chapter Ninety: Heavenly Wandering
A bank notification chimed in his mind: eight-tenths of a yuan had arrived in his account.
At the reminder from his neural interface, Li Shang sprang up from bed.
“Holy crap, it actually makes money.”
His eyes filled with disbelief.
When he first saw the new update to the game, he had only meant to treat it as a bit of fun. Uploading that video of himself, an old master, and a tirade against heaven, the earth, and the clan leader was only to see how the ridiculous netizens would react.
Yet he had never expected to earn real money from it.
It was not much, but it was the first real windfall of his life.
A second alert flashed.
Another eight-tenths of a yuan had been credited.
“Holy crap, another eight-tenths!”
Just as Li Shang was still reeling from the fact that he could actually make money, the interface kept telling him more money had arrived.
But that was only the beginning.
The incoming-funds notifications came like rolling waves, one after another, in his mind.
To lie at home and still watch money keep arriving filled Li Shang with such excitement that his whole body trembled.
Without hesitation, he entered the game at once and looked at the content he had posted.
Title: Slick-Talking Emperor of the Mystics
Price: One yuan
Views: 167
Purchases: 31
Total credited: 24.8 yuan
He drew in a sharp breath at the amount.
He could hardly believe his eyes.
It had not even been an hour since upload, and he had already earned 24.8 yuan.
What could he even say to that?
Their pressure had made him a god.
“Teacher Pressure Has Forced Me” was truly thinking of the players with complete devotion.
Across the entire Open Quest platform, there was no one else who could let players earn money by playing a game.
Li Shang was moved beyond words.
So moved, in fact, that to express his feelings, he spent nearly an hour composing almost six thousand words of praise and posted them in the comments.
The title was: The Most Conscientious Designer in History! Only “Pressure Has Forced Me”!
Once the comment was posted and refreshed, replies surged in like a tide.
User 2507220257: Somehow it feels like something is off.
All Awake but Me Drunk: Indeed. This is far too “conscientious.”
WeasonBay: Yes, yes, but I just want to ask: where is my money?
From-the-Heart Brave Brave: Love is like blue sky and white clouds, a clear sky for ten thousand miles, but I still don’t have a good mood.
Looking at those comments, Li Shang frowned.
He felt that these players had somehow misunderstood Teacher Pressure.
Time would prove everything, he muttered to himself.
He left the comments, then looked back at the credited amount for Slick-Talking Emperor of the Mystics.
“Holy crap, it’s already 122.4!”
“Damn, you’re amazing, Pressure Has Forced Me!”
With a triumphant shout, Li Shang tossed the matter of the comments to the back of his mind.
He eagerly opened the term-draw interface, ready to do a tenfold draw—not for the terms, but simply to repay Teacher Pressure.
The wheel spun, and then...
Common
Common
Common
Rare
Common
...
Li Shang: ...Excuse me, can I have my emotions back?
...
In an apartment on Moonlit Street, Yin Jian exhaled slowly. Today was the second day after the game update.
He came to his computer desk with some nerves, turned on the computer, and checked the previous day’s sales for Mystic Path.
31,518,178
At the sight of those digits, Yin Jian froze for a moment, then the corners of his mouth shot upward uncontrollably.
After the initial wave of delight, he realized how unseemly he looked and quickly pressed his lips back down with his fingers.
Be steady. Be steady.
He repeated it to himself.
This is only a small milestone on the road to my goal. I can’t get arrogant.
Once his emotions settled, he drew in a breath.
Mm. Sweet.
“Things are looking up.”
Yin Jian sat down, pulled up the game’s detailed revenue report, and began analyzing the reasons behind this growth, checking whether it matched his expectations.
If not, then what was the cause?
Only by figuring these things out could he make even more money.
“Workshop revenue from players is only a little over seven percent of total sales, far less than I expected... probably because this feature was just launched and not many players have tried it yet. It needs time to develop.”
“And excluding workshop revenue, the term lottery has already brought in nearly twenty-nine million, more than sixty percent growth.”
Yin Jian frowned. Although milestones would indeed increase players’ appetite for draws, it should not have been this exaggerated.
There had to be another reason he did not know.
“What could it be?”
Thinking it over, Yin Jian opened the game’s comment section, hoping to find an answer, and along the way he pinned some of the comments praising him to the top.
Not because he wanted to show off, but simply because he thought these players had gone to the trouble of typing so much, and that was no small thing.
After browsing through the comments, Yin Jian nodded thoughtfully.
So that was it.
At last he understood the fundamental reason for the surge in sales.
The player workshop had made players money, but the money came too easily, creating a mindset in which even if they spent it, it would not hurt.
“So they’re very willing to take the money they earned and spend it on draws, and once they get hooked, they’ll even recharge more.”
“This is practically letting the grass be cut down, then grow back on its own so it can be cut again...”
Yin Jian no longer knew what else to say.
He had accidentally created an endless crop of grass to be cut, and where was he supposed to complain about that?
“Serves me right for making money.”
He shook his head, feeling helpless.
Still smiling to himself, he closed the comments and was just about to go refine the new mode when his neural interface suddenly chimed with a new message.
He opened it, expecting it to be Zhou Shun again, but after checking, he saw it was a corporate account called Sky Games requesting to add him as a friend.
“Sky Games?”
Yin Jian searched his memory carefully, but could not find anything related to this company.
After a moment of hesitation, he chose to accept the request.
As soon as the request went through, the other side sent a message.
Sky Games: May I ask if this is Mr. Yin?
Yin Jian: Yes. What do you need?
Sky Games: It’s like this. Our company is also a virtual game company, and we would like to invite Mr. Yin to join us.
Seeing the reply, Yin Jian’s brow furrowed.
Yin Jian: How did you know I work in virtual games? I don’t remember ever leaking my real-life information.
Sky Games: We happened to learn it.
That answer made Yin Jian’s expression darken a little.
“Is it Open Quest, or Li Jianghe...”
He began to speculate.
But he quickly dismissed both guesses.
As a semi-official figure, Li Jianghe would simply never do such a thing.
And as a major company with channels across the entire Xiahua star sector, Open Quest was even less likely.
If it were exposed that they leaked user data, the consequence would be a total ban from Xiahua’s network authority.
“In that case, they must have bought it through a gray market channel.”
In this data age, any information could be dug up, provided one was willing to pay.
“They investigated me and still want me to join their company? That boss really is a talent. Without a few years of brain damage, he never would have thought of something like this.”
Angry as he was, Yin Jian could only swallow it.
He had no evidence to accuse them.
Yin Jian: Sorry, I’m not interested.
After replying, he was about to block the other party, when...
Sky Games: Please don’t rush to refuse, Mr. Yin. Take a look at our offer first and then think it over.
Sky Games: Our revenue split is seventy-thirty, with the designer taking seventy and us thirty. Moreover, as long as you release a game on our platform and sign with us, we can customize an aether doll for you according to your requirements as a reward, specially tailored to you.