Chapter 8 Forum Opening and Live Video
After I mentioned that I was offline, I found that everyone was still awake. When I asked, I found out that they had taken a nap while playing the game and were all very energetic. So I started a crowdfunding campaign to buy a heart-protecting mirror.
In the WeChat group "God's Forsaken Land First Test Strategy Group", messages were flooding in at an astonishing speed.
What Canned Food I Say (Group Owner): "Brothers, here's the situation. I definitely can't come up with 500 contribution points by myself. But I can guarantee that the 'Evil God's Heart-Protecting Mirror' is absolutely the current version's ultimate artifact! Its built-in video recording function is our nuclear weapon for recommending this game to the world! With the 20% discount now, let's try to get it for 400 points."
I'm not a husky: "400 points? Kai, are you crazy? Everyone just finished the task and only received 50 points, plus what we had before, it's only a little over 100. This would require a large sum of money from most people's savings."
Edison reincarnated: "From a technical point of view, Kai is right. Talk is cheap. These online trolls are saying we're paid trolls or shills hired by big companies. If we can release a first-person demo video, even including the UI, it would be a game-changer! They'd definitely slap us in the face!"
Dangdangdangxinzhigang: "I support it! I want the whole world to see how I fight Warcraft hand-to-hand (even though I died once)! I'll bid 80 points!"
Let me teach you a lesson: "I'll also put up 80 points! As long as Brother Kai agrees to give my special barbecue a close-up when recording the video, and also promote the future 'God's Forsaken Number One Restaurant' signboard."
Driven by both the desire to prove they weren't crazy and the collective sense of honor among first-test players, the 15 players displayed astonishing unity. In less than ten minutes, they had gathered the "huge sum" of 400 contribution points.
All the money was transferred to "What Canned Food I Said".
...
In the dead of night, in the land forsaken by God.
Li Wei looked at the newly logged-in "What Canned Food I Said" and the group of onlookers behind him who clearly had nothing better to do but insisted on logging on to watch, and a barely perceptible smile appeared on the corner of his mouth.
"These leeks... no, these dependents have a really high level of awareness."
Li Wei originally thought that this heart-protecting mirror, priced at 500 points, would take them at least three to five days to sell. Unexpectedly, on just the first night, they had already learned how to "crowdfund".
"Mortal," Li Wei sat on his throne, his voice still ethereal and indifferent, "what do you seek by visiting my temple in the dead of night?"
When asked what kind of canned food it was, he said he would kneel on one knee respectfully (this was the standard posture he had summarized after researching a lot of medieval etiquette in the group).
"Great God, your followers yearn to record the truth of this world so that more lost sheep may know your might. We need that 'heartpiece of the evil god'."
Li Wei chuckled inwardly: That sounds nice, but isn't it just about wanting to record a video and post it on WeChat Moments to show off?
However, this suited him perfectly.
"allow."
Li Wei extended his pale finger and tapped it gently.
A magnifying glass, about the size of a palm, with irregularly serrated edges and a dark red, eye-shaped gemstone inlaid in the center, floated out of thin air in front of what I called a can of food.
This was actually something Li Wei created using a fragment of obsidian from a corner of the temple, along with a tiny bit of [Illusion] authority. As for the recording function? That was simply using the [Mental Link] network of the godhood to intercept and save the player's visual signals.
But in the eyes of players, this is a divine artifact!
[Congratulations to the player who has obtained the first rare-grade equipment in the entire server: Evil God's Heart Mirror] [Features activated: First-person perspective recording, monster information view, view personal attributes]
"What canned food?" I asked excitedly as I took the breastplate and fastened it to the chest of my tattered burlap vest.
Buzz!
The red eyeball on the breastplate suddenly blinked, and a pale red light screen unfolded on his retina.
[REC] [00:00:01]
"It's recorded! It really's recorded!" What Canned Food shouted excitedly in the voice channel, "The picture quality! The resolution! It's definitely at least 8K! And there's absolutely no lag!"
"Quick, quick! Kai, look at me! Look at me!" I'm not a husky immediately jumped in front of the camera and struck a bodybuilder pose, even though his skinny frame was really nothing to look at. "This is going to be on TV!"
"And me!" I'll teach you a lesson, holding up a piece of charred hyena meat. "Give this piece a close-up! Let the audience see the marbling! The sheen!"
"Stop messing around!" I said, shoving aside these photo-stealing clowns. "We need to shoot something with substance. Let's go outside! Shoot the scenery, the physics-based destruction effects, the battle!"
So, in the dead of night in this strange world, a peculiar "war correspondent group" set off.
Cameraman: What canned food, I'll tell you. Stuntmen: Dangdangdang's Heart (responsible for moving the boulder), Edison reincarnation (responsible for demonstrating how to chop down trees with stones). Extras: The rest of the players responsible for screaming and acting as background figures.
First, they filmed the eerie yet magnificent double-moon night view surrounding the temple, the oppressive atmosphere practically overflowing the screen. Then, Gangzi performed a "punch that smashed a dead tree," perfectly capturing the details of the flying wood chips and the scrapes on Gangzi's hands. Finally, they even had the luck (or perhaps the misfortune) of encountering a lone, low-level slime. Under the direction of "What Canned Food I Said," the group didn't swarm it, but instead, like filming an animal documentary, showcased the slime's wriggling movements, attack methods, and the fluid physics effects after it was pierced by the iron bar.
After two whole hours of shooting, we had a lot of footage.
"That's a wrap!" I said, patting my chest protector with satisfaction. "Brothers, wait for my good news. I'll be editing all night tonight, and tomorrow morning, I'm going to cause a major earthquake across the entire internet!"
Just then, a pale gold system pop-up window suddenly appeared in everyone's field of vision.
[Server-wide Announcement: The official forum for the Forsaken Lands is now open.] [A holder has been detected to possess the "Evil God's Heart-Protecting Mirror." The video data transmission channel has been established. Your first-person perspective recording is now synced in real-time to the forum's "Personal Center - Resource Library."]
"Holy crap! The forum's open?" "This game even has car-to-car connectivity? Wait, I mean, brain-to-brain connectivity?" "Quick, check if there's a cool picture of me!"
The players instantly went wild.
He was even more surprised and delighted when he heard about the canned goods. He had been worried about how to export the data from the helmet, since it was a holographic device without a USB port. Unexpectedly, the official website provided cloud synchronization!
He immediately brought up the system menu and, sure enough, found that the previously grayed-out "External Links" option had lit up. With a thought, he clicked it, and a semi-transparent black webpage appeared before his eyes.
Not only are the forum sections comprehensive, but there's also an incredibly powerful online editing tool! The two hours of footage he just shot is already neatly arranged on the timeline.
"What... what kind of divine optimization is this?"
I was so excited when I said "canned food" that my hands were shaking. He wasn't in a hurry to log off; he just plopped down on the cold steps of the temple and started frantically working on the virtual editing interface.
He trimmed redundant shots, adjusted the color tone (even though the original film was already cinematic quality), and added rousing background music (built into the system). Like a possessed artist, he pointed at the air in the dead of night in this other world.
This cutting took more than an hour.
When he finally finished rendering the video titled "[The Forsaken] Gameplay Demo: If This Isn't Real, I'll Eat My Monitor Live!" and clicked [Publish], he breathed a sigh of relief.
"It's safe."
...
Earth, the next morning.
With the video titled "[The Forsaken] Gameplay Demo: If This Isn't the Real World, I'll Eat My Monitor Live!" being simultaneously released on Bilibili, Weibo, and YouTube, the internet, already agitated by the "ghost link" incident, completely exploded.
The video has no background music, only the sound of whistling wind, heavy footsteps, and the players' heavy breathing.
The scene opens with a long, low-angle shot. The dark, dilapidated temple dome is visible, with two enormous, imposing twin moons (one red, one white) slowly rotating outside a hole. The camera then pans down, sweeping across the obsidian pillars, bearing the marks of time, every crack and speck of dust clearly visible.
Immediately afterwards, the camera switched to a first-person combat perspective. Facing the corrupted hyenas (a mix of previous flashback scenes and newly filmed footage), the overwhelming stench seemed to emanate from the screen. When the monster's sharp teeth shattered the stone slabs, and flying debris cut the players' faces, drawing blood, the on-screen comments instantly disappeared. Everyone was terrified by the realistic pain.
At the end of the video, there's a monologue by "What Canned Food I Am". He stands on the edge of a cliff, gazing at the distant, misty Black Sea, holding a piece of black bread. "Some say it's CG, some say it's special effects. But let me tell you, this piece of bread in my hand is so hard it could break your teeth, it'll hurt your throat if you eat it, but I can taste the wheat flavor. The wind here will make you cold, the wounds here will make you hurt. This isn't a game, this is... another life."
Within an hour of its release, the video garnered over a million views. Within three hours, it had been shared over ten million times across the internet. Countless gaming influencers, special effects artists, and even physics professors were drawn into the fray.
A well-known visual effects content creator reposted and commented: "I'm blown away. The lighting, the particle effects, the fluid dynamics... even top Hollywood blockbusters are only this good, right? And this is real-time rendering? Can current graphics cards even handle this?"
A hardcore gaming media outlet commented: "If this were true, all existing VR devices could be thrown in the trash. But how is that possible? Which company has this kind of cutting-edge technology?"
Of course, a barrage of criticism followed. "It's obviously fake! It's definitely pre-made CG to fool newbies!" "Pain sensation? Taste sensation? How much did the blogger get paid to make this up?" "Waiting for the blogger to livestream himself eating his monitor!"
Whether they believed it or not, everyone's appetite was whetted. The mysterious black webpage was once again overwhelmed with visitors, all wanting to know: "When will the second batch of spots be released?!"
In another world, inside a temple.
Li Wei watched as wave after wave of surging faith power surged within the divine core, much like watching a stock market chart soar to new highs, and he couldn't stop smiling.
The attention generated by this wave of videos has translated into a large amount of general faith (curiosity, shock, and anticipation). Although it is not as pure as that of fanatical believers, it is abundant and satisfying!
His previously withered divine essence began to emit a faint golden glow.
"very good."
Li Wei opened his eyes, feeling the divine power filling his body.
"Since everyone is so enthusiastic, I can't be stingy."
He glanced at the 15 first-test players outside frantically chopping down trees for "property certificates," and then at the countless soul signals in the void yearning for connection.
"Mia."
"Meow?" The cat-eared girl, who was munching on dried fish in the corner, looked up.
"Go issue the mission and have them clear out the ruins behind the temple." Li Wei revealed his capitalist fangs. "We need to prepare for…recruiting more people."