Chapter 331:

Words : 2931 Updated : Oct 15th, 2025

“Holy crap! How did I die? How did it come without any warning?” In Joy Stick’s bedroom, wearing a tank top and beach shorts while leaning against the headboard, Brother Stick confusedly took off his gaming helmet. Just moments ago, his game connection was cut off, coming without any warning and leaving him completely puzzled. The helmet showed that his character died because his life force was transferred to his descendant during the “Embrace,” as his descendant’s injuries were too severe, resulting in his life force being reduced to zero. Theoretically, this shouldn’t be possible, after all, Joy Stick was the one initiating the Embrace, how could he be “drained dry” by his descendant? But the problem is, gaming helmets don’t lie. He currently can’t log into the game, and the 72-hour death respawn countdown has already begun, so what happened is clear. This fool didn’t really understand the principles of the “Embrace” when he was previously embraced by Murphy, only watching a cutscene CG. Actually, it’s not just Joy Stick, none of the current little players really understand the internal logic of this extremely sacred ritual for vampires. Simply put, there exists a “strong-weak” distinction. Murphy’s strength far exceeds the little players so naturally there was no backlash, but the strength comparison between Brother Stick and Melia Korando was exactly reversed, although he initiated the Embrace, he was undoubtedly the weaker party. “Damn, I knew this feature definitely wasn’t finished! This is absolutely a half-baked product! And they just released it, ah, the damn dev team is really harmful! I didn’t have to die originally.” Joy Stick threw his helmet onto the bed in frustration and ran to the balcony to light a cigarette. It was midnight in the game, but early morning in reality. Looking down from Brother Stick’s 27th floor balcony, an entire city was at its busiest time of the day, the hustle and bustle of traffic making one emotional. “First go eat, then report this malicious bug on the forum!” Brother Stick extinguished his cigarette in the ashtray, went back inside to take a shower, then changed into loose clothes and strolled out to eat breakfast, also calling Meow King to complain a bit. After hearing that Brother Stick also died due to bizarre reasons, Brother Meow’s anger immediately dissipated by 99%, feeling one person’s misfortune versus two people’s misfortune is naturally different. In this regard, Brother Meow didn’t hide his schadenfreude in front of Joy Stick, making Brother Stick grind his teeth in annoyance. But he soon got over it. This wasn’t their first time dying, any experience, good or bad, becomes bland once it happens enough times. The two brothers in misfortune comforted each other and agreed to go fishing together in two days. Their cities weren’t far apart, with a lake district right in between, since resurrection takes three days might as well treat it as offline bonding time between old brothers. “Sigh, do you think it’s possible that we accidentally entered an unfinished high-level area or specific scene?” Over the phone, Brother Meow raised a new possibility. He drawled to Brother Stick: “Whether it’s the instant-kill subspace abomination I encountered, or the ‘Embrace’ request you experienced, these should theoretically both be unreleased game content that we shouldn’t have access to at our current stage. It’s possible the dev team was running program tests in that specific area, and we accidentally wandered in which triggered our unexpected deaths.” “Oh? That’s an interesting theory.” Joy Stick, who was slurping his eight treasure congee, paused for a moment, then continued thinking along this line of reasoning, saying: “So you’re saying, the maze spell we encountered halfway was actually an ‘invisible wall’ in a different form? I was wondering how such a high-level maze spell would suddenly spawn in that large empty area. Perhaps this was the ‘test area boundary’ made by the dev team?” “Hmm, that makes sense!” Brother Meow also felt his guess was close to the truth. He said: “Plus you said you found clues about the old church sacred blade, and got a whole set of seven pieces of intelligence all at once, how could the crafty dev team be so generous? For a quest chain rewarding a masterwork commander-grade faith blade, giving one piece of information would already be generous! They wouldn’t waste such design resources even if they had them. So I think we definitely ran beyond the ‘map boundary’ and accidentally entered their test area and brought stuff out. Damn, this means we exploited a bug? Do you think the intelligence already obtained will be taken back, causing the sacred blade treasure hunt quest chain to be nullified?” “Uh, probably not.” Brother Stick hesitated, thinking for a few seconds, saying: “This isn’t our fault anyway, if they really cordoned off an area for testing, they should have made the invisible walls more secure, but that thing scattered as soon as we charged at it, this is clearly the dev team’s mistake. Here’s what we’ll do, I’ll ask Brother Alpha on the forum later. But based on the dev team’s previous practices, the intelligence we obtained won’t be taken back, they also won’t cover up their mistakes. Remember before when Dump Truck and Bulldozer triggered the hidden rescue quest, after they completed it the dev team hadn’t designed corresponding rewards, and ended up asking Lumina about the situation to create rewards on the spot? To be honest, they’re quite open-minded about this stuff.” “That’s true” The cautious Brother Meow was still a bit worried, saying: “I’ll report this situation first, you eat first, then rest a bit, I’ll call you if there’s any news. By the way, are you sure the Embrace succeeded before you logged off? Do you have your own descendant now?” “Hey, probably succeeded.” Joy Stick sent the last spoonful of congee into his mouth, contentedly rubbed his belly and wiped his mouth before happily paying the bill. While swaggering back to his residential complex, he told the curious Meow King: “That quest didn’t have any trigger prompts, so I don’t know if the quest was completed, but before I died I could clearly feel something new in the character interface, just didn’t have time to look at it more closely before getting kicked offline. Say, if this really is a bug, will the dev team take back my descendant storyline? Those two sisters aren’t ordinary people. They’re the daughters of Korando, the Greyclaw leader who died by our hands before, they’ve got quite the background.” “So, they’re seeking revenge for their father’s death?” Meow’s tone became strange, he said: “I don’t understand you vampires’ perverted ways, but I feel if they really have that kind of identity, you better be careful, watch out for getting your throat slit in the middle of the night.” “Psh, what’s there to be afraid of, I get a new life every three days!” Brother Stick laughed, chatted with Meow for a few more sentences then hung up the phone. After returning home he planned to take a short nap. He’d been playing the game day and night for this period of time, although the gaming helmet’s powerful functions prevented him from losing his perception of night and day, this kind of long-term life rhythm in the virtual world still made Joy Stick feel a bit unadjusted after returning to reality. Just like needing to adjust to jet lag after flying long distances, Brother Stick felt he also needed to adjust his perception of the real world through a short but satisfying sleep. Pouring himself a cup of yogurt, he sat on the couch and turned on the TV to watch sports programs, but after watching for just a few minutes his head tilted to the side as he leaned against the couch and started snoring. He was sleeping quite soundly. But the problem was he started dreaming as soon as he fell asleep, and the dream was very strange. Joy Stick felt like he had transmigrated into a woman’s body, hazily watching a black and white silent film of someone else’s life from a first-person perspective. In his perspective, he saw “himself” born into a medieval “godfather family.” Her father was the underground boss of a prosperous small city, busy fighting over territory with peers every day, while her mother wasn’t with her father out of love, she was just an “extra gain” from one of father’s robberies in his early years. But to be fair, although father didn’t have much feeling for mother, he did fulfill his responsibilities as a husband and father. Although the family often needed to flee from enemies, traveling back and forth on country roads by horse carriage in unsettling nights. But whenever there was a chance, her father would put down his work to guide her and her sister in reading, writing and sword practice. Such life continued until she was 20 years old, when one day her father’s “business” suffered a major setback, as the newly crowned king began cracking down on the black market to stabilize his rule, father nearly got killed by soldiers in the street and their family fell into vagrant-like circumstances. She remembered clearly, one evening, her injured and disabled father left alone from the bridge tunnel where they were hiding, and when he returned at midnight, it was as if he had become a completely different person. Not only had his disabilities been restored, in the darkness she could see blood light dancing in father’s eyes. She remembered father telling her that he had sold his soul to the devil, in exchange for returning their family to past glory, at that time she didn’t understand what father meant, but soon, their family’s life not only returned to its original wealthy path but went even further. In less than 5 years, father became the underground godfather of several surrounding cities, and it wasn’t until then that she first heard the name “Wolfsbane” from father’s mouth. By this point in the dream, Joy Stick already felt something wasn’t right. He kept struggling in the dream trying to break free from this horrifying “memory” however you look at it, this struggle also affected the dream’s continuation, its time progression suddenly accelerated, the following decades of time flashing past Brother Stick’s eyes in freeze frames. The final scene stopped on a desolate night, “herself” lying helplessly on the ground waiting for death with blinded eyes, while beside her knelt a tall man with a bloody mouth. That was clearly the scene when Joy Stick completed the Embrace two hours ago. This directly scared Joy Stick so much his hair stood on end. The 1.8 meter tall man jumped up from his couch, also kicking over the yogurt cup at the corner of the table, causing the milky white liquid to splash everywhere. “F**k! F**k! What the hell was that!” Brother Stick stood barefoot in the living room holding his head, still in shock. The TV was still playing a recorded ball game, outside was still sunny, but none of this could calm the fear and unease in his heart. He was certain there was something wrong with the dream he just had! That wasn’t a dream! That was the life of his descendant Melia Korando whom he had just “Embraced” in the “game”, like an unfolded scroll for him to browse, with no secrets hidden within, even the face of a boy Melia had secretly loved when she was 12 years old was seen clearly by Joy Stick. He knew he had just experienced a “supernatural event”, after gradually calming his nerves, the furious Joy Stick rushed into the bedroom, put on his helmet and went on the forum. He was already someone lacking a sense of security in his personality, after encountering all these inexplicable situations, he just wanted an explanation from the 《Reality Realm》 dev team! What the hell did these bastards inject into his brain? If they don’t give him an explanation, don’t blame him for finding ways to “defend his rights.” However, there was no reply after sending private messages to administrator Alpha on the forum. Just as Joy Stick was getting anxious, Brother Alpha’s assistant “Xiao Cui” actively sent him a message. Assistant Xiao Cui:【Dear little player, what exactly happened to make you so angry? Did you encounter something unpleasant during gameplay?】 Onboard Joy Stick:【You have the nerve to ask!】 He angrily told Xiao Cui everything he had just experienced, the latter took a long time to reply, just as Brother Stick was about to lose patience, Xiao Cui responded: Assistant Xiao Cui:【You know that the vampire racial feature ‘Blood Pact’ functionality is still under development, right?】 Onboard Joy Stick:【I know! But why did you ask.】 Assistant Xiao Cui:【Since you know this is an unfinished feature, why did you and Meow King cross over the normal game area, enter the ‘test area’ you shouldn’t have entered, and complete it without permission when interfering with this yet-to-be-perfected plot progression? Of course, I’m not pointing out your mistake, dear little player, I’m just telling you this is the main reason for your current situation. If you had carefully read the gaming helmet guidance manual provided by the dev team, you would know that our helmet uses the most advanced brainwave sensing program currently available to give players a 100% realistic gaming experience. The dev team would absolutely not implement such a program that directly acts on the brain into the game process without ensuring 100% safety. But the problem is that you ‘accidentally’ participated in a not yet fully tested feature two hours ago. The NPC’s memories that appeared in your dream are the character story written by AI for her, shared to your memory through brainwave sensing. From a functional perspective, this isn’t a serious problem. As long as you don’t continue logging in within seven days, you will gradually forget it... hmm, getting technical here, still let him explain it to you.】 “Ding” A notification sound rang in Brother Stick’s gaming helmet, he noticed that administrator Alpha who hadn’t replied before came online and sent him a private message. Brother Stick opened it and immediately felt his blood run cold. Alpha:【Damn! I just took a nap, how did you and Brother Meow cause such a big incident? What exactly did you two do, I just got yelled at by the dev team while completely confused. They said the test they prepared for half a month was ruined by you guys, the program data output is now ‘contaminated’ and needs to be redone. The programmers forced to work overtime again are about to go crazy. Brother Meow’s situation is still okay, just need to clear his interference data and run the subspace chaos spirit energy program again. But yours I just checked the backend records. Your accidental intervention this time will cause the Korando sisters NPCs to possibly be permanently deleted, along with the ‘Wolfsbane remnants’ plot line that the planning team has already finished designing, otherwise it will trigger a series of bugs we can’t predict.】 Onboard Joy Stick:【??? So it’s my fault? Brother Alpha you don’t know how miserable I am! I started having weird dreams, I just dreamed of Melia Korando’s entire life okay! I thought I was possessed, it literally scared me to death!】 Alpha:【Aiya, we already said it’s an unfinished feature, we can’t predict what consequences it will produce either, telling you not to exploit bugs isn’t because we’re afraid you’ll break the server, it’s really for the sake of your mental health. How about this? I’ll seal your login permissions for a week first, do some testing in the backend, and unlock it for you after confirming there are no problems. You need to regularly report your situation in the real world to me every day this week, if there are any aftereffects you must tell me immediately. The medical team is also preparing to establish a file for long-term observation of you.】 Onboard Joy Stick:【Can’t log into the game for a week? That’s not necessary, I suddenly feel it’s not that serious, it’s just a dream after all, aren’t dreams supposed to be strange and absurd.】 Alpha:【This won’t do, we must ensure the psychological and physiological health of every test participant, I consulted with the medical team, your condition needs at least a week of internet abstinence for observation.】 Onboard Joy Stick:【Fine then, does Meow also need to be observed for a week?】 Alpha:【His problem isn’t as serious as yours, after all the program he interfered with wouldn’t trigger brainwave interference, so he can after three days】 Onboard Joy Stick:【But he was also involved in this right, what I mean is why not observe him for seven days too? What if he has some aftereffects he’s not aware of? Uh, of course, I’m just making a suggestion, don’t tell him it was my suggestion, mainly because I can’t log in these seven days, I’ll be bored. Got to have someone keep me company right. We’re brothers, got to share hardships together right?】 Alpha:【...Your understanding of the word ‘brothers’ is really distorted, Brother Stick. Fine, I’ll ask the medical team first, see if he needs seven days of observation.】

Chapter 331:

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