Game of the World Tree
chapter-337

Yuanjuan’s impression of these so-called MMORPG games is that it usually involved playing a user created character and constantly doing quests on and on while endlessly battling monsters just to level up and acquire better equipment.

Since MMO’s in general cater more to a large player demographic, their storylines and depth of NPC characters are typically rudimentary and somewhat crude for her liking.

Thus, she developed an aversion to these types of games.

As for its high degree of freedom, no matter how great a game Elven Kingdom is, in the end, it’s still an MMO and couldn’t excel at everything, right?

Yet, as she gradually learned more and more about this game, she realized she had been truly naive and prejudiced about her own biases.

Clearly, this wasn’t just a simple MMO game but rather, it was more of a simulation of the real world that’s just masquerading itself under the pretext of an MMO game!

Cities constructed by the players themselves, furthermore, its main storyline isn’t fixed and often also incorporates players into its major plots, thereby allowing anyone to also become significant characters as well within the ever expanding lore of the game…

In addition, some NPCs were reportedly capable of being educated and sometimes even retained what they learned, applying it to their daily lives!

Not to mention the replication of the five senses and gravity that felt so incredibly authentic that it leaves players questioning whether they’re truly immersed in a virtual world or experiencing reality itself!

No wonder this game is so popular…

At first, Yuanjuan just thought everyone must be playing this game mainly for the mind acceleration benefits.

After all, having one’s time increased four times inside the game equated to extending one’s life in a different sense, especially with the added perk of being able to surf the internet within the game!

Just that mere fact alone lets anyone binge-watch shows more easily and indulge in countless other activities without the constraints of real-world time limitations.

With these features, how can one still insist on using the internet in real life like some bored-to-death college student, the kind who stays holed up in their dorm all day and were too lazy to even go downstairs for a meal and opts for food delivery, when they can just pop inside the game instead?

However, when Yuanjuan delved further into the intricacies of Elven Kingdom, she finally understood that even without the mind acceleration features, this game would still be a colossal hit!

To quote a well-known streamer, Xiao Mu, who is one of the seasoned players of the game—Elven Kingdom wasn’t merely a game; it was a new world, a second life!

Of course, what attracted Yuanjuan the most were the meticulously detailed beautiful NPC characters, especially their faction leader, the goddess Evé.

And as she kept chatting with her friend about Elven Kingdom and its various game mechanics all through the night, Yuanjuan found herself fully hooked on this virtual masterpiece of a game.

To hell with Dream Idol!

After seeing the incredibly realistic NPCs within Elven Kingdom, she could no longer tolerate the crude character models and game engines of her previous games!

She now firmly believes that Elven Kingdom could better satisfy her interests, enabling her to engage in more immersive activities like managing businesses or building relationships with and nurturing NPCs like never before…

The game’s emphasis on freedom and immersion makes it perfectly suited for such kind of gameplay, and undoubtedly, Elven Kingdom meets all these conditions.

Thus, with astonishment and admiration, Su Yuan was successfully dragged down into the deep rabbit hole of Elven Kingdom by her best friend.

A critically acclaimed masterpiece!

Of course, Yuanjuan was not the only one left shocked on the first day of the fourth beta test as most of the newcomers shared the same sentiment as well.

Although Elven Kingdom had been in closed beta for several months in the real world, within the game itself, seasoned players all the way back to the first-beta had already spent almost a year immersed in this virtual world.

As such, extensive information and video content regarding the game had been uploaded and spread widely across the internet by now.

Nonetheless…simply learning about the game from these various third-party materials beforehand offered a completely different experience than actually playing the game firsthand.

And many things inside the game couldn’t be properly conveyed until one has truly entered the game…

“It feels so real,”

“An epic masterpiece,”

“Extremely high degree of freedom,”

“It’s just like another world,”

“Super intelligent NPCs,”

“Character modeling that outshines all other virtual games,”

For a moment, a sea of praises for Elven Kingdom flooded the internet.

If there was anything to complain about, it was that the map was just too large, and running through it without the aid of teleportation was likely to break one’s legs.

Just imagining doing a quest, wherein one might have to run through the forest in the game for hours seems entirely too brutal.

Fortunately, the developers allowed players to access the internet while playing, and the breathtaking landscape of the game can also serves as a welcome distraction; otherwise, perhaps no one could endure such a boring ordeal.

Moreover…

When will the open beta be released to the public?!

(╯°□°）╯︵ ┻━┻

Of course, these complaints mainly originate from those poor individuals who eagerly registered but, alas, were not selected for the fourth beta.

However, only Evé herself knew that when it came to selecting participants for the closed beta, there was no luck involved.

In actuality, the whole selection process was just her sending out invitation codes one by one based on the criteria of each applicant’s online gaming time and their gamer proficiency.

Essentially, only those with the potential to be efficient tools had the chance to catch her eye.

As for those who were just joining in for fun or had some ulterior motives, these people probably wouldn’t have been selected at all, even if there were another eight hundred rounds of closed beta tests.

After all, it requires 0.003 divine power for her to create an avatar!

Although her current divine power capacity was now quite abundant, she still had to be frugal or else she might deplete it too quickly if she got careless with its usage.

Overall, Evé was quite satisfied with the results of the fourth beta test.

The arrival of fifty thousand newcomers instantly brought a bustling activity to the Elven Forest.

Additionally, due to her increased strength, the mana in the core area of the Elven Forest became much more abundant.

It resulted in many magical beasts lingering within the peripheral area, to be gradually attracted, thereby filling the gap created by the overhunting tendencies of the previous closed beta players.

Of course, as the mana capacity of the entire Elven Forest increased, a considerable number of ordinary beasts also evolved into magical beasts.

Moreover, under the influence of Divinity of Life, the strength and reproductive ability of these magical beasts were also significantly enhanced…

With these various effects in play, the number of magical beasts in the Elven Forest seemed to achieve a temporary balance with the rate of consumption of the players.

At least in the short term, the fourth beta players wouldn’t encounter any leveling issues due to the shortage of mobs to hunt.

But then again, even if the monster population decreased once more, the players could still do some tasks assigned by Evé, as well as venture into the underground dungeon where shadow monsters constantly spawn.

Of course, in the long run, there still needed to be a stable source of experience for new players.

Veteran players could obtain lots of experience through quests and such, but these new players definitely needed more proper arrangements.

Nonetheless, this matter isn’t that urgent. I can just make a mental note of it first and look for opportunities to perfect it later.

Thinking about her future plans, Evé couldn’t help but sigh softly.

There was just so much to do!

Fortunately, everything had gone smoothly so far.

Meanwhile, her other arrangements was also proceeding smoothly…

After the implementation of the recent update, all veteran players were surprised to find a new barrier around the Chosen City.

Nothing seemed different from the inside.

But if one were to step outside, they would find that the entire Chosen City, along with the World Tree, had completely disappeared from view.

—No, it didn’t actually disappear per se, but rather was sent to some kind of altered isolated space, accessible only by calling out the goddess’s true name.

The veteran players quickly became curious about this changes and received relevant explanations by checking the game’s recent update logs.

In general, this was implemented to protect the real identity of the Goddess and the Chosen Ones.

In the devs explanation, it was stated that they decided to separate the existence of the World Tree and the Chosen City from the Elven Forest and relocate it to an isolated dimensional space.

The World Tree and the Chosen City are now located within this secured space, accessible only to players and believers of the goddess, as well as those who know the goddess’s true name and have gained her approval.

After the barrier is put into place, any outside party will never be able to find the Chosen City, nor see the real body of the World Tree, and will only see a withered fake ‘World Tree’ in its place instead.

The Chosen City would become a place akin to Avalon from the legends of King Arthur or the Garden of Eden described in the Christian Bible.

Of course, the real reason was just for Evé to conceal her true identity.

Meanwhile, in the supreme temple of nature on the World Tree, Li Mu, who had returned from the Maple Leaf Territory via self-inflicted death and had just respawned, was having another conversation with the Saintess, Alice.

“The verse of the prayer will now be changed? And what’s more, the Goddess will now be referred to as the Goddess of Life in the future?”

Observing the devout expression etched onto Alice’s face, Li Mu found himself somewhat surprised.

This…What kind of plot twist is this?

— 337 —

【 WHAT KIND OF PLOT TWIST IS THIS? 】

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