Chapter 78 – Suspected Bug

Half an hour ago, the relevant department finally managed to restore the internet connection that had been down all day. The front desk clerk, who had been napping at the counter for the entire day, finally welcomed a few scattered customers and immediately perked up.

Lu Yue had no plans for the evening and had been idling in the shop all day. Unlike Meng Chudong, he rarely played games on the shop’s computers. Taking advantage of the quiet time without internet or customers, he picked a machine to watch a movie and found it oddly enjoyable. Meng Chudong, on the other hand, was the complete opposite—without the internet, he wouldn’t even touch the computer and simply retreated upstairs to sleep. Now that the internet was back and customers were trickling in, their situations quickly reversed—one pushed away the keyboard and got up, ready to head home, while the other leisurely came down the stairs and settled into the second boss’s exclusive VIP seat with practiced ease.

Having spent the whole day slumped in the lobby seat, Lu Yue felt like he was covered in the unique scent of an internet café—a hard-to-describe mix of tobacco, fast food, sweat, and dust. Unable to wait until he got home, he went straight upstairs to Meng Chudong’s place to take a shower.

By the time he came back downstairs, it was exactly 11 p.m. Meng Chudong, as usual, was sitting in his single-person sofa, intently focused on his computer.

Lu Yue never bothered to say goodbye to his childhood friend when leaving—or rather, even if he tried, Meng Chudong probably wouldn’t have the time to acknowledge him. So he merely cast a habitual glance before preparing to leave. But that one glance revealed something bizarre.

Meng Chudong was indeed facing the computer, but he wasn’t typing or wearing headphones. He was just sitting there, totally absorbed in a silent communion with the monitor. Was this guy reading a novel? That was the only explanation Lu Yue could think of.

When he got closer, Lu Yue realized he had been too narrow-minded.

The monitor was pitch black—this guy hadn’t even turned on the computer…

A chill ran down Lu Yue’s spine. He quickly waved his hand in front of his friend’s face. “Hey! What the hell are you doing?! Don’t scare me like that.”

Meng Chudong looked up at him, then turned his gaze toward the front desk before suddenly raising his hand. “A bottle of water.”

The front desk clerk quickly brought over a bottle of Nongfu Spring and then gulped nervously. “Second boss, you should’ve said ‘another.’ This is the third bottle already… You’re making me thirsty just watching you…”

Meng Chudong ignored the girl, unscrewed the cap, and chugged half the bottle in one go.

After the clerk left, Lu Yue was left scratching his head. “Are you okay? Why aren’t you turning on the computer? If you’re really feeling off, go upstairs and rest.”

Meng Chudong gave a faint smile. “I’m fine. Just a little nervous.”

The corner of Lu Yue’s mouth twitched. He scanned the surroundings but found no obvious source of nervousness, so he could only use his limited Earthling intellect to guess: “Does the computer… explode when you turn it on?”

Meng Chudong sighed but didn’t elaborate.

Lu Yue was dying of curiosity, but no amount of pestering could pry an answer out of him. In the end, he left in a huff.

The moment Lu Yue stepped out, Meng Chudong’s phone vibrated.

[Still no internet~~~~~~~~]

Even the Commander’s text messages carried a hauntingly seductive tone.

[Try summoning me again.]

[Why aren’t you cominggggggggggg~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~]

[I’m here.]

[Fuck!]

Putting down his phone, Meng Chudong straightened up and stared at the dark monitor for two seconds before exhaling deeply. Finally, he pressed the power button on the CPU.

The computer wouldn’t explode when turned on, but his heart—which had been pounding erratically all day without any semblance of calm—might be in real danger.

The Ghost Server Legion Commander’s heart had been restless all night.

At first, it was because he couldn’t see the Deputy Commander—yes, that guy who had confessed and then vanished into thin air. His heart felt like it was sprouting weeds, though he couldn’t quite pinpoint what he was anticipating. As a result, his focus during the entire dungeon run was horribly scattered, causing Sister Blood Bull to die once and 2B to die twice. The 2 Bull couple immediately teamed up to criticize him fiercely.

Then, Your Uncle magnanimously forgave him for abandoning him to his fate the night before, reasoning that since his level couldn’t go up anyway, dying once or twice to the Greatsword made no difference. This led to the sudden emergence of a critical issue—three people in the entire legion, including Your Uncle, were stuck at Level 65. No matter how much XP they accumulated, they couldn’t level up to 66!

This was undoubtedly a serious problem. And when faced with a serious problem, how could they be without their godlike Deputy Commander?!

At 11:17 p.m., the little bird named Polly finally flew into Huaxia Summit and the legion’s YY channel.

Fang Zheng was moved to tears, casting aside all thoughts of confessions and vanishing acts, and immediately presented the problem—

“Birdy, how much XP have you accumulated after Level 65?”

Meng Chudong had braced himself for anything, but he was met with such a straightforward, technical question right off the bat. For a moment, he felt the urge to strangle a certain fatty.

But thoughts aside, he glanced at his XP bar and noticed something odd: “XP bar at 99.99%… I think it’s been like this for the past couple of days…”

Huaxia Online was designed so that when a player’s XP bar maxed out, the character would automatically level up. But now, the XP was still being gained, yet the bar couldn’t break through the 100% threshold—meaning the system wouldn’t level them up.

“Exactly,” Fang Zheng slapped the table. “Your Uncle, Your Sister, and Mad Lad are all facing this issue. No matter how many dungeons they run or mobs they kill, their levels just won’t go up. This is a bug!”

The Commander, still languishing at Level 64, was beyond excited about this major discovery.

The Deputy Commander fell silent for two seconds before sighing softly. “My Commander, Refined Into a Demon is Level 66.”

Birdy wasn’t making things up. Just a few seconds ago, Refined Into a Demon—who had been Level 65—was tinkering with something somewhere when his level in the legion roster suddenly updated to 66!

“I didn’t do anything! I was just refining my pet like usual!” Before the Commander could ask, 438 rushed to report.

Fang Zheng facepalmed: “So you just… refined and refined and then leveled up?”

438: “Yeah!”

Fang Zheng had been about to say, “Yeah, my ass,” but at the last second, he changed it to: “Yeah, your head! How come everyone else is stuck but you’re not?”

438 was aggrieved: “I don’t know either… Should I request to drop back down to stay in sync with you guys?”

The entire group: “……”

Sister Blood Bull was a woman of action. By now, she had already scoured the forums: “I just checked. A lot of people are reporting the issue of being stuck at Level 65, but some have managed to level up. They’re not sharing how, though—just posting screenshots.”

Mad Lad scoffed: “These days, photoshopping is easier than eating.”

Blood Bull: “It’s not photoshopped. I verified it.”

Mad Lad: “……”

As for how she verified it, the legion members figured their intellect might not be up to grasping the technical details. But if Blood Bull said it was verified, then it must be true. =_=

So now the problem was clear: leveling up was definitely possible, but there had to be a special method. As the saying goes, rarity breeds value—those who had cracked the secret naturally didn’t want to share it.

Fang Zheng tilted his head in thought, then suddenly opened the list of all online players in Huaxia Summit. Behind the densely packed online IDs were their classes and levels. Scrolling from top to bottom, he saw all the familiar and unfamiliar legions, but only two players had broken through Level 65—Hu Yifei12138 and Refined Into a Demon715.

Were numerical suffixes the kryptonite to this bug?! =_=

In the YY channel, the legion members were helping 438 jog his memory—

Your Sister: “Do you have the memory of a USB flash drive? Can’t even remember something like this…”

Mad Lad: “Think harder! If you can’t remember, you’re fined!”

2B: “Yeah, hand over all the herbs you gather to the legion—none for yourself!”

Crossplayer: “And you’ll be disqualified from future legion title evaluations!”

Your Uncle: “You guys are brutal. It’s fine, Demon Refiner. If you really can’t remember, don’t force it. Just focus on refining your pet. If you mess that up, the losses will outweigh the gains.”

438: “Your Uncle, I hate you, rawr…”

Fang Zheng considered sending Hu Yifei a whisper to ask—maybe, given their shared server origins, she’d be willing to drop a hint. But before he could finish typing, her ID in the list suddenly went dark.

Since the server merge, Hu Yifei and her Anti-Romance Alliance hadn’t appeared in the game at all. He had assumed she had quit Huaxia entirely, but now it seemed she was still playing, albeit infrequently. But couldn’t she have logged off five minutes later?! Why did it have to be right this second?!

On one side, the Commander, harboring ulterior motives, sent Hu Yifei a friend request, hoping she’d accept it the next time she logged in. On the other side, someone (or rather, a group of like-minded friends) came looking for the Commander with ulterior motives of their own—

[Whisper] Nicknamed White Dragon Horse: Someone in your legion hit Level 66?

[Whisper] War-Snow Wolf: You there?

[Whisper] Greatsword: How about I stand still and let those two from your legion kill me once? No, twice. In exchange for the Level 66 method.

[Whisper] Lanruo Xiaoqian: Commander bro~~~~ Newbie here, wanna join the legion~~~~ Take me to Level 66~~~~ [blink]

[Whisper] Drink Till You Drop: Is Your Sister in your legion’s YY right now? Can’t reach her by phone or text.

…There seemed to be something odd mixed in there. =_=

[Whisper] Milk is Mom: No one, you’re hallucinating.

[Whisper] Milk is Mom: Nope.

[Whisper] Milk is Mom: Twenty times, then I’ll consider it.

[Whisper] Milk is Mom: Acting cute is shameful. Have some self-respect.

[Whisper] Milk is Mom: Hold on.

Commander: “Your Sister.”

Your Sister: “Hmm?”

Commander: “What are you doing?”

Your Sister: “Studying guides.”

Commander: “Switch back to the game and check your whispers.”

Your Sister: “Oh.”

[Whisper] Milk is Mom: She just alt-tabbed out. She’ll reply now.

Damn, Commanders are all living saints, aren’t they?!

[System] Polly has invited you to join his party. Accept?

The millions of alpacas stampeding through Fang Zheng’s heart vanished into thin air the moment he saw Birdy’s sudden party invite, leaving behind only a vast prairie—clear skies, open land, a gentle breeze blowing, refreshing and uplifting.

[System] Milk is Mom has accepted the party invitation.

[Party] Polly: Coords XX, XX

[Party] Milk is Mom: ?

[Party] Polly: I asked 438. He picked up a pretty unusual quest while herb-gathering at this location. I want to test if it’s related to this quest.

[Party] Milk is Mom: Then why form a party?

[Party] Polly: It’s a quest that requires a party to accept.

[Party] Milk is Mom: Was 438 in a party at the time?

[Party] Polly: He was with us pushing a world boss nearby, took a break to gather herbs, and happened to pick it up.

[Party] Milk is Mom: ……

[Party] Polly: Herb-gathering is a good habit, really.

[Party] Milk is Mom: ……Yeah.

On the way to the coordinates, Fang Zheng suddenly remembered to ask—

[Party] Milk is Mom: Why are we typing? Couldn’t we just talk in the legion YY?

[Party] Polly: It’s not confirmed yet, so there’s a chance of failure. And failure would undermine the leader’s authority in the legion.

[Party] Milk is Mom: Uh, do I even have that?

[Party] Polly: Highly doubtful, I was talking about myself.

[Party] Milk is Mom: Go die—

[Party] Polly: No.

This guy keeps getting worse by the day, damn it TAT