Chapter 481: Teammates' Resentment
Everyone felt a bit awkward.
Just moments ago, Lin Xue had been cheerfully directing everyone to load stones onto the catapult, but now she fell silent. Clearly, her imagination hadn't been broad enough!
And indeed, when you saw a catapult, stones, and a city wall, a normal person's first reaction would be to use the catapult to throw stones. Who would think of throwing people?
But after Chen Duxiu's reminder, everyone realized that in this game world, throwing people directly was indeed much more convenient than throwing stones...
Lin Xue started directing the little snowmen and penguins to stand on the catapult, flinging them over one by one. When it came to Chen Duxiu's turn, he typed, "You go first."
Lin Xue was deeply moved. This was the spirit of sacrifice!
This Chen Duxiu truly lived up to the name of the revolutionary martyr, always remembering the people's teachings, leaving the chance to live for others, burning himself to illuminate the path forward for all of humanity...
Standing on the catapult, Lin Xue typed with great emotion, "Thank you, Chen Xiu! I'll open the door for you once I'm over!"
There was an iron gate next to the city wall, but it had a bolt on the inside that couldn't be opened from the outside. After Lin Xue flew over the wall with the catapult, she could unhook the iron latch hanging on the door, allowing Chen Duxiu to come over too.
But just as Lin Xue flew into the castle and was about to open the door for Chen Duxiu...
She saw Chen Duxiu wobbling over, grabbing the iron hook from the outside, reaching through the iron bars, and flicking the inner hook open...
Then Chen Duxiu silently pushed the door open and walked in.
Lin Xue: "..."
What the hell?!
This door could be opened directly with the iron hook, and we wasted all that effort messing with the catapult!
Every time you fire the catapult, you have to crank the winch, and using this game's physics engine to crank the winch is a total pain in the ass!
And judging by how familiar and practiced Chen Duxiu looked, he must have known all along that you could enter through the front door, right?!
Then why were you standing there with us, stupidly pushing the catapult? And why did you remind us we could throw people over? Why didn't you just come over and open the door yourself?!
You had to wait until we all went over before opening the door—were you doing that on purpose?!
Watching Chen Duxiu wobble in, Lin Xue felt like grabbing his red hat and tossing him into the river right then and there!
...
"Resentment Value: +32!"
Chen Mu looked at the information on his virtual wristband and almost burst out laughing.
Obviously, Chen Duxiu was his alternate account. Because his main account was too famous and he'd be recognized almost everywhere he went, he created a second account to keep a low profile and sneak into Lin Xue's game room.
At this moment, on the virtual wristband, many light points appeared out of nowhere, merging into two transparent spheres on the left and right. These light points were also in two colors, representing Happiness Value and Resentment Value.
Of course, the Happiness Value made up the vast majority, because *Human: Fall Flat* was inherently a fun, joyful game. Most players would laugh until they were as limp as the game's little characters, so Chen Mu was mostly collecting Happiness Value.
These Happiness Values varied in size—some were just over ten points, others were dozens, and occasionally he'd see over 100 points. He wondered if the player providing over 100 points had laughed themselves into a hernia...
Still, even so, the sphere accumulating Happiness Value was still a long way from full. It had been about two hours since the game launched, and it was only a little over a tenth full.
The sphere didn't show exactly how much Happiness Value was needed to fill it, but clearly, the amount was huge and wouldn't be filled anytime soon.
As for the sphere accumulating Resentment Value, it was even slower. So far, it only had a tiny bit at the bottom, barely noticeable.
However, during his research, Chen Mu also discovered that joyful games didn't provide zero Resentment Value—they provided some, but very little.
Moreover, any resentment players felt toward Chen Mu himself would be counted in this sphere. For example, when Chen Mu picked up a little snowman and threw it into the river earlier, it gave him 4 Resentment Value.
Chen Mu was initially thrilled, thinking he'd found a way to make money. But after throwing them repeatedly, he stopped getting Resentment Value—instead, it turned into Happiness Value...
What the hell! Little snowman, did you awaken your masochistic tendencies?!
But thinking about it, in *Human: Fall Flat*, players basically never felt frustrated. Even if other players messed with them, they wouldn't resent the designer—they'd just happily wrestle with each other...
Chen Mu also noticed a more serious issue: the rate of Happiness Value acquisition was constantly declining.
At first, many players provided between 30 and 100 Happiness Value, but later it gradually dropped to around ten points, and then even less.
In other words, when players first started the game, they found it incredibly fun, so they generated a lot of Happiness Value. But once they got used to it, it wasn't as joyful anymore.
Fortunately, new players kept joining. Chen Mu roughly estimated that at the current rate, it would take about a full day to fill the Happiness Value sphere.
But the annoying part was that he needed both Happiness Value and Resentment Value to fill an entire sphere before he could perform a third-stage lottery. And right now, the Resentment Value he'd collected was pitifully small...
What to do?
Chen Mu thought of two methods. The first was to sneak into various game rooms like before and leech Resentment Value from players. The second was to create another small game that could generate negative emotions.
Actually, leeching Resentment Value was quite efficient, because Chen Mu found that when he did, he got a lot—each player provided anywhere from 10 to 70 or 80 points. But when the game itself generated Resentment Value, it was much less, often just three to five points at a time.
Thinking about it, causing trouble in-game could directly make teammates resent him, but as a developer, players wouldn't often resent him unless he constantly set traps for them...
Chen Mu suddenly found this new mechanic quite interesting—at least it pushed him one big step further down the path of "getting back at society"...
...
"You guys go ahead, I'll hold down the switch!" Chen Duxiu typed.
The other teammates, unsuspecting, were still marveling at the warmth of human kindness. But just as the first player was about to walk through, Chen Duxiu silently stepped off the switch.
The automatic door closed, trapping the lead player...
Everyone: "???"
The moment they turned back to look, Chen Duxiu stepped back onto the switch, and the door opened again.
"Oh, he must have accidentally stepped off."
The teammates, still unsuspecting, prepared to cross the automatic door again. But Chen Duxiu stepped off the switch once more...
The automatic door closed again, trapping the teammate!
Everyone: "..."
"Resentment Value: +30! +10! +8!"