NOVEL NEXT 046. Pay-to-Win, Gacha, White Light, and Dead Ends
- Pay-to-Win, Gacha, White Light, and Dead Ends
“I still can't give up the arrogance of being a player... Sigh, so to change the whole industry, I have to start with myself.”
Li Aozzi secretly warned himself, avoid arrogance, no more arrogance.
Adjust your mindset, adjust your mindset.
It was arrogance that destroyed the Starfall Masters community.
They should have had a warm, inclusive, and diverse community culture, with many people creating secondary works, hand-written texts, video edits, fanfictions, and even offline meetups—similar to the gatherings of Martial Artists and Mages.
This profession is definitely not inferior to others.
If players are willing to join, Li Aozzi would certainly build this profession into something great.
“Of course, I can’t think like that. Even without players, so what? I’ve invested my youth, effort, and love into this profession, gaining money, streaming income, and the audience's love. Changing the inevitable decline of the Starfall Master is my duty.”
After all, he gained too much from the Starfall Master in his past life: benefits, fame, many friends. These brought more than just material changes.
“Whether players arrive or not, I must be prepared to establish a new order. Rebuilding the glory of the Starfall Masters is our duty!”
Start with the Blood Magic path, paving a stable route.
Next, consider how to simplify the job threshold, making the Starfall Master accessible and popular.
The community is too small. Even if it increased by hundreds or thousands, it wouldn’t be oversaturated, and the universe is too vast.
On a cosmic level, numbers are crucial.
The universe is too big; too few people means no chance or justification to occupy territory.
Mages can easily claim large swathes of space for “magical research,” essentially colonizing planets.
Martial arts masters with many disciples and thriving industries expand territory and accommodate populations naturally.
But Starfall Masters are awkward. They live long lives, have few numbers, and lack the organizational scale to utilize much space, making any justification shaky.
“Besides increasing numbers, personal strength is the main factor... Nothing is more reliable than strength.”
“Li Aozzi, Li Aozzi—you must stay calm. Arrogance only makes me weak and incompetent. I must not start this bad habit.”
He muttered to himself.
On reflection, since crossing over, he seemed to have always maintained a player’s style, inadvertently revealing his disregard for others, hindering his progress.
Humility fosters progress is not just empty talk. Li Aozzi realized he was too restless, not correcting his mindset.
He no longer had the player’s capital—the three revival chances, and even if exhausted, one could respawn with memories and bound equipment.
Low-profile, humble, steady, calm.
These should be his current qualities.
After his self-reflection, Li Aozzi looked at Yavanna, unable to suppress his jealousy.
Damn, I still really want her… talent.
“If I can get this talent, I can ascend to Bishop in version 3.0, and from level 90 to 180, no one at the same level will be my opponent! No one!”
Hence, this troublesome woman couldn’t be killed just because of a bad mood.
Seemingly sensing Li Aozzi’s gaze, Yavanna looked up, their eyes met, and Li Aozzi immediately glared at her in displeasure.
He was holding a grudge over losing a specialization.
“I need to think... how to get her talent or replicate it.”
Li Aozzi had the Energy Capsule, not lacking abilities, but personal talents were bound to people, making them hard to obtain.
His first thought was to open the [Game Store].
—As the saying goes, problems that money can solve aren’t real problems.
“This is the final patch version store, and I remember there are some talent-related items…”
Li Aozzi searched for keywords, finding three items.
The first was [White Wax Fantasy Crystal], a magical item. With a relationship level of 500 (respect) or higher with the target, it allows mutual sharing of racial, personal, and class talents.
This item, introduced in version 3.7.1, was cheap, costing only 168 points.
Li Aozzi recalled it was used by spellcasters for mutual exchanges. Two mages with a good relationship would share talents.
Since the magic side mainly relied on academic knowledge and skill accumulation, this served to prove their unbreakable friendship.
However... the prerequisite was quite challenging.
Achieving 500 respect points was hard enough, and after sharing, if one killed the other, they’d lose the ability to share.
Not viable, Li Aozzi turned to the next item.
The second was a tech-side item, [Gene Mirror Replicator], ridiculously expensive at 19,288 points, allowing direct replication of all talents, skills, specializations, knowledge, and memories from a defenseless target.
This was a powerful item, but Li Aozzi hesitated to use it on Yavanna.
The [Gene Mirror Replicator] was a one-time purchase, with no level restrictions. Using it on a low-level target would be a waste.
He wanted to save it for high-level bosses like [Annihilation Demon Lord] Scarvey, [Moon Maiden] Jasmine, or [Death Recorder] De Annie.
These three had talents and specializations truly worth the cost, with high cost-effectiveness.
[Objective Resonance] was a god-tier talent, but compared to these three version bosses, it lacked cost-effectiveness... Li Aozzi had to consider carefully.
He didn’t want to sacrifice future development potential, especially for version 8.0 [Song of Despair], a version demanding individual strength over teamwork.
That period was supposed to be the prime time for solo classes, particularly the Starfall Master, but its small numbers prevented any significant impact, causing Li Aozzi endless heartache.
“Better to save it for space.”
To find a breakthrough, he looked at the third item.
The third item had no purchase limit but was not cheap. It was a random draw from the target’s skills, items, specializations, or talents.
Since it was a draw, not a copy, the extracted skills or items would adapt to the new user.
For example, a skill suitable for mages would adjust its attributes if extracted by a warrior, avoiding a sense of loss for the warrior player.
This sounded good... but the lack of guarantees made it risky.
Li Aozzi recalled a professional player’s stream, where he spent a fortune on 1,000 draws, swearing to extract a demon warlock’s [Summon Succubus] skill.
After spending all the draws, he ended up with 986 [Human Amber] skills, swearing off gambling and spending ever again.
One draw cost 648 points. Li Aozzi worried about bad luck, fearing he’d spend all his points and end up extracting Yavanna’s underwear without getting a specialization.
After all, he was no longer a player and couldn’t use the power of money.
Most of his points needed to be traded for rare resources, making exchanges more worthwhile.
However, if he gambled on luck, there was a way to temporarily increase his ‘luck.’
Although the cost was high, it was acceptable for now.
Thinking it over, Li Aozzi felt his luck wasn’t too bad. He could try his luck before doing that task.
With that in mind, he clicked the purchase confirmation.
[Do you want to purchase ‘Ticket to the Trekie Exhibition’?]
[Purchase successful]
Li Aozzi drew a meticulously crafted card from his pocket. The rectangular card had a slight resilience, feeling weighty. The front featured a dragon with resplendent gemstone scales, and the back bore a gold-foiled phrase:
‘Enjoy the grand exhibition.’
Qiu Ran and Yavanna immediately noticed the high-end item Li Aozzi took out, sparking their interest.
“What’s this? It looks beautiful,” Qiu Ran asked curiously.
Tear—
The next moment, Li Aozzi pointed the card at Yavanna and tore it apart.
[You used the item ‘Ticket to the Trekie Exhibition’ on target “Yavanna Haskisin.”]
[Drawing in progress…]
[You obtained ‘Signal Transmitter.’]
“Damn it!”
Li Aozzi pulled out a signal transmitter the size of a beetle. Yavanna’s eyes widened.
“How did you get that?”
Li Aozzi didn’t answer, now hating talking to women. He held the signal transmitter between his fingers, pondering.
Clearly, his luck was bad today, drawing such trash… but perhaps not completely useless.
“This might come in handy.”
Li Aozzi remembered his task, which involved infiltrating the White Fang gang’s camp without being detected.
According to players’ understanding of ‘infiltration’ as defined by Netizens (the developers and operators of*Star Abyss*), as long as his information wasn’t exposed, it was considered successful.
With this perspective, even wiping out the camp counted as infiltration.
Using a nuclear bomb would also count as infiltration.
Even luring enemies to kill each other could be infiltration.
The key was whether information was exposed! If his information wasn’t exposed, it didn’t count as failure.
“I’m struggling with how to deal with Nimotin, fighting her would waste time, but I’ve already provoked her, and being chased is annoying—so let the White Fang gang deal with her for me.”
After all, I’m not a bad guy. What bad intentions could a little mutator have?