Gamers Are Fierce-Chapter 795 - 793 Twilight
Generally speaking, aside from a few oddballs, the vast majority of gamers despise cheats in multiplayer competitive games. "Immortal," "God Immortal," and similar nicknames are just reluctant jests. If one actually gets killed by a cheat in-game, they're definitely going to spew some choice words.
However, the two Immortals in Brother Long's ordinary matchmaking game made use of such distinctive, miraculous cheats that the spectating crowd didn't get angry. Instead, they were filled with curiosity, as if watching a battle of magic between gods.
Two years ago, there was a "Battle of the Gods" in PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds, organized by cheat development teams, with hundreds of cheat users and representatives competing. The goal was not only to chase the fame of being the world's top cheater but also to market the game's cheats. At the time, it attracted a large number of onlookers.
Since cheats are not legal or compliant, the streaming channels organizers started for the Battle of the Gods were quickly banned by the platforms. This forced them to strategically shift between different sites.
Perhaps the technical capabilities of the different cheat teams were quite similar, so the gameplay footage didn't showcase as many Spells as one might expect. The game began with 13 players being disconnected by bomb cheats. After the remaining players picked up guns and began shooting into the air, several dozen more were killed using aimbot and bullet tracking cheats.
The survivors tried to flee thousands of miles and dive into the ocean. They used underwater breathing cheats to avoid the aimbots and even attempted to use the Secret Technique of no-cooldown healing (instant full health with bandages and medkits) to resist the tracking bullets.
But all their efforts were in vain under the strongest Immortal's magic spells. The seabed players were taken out with a single shot. Those with the no-cooldown medicine cheats had all their medicine depleted by tracking bullets, meeting their demise in the poison circle. The most powerful cheat was merely bullet tracking that ignored health-lock over long distances.
The "Battle of the Gods" event had a big buildup. However, it didn't present the weird and wonderful magic seen in GIFs or videos, which was somewhat disappointing to the audience.
Moreover, after the event ended, a large number of cheat production and sales teams, including the event organizers, were taken down in the real world. This was done by a company that had acquired the rights to PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds before the second Battle of the Gods could take place.
Cheat developers, general agents, and distributors from second to fourth level—over a hundred and forty people in total—were all arrested and cheerfully sent away.
This event went down in history as "Ragnarok."
Now, it was only the third day since the new version of PUBG had launched. Brother Long was also a major streamer for TigerFish, with countless nobles in his streaming room, as well as many employees from Blue Hole and Penguin lurking. Dragon Head White Lab Coat and the Immortal named FPU had caused such a stir that related threads with hundreds of posts had sprung up in various forums and message boards. The buzz was unparalleled, even trending toward the top searches on Weibo.
The viewers in the streaming room also knew that with the precedent of "Ragnarok," Dragon Head White Lab Coat and FPU likely wouldn't last long. Blue Hole would probably enact dimensional sanctions, banning their accounts, forcibly kicking them out of the game, and even possibly shutting down the match. There might even be repercussions in the real world afterward. Many audience members had already prepared the message "BOO HOO HOO, the Immortal has fallen" to send out at any moment.
"This Immortal is really flying fast," Brother Ruozi, who was driving, couldn't help but remark. "I'm flooring the gas pedal and still can't catch up."
"Nonsense, that's a Daluo Golden Immortal. Do you think you can catch up?" the rich player said laughingly. "Hey, hey, look ahead, there are several cars coming our way. Aren't they your fans, Brother Long?"
The people in the vehicles ahead turned their cars around and drove side by side with Brother Long's car. They turned on the public microphone and shouted, "Brother Long, we're your fans! We've fled to join you!"
Brother Long also turned on his free mic. "Where did you guys come from? What's the situation with the other Immortal?"
"We came from Picado," one of the fans called out. "Lion City was too terrifying. It was in the direction of the shrinking safe zone, and many people were hiding there.
"Then suddenly, this guy called FPU in a black suit flew out and started assimilating other people. One became two, two became four, four became eight, and the whole of Lion City was filled with people in black suits. One of my teammates was taken down there too.
"Now, he's not even showing up in my friends' group, and there's no sign of him on the team voice chat either. We only managed to escape because we were far from Lion City, so we drove to find you."
"Damn, is this 'The Matrix' or what?" Brother Long sucked in a breath of cold air. He glanced at the soaring popularity in the streaming room and the flood of comments, then couldn't help but COUGH. "Ruozi, you keep driving and follow. I'm going to find someone to ask."
The person he referred to was naturally a Blue Hole staff member. As one of the top streamers for the PUBG section on the platform, he of course had contact with high-level employees of the game company, usually getting insider news to have something to talk about with his audience during the stream.
He took off his headphones, avoiding the camera, opened his WeChat contacts, and had just sent "You there?" when the other party immediately made a WeChat call. After it connected, they said, "Brother Long, we are checking this FPU, but the tech team can't find this person's game information."
"Can't find it? What do you mean? Can't you directly access the backend data?"
The person on the other end replied helplessly, "The backend data for the other matches are normal, but this match's data has crashed. We can't view anything, nor can we close the match or kick the players out. The tech team is urgently repairing it now. With the new version just launched, it would look really bad if this made it onto the trending searches because of this issue. How about... you exit the game and stream something else for now?"
"Ah..." Brother Long drew out his voice. He understood the other party's predicament, but the skyrocketing popularity of his live stream made it hard for him to let go.
Just as Brother Long racked his brains, trying to figure out how to get by—
BANG BANG BANG!
The door was pounded on loudly, startling Brother Long so much that he nearly dropped his phone.
"I already said I'm streaming!" he quickly realized what was happening and shouted out towards the door in frustration. "Whatever it is, it can wait!"
The one knocking was probably his new maid; she did things without any sense of proportion—it was so annoying.
"Long Hao, open up! We are officers from Xu Huai Qu!" A deep and robust voice called out from beyond the door, using Brother Long's real name.
As soon as he heard the word "officer," Brother Long broke out in a cold sweat, and a flurry of comments began to drift across his live stream.
[Holy crap! Officers have shown up at the door! Did Brother Long do something wrong?!]
[Maybe he didn't pay for mineral water he bought last year?]
[Brother Long, see you in another life (´╥ω╥`)]
BANG BANG BANG!
The knocking became even louder. Brother Long, gritting his teeth, walked to the door and opened it.
Outside stood seven or eight large men wearing officer uniforms, their faces grim. One of them strode into the room and casually twisted the camera downwards to prevent the room's interior from being seen on the live stream. Then, he operated the computer for a moment, shutting down the live stream interface, causing viewers to post comments like [???], [Did Brother Long get taken down?], and [What's happening?].
After all of this was done, the burly man straightened up. He looked at Brother Long, who was shaking like a leaf and had no idea what he had done wrong, and said in a stern voice, "You, come with us. This computer is being requisitioned; please cooperate with our work."
"Requisitioned?" Brother Long stammered, "I, I have some important files on there..."
COUGH COUGH. He was, after all, a public figure. If the "confidential files" on there were leaked, how could he face the public?
"It's a temporary requisition; we'll return it to you later." The burly man waved his hand impatiently. The officers on either side immediately grabbed Brother Long by the shoulders and half-dragged, half-pushed him out of the room, slamming the door shut with a BANG.
This abrupt turn of events frightened the other people in the same team. Brother Ruozi, sensing that something was definitely not right, quickly shut down the live stream and stopped the car in the game, not daring to make a sound. The local tycoon, who claimed to have connections everywhere, obediently shut his mouth to avoid bringing trouble upon himself. He might have assets worth hundreds of millions, but he would not dare to offend official personnel.
The sturdy man, or rather Xing Hechou, sat in Brother Long's gaming chair, put on the headset, and said calmly, "Little Ruo, you've shut down the live stream, right? Good. We are officers from the Mobile Detachment. Your home address is in Tianjin Door Dongli District on ** Street? Our colleagues will visit you soon to requisition your computer; please cooperate with our work. As for now, keep driving and follow that Dragon Head White Lab Coat."
"OH—OH—" Brother Ruozi, having lost all the grandeur and arrogance of the moniker "E-sports Black Hand," nodded continuously, obediently stepping on the gas and resuming driving. "Um... Officer Comrade, have we gotten involved in some sort of unusual incident... Will there be danger?"
"It's fine; just drive and follow my instructions. You won't run into any trouble." While saying this, Xing Hechou picked up his phone and dialed a colleague in the equipment tech department at the Special Affairs Bureau in Yin City. "Hello? Old Chu, send over some hacks for these accounts I've marked. Yeah, godmode, auto-aim, wallhack, poison immunity, Quick Medicine, invulnerability, super weapons, flight, aquatic breathing, resource gathering... Send me a copy of each hack. Li Rising is our good comrade; we can't let him get ambushed by those scoundrels from Prometheus Laboratory Company."
