Chapter 92: The Ninety-Second Day of Being a Salted Fish

“Hmm…” Lu Yuan murmured in thought.

Goudan, hearing his long silence, let out a chuckle from the kitchen. “I told you, showing it to you wouldn’t do much good.”

“True enough,” Lu Yuan laughed. He tossed the communicator aside and leaned back in his chair, his eyes fixed on the distant sunset.

The atmosphere of the Desolate Planet was thinner than most planets he had visited, but because it was relatively turbid, much of the star’s light was blocked. At this moment, the star was nearing the horizon, its light shifting toward a dim, deep red that no longer stung the eyes.

For Lu Yuan, whose unique constitution allowed him to look directly at a supernova explosion caused by a Stellar Bomb 90231, this light posed no threat at all. Even if he stared at it indefinitely, it wouldn’t be a problem.

After spacing out for a long while, Lu Yuan slowly gathered his thoughts. He pondered a bit longer before saying, “There can only be two reasons.”

“Let’s hear them?” Goudan said.

“Obviously, this game has the ability to distinguish a player’s identity,” Lu Yuan explained. He watched Goudan bring out a plate of stir-fried mushrooms and sighed before continuing. “To identify someone, I think there are roughly three most direct methods.”

“Three?” Goudan asked.

“Appearance—judging by looks, height, weight, including body fat percentage, physical fitness, and so on; or Mental Power; or DNA.”

Goudan nodded. “Reasonable.”

“But the third one can be ruled out immediately. I have a rough understanding of how the Star Pirates access the StarNet. In short, the account Ying Xun gave Zhu Rong definitely isn’t linked to her DNA. And a game existing in a virtual world couldn’t possibly obtain a player’s DNA information out of thin air.”

Lu Yuan continued, “That leaves only two possibilities. Actually, both are possible. The game requires authorization to access physical data, and by detecting that data, it can identify a person. Just like how I know it’s you when I see you.

“But there’s a problem with that. A person’s physical data isn’t static over the long term. People can get plastic surgery, their physical condition changes with age, and illness, diet, and environment all have an impact.

“Then there are extreme cases, like twins. They might look nearly identical. For a game that only reads information by scanning the body, it would likely be difficult to tell them apart.”

As Goudan listened, he brought out another bowl of stewed mushrooms. Lu Yuan sighed again.

Goudan then placed two bowls on the table, pulled up a chair, and sat down across from him. “So, it’s Mental Power?”

Lu Yuan wasn’t entirely certain. He shook his head. “I can only say that I think it’s the more likely possibility. Holographic game headsets can read brainwave activity; by extension, they can actually read Mental Power. Every person’s Mental Power has its own unique signature. While it’s difficult to distinguish, it’s not impossible.

“Furthermore,” he took a spoonful of mushrooms and ate slowly, “it seems this game filters for specific players.”

“Indeed.” Even Goudan could see that much.

Lu Yuan said, “Filtering must have specific criteria. I don’t think it filters based on physical data—Zhu Rong is frail, her physical fitness isn’t great, she’s malnourished, and her bone density is insufficient. My constitution, on the other hand, is at the absolute peak. We have nothing in common in that regard.

“Conversely, Geshu Qing and Zhu Rong both grew up on the Desolate Planet, they aren’t far apart in age, and their physical conditions are relatively similar. Yet Zhu Rong can enter the game while Geshu Qing cannot. I think this selection criteria must be unrelated to physical fitness.”

“Your Mental Power is very strong, and Zhu Rong’s seems to be very strong as well?” Goudan asked thoughtfully. “Is the selection criteria related to the intensity of Mental Power?”

“Zhu Rong’s Mental Power intensity…” Lu Yuan thought for a moment. “Among the people I’ve met, she’s one of the strongest. But the game’s selection criteria shouldn’t be—or at least isn’t solely—Mental Power intensity. If the condition were that simple, someone would have figured out the pattern long ago.”

“So what do you think the selection criteria is?”

“I don’t know,” Lu Yuan said, slipping back into his ‘salted fish’ state. “There are many possibilities, but no way to be sure. Actually, I have a feeling it’s something like ‘talent.’ Thinking back, the people I met in the game all had excellent talent—both for gaming and for combat.

“But that’s too abstract. Whether a person has talent… even I have to spend some time with them before I can judge. I don’t think a game could instantaneously determine if a player has talent or not.”

“Another thing is, we both really like the game. But that’s even harder to use as a standard for judgment. We’ll have to wait and see. There’s no other way for now.”

Lu Yuan paused, then added, “However, we can have Geshu Qing talk to Nan Mu or Nan Yingzhe about this. I think they should have some understanding of the game. He’s at the Capital Star now, and since Geshu Ming will be arranging for him to debut in social circles soon, he’ll have opportunities to come into contact with Nan Mu and Nan Yingzhe.”

“Would Geshu Ming have any information about the game?” Goudan asked curiously.

“I don’t know.” Lu Yuan shook his head. “I did tell her the game was fun, but as the heir to the Geshu Family, she’s incredibly busy. She’s not interested in mecha games either, so she’s never played it.”

“I see.” Goudan nodded and forwarded Lu Yuan’s words to Siming. As he typed, he sighed. “We should have given them two, or even three communicators back then.”

Speaking of this, Lu Yuan felt a bit of regret as well. At the time, he had assumed that Siming and the others would almost certainly be taken to the Capital Star by Geshu Ming and wouldn’t be separated from Geshu Qing. He had been lazy and only provided them with one communicator.

Furthermore, he had been secretly planning back then that even if they were separated, they could still communicate within the game.

While he couldn’t rule out the possibility of their actions in the game being monitored, as long as they could meet face-to-face, there were countless ways to pass information. Siming and the others were smart; they would surely find a way.

“It’s a pity I didn’t know back then that not everyone can log into this game,” Lu Yuan said helplessly. If he had known sooner, perhaps he could have followed that lead to uncover more information, and Geshu Qing wouldn’t have ended up in this state of being half-disconnected from them.

“You actually didn’t notice something so simple back then?” Goudan teased.

Lu Yuan laughed in spite of himself. “I had a lot of people around me at the time, but the only one I truly trusted… was Geshu Ming.”

“What about Marshal Lu Zhongli?” Goudan asked.

“Oh…” Lu Yuan fell silent for a moment, then shook his head. “It’s hard to say. He saved me, so logically I should trust him. But I don’t know what his relationship with Nan Hui is, and I still don’t know to this day.”

Goudan’s eyes darkened for a split second.

Lu Yuan continued, “I didn’t know many people in the game either. I was young then and didn’t really know how to socialize. That’s why I didn’t know about the login restrictions.”

“Fair enough.” Goudan also remembered the information Zhu Rong had gathered from the game; Lu Yuan had always been a lone wolf and never joined any guilds. So, while many people in the game admired Lu Yuan, very few had actually interacted with or understood him.

By this time, he had finished sending everything Lu Yuan said to Siming. As for how Siming would convey these things to Geshu Qing… that would depend on their own resourcefulness.

Being far away on the Desolate Planet, he couldn’t offer much help.

Especially since he had his own tasks to attend to.

“There’s one more thing I want to talk to you about.” Stuffing the communicator back into his pocket, Goudan thought for a moment and spoke.

“Go ahead,” Lu Yuan nodded.

“Our harvest has been good lately, and we have quite a lot of mushrooms on hand. It hasn’t rained these past two days, so we’re planning to dry them out for easier storage. That way, we’ll have some food reserves,” Goudan said.

Lu Yuan looked up at the sky. Heaven knew how many mushrooms he had eaten lately… The tiny amount of food from the small batch of supplies dropped by the last Garbage Ship had long been finished. Recently, Goudan and the others had been obsessed with growing mushrooms and hadn’t bothered with other food, so he had been eating mushrooms right along with them.

Goudan continued, “And in a few days, another Garbage Ship will be coming. They should be dumping some things then.”

When the last Garbage Ship came, they hadn’t been sure if Lu Yuan’s act of sinking a Garbage Ship would be discovered, and they were quite worried. But the crew on that ship hadn’t noticed any issues and dropped the supplies as usual. Goudan and the others felt much more secure now.

Lu Yuan nodded. He had also calculated that the timing was about right. The last time a Garbage Ship came was before Siming and the others left. A significant amount of time had passed since then, so it was time for a new one.

“Those supplies, combined with the mushrooms we’ve stockpiled, should be enough for everyone to live on for a while. So I plan… to keep a portion of the people engaged in production, while the others start considering outward expansion.”

He took a deep breath. “Now that Siming and the others have their lives on track, it’s time for us to move. This small patch of land can’t be the only part of the Desolate Planet moving toward prosperity. We want to lead the entire Desolate Planet in re-establishing order.”

“It might be a bit rushed,” he said with a determined expression, “but I still want to start this as soon as possible. The faster we move, the better the Desolate Planet will become. Before everyone else realizes what the Desolate Planet is, we must transform it into something presentable.”

Lu Yuan watched him quietly. “What do you plan to do?”

Goudan lowered his gaze. “Exactly what you did. First, use force to impose and establish rules, then rely on civilization to shake their savage beliefs.

“Siming previously arranged for Lao Tong to find her former subordinates. Some of them have already arrived here. Our military strength is not weak; I think it might be enough.”