Scourge Messenger

Chapter 26 Thank you for your hard work

It's really not surprising at all.

Yan Qing sighed inwardly. When he saw that the mission reward was only a Bingzi Jiaolin, he knew this situation would occur - but he couldn't even blame others, because the settings of the Thieves' House were all written by him.

Fighting for mission rewards, intrigues between teammates and even backstabbing each other are part of the fun of playing Thieves' House. Yan Qing referred to board game elements such as Werewolf when designing this dungeon, striving to allow players to have a thrilling gaming experience in this low-level dungeon.

However, in real life, it is too tense and exciting to encounter teammates starting to intrigue against each other before completing the task.

"Wow, Qi's standard rare token, the General's Sword. It's said that only five can be crafted each year. All the nobles and generals of Qi are proud to wield the General's Sword. I didn't expect that you, White Fox, actually possess such a precious token!" Shang Xinlei commented sharply, "Although sublimated rare tokens are generally stronger than synthesized rare tokens, in the past, the Shenwu Emperor commanded the Qi generals to dominate the world, and your Mingwang Armor, Black Wolf, is more defensive-oriented—"

When Ying Ru heard Shang Xinlei's words, he felt that something bad was happening.

Heilang was obviously a military hero from the Zhou State, and he couldn't stand the reputation of Qi State's brave general Jian!

Almost every word that Red Snake said hit the point that would make Black Wolf angry!

clang!clang!clang!
As expected, after hearing Shang Xinlei's words, Yaoshiyuan's offensive intensified, forcing Ying Rushi to retaliate. However, the more Ying Rushi fought back, the more intense the pale golden glow around Yaoshiyuan grew. Ying Rushi knew that once the pale golden glow accumulated to a certain level, Yaoshiyuan would unleash a terrifying counterattack. Therefore, she had only two choices: surrender, or shatter Mingwangjia's defenses with a more powerful attack now!

She can only and must choose the latter!
Ying Ru had been playing the role of a smooth peacemaker since she joined the House of Thieves, but even clay figures can get angry, let alone her, a county magistrate from the royal family of Qi? Her relatives were all scum who would kill and torture people in the streets at will. She didn't do that simply because she knew propriety, righteousness, and shame, not because she didn't know how to do it!

The sword of the brave general emitted a faint green light, and it was so sharp that even the wind could be cut by it.

When Yaoshiyuan saw the aura of the General's Sword, her eyes lit up and her blood surged. The reason she wanted to acquire the Thieves' House so badly was not only to make the Zhou Kingdom great again, but also to be able to fight against powerful warriors from all corners of the world!
Let me see, is it my Mingwang Armor that is as immovable as a mountain, or your brave general sword that can break through the army!

"enough."

A straight white iron knife was inserted from the middle. A gleam of light flashed in the eyes of Yaoshi Yuan and Ying Rushi. They seemed unable to restrain their strength. They chopped out with all their strength using their swords and fine steel spears!
clang!
With a loud bang, the three weapons intersected with each other, but Yao Shiyuan and Ying Rushi's expressions changed at the same time.

Their weapons were all emitting the afterglow of spiritual energy fluctuations, indicating that they had activated the power of the tokens and added blessings to their weapons.

But the straight iron knife that stood between them did not have any spiritual power fluctuations!
A token without spiritual power is no different from any other object!
You have to know that their full-strength attack could even make a dent in the door of the gold cabinet, but the white iron straight knife that withstood the full-strength attack from both sides did not even have a crack.

How can this be? !
Yan Qing didn't even activate the token, and he handled it with ease as if he was separating two fighting animals.

How on earth did he do it?
Medicine Master's wish and response were incomprehensible and unacceptable, because this result could only prove one thing—

The gap between Huang Quan and them is so great that they can't even discern the other party's methods!

Three turns? Four turns?
"Have you had enough trouble?"

Yan Qing glanced at them coldly, then gripped his knife tightly and swung it upward, knocking away their weapons. He didn't use much strength, but Yaoshi Yuan and Ying Ru were intimidated by his power and didn't dare to resist, so they obediently retracted their weapons.

"And you, Red Snake!"

Yan Qing pointed the knife at Shang Xinlei.

"If you can't speak, don't open your mouth."

Shang Xinlei immediately clutched her throat, her mouth opening and closing, but no sound came out, as if Yan Qing had disabled her ability to speak at all. Her face was filled with fear, as if she had suddenly lost her voice, and she pleaded pitifully for Yan Qing's forgiveness.

Little drama queen.

Yan Qing and the other two had the same opinion in their minds.

Under the watchful eyes of Ying Rushi and Pharmacist Yuan, Yan Qing directly reached out and took the Bingzi pepper forest from the gold cabinet.

"I'll keep this knife," he paused, "until the mission is completed."

The two, already intimidated by his power, accepted the outcome when they heard he wasn't taking the items for himself but was keeping them temporarily. Yan Qing heaved a sigh of relief when he saw they had all behaved and stopped causing trouble.

He hadn't dared intervene in the fight between Black Wolf and White Fox. They were both Rank 2 messengers, and he wouldn't be their match in a fight. But watching them clash weapons, Yan Qing suddenly remembered something—while they could attack each other, the game system still considered them teammates.

After all, the Thieves' House is not a PVP but a cooperative PVE instance. Although you can attack or even kill your teammates, no equipment will be dropped and no experience will be lost when your teammates die. It is just a wasted death and the mission has failed.

Of course, in reality, there is no such thing as "death in vain". Death is real death.

As we all know, game programs try to call existing codes as much as possible, rather than adding new code groups every time a planner writes a function. After all, there will be more and more new content in the game, and constantly adding new codes will simply create a mountain of shit.

The same logic applies to planning. Planners who come up with a brilliant idea on the spur of the moment and ask programmers to keep writing new features to match it will sooner or later be dragged out and fired by the programmers. Qualified planners, when envisioning a new activity, should refer to existing features in the game and let programmers transform old features into new gameplay as much as possible.

To get his proposal approved, Yan Qing devised nearly every new gameplay mechanic he'd planned for Thieves' House that could be modeled after the game. For example, the Thieves' House mechanic, where teammates could backstab each other, was based on the very common "Team Talk Mode"—players on the same team could fight each other simply by activating the Talk Mode, with no loss of life.

In the sparring mode, the player's weapons and armor will not consume durability, and the token will not be destroyed by the opponent's "crushing damage" (damage that exceeds the durability of the weapon).

Simply put, teammates in the Thieves' House can harm each other, but they cannot destroy other people's tokens.

If it is really as he expected, then even if Yan Qing is not strong enough, he can still interfere with the battle between the black wolf and the white fox!

Yan Qing admitted that there was a gambling element in his behavior, but he gambled correctly.

Pharmacist wished that they would only see Yan Qing blocking their attacks with a sliver of iron. Even if they guessed that it was related to the 'divine rules', it would be difficult to find out the truth in a short period of time.

Before they figure this out, they will only overestimate Yan Qing's strength as much as possible.

When leaving the vault, Yao Shiyuan and Ying Rushi subconsciously took a step behind, and Yan Qing naturally walked to the front.

He held a large sack in his right hand and a piece of pepper in his left hand, and led everyone out of the inner hall.

Many people were waiting in the hall outside. They formed three layers around the entrance. The outermost layer was composed of monks, the inner layer was composed of nobles, and the innermost layer was naturally An Wu, who was blocking the entrance. At this time, An Wu's left arm was almost completely burned, with the blackened and charred arm bone exposed. The left half of his body was also severely burned, and he could no longer recognize any human form.

When the monks saw Yan Qing and his group coming out, they retreated to the side in fear. Among them were some martial monks and even a second-level messenger at the Chengming level. However, they did not dare to approach Yan Qing and his group at all.

There were also differences between couriers. Even if truly powerful couriers didn't frequently enter secret realms, they rarely stayed in the main city. How much courage could a monk, even a second-level monk, possess for staying in an unburdened area like Anguo Temple, even if he was unsure of security?
"Do we want to kill them?" Yao Shiyuan suddenly asked.

When the monks heard this, they immediately panicked and fled into the depths of Anguo Temple.

"We are thieves, not serial killers." Yan Qing said calmly, "But it doesn't matter if you want to kill me."

Yao Shiyuan thought about it and decided not to take action - the monks were so good at running that it would be too inefficient to kill them one by one. She would wait until she got home and clean up these insects in the name of the commander of the Embroidered Uniform Guard.

Although Xue Yan and other nobles saw them carrying large and small bags, they all kept silent as if they had become blind and dumb. Under the gaze of everyone, Yan Qing walked up to An Wu, who looked like an evil spirit, and patted him on the shoulder.

"thirty."

An Wu nodded, stopped blocking the door, and began to count down: "Thirty, twenty-nine, twenty-eight..."

Yan Qing turned to the nobles and monks and said, "If you don't want to die, leave Anguo Temple before he finishes the countdown."

Passing by An Wu, Yan Qing stopped and said softly.

"Thanks for your hard work."

(End of this chapter)