I slay demons and monsters in a bizarre city.

Chapter 45 The Secrets of KMS Games

This was indeed the second basement level of KMS Games. There were so many people in front of him that Li Changgeng felt the place was very cheap, like commodities displayed on the ground, worthless at all.

There were men, women, elderly people, and even children.

These people looked exactly like real people, just sleeping peacefully.

Li Changgeng mustered his courage and walked over. This should be a special human creation base. Based on his consciousness and self-awareness, Li Changgeng was certain that these people were not real people, but rather digital cyborgs with implanted memories, or even program-controlled ones.

Li Changgeng walked through the crowd and noticed that each person had a special number next to them, which should be a kind of quantity code. KMS000001163 was an old man with gray hair and wearing reading glasses. This code number should be similar to a person's ID number. Judging from the number of digits, it was already after the 1000th one.

Could it be that many of the people walking the streets of Blacksea City aren't real people, but rather digital cyborgs? That's highly possible. These digital cyborgs are unaware that they are not human.

Current technology and biotechnology have reached an extremely advanced level. If it weren't for ethical issues, there would be more digitally engineered humans living in society, indistinguishable from real people.

There were so many people that Li Changgeng couldn't see the end of the line; the entire second underground level stretched outwards indefinitely...

What's even stranger is that these "people" all have their eyes closed, and Li Changgeng, walking among them, feels like he's being watched.

Li Changgeng wanted to leave this gloomy place as soon as possible. This was the first time he had seen so many people since the Eternal Night Mist.

Li Changgeng returned the way he came. When he reached the edge of the crowd, he saw a face that everyone recognized. It was his colleague, employee number 15, with whom he had a fairly good relationship and was quite familiar with him.

KMS000000015, this special number is under his feet.

No wonder he's called Number 15. But here's the question: is Employee Number 15 actually one person? Does that mean that during the day, Employee Number 15 works diligently, and at night, he goes back to the second basement level to rest and sleep like a human being...?

Thinking of this, Li Changgeng became frightened. Could it be that the people on the second basement level were all employees of KMS Games, and that they were all developing the Metaverse virtual digital game? What about him? What was Li Changgeng himself?
"Number 15, wake up! Time to go to work!"

Li Changgeng squeezed the arm of number 15 hard. It was warm and elastic, and felt very good. He couldn't tell that it was a fake.

Employee number 15 remained motionless with his eyes closed.

An inexplicable fear enveloped Li Changgeng. If KMS Game Company really had problems, he needed to resign as soon as possible. Jobs were extremely hard to find these days, the unemployment rate was incredibly high, and ordinary people could only survive on supplies distributed by the United Government. Very few people were able to work and earn a salary. If it weren't for Li Ying's medical expenses, Li Changgeng would definitely have resigned from KMS Game Company.

Leaving the company now is not realistic. He received 100 million yuan for developing the game and signed an agreement with KMS Games to complete the entire development cycle of the game. If he leaves early, it will be considered a breach of contract, which would result in a huge amount of compensation.

There is a way to verify Li Changgeng's idea: whether employee number 15 on the second basement floor is the same person who works at KMS Games during the day.

Li Changgeng lightly pinched a very shallow mark on employee number 15's arm; it was barely noticeable unless you looked closely.

When Li Changgeng was at work, if he checked and found scratches on employee number 15's arm, it would indicate a problem.

"Holy crap!" Li Changgeng was startled. He turned his head and saw the buck-toothed girl's huge buck teeth. With the dim lighting, he thought she was a living dead zombie. People scaring each other is truly terrifying.

Li Changgeng even reached out and touched the buck-toothed girl's big buck teeth. They looked just like real ones, with leftover vegetable leaves on them. It was disgusting. Li Changgeng shook his hand. Did these people even eat?
Leaving the second basement level, Li Changgeng hurriedly stepped into the elevator. KMS Games Company was 99 stories high, enough to accommodate a thousand people working there. It was unimaginable if all these people were on the second basement level. The advantage of doing this was that it saved a lot of labor costs.

These people had no complaints, didn't rest, didn't need overtime pay, and had long lifespans. Li Changgeng was really starting to lose track of what was real, what was fake, or what was a digital cyborg.

What could be on the basement level? Li Changgeng pressed the elevator button for the basement level, and the button flashed its lights incessantly, indicating that Li Changgeng should not linger on this floor.

They could only go up to the 99th floor and return to the place Lin Jiuge had given them to live in.

Lin Jiuge might not be plotting against him, deliberately letting him stay in this place so he could witness everything, even the two evil spirits that went to kill him—it's all possible that Lin Jiuge deliberately arranged for them.

Anything is possible!

Li Changgeng picked up his phone, glanced at the time, and saw it was already past nine o'clock; it was time to go to work and clock in.

Following the narrow passageway, Li Changgeng saw a small black elevator. At the entrance stood a man in black wearing large sunglasses, with a gleaming silver pistol tucked into his waistband, making no attempt to conceal it.

"Please come downstairs! This is the only elevator that goes to the 1st and 17th floors!"

The elevator door opens.

Li Changgeng felt as if he had been transported to another world. He clearly remembered that when he first came here, there was no elevator, only an emergency staircase.

"Please leave quickly!" The man in black pulled out a pistol and pointed it at Li Changgeng's forehead.

"Relax!" Li Changgeng had witnessed too much strangeness and terror; a person with a gun posed little threat to him.

He arrived at the 17th floor, Li Changgeng's workplace. As usual, he would turn on his computer first thing when he arrived at work, and then go to the coffee shop to get a cup of coffee, where he would run into employee number 15.

Li Changgeng hesitated for a moment as his hand touched the power button on the computer. Why was every day so routine?

This time, he didn't turn on the computer first; he went to make a cup of coffee first.

"Good morning! The company layoff list will be released today! Don't worry, you're the company's star now. Buck-toothed Girl will likely be fired, and so will number 15. Goji Berry Guy might be next!" Silly Butt, with her flowing, glossy black hair, was still wearing skate shoes and ripped jeans, except that the back of her jeans was still very revealing, showing off her pert, firm, and snow-white buttocks…

Her top was the same old checkered t-shirt worn by mental patients, and her illegible name tag hung around her neck.

Actually, Silly Butt isn't silly at all; she's just a bit neurotic and occasionally stubborn. But everyone in the company calls her Silly Butt, and over time, everyone has come to accept it.

"Nobody can say for sure!" Li Changgeng couldn't help but glance at Silly Butt's butt. It was truly sinful that he wouldn't even spare Silly Butt's butt. To be precise, Li Changgeng didn't have a girlfriend in the real sense.

"Who is Brother Goji Berry?" Li Changgeng didn't have much of an impression of this person.

Silly Butt flicked his flowing long hair. "He's just a kid who's not even thirty yet, with goji berries in his thermos. Hey, I thought he was pretty handsome, but who knew he was all show and no substance, all show and no substance, a good-looking but useless guy."

It seems like there isn't a single normal person at this KMS game company.

This is so weird!
As far as he could remember, this was the first time that Silly Butt had spoken to him in the morning. Just then, employee number 15 walked over looking exhausted, and Li Changgeng clearly saw the scratches on his arm…

(End of this chapter)