Forty-nine rules of the end times

Chapter 134 The Ordinary People's Counterattack

"This is the fifth one."

Guan Tong saw that she was ranked "first" and happily withdrew her shadow.

He has just completed another challenge: "Going to the Deepest Part of the Underground".

The creator of this challenge project may work in some deep underground facility, or have some tools or abilities that allow them to burrow underground, which is why they created this challenge, thinking they are invincible.

But he certainly couldn't have imagined that Guan Tong's shadow, in its ethereal state, had no physical form and no pressure restrictions, allowing it to extend deep underground.

Winning first place in this challenge would be a piece of cake for him.

As a result, on the afternoon of January 2nd, the second day after the rules were implemented, he won first place in all five challenge events.

These five tracks are almost all related to distance and speed, and they were specifically chosen by Guan Tong. Utilizing his ability to use shadows and teleportation, he has an almost absolute advantage on these tracks.

"Five first places, three of which are 10-point increases to the cap, and each additional first place will give you an extra 5 points... I have now accumulated 20 points to increase the cap."

A 20-point increase in mental strength is already quite significant for Guan Tong. Normally, her natural growth is only 4 or 5 points per month. This 20-point increase is equivalent to four to five months of natural growth.

However, he was definitely not satisfied with 20 points. If he didn't seize such a valuable opportunity to improve further, who knows when there would be a similar reward next time?
Moreover, he urgently needed to write the fifth page of his "Wordless Book," but he couldn't do it without sufficient mental strength.

"There must be other people creating ocean-related challenges, like the one deep underground we just encountered..."

Guan Tong thought that perhaps some divers, or even people in submarines, would create similar rules.

His influence extends deep underground and into the ocean, making it a given that he'll win first place in these projects.

However, Guan Tong also noticed the widespread impact of the information being leaked.

Actually, he didn't think it would be exposed at first.

Because the eleven people who spent 50,000 Ascension Coins to buy the rules, regardless of what groups they are backed by, definitely hope that their group is stronger than other groups.

For this reason, those who buy intelligence will not need to discuss it and will likely tacitly keep it a secret from each other and secretly use it to enhance the strength of their own team's Ascendants.

Guan Tong could guess that there were people from the Countermeasures Research Office among these eleven buyers, but he didn't expect that the North Star Kingdom government would eventually decide to fully disclose the intelligence.

Based on previous experience, he believed that the authorities would choose to keep it secret in order to avoid widespread conflict.

In retrospect, the official announcement that non-core data would be made public was not just empty talk; it was a genuine policy shift.

After the intelligence was released, and after more than ten hours of fermentation and discussion, people's attitude is now very clear: they do not want to use their mental power to benefit the strong.

Guan Tong glanced at his website forum. In the casual chat section, many people clearly stated that they would not create challenges, and some even started a joint post hoping that the official team could come forward and give an explanation.

He even saw many people criticizing him, the station manager.

"If you ask me, the station chief shouldn't have sold this information! If others hadn't known, there wouldn't have been so much trouble."

"Yes, if only the stationmaster and a few other people knew, they could have just secretly benefited themselves, and it wouldn't have turned into such a big scandal now."

"I reckon the station manager's abilities are limited; even with the information, he can't get many first-place finishes, so he simply sells the information to make a profit! At a high price of 50,000, he must have made quite a bit of money this time, right?"

"Station chief, come out and accept your torture!"

"The site administrator bears full responsibility for this. For his own benefit, he has harmed countless ordinary people. Does the site administrator dare to come forward and respond? @AscendingHome-SiteAdmin"

Seeing this, Guan Tong scratched his head and realized that what he said wasn't entirely wrong; he was indeed selling information for his own benefit.

So he doesn't use his privileges to delete posts, but he also doesn't reply to them. Let people insult him; he won't change anything after they've finished.

If there's any change in Guan Tong since entering the post-apocalyptic era, it's that she's become more self-centered. Having lived in seclusion for so long, her words and actions stem from her own heart, but she no longer considers the opinions of others.

Besides the verbal attacks against him, many people are also discussing how to keep their projects in first place.

After all, apart from those who are determined not to create projects and want a lose-lose situation, most ordinary people still want to follow the rules and not want their mental strength to diminish.

The extensive discussion did lead to some solutions.

One of them was discovered by Guan Tong on the first day: by taking advantage of the fact that the official shelters are not open to the public, the challenge projects are located in the shelters, thereby greatly reducing competition and ensuring first place.

This measure is good in theory, but currently fewer than 100 million people are living in shelters. The country's urban population is over 700 million, most of whom are still living in temporary settlements, waiting for more shelters to be built. These people cannot use this measure, even though many have appealed to the authorities to temporarily open shelters to them during this period… but everyone knows it's basically impossible.

If the authorities really do that, all the shelters will fall into chaos and the consequences will be unbearable.

Besides the shelter strategy, people also came up with another strategy, which happened to be the same one Guan Tong encountered, similar to the one at the Tian Ding Mountain camp—namely, to defend their first place by force.

They are essentially the same, but their scales are completely different.

Specifically, this means that hundreds of people gather together at a designated point to form a collective, ensuring that each individual within the collective is prioritized for their project.

In other words, if an outsider tries to challenge any of the people in the gathering point's projects, the entire gathering point will band together to stop them using violence.

This strategy, though simple and crude, was surprisingly effective.

Guan Tong even saw that on his forum, people from two gathering points in the same city, not far apart, had formed a "mutual protection alliance" after contacting each other.

The people at the two gathering points agreed that they would not compete with each other for first place, but if an outsider tried to take it from them, the two gathering points would unite against the outsider.

A single gathering point can hold several hundred people, and two gathering points can hold over a thousand. They have manpower stationed on guard, and a large number of people are always on patrol at the designated challenge locations. Any outsiders who approach will be quickly detected and the personnel inside the point will be notified.

Then a vast ocean of hundreds or even thousands of people quickly arrived. Even the strongest would have no choice but to give up the challenge and retreat when faced with so many people. Few would dare to stay.

The poster said that with this one trick, their two gathering points have exceeded a thousand people, and none of the challenges created by each person have been dethroned so far.

After the post gained popularity, many people left comments saying, "I've learned something," "Our community just had a meeting and we've decided to learn from your approach!" and "Let's get a mutual protection alliance going! Since the authorities don't stop the strong from plundering the weak, then we'll protect ourselves!"

After reading it, Guan Tong couldn't help but marvel at the power of people's initiative and collective will.

If everyone at the gathering point can unite as one and set up the challenge location around the gathering point, with personnel patrolling and guarding at all times, then outsiders who want to take on the challenge will face huge risks.

Guan Tong, having experienced it firsthand, couldn't understand it better. Back then on Mount Tianding, if he hadn't been so much stronger than the people in that camp, he probably wouldn't have been able to leave even if he wanted to.

"If the gathering points in various cities quickly reach a consensus and form a mutual protection alliance using this set of countermeasures, then most powerful individuals will probably have no choice but to turn their attention to the loosely organized camps outside the cities..."

"...It's worth noting that, apart from releasing information, the authorities have remained silent. They neither prevent the strong from seizing the top spot from others, nor do they prevent people in gathering points from forming mutual protection alliances..."

Guan Tong thought to herself that the authorities were probably in a dilemma. If they publicly condemned the strongman, how would they explain their centralized distribution system? If they prevented the people at the gathering point from using violence to attack the challenger, they would be even less able to convince the public.

Therefore, it's better to remain silent and let the strong and the weak each find their own way to seize/protect their interests.

fair enough.

Guan Tong himself wasn't inclined to enter the city to become the top dog among the city's inhabitants. His goal was more in the wild.

It's not just about comparing risks, but also about taking responsibility for one's own choices, just as he had previously thought.

Those who chose to stay in the city, although their movements were restricted and items and ascendant coins were distributed according to the group, received protection from the authorities in various aspects.

Those who choose to leave the city and live in the wild choose freedom of movement, but no one will provide them with shelter anymore.

So, if your first place is taken away, who can you blame? Will you wish you hadn't left the city in the first place, so that you could have collectively secured your project's first place by using shelters or gathering points?

Making a choice means accepting the consequences. Therefore, Guan Tong felt no shame when she took first place from others, because this was the kind of situation that could be faced at any time when choosing to venture into the wilderness.

He continued reading and found a peculiar post.

This post is second only to the "countermeasures post" in popularity, with over a thousand replies and still growing rapidly.

Post title: "Call for/Statistics on Challenge Projects Established by Sponsors"

donors...

Guan Tong was somewhat concerned about this word in the post title. After he opened it, he found that the poster had posted a long and intense post on the first floor.

"First of all, some people may not know what I mean by 'patrons'. To put it bluntly, they are those who are controlled by certain organizations or groups and are specifically provided with resources to the key individuals cultivated by those organizations! These people are patrons, or to put it bluntly, they are human mines."

Let me give you an example. The most typical support model is the Tulip Federation: sheep flock - wolf pack - alpha wolf model.

Most people probably haven't heard that the Tulip Federation now divides all Ascended beings in the country into three categories:
The alpha wolf is the strongest chosen one, and all resources are supplied to him with the highest priority; the wolf pack is a group of strong individuals surrounding the alpha wolf, whose status is second only to the alpha wolf, and they also receive priority in resource supply; while the sheep are the ones responsible for providing resources, which is what I wrote in the title of my post as the providers!
Why do I know all this so clearly? It's simple: because I'm currently in a city in the Tulip Federation, and I'm one of the Sheep Ascendants! My Ascendant Coins, items, and even the challenge project I'm about to create all serve the wolf pack and the alpha wolf. If they disobey, they'll be publicly executed!
So why am I posting this? First, this website is the safest; I'm not afraid of being traced if I speak the truth. Second, I believe ordinary people like us shouldn't be treated this way, and we should launch a counterattack!
I believe one way to retaliate is for us, as the providers, to publicly disclose the challenging projects mandated by the higher authorities. Then, I implore the truly powerful nations, or capable public groups, to seize first place in these projects! The more you seize, the faster this funding system will collapse!

(End of this chapter)