Chapter 421: Chapter 407: The Auditing Student and the Prototype of the City-Building System (1st Update)

Ultimately, it was agreed that, as a visiting student, he would enter the university for study.

To everyone present, this status seemed somewhat bizarre and… unbelievable.

Because in a university, a visiting student is like just any other person, anyone can assume that role, even a security guard could attend Tsinghua University as a visiting student, there’s really no one overseeing that.

Moreover, visiting students don’t even get a diploma upon graduation, so there was no need for the university officials to travel all the way to the upper city to discuss this matter with the insect controllers.

However, this visiting student from the insect controllers was a bit different from the usual visiting students, first of all, he could stay in the university dormitories just like regular students, and other facilities of the school were also open to him.

The only difference from students formally admitted by the university was… he wouldn’t receive a diploma after four years of study.

This situation was something Jiang Qiao had anticipated, and in the eyes of President Yin, it was also very fair and reasonable.

After all, with his academic performance and no notable athletic awards to speak of, it would indeed be unfair to other applicants if the university admitted him for no reason.

“No… no diploma?” The mother of the insect controller nearly blurted out… what was the point of going to university then?

“It’s like this, your child will have special tutors in the school, and if he shows enough talent, after his studies, he may directly apply for postgraduate studies,” the official explained.

How could one apply for postgraduate studies without a university diploma? A pile of questions accumulated in everyone’s hearts, but the biggest question was, how could an underachiever with the worst high school grades aim directly for postgraduate studies?

Was this some kind of epic-level sarcastic joke?

This time, the crowd listening in didn’t react with bumps on their heads as they did when President Yin made his statements, but rather with a head full of question marks, and the reporters… they didn’t dare to ask.

“That’s the way it is.”

The official didn’t know how to explain any further and quickly pulled out a guidebook from his briefcase. This guidebook was written by Jiang Qiao for his father, but unexpectedly, Jiang Qiao’s father actually handed it over to the official.

“In the process of your child’s studies, he will be exposed to various life professions and skills related to the holy spirit for extended periods, including alchemical engineering, pharmacology, foundry studies, magic kinetic energy, all taught by tutors specifically, which should greatly enhance your child’s… interest in learning.”

Damn… what is this thing? After the official finished reading, he felt like he was… advertising for a cram school?

But the biggest question was, what kind of cram school was this? Alchemical engineering? Magic kinetic energy? What kind of subjects were these?

The more they heard, the more question marks appeared over the heads of those around, yet President Yin and the insect controller understood…

What the insect controller gathered was that an instructor from the university wanted to take him to the holy spirit to train life skills; not just to practice, but also to study knowledge related to life skills.

The insect controller wasn’t much interested in physics, chemistry, English and the like, but he was interested in alchemical engineering, pharmacology, the language of the holy spirit!

“I’m willing to go!” The insect controller agreed without a second thought, he also practiced life skills in the holy spirit, not just practiced, but also researched!

Because in the game, no matter what he learned, the insect controller could see progress, and after leveling up, the things he made could be sold for money and to show off, which was way more motivating than memorizing textbook materials in high school.

Since the insect controller expressed such enthusiasm to go to the university as a… visiting student, his mother also had some understanding; with his current grades, he might not even be admitted to a Tier 3 university.

At least at the university, there was a professor interested in him, so let him be a visiting student.

“Then, please sign these agreements, and oh, friends from the press, it’s best not to broadcast this part, and if possible, could you tell me what program you are planning to make?” After reaching an agreement with the insect controller, the official immediately turned his attention to the confused reporters nearby.

The reporters began to formulate their responses, pondering how to answer, but for President Yin, it no longer mattered.

President Yin had already returned to the passenger seat of his own car.

“This might be a beginning,” President Yin mused, looking out through the passenger window at the entrance to the insect controller’s residential complex.

“A beginning?” President Yin’s secretary had nearly had a heart attack just moments before.

“The beginning of the integration of games and reality, or rather… this integration has already begun; anyway, let’s just wait and see,” said President Yin.

However, his secretary still didn’t understand what President Yin was talking about, while President Yin once again glanced at his watch.

There were four hours left until the end of the holy spirit’s strategy event, and the reward for the city-building stone was about to be issued!

…

Instance Lord’s dormitory.

The Lake God looked nervous under Jiang Qiao’s gaze; she had been living just fine at the core of the nuclear jump point, but recently, without raising her milk allowance, she had relentlessly used Divine Power Crystals to boost her favorability until it crossed into trust.

Then she was teleported here by a beam of light.

“Place your hand on this?”

Jiang Qiao held the Divine Power Crystal that had lost its divine power, which was essentially a City Building Stone, and presented it to the Lake God as he spoke.

The Lake God and Jiang Qiao had a relationship of trust, and she always remembered the favor of Jiang Qiao turning her small fishery shop into a popular fishing spot in the City of Gods.

Therefore, she hesitated only briefly before touching the City Building Stone with her small hand.

Inside the City Building Stone, where the city was originally dull, a faint blue hue was added, and the city’s central dried-up fountain began to slowly overflow with clear liquid.

But it was just a hint of pale blue.

Jiang Qiao was now perfecting the Holy Spirits’ city-building system, which was quite different from the stronghold construction system. One major difference was… the city-building system contained preset building options, as well as a crucial resource option known as ‘population.’

The resource ‘population’ was actually the residents who once lived inside this piece of Divine Fragment. After losing its divine power, these residents were stripped of their personality, memory, soul, and even their very existence!

Within the Divine Fragment where Queen Mei resided, her people could at least continue to exist as the living dead, but the residents of this city had turned to dust.

To restore a Divine Fragment meant to restore the existence of these residents, but Queen Mei told Jiang Qiao that even if their existence was restored, their memories, souls, and personalities could no longer be retrieved.

To put it bluntly, these populations were akin to tool people, NPCs with the lowest level of intelligence, with only a small part of the city’s heroic representatives like Queen Mei capable of regaining self-awareness.

Although cruel, this was the situation Jiang Qiao wanted to see; in the city-building system, the population was just a number, a ‘currency’ that a player used to raise the city’s level.

So how could the population be increased?

Jiang Qiao gazed at the large list of data displayed above the City Building Stone in his hand.

When the Lake God’s hand touched the City Building Stone, the population data increased from zero to ten thousand.

‘Population: 10000/1200000′

The maximum population limit of one million two hundred thousand was the original number of people in this city. Before its destruction, the city had over one million one hundred thousand inhabitants, which Jiang Qiao rounded to a whole number.

Population is the most critical resource when a player builds a city, followed by a very complex list of resources such as water, minerals, and city aesthetics, all serving the resource of population.

The most straightforward method for players to gain this population resource was to invite gods. The Lake God, a lower deity, after taking permanent residence in this city and becoming its patron deity, brought a population increase of ten thousand.

This meant… to fully restore this Divine Fragment, at least ninety to one hundred and twenty gods needed to take up residence.

“Isn’t that too difficult to achieve? There are only seventy-seven gods in the City of Gods by any count, and currently, only about ten have a high favorability with players.”

Jiang Qiao signaled the Lake God that she could remove her hand. Under the leadership of Silver, the players had emptied the Gods’ Alliance, but not all gods in the Gods’ Alliance were willing to become allies of the Holy Spirits.

Most gods were still just employees of the Holy Spirits…

“Many gods are nurtured on the starmap; in some of the more flourishing planes, you can even find bars specifically for gods to rest,” said the Black Ash Knight, continuing his role as the know-it-all of the starmap. “The commonly used currency among gods is the Divine Power Crystal. You can indeed use these to employ gods, but we also have other methods to attract them.”

“Such as?” Jiang Qiao listened to the Knight’s explanation, sensing that the starmap was not a chaotic space but rather one orderly developed under the influence of the two major powers, the Gods’ Alliance and Creation Sanctuary.

This resulted in the gods’ currency being universal across various planes, with entities like plane pirates, extinction units, Obliteration Legion, Void Swarm, Chaos Island, and Abyssal Aberration all deemed as disasters on the starmap.

The Devouring God was also a disaster on the starmap, prompting the Gods’ Alliance to issue bounties to eliminate these threats, with Divine Power Crystals as rewards.

It was a systematic way of functioning, only… the Holy Spirits led by Jiang Qiao had transitioned from being the hunted to the hunters.

Jiang Qiao had ways to collect Divine Power Crystals, but… the problem was, where would he find so many gods?

“Eternal*Thorne… Agent, you have been mentioning this interesting name on the starmap recently,” said the Black Ash Knight.

“Interesting?”

“Thorne has a delicate position on the starmap. In terms of recruiting for city-building, he would provide you with more useful answers than I could. I should also try to restore my body,” remarked the Knight as he crawled back into his pancake box, covering himself with the lid, ready for rest. Recently, this package had become the pancake… er, the home of the Black Ash Knight.

“Thorne again?”

Jiang Qiao remembered that Thorne had mentioned finding some opponents to fight against Zhao Mingwei in an alley.

“Just pull him over here,” said Jiang Qiao, glancing at the system time. Now was Thorne’s rest time, and Jiang Qiao could pull him into the instance lord’s residence without any trouble.