Chapter Text
Shit!! Shit! Shang Qinghua panicked as he watched the stupid players of Huan Hua Palace casting spells at someone off his loaded map. Shang Qinghua huffed, “Go away!! There’s nothing on this side of the map; just herbs and low level monsters!! Let me grind in peace!!’
[System: PVP Event - Huan Hua Attack]
Shang Qinghua facepalmed as he read the system notification. He rapidly clicked his mouse a bunch of times on this map to navigate his avatar away as much as he could. This is NOT what he signed up for.
Shang Qinghua recently got into a MMORPG, Proud Immortal Demon Way as per the recommendation of his friend, Shen Yuan. The PIDW production team was looking for beta testers and casual writers for the event campaigns and with Shang Qinghua’s degree in computer science (and extensive gaming experience in general), he managed to snag a spot as a beta tester and got his account and avatar set up in the An Ding base, reserved for the game’s other testers. Honestly, it was the perfect job for Shang Qinghua considering how he absolutely hated customer-facing jobs and can not stand most of his obnoxious cohort to start with. Entrepreneur this, crypto that. Psh! That’s bullshit! Being able to not only just game all day but also contribute to some of the plot was literally his dream job.
However, since he preferred to just grind in peace, Shang Qinghua did not expect to accidentally join Huan Hua Palace’s dumb PVP event, who by the way LOVED to pick fights with other clans all the time. Just as he was about to equip higher level armor to avoid getting hit by a stray attack, a black shadow animation curled up from the ground revealing another user who teleported into his vicinity on the map, with a severely low HP bar.
The Huan Hua Palace players had yet to arrive as Shang Qinghua observed the low HP player. His user reads: “Ice King” All of his armor was obliterated, the avatar’s movements were slowed, and he had suffered poison damage that would need 72 hours real time to clear. Ice King was also of demon class, which was a rare DLC from the early stages of the game. Ok there, PIDW veteran. What a nerd, Shang Qinghua thought, despite that he too started playing the game a few months after its release.
Then Shang Qinghua did a double take and almost spit out his coffee when he saw this Ice King’s level. Level 99?? Ok damn! Shang Qinghua had leveled up as much as possible before hitting the paywall (which isn’t that high unfortunately – it was level 20) and he didn’t feel like paying to play with the eh salary he makes. Shang Qinghua deduced: this Ice King definitely dropped mad cash to level up to this point!!
Shang Qinghua cursed at his boss or whoever the heck designed the game and clicked to open his inventory to use a few health and mana potions on this Ice King for now. Ice King’s avatar glittered a bit but the red bar only inched back up to a quarter of full HP thanks to poison damage.
A chat bubble popped up over Ice King’s head, "Thank you"
Yet, before Shang Qinghua was able to type out a reply, Ice King’s avatar flashed red as attacks were being fired again. Shang Qinghua prepared to retaliate and equipped his armor, then realized that the hits missed him entirely and that they were directly targeting Ice King! These stupid Huan Hua Palace players just wouldn’t stop!! Yes, we get it, demon players are rare and drop mad loot but there’s no need to corner this one player! Seems a bit unfair?!
Shang Qinghua quickly scrolled on the map and clicked to set a marker on a random tavern far away.
He typed out, «do u have enough mana to teleport to this marker i set?”
Ice King again didn’t reply, but activated the teleportation spell. The same shadow graphic as before wrapped both of their avatars in a black shadow and the screen turned to black, with LOADING… graphic. As the surroundings rendered its details, the black shadow unfurled, spawning them in the lobby of the selected tavern. Shang Qinghua felt bad for the demon player getting picked on by a whole clan so he quickly finished the chat log prompts with the tavern NPC and rented out a room with his in-game B-Coins so Ice King can wait out the 72 hours to clear the poison.
Their avatars walked up to the room without any further messages. When their room graphics finished loading, Ice King finally typed, ‘My HP is still low. Give me more health potions’
Shang Qinghua frowned to himself and glared at the chat box. He almost threw his mouse in frustration. Who does this guy think he is? I save your ass and you go around demanding me stuff? Lucky for you, I hoard health potions like crazy so fine! I can spare some I guess. He opened his inventory again and used them on Ice King, even though they both knew the poison damage made it hard for Ice King to restore full HP.
Shang Qinghua pondered for a short while as Ice King’s avatar glittered again. Hold on… Ice King was very high level after all and had a demon avatar which is super rare these days. Shang Qinghua on the other hand was just a human rogue, one of the free-play classes but he liked the skills enough to keep playing. Ice King appeared to be someone very invested in this game huh (especially… money-wise!)! It might be a good idea to stick around this super OP (or super no-life) player.
Shang Qinghua decided to send over a friend request to Ice King.
“ice king!! allow me to follow u around!! i can provide u with more health potions in the future. I will remain loyal by ur side!! pls accept my friend req’ Shang Qinghua activated the bowing emote for good measure.
‘Fine, I will be in this room until the poison damage clears.’
A ping in the game system indicated Ice King accepted his friend request.
The next three days passed by without much action, since the Huan Hua Palace players realized they couldn't track down where Ice King went and ditched their PVP event. The two didn’t chat much beyond Shang Qinghua paying for the room for 2 more days with his dwindling in-game B-Coins. There weren’t any new campaigns Shang Qinghua was dying to start so he just explored the map to forge more potions for Ice King as Ice King waited for the 72 hours to pass, his avatar mainly idle.
Once the 72 hours was up, Ice King’s avatar was still idle and Shang Qinghua got a dm from the moderator of the An Ding base, telling him the beta testers needed to regroup to discuss a new campaign that wanted some writers to flesh out the NPC details.
Without further thought, Shang Qinghua figured Ice King didn’t need him around anymore to guard? his avatar so there was no need to stick around anymore. So he quick-travelled back to the base to join the meeting. The new campaign featured the main NPC, Luo Binghe, where the player travels with him across the JinLan City map to investigate the mystery of a sudden plague.
Upon getting the details of the new campaign, Shang Qinghua felt very excited to start working on writing the NPC dialogue. He loved being involved with the NPC Luo Binghe’s dialogue, because his current arc will feature heartbreak and betrayal! Shang Qinghua took pride in himself as angst was his favorite thing to write afterall and his lines for Luo Binghe always were a big hit! (He saw many scream-quote them on Weibo hehe) Shang Qinghua left his avatar on idle in his An Ding room as he minimized the window for PIDW. He unshrimped his back, feeling his spine creak a little and opened up a new file to start the new job. Without realizing, he got sucked into a non-stop spell of writing, typing away on his laptop.
The writer was a few hours into his work when Shang Qinghua was ripped out of his hyperfocus and heard a dm ping.
Opening it up, he saw Ice King message, “Where did you go?”
“oh, sorry i got summoned back to my base”
A familiar black shadow suddenly opened up in his room, fading away with Ice King teleporting in. Hold on, how the hell did he know which room to teleport into??? The An Ding base was locked out to anyone who isn’t a part of the in-game clan?? Is this a glitch?? But Shang Qinghua reasoned with how high level and og of a player Ice King is, he probably was able to bypass some of those rules.
“You left. You promised me you’d stay by my side”
“wtf i have no idea how u managed to get in here"
"also sorry, I had work to do!!”
Ice King’s avatar walked around the room briefly like he’s exploring it and typed, “This is An Ding. You must be a beta tester.”
“ye… i mean das what my work is’
‘I see.” A quick pause.
“You are to provide me with the latest campaign details, including whichever ones you’re working on in exchange for this loyalty”
Shang Qinghua blinked slowly at the chat box, trying to mull the text over. Is Ice King trying to get Shang Qinghua to break his NDA? Hm, it’s questionable. But it’s not the first time he’s seen leaks happen and most of the time, they end up being good press for the game anyway. And if there was bad reception, the writers could easily just go and fix the dialogue and get even higher ratings and engagement. And it’s only one person anyway. Considering Ice King’s crazy high level and rare class, he’s definitely just a big MMO nerd, he’s definitely harmless. Also, the more he sticks around Ice King, the more XP and good loot he’s able to pick up!
Shang Qinghua finally reached a conclusion in his scattered thoughts and justified his response internally: ‘ok fine, but this info is just for u ok?’
‘Fine.’