Five Frozen Centuries

Panda Novel

“There are still 60 seconds left until ‘The Rise of the Human Race’ begins. The countdown begins now. 59, 58…”

The dark clouds disappeared and the sky turned white. The sea suddenly became calm. For a moment, the sea was as silent as if the world had gone quiet.

Only the voice of the countdown was heard.

At that moment, a Black Dragon flew past the surface of the sea. Its gigantic wings produced a gust of wind. The strong wind howled as it surrounded the quiet world, causing waves to form on the originally-calm sea surface.

A young man with black hair and black eyes sat on the Black Dragon’s back. The two words ‘Wei Huo’ were written in white on his head. That was his name and game ID. The initials ‘LV1’ were behind the ID. That was his game rank.

“Other games use EXP to level up. You only get EXP after levelling up, right?”

Wei Huo opened the Quest Menu and realized that he had received a compulsory quest.

‘Collect 10 Wood Units and 5 Stone Units. Level +1 once you succeed.’

Wei Huo then looked at his own level. He did not have any EXP, but he could obtain 500 EXP after upgrading to level two. That EXP could be used to upgrade his skills.

The 500 EXP could also upgrade five level-zero skills to level-one skills.

In that case, a player’s skill upgrade would be faster…

Wei Huo looked at the sky. “What a boring countdown…”

After saying that, he took out a pitch-black helmet and put it on. It would be better to say that it was more like a black jar rather than a helmet. That was because the helmet had no other opening apart from the lower-mouth opening. Once one wore it, their whole head was sealed.

It was Wei Huo’s first time wearing this thing on his body. He could not help but say, “As a helmet, you leave two holes for the user to observe the situation outside!”

Wearing the helmet meant going blind. Fortunately, Wei Huo, who was in the imposing aura, could switch to the first-person and third-person perspective. It did not matter if the helmet had two holes.

The creator of the helmet had even kindly drawn two holes and a pair of realistic eyes on the front part of the helmet. The pair of eyes was very vivid, and no matter from which direction one looked at the helmet, one would feel that those eyes were staring at them.

Ye Yunxiao was mischievous…

He was the creator of the helmet. He was an NPC who had discovered that this world was a game. He had made the helmet, and he could shield himself from detection by wearing it.

Not long after Wei Huo put on his helmet, sounds were heard from the sky again. Players could also see a red virtual loudspeaker appear in the sky. It was a world loudspeaker worth 500 Magical Stones. One could shout at the whole world by using it.

“The selection of one percent of all humans has been completed. First, a compulsory quest will be issued to all players. If the number of humans in the world is less than 200 million, all players will be unable to be resurrected and will be punished with the ultimate punishment. Check the current number of humans through the Quest Menu.”

Wei Huo was shocked. He had already received a quest.

“Lifelong Quest: The number of humans is currently 74.2 billion. If the number is less than 200 million, the players will no longer be resurrected and will be punished to the extreme!”

Wei Huo narrowed his eyes. Time halted and players descended. Wei Huo had been waiting for this moment for 500 years.

He removed his pitch-black helmet and a notification popped up in the game system. “The difficulty level of the game is normal. When the average level of players in the world reaches level 30, the difficulty level of the game will increase to difficult.”

Wei Huo was a little surprised. Was it possible to increase the difficulty level? Plus, it was currently only at a normal level?

The landscape of the Northern Continent had undergone an earth-shattering change. Wei Huo could not see where he was on the map. After a long time, the Northern Continent on the map had moved. It seemed like it had been modified by the Gods, and Wei Huo did not know the way back.

Fortunately, a new menu had been added to the Menu. Wei Huo’s parents were both healthy according to the Menu.

Wei Huo let out a sigh of relief.

At that moment, he was riding his Black Dragon toward the Northern Continent. The Northern Continent had only been known as Wei Huo’s home before. This continent was now known as the Dragon-Soaring Continent, which meant that it had a soaring dragon as its symbol. It was obvious that it had been transformed into this continent from the Asian Continent.

“The game creator is biased toward our country!”

The Black Dragon flew past and Wei Huo gradually saw a coastline. It was the Dragon-Soaring… Forget it, let’s call it the Northern Continent.

The Black Dragon disappeared on the coast while Wei Huo held a new card in his hand. He felt helpless as he stared at the card. There were too many game elements in this game.

At first, I thought it was a survival game. However, when I worked hard to survive, the blueprint appeared. Just as I thought it was a construction game and started creating buildings, caves and ruins appeared. Just as I was about to kill monsters to level up, the Divine Realm card appeared again.

So, in conclusion, this was actually a money-making game, right?

The creator of the game knew very well what he should do. What should he do? Be creative? Have a goal? Be motivated? No, he would not be fooled by these imaginary things. As an excellent game creator, he knew very well that he wanted to create a money-making game.

Like a famous person had once said, “The game world is fair. You can use money to defeat fate here. Can you do that in reality?”

The game emitted a strong if-you-don’t-have-money-to-play-your-*ss-is-doomed feeling, as if this was Wei Huo’s upgraded quest.

That was not a bad thing, as it could mess with the players’ Magical Stones to help them.

Wei Huo was planning on collecting materials, when an option popped up. ‘Pay five Magical Stones to complete the quest in an instant.’

Wei Huo looked up at the sky and said, “Game creator, you’ve worked hard!”

Wei Huo then clicked ‘Reject’. As long as he tried to test out what was going on with the quest, his level would automatically jump to level two after he collected all the materials. At the same time, he would also gain 500 EXP.

The next quest was: ‘Please create a bonfire and a simple wooden shed. The quest’s rank will increase after the quest is completed. You can complete the quest with 10 Magical Stones.’

Wei Huo understood that this was a novice guide quest.

The person in the lead was Zhou Yi. He was already at level 10. The top 1,000 players had all reached level 10. He could spend money to complete the quest, but since so many people were stuck at level 10, it seemed like level 10 was a challenge. The quest could not be completed easily, nor could it be cleared by paying.

Let’s not pay attention to these players for now. The time halt is over. How are the humans now?

Wei Huo took out five Normal-ranked cards and cast them away. With a flash of white light, five falcons flew toward the sky in different directions. These falcons had been created by Wei Huo while he had been practicing his Card Creation Skill. They were of no use except for reconnaissance.

Right at that moment, a few gigantic Winged Dragons flew over from the horizon.