Chapter 403 - 254: When in Doubt, Cast a Divination! (2)

This is really strange!

Everyone’s playing the same game, so why is the game experience different for each person? Aside from receiving the same tasks, nothing else seems consistent.

Fortunately, Ice Cola isn’t the only one who noticed this; other players have realized it too.

After some comparison, the reason was quickly identified: the Divination System!

After unlocking the Divination System, the triggered trigrams for everyone were different. Some people got a "Great Auspicious" trigram, so their playthrough was smooth, while others got a "Great Ominous" trigram and have died and revived several times.

"Does everyone have a different trigram, and do different trigrams trigger different tasks and paths?"

Upon learning this, Ice Cola suddenly became interested in this divination feature.

This thing is quite impressive!

Let’s not discuss why each person’s trigram is different, because it’s most likely random.

The key point is, even if two people have the same "Great Ominous" trigram, why are their encounters and experiences completely different? And why are the cryptic messages and trigram interpretations completely different?

That shouldn’t be the case!

Counting up on his fingers, Ice Cola recalled from community discussion threads that there are five trigrams in the game: Great Auspicious, Little Auspicious, Neutral, Great Ominous, and Little Ominous.

Normally, the game designers should design a set of tasks and experiences for each of the five trigrams, and then have them appear randomly, ensuring each player’s experience is unique.

But no matter what, these variations should be limited to those five, so it shouldn’t be possible for the same trigram to lead to different processes and experiences.

After all, designing a set of task processes for each trigram is already quite labor-intensive and time-consuming, designing several different processes for each trigram would be excessive.

Moreover, trigrams change with the time of day.

With so many time periods in a day and the game’s time passing quickly, trigrams change every few minutes. The designers couldn’t have accounted for everything so thoroughly.

So Ice Cola boldly speculated that "Mountain Village Memories" likely calculates a trigram first, then derives subsequent task processes and encounters based on it.

In other words.

Before divination, the game is in a chaotic state, without predetermined task routes and processes. After divination, with a fixed trigram, the game clears the fog and sets a definite route and process.

"That’s quite interesting!"

Ice Cola chuckled, never expecting the game’s designers to give the protagonist such a mystic cheat.

The most intriguing part is that it’s strikingly accurate!

Since the trigram comes first and processes follow, according to this sequence, in "Mountain Village Memories" the divination function can predict fortunes, whether good or bad.

This isn’t mysticism, this is science!

After all, it’s achieved through technical means, so even though the method of divining fortunes sounds mystical, it’s not overly absurd; it’s just a small program.

It’s time!

Taking a quick glance at the bottom-right corner of the computer screen, Ice Cola snapped back to reality and quickly switched back to the "Mountain Village Memories" game page.

The auspicious time has arrived!

During his screen-switching, the game’s time had transitioned from midnight to 1:00 AM, which corresponds to around two in the morning in the 24-hour format.

"Divination, activate..."

Before taking action, divining for himself first seemed wise. Even knowing it’s the lucky time, what if it’s inaccurate and suddenly turns "Great Ominous"?

Fortunately, the divination system in "Mountain Village Memories" is reliable. If it says it’s a lucky time, it’s a lucky time, and the bright "Great Auspicious" sign instantly calmed Ice Cola’s nerves.

A "Great Auspicious" trigram, with this sign, forget the monsters in the wooden house, even if King Yama appeared, Ice Cola would dare to spar with him.

Indeed!

The "Great Auspicious" trigram wasn’t just for show; when he controlled Hu Xi to return to the wooden house, he quickly found clues without hearing any strange footsteps or breathing sounds.

It went so smoothly...

The whole process was so smooth that Ice Cola could hardly believe it. Is this the charm of the lucky time? No wonder people choose auspicious times for weddings and funerals; it really works!

"Too bad it’s just a game."

With an inexplicable sigh, Ice Cola felt a bit regretful. The divination system in the game may not predict real-life fortunes.

Otherwise, it would be powerful!

If the program could predict real-life good and bad fortunes, who would bother checking the almanac or burning incense? They’d just play "Mountain Village Memories" with Ba.

Of course, he’s just joking.

No matter how otherworldly Ba is, he couldn’t write code that predicts real-life fortunes. Otherwise, he wouldn’t live in a villa, but in a divine palace.

After a bit of daydreaming, Ice Cola soon found the key clue and solved an important puzzle in the early game: the location of Old Hu’s body!

Old Hu has passed away and been buried.

But what was buried was a fake coffin; the real body is hidden in the first cave in Santong Village.

What secrets are hidden inside the cave?

What are the villagers hiding? Who’s responsible for Old Hu’s death? What exactly is concealed in this peculiar village?

When in doubt, divine first!

After playing "Mountain Village Memories" for two hours, Ice Cola developed a good habit of divining for himself before taking on any tasks.

Charge in brainlessly with a Great Auspicious, assess the situation with a Little Auspicious, be cautious with a Little Ominous, and wait in place with a Great Ominous.

A perfectly good horror game was surprisingly turned into a divination simulator by him. Before playing, he never thought he’d put such faith in a mystic feature.

But what could he do? It was just too accurate.

Those who don’t believe in the divination results while playing "Mountain Village Memories" end up facing setbacks. If the trigram says "Great Ominous," then things really won’t go well for you!

However, Ice Cola also discovered that the trigrams are mostly for reference. It’s not like a "Great Ominous" means the game is unplayable; it’s just relatively more challenging.

Moreover, divination is only accurate if you take on tasks and complete them. If you’re just idly wandering around the map without tasks, then the trigrams aren’t accurate.

"Right!"

As if remembering something, Ice Cola slapped his forehead, quickly switched screens back to the homepage, and opened "Cultivation Fantasy."

Forgot to hang the Heavenly Dao Program!

As a loyal Cultivation Faction and Cyber Merit player, Ice Cola had been playing "Cultivation Fantasy" for a long time.

This led to a habit where, no matter what game he’s playing, he always hangs the Heavenly Dao Program in the background, just to avoid missing out on merit rewards.

Even the legs of a mosquito are still meat!

He aspires to be a man of Merit Ascension, never missing any chance to earn Cyber Merit.

Speaking of which...

Can "Mountain Village Memories" earn merit?

As a new game, and especially a single-player horror game, Ice Cola hesitated as it seemed there was no way to earn merit rewards in this game.

It feels a bit awkward!

If merits can’t be accumulated, what’s the point of hanging the Heavenly Dao Program in the background?

Just as Ice Cola found it pointless and was about to terminate the "Cultivation Fantasy" program to continue playing "Mountain Village Memories," the game crashed.

That’s right!

Just as he switched back to the game page, the screen went black, and moments later it returned to the "Start Game" and "Continue Game" main page.

"What is this?"

A new game having bugs is understandable, and Ice Cola didn’t mind the game crashing. Having encountered such things several times, he’s become used to it.

Being a newly released game, the player’s tolerance is slightly higher. If another game crashed like this, he would have already left a negative review.

Thankfully, the save wasn’t lost!

Reentering the game, Ice Cola was about to explore the cave, when out of the corner of his eye, he noticed the "Divination" feature glowing with a red dot.

"Divination Function Unlocked, click for more details."

Ice Cola: "..."

What’s going on?

The game just crashed, the save wasn’t lost, and the game progress is still there, so why is the divination feature unlocking again?

Wasn’t this feature already unlocked? Did I use a pirated version before?