bookpower Chapter 62: The Meaning of The Nameless_l
Chapter 62: The Meaning of The Nameless_l
Chapter 62: Chapter 62: The Meaning of The Nameless_l
Staring blankly at his own death screen, Huang Ping began to recall what had just happened.
“I bravely charged at three Tubo cavalry with my leather shield in front of me, I conjectured that these low-level NPCs should have been knocked away by my shield bash, then I could’ve taken the opportunity to finish them off with my blade.
But the result was... I got instantly killed?
Those cavalrymen all had big beards, but they were definitely all young men, because they had no sense of martial virtue!
Disbelieving, Huang Ping restarted the game from the save point. This time, he chose to move stealthily, waiting for the chance to launch a surprise attack. His spear successfully pierced a cavalryman in the waist, assisted by the game1 s auto – aim.
He wanted to press his advantage, but the other two cavalry charged over, their curved swords turned into divine weapons by the speed of their steeds, severly decapitating him.
“Defeat”.
The red text constantly shifted in Huang Ping’s vision, sometimes morphing
into “noob,” and at other times “weak.”
Dying twice in the tutorial left Huang Ping speechless.
If you want to make a Soul Series type of game that tortures people, just say it outright. There’s no need to sneakily hide it.
Though the Soul Series can barely be considered related to war themes, their relevance is about the same as saying the Soul Series is about romance and character development.
After all, both have pretty girls, right?
Exhaling deeply, Huang Ping was about to commiserate with Monkey about the difficulty of the game when he noticed that Monkey was playing a scene he had never seen before.
Sandstorm filling the sky, unbearable heat, the protagonist wandered alone in
the desert.
His water bottle was empty, and the character in the game was more prone to dehydration in the desert environment, hovering on the brink of death.
But Monkey was fearless. The moment he crossed a patch of shadow on the ground, he sharply bent his bow and shot an arrow. A bird in the sky fell at the sound, becoming Monkey’s spoils of war.
Hooking the bird on his back, Monkey verified the direction the bird came from and slowly walked toward that direction. He eventually found a water source just before dying of thirst.
Watching Monkey’s screen, Huang Ping asked in confusion, “Aren’t our starting points different?”
“No idea. I was born in a Tubo slave town. Right at the start, I encountered Tubo cavalry looting. What about you?
However, the more tedious the details, the more exhilarating the combat became when it finally occurred.
Especially watching Monkey fight, one could really experience that feeling of tension and thrill, where every slash drew blood, and every move was lethal. Different from the typical “Souls” games, “The Nameless” was more like an incredibly realistic soldier combat game.
The enemy Al was unbelievably realistic as well. They would feign surrender, flee, and if they sensed defeat, they might even adopt a mutually destructive fighting style, forcing the player to make difficult decisions.
A moment of carelessness, even with victory in sight, could lead to dying on the battlefield; every fight was particularly thrilling.
Unlike the precariousness of being a lone wolf, once one successfully entered the Protectorate, it was a different feeling altogether.
The population of the Protectorate was older, so the young Nameless who came here was treated almost like a beloved mascot.
Old soldiers in their thirties would pester the protagonist every day, telling their stories;
Some old soldiers would repeatedly speak of the prosperity and splendor of the Tang Dynasty’s Chang’an, even though they had never been there;
Players would see the red willow tree at the entrance of the camp, its branches already laden with the hair of soldiers who had gone out.
It was at this moment that Huang Ping finally understood what his mission as a guide had been.
He was a messenger.
Every so often, the Protectorate of Anxi would send messengers to Chang’an to tell the Emperor of Chang’an that the Protectorate had not fallen and that they were still resisting Tubo.
Our soldiers are insufficient, our weapons are old, we have no horses, food must be self-sustained, but still, we remain here, never surrendering.
In this land 7000 li away from Chang’an, there are still those whose hearts turn to Chang’an, who are defending this territory for the Tang Dynasty.
But the Protectorate of Anxi and Chang’an have been separated for a long time now.
The roads have disappeared beneath the sand, Tubo and other foreign tribes ravage the compulsory paths, and the journey to Chang’an is essentially a death march.
Yet, every so often, there are those who volunteer to serve as messengers to Chang’an. Even if they are to die, they wish to die on the road to Chang’an. After learning about these things from other old soldiers, Huang Ping fell silent.
At this moment, he seemed to understand why Fang Cheng had made the environment so realistic and why the protagonist had to endure so many hardships.
Only by experiencing it can one truly empathize. Even separated by the screen, he could feel the plight of the soldiers.
If he were to actually experience it in person, he likely wouldn’t last even a day. But these soldiers, they bore hardships that others had never known, and still, they remained stationed here.
Their names had faded away; they were the Nameless, illustrating the backbone of the Tang Dynasty in the sands, holding upright the spine of their nation in history.
This, then, was the meaning of being The Nameless.