Traveler of the River of Time and Space-Chapter 529 - 13: Steam Punk: Desire City 2

Although he ended up in trouble in "Steam Punk: Desire City", Su Ziyu wasn’t in a hurry to dive back in.

He entered a smaller portal nearby, and soon a blue planet appeared before his eyes, with a barren, cratered satellite orbiting it. As some information surfaced, Su Ziyu’s perspective changed; he became a creator, beginning to create life on the planet from microorganisms all the way up.

"Terra?" Su Ziyu looked at the name of the planet before him and murmured, "It’s highly similar to Earth, even the moon is identical."

"Is it a coincidence?"

This single-player game was much simpler than the first one.

As a creator, Su Ziyu had to continually evolve life, advance civilization by millennia, and explore outward. During this process, he might encounter alien civilizations. If the race he evolved wasn’t perfect, then sorry, the race he created would quickly be wiped out by alien races like the insect race, void spirit, beastmen, etc., and the planet "Terra," which is very similar to Earth, would soon be occupied by them.

An interesting point is that the game also mentions three evolutionary concepts, which can only be triggered in the later stages of gameplay: Mechanical Ascension, Spiritual Ascension, and Hive Mind.

Su Ziyu inadvertently created a humanoid race that ended up developing a Hive Mind.

"It’s indeed the Solar System."

After successfully entering the Interstellar Era, Su Ziyu looked at the map scene presented before him and murmured, "The game is indeed modeled after the Solar System."

"So as the shining technology of game creation!"

"Could it be Earth’s civilization?"

Interesting.

The setting of the first game, "Steam Punk: Desire City," is approximately between the 18th and 19th centuries, a game world constructed with steam-powered civilization as the theme. Although it hasn’t been fully explored, judging from animals like mosquitoes, flies, mice, etc., it seems to be made using Earth as the blueprint.

"Biological Evolution 2.0" is another mode of the game. It directly starts development using Earth as the map, with many alien civilizations branching out. The ultimate clearance condition is to dominate the Milky Way Galaxy.

Su Ziyu quickly exited the second game and directly entered "Infiltrator."

This single-player game is quite average, its storyline background roughly occurring around the twentieth century, where the protagonist, as an assassin, needs to assassinate different targets. The game is not as finely made as the others, and the content is not much. The NPCs’ responsive intelligence is obviously a notch lower, possibly indicating it’s a rather old primitive virtual game.

"The shining technology is definitely greatly related to Earth!" Su Ziyu thought to himself.

Returning to the initial hypercube space, Su Ziyu once again entered "Steam Punk: Desire City."

The same scene remained.

This time, Su Ziyu didn’t try to attack the sheriff, Johnson, but instead followed the process and left the ruins.

In the game, the protagonist’s physical fitness is only at the level of an ordinary person, and even if stronger, he wouldn’t be a match for sheriff Johnson. No matter how rich Su Ziyu’s combat experience is, he cannot defeat an extraordinary who can perform instantaneous spells, especially since this extraordinary also holds a gun and is highly vigilant.

To kill him, some cunning method must be used, but Su Ziyu hasn’t found one yet.

An ambush is impossible to succeed. To put it professionally, this sheriff Johnson has the Intuitive Evasion specialty, making it unlikely for an ambush to catch him unprepared.

Woo woo woo.

Just as Su Ziyu left the ruins, he heard the whistle of a train. In his sight was a dirty street, about more than three hundred meters away was a river, and from afar, he could see the murky dark waters. The railway and rail car were built within the city, with cables hanging above the road’s center, and the streetlights lined on both sides. Alongside the rail car were roads populated with old-fashioned cars and meticulously crafted carriages, with everything in view filled with a strong sense of era conflict.

This seemed like a period of turbulence where new civilization was replacing the old.

"This game is better made." Su Ziyu looked at pedestrians on the road whose behavior patterns weren’t fixed. Some people left and didn’t appear again.

A small cursor appeared to guide him.

Su Ziyu moved forward in this ancient yet revived city guided by the cursor, the buildings on either side having a Renaissance feel, yet some skyscrapers were at the level of modern civilization.

"Edward?"

"Where did you go just now?" A man who looked like a thug ran over. He had a dagger on his waist, and as he opened his mouth, he showed a full set of yellow teeth, saying, "Old Shark is looking for you!"

"A batch of goods has arrived."

"Let’s go help escort it. He said he would take us to have some fun once we’re done, haha."

——"Poisonous Snake Hanks."

This should be entering the storyline.

Su Ziyu followed this NPC and came to a warehouse near the docks. A huge steam ship was docked in the distance, and the two directly entered a warehouse nearby. As soon as they entered, they saw several armed men, one of whom was cleaning a six-barrel drum machine gun in his hands, with its barrel nearly twenty centimeters in diameter, heavy enough to be used as a club.

——"Old Shark."

"Here?" The man named Old Shark nodded slightly toward Su Ziyu and said, "It’s about to get dark. We’ll move shortly."

With that, he gestured for Su Ziyu to find a place to sit.

In the corner, several thug-like people were playing bridge, and the stakes seemed to be quite high, with the faces of those losing money flushed red.

"The background seems like the 18th-19th century." Su Ziyu looked around and thought to himself, "It looks like this Crystal Wall Element Earth civilization is already very advanced."

To make a game to such an extent, the technology tree must have been leveled very high indeed.

"Perhaps this planet once was just a colony of Earth; otherwise, there’s no way to explain why their staple food is potatoes," Su Ziyu speculated.

As dusk fell.

Soon, Old Shark stood up and said, "Gather your things; this batch of goods is very important."

"If something goes wrong, watch your lives!"

A group of thugs stood up and jokingly laughed. Not paying attention, Old Shark said this each time, just some contraband drugs, haven’t they transported a batch each month at the docks.

Su Ziyu also stood up, and Poisonous Snake Hanks handed him a handgun.

Finally, a weapon that looked decent.

But why doesn’t this game have an inventory?

The group directly headed to a secret warehouse at the docks. From afar, they saw another group of people, and later Old Shark went over to say a few words, then started arranging personnel to transport the goods.

Everything was organized well.

There were no prompts now, so Su Ziyu followed the thugs’ actions.

He didn’t know what the goods were, but there was a lot of it.

"Hehe!"

Just when Su Ziyu thought the plot was heading for a mishap, it indeed took a turn for the worse.

In the dark.

A man wearing a tuxedo and donning a white clown mask appeared, he laughed exaggeratedly and suddenly raised his hand, tossing out a flurry of playing cards.

Thump, thump, thump.

A flash of blood burst.

The playing cards almost brushed past Su Ziyu’s face, directly creating a bloody hole in the foreheads of several thugs beside him—ordinary paper cards, yet in the clown’s hands more powerful than bullets.

"Damn!"

"Is this game so difficult?" Su Ziyu awkwardly rolled to dodge, and just as he managed to draw his gun, he saw a nude woman with dense seaweed-like hair emerging from the distant seawater.

A shrill cry rang out.

GG.

Feeling a bit exasperated, Su Ziyu looked at the hypercube hall in front of him, directly disconnected the neural link, opened the game pod, and said to Jane outside, "Has anyone cleared the Desire City game?"

"No." Jane seemed to have expected this and smiled, "But if you join the Rebel Army, you have the chance to try."

"The Star Realm Merchant who sold us the game pod said the game is somewhat special."

.........