Chapter 64: Waiting by the Tree for a Rabbit

In fact, the system’s requirements for the stage task, purely in terms of the number of recruits, were not particularly harsh. He only needed to recruit one person within twenty-four hours.

But the catch was that this member had to sign a contract for more than three years—

If this were the real world, a three-year employment contract would be routine, but in a game, having guild members sign for three years was simply outrageous. Who would stay in a game world for three whole years? Agreeing to such a contract was tantamount to promising undying loyalty to the guild, swearing never to transfer elsewhere.

With this restriction, it became exceedingly difficult for Wen Nan to find anyone willing to join.

Sitting on the miniature sofa, Wen Nan turned and looked meaningfully at Yu Shujun.

Yu Shujun, leaning against the wall, replied coldly, “Don’t look at me. I’m on a character account right now; I don’t count as a player.”

Truth be told, even if he switched to his player account, Yu Shujun’s account was already bound to another guild. There was no way he could join Wen Nan’s fledgling guild, but he couldn’t be bothered to explain this, and likely Wen Nan wouldn’t care even if he did.

Wen Nan indeed had no interest in delving into Yu Shujun’s account situation. Glancing at the dwindling time left in the game hall, he felt a mounting sense of unease.

If he couldn’t find a founding member within these last three hours, his domain would be reclaimed. Losing hundreds of thousands of gold coins was nothing; he could always earn it back. But being permanently barred from ever creating a guild again—that was something Wen Nan couldn’t accept.

He had to complete these three tasks.

Pulling up the community page from the system, he entered the [My Community] tab and opened the interface for his newly created, barren guild. The first thing he did was change the guild name, using a pun on his own name—

[Steady Win].

A little tacky, perhaps, but Wen Nan found it rather catchy. The [Steady Win] Guild—easy to remember.

Next, he opened the details page and rewrote the guild’s introduction—largely “borrowing” from the [Feng Shuihuan] Guild’s description he’d just seen.

He also jotted down a few grand plans for the guild’s future development, painting an enticing picture, and finally added the members’ rights and obligations—just two, direct and simple.

Anyone who joined within the first three hours of the guild’s creation would enjoy a limited-time benefit—

Rights: Equal standing with the guild leader, except for management privileges;

Obligations: None.

With everything in place, Wen Nan made a recruitment notice into an advertisement and posted it on the wall of his little office building, just like most real estate agents did.

After that, all that remained was to wait.

The game hall wasn’t especially large—maybe sixty private booths at a glance. But there was no shortage of new players taking a break here; at its peak, there could be thousands.

That meant, on average, each booth saw about a hundred people pass by. In theory, if he could capture an average share of the traffic and achieve just a 1% conversion rate, Wen Nan could complete the first stage task with ease.

But that was only in theory.

Reality, as always, was less forgiving.

Aside from a handful of people who paused briefly in front of his little building, nothing happened.

That was to be expected. Even at a job fair, with fresh graduates everywhere and résumés flying, only a few ever landed with a fledgling company. And if that startup added the labels “established today,” “currently only the founder, flying solo,” and “the founder is a newbie himself,” it was enough to send any job-seeker fleeing.

In this harsh reality, Wen Nan endured two hours of utter neglect.

Of course, he didn’t just sit idle all that time. Taking advantage of the gap, he browsed the newly unlocked player mall, then pulled up the replay of his trial zone livestream, curious about the bullet comments—

While inside a map, players could see each other’s livestreams—unless blocked—but not the bullet comments; they could only view overall popularity and betting stats.

Once the final settlement period began, the stream would close, and the replay would be packaged into each player’s account storage, visible only to the player themselves.

The bullet comments from the stream would be embedded in the replay for later reference.

It sounded like a user-friendly design, but when Wen Nan opened his own replay, the only comments floating across the screen were things like [Here we go], [Finally started], [+1], and some random emoji—utterly devoid of useful information. The rest were all [***].

All blocked out?

Why?

9527: [According to game regulations, given that certain dungeon storylines can significantly impact completion difficulty, and to ensure absolute fairness, any discussion related to map storylines or settings is considered a spoiler and will be blocked. This rule applies not only to livestream viewers, but also to all contestants.]

Contestants can’t spoil things for each other either? If they accidentally let something slip in conversation, is that not allowed?

9527: [Any contestant’s speech or behavior that involves spoilers will be met with a verbal warning from the system. Three verbal warnings result in a fine; three fines result in account deletion.]

So if a chatterbox slips up nine times, their account is gone?

The consequences for spoilers were this severe?

So why had he never received a single warning?

9527: [To date, your conduct has been exemplary. There has been no instance of spoilers.]

Wen Nan: ?

Really?

He was that self-disciplined?

Time always flew when watching replays. By the time Wen Nan snapped out of the system, he realized he had very little time left.

[Time remaining until the next dungeon opens: 00:39:18—]

Damn, just over half an hour left?!

Not a single player had even set foot in his little office.

What was he supposed to do? Go out and recruit people in person, like that member from the [Feng Binghuan] Guild?

That kind of thing… was just too embarrassing.

Wen Nan suddenly missed Wang Erxiao. If that chubby kid had ended up in the same hall, Wen Nan would have completed the task instantly, instead of being stuck in this predicament.

But now wasn’t the time for self-pity. Wen Nan turned to look at Yu Shujun.

With just a glance, Yu Shujun could guess what he was thinking, and before Wen Nan could even speak, Yu Shujun cut him off coldly:

“If you send me out to recruit, even the few who might have stopped to take a look would probably be scared off, master.”

Thinking of Yu Shujun’s past behavior, Wen Nan had to admit he had a point.

He sighed, feeling puzzled. “Back in the trial map, you got along fine with my ‘harem’. Why is it here in the game hall, when it comes to players and NPCs, you’re so different?”

Yu Shujun replied, “Players are players, characters are characters. To me, they are completely different, master.”

Wen Nan wanted to ask what the difference was, but seeing how little time he had left, he realized now wasn’t the moment for idle curiosity.

With only a little over twenty minutes remaining, was he really just going to sit here, waiting for a miracle? Or rather, waiting for doom?

As he pondered, a “rabbit” burst into his private domain.

“I want to join the guild!”

A voice called out from outside the door.