Chapter 1 The Impending Storm

After the system announcement ended, all the players began looking for a place to log off.

Although everyone complained about the system upgrade, night was almost upon the virtual world of God's Domain. Even in God's Domain, there wasn't much to do except trade the day's spoils and chat with companions for a bit of fun.

Taking advantage of this time, Shi Feng immediately rushed to the Red Leaf Town Auction House to sweep up goods. Ores, herbs, various materials – anything rare, he bought it all. He bought everything he could, filling his entire backpack. He even wanted to run to the bank warehouse to store it all, then come back and buy more.

However, the system reminder indicated that there were less than three minutes left before the forced logout, and there wasn't enough time.

"Ah, I can only buy this much," Shi Feng sighed helplessly, looking at the time.

Fortunately, he had obtained a lot of money from previous transactions and was still able to buy more than ten gold's worth of various materials.

Then, Shi Feng headed to the inn to log off.

Along the way, many players were excited about the system upgrade, talking about it amongst themselves. Everyone was looking forward to what benefits this system upgrade would bring.

Shi Feng just wanted to say "Hehe" to that.

The evolution of God's Domain did indeed have benefits, but many things were unexpected.

Arriving at the inn, Shi Feng spent 10 copper coins to rest for a day.

When other players saw Shi Feng extravagantly spending 10 copper coins to stay at the inn—10 copper coins being the equivalent of five or six hours of grinding monsters—they thought he was simply throwing money away. However, seeing that Shi Feng's level was 7, they didn't dare say anything. Level 7 was definitely a top figure in Red Leaf Town. If they angered Shi Feng, being killed back to level zero wasn't impossible. After all, such things often happened in Red Leaf Town. They could only secretly despise him in their hearts.

Truly, money makes you capricious!

Shi Feng went to his room without paying them any attention. He wouldn't bother explaining why he chose to stay at the inn instead of just finding a random place to log off.

As the morning sun rose, Shi Feng got up and removed his advanced virtual reality helmet. It was now 8 AM, just the time he usually started his morning exercises.

At this moment, his phone rang. The caller ID showed Hei Zi.

"Hei Zi, what's wrong?" Shi Feng answered the phone, asking strangely. Hei Zi usually wouldn't contact him unless something big had happened.

"Brother Feng, something major has happened! You quickly turn on the TV. It's being broadcast on the news right now. Almost every TV program is covering it." Hei Zi was panting, his tone extremely excited, as if he were doing some intense exercise.

Shi Feng turned on the old, small TV in his rented room and randomly switched channels, finding that, indeed, every channel was interrupting its programming with news.

"At 5 AM today, most of the world's top one thousand financial groups announced their entry into God's Domain to promote the development of the virtual economy. At the same time, they are establishing their respective financial groups' God's Domain studios."

"Latest God's Domain report: According to official statistics, due to the large number of global financial groups entering God's Domain, in just under three hours, all God's Domain virtual helmet sales points have become overcrowded. The number of God's Domain players has suddenly surged by 800 million users, with the number of simultaneous online users reaching over 1.8 billion, breaking the world record for online players in a virtual game."

...

Various news reports about God's Domain were constantly appearing on TV. At the same time, there was also promotion of God's Domain as humanity's second world, encouraging everyone to experience it and promote the main system to collect data and improve God's Domain. The price of virtual helmets was reduced from 8,000 credit points to 4,000 credit points, while the price of advanced helmets remained unchanged, as did the price of virtual pods.

"They're really fast," Shi Feng said with a slight smile after seeing these reports, without being surprised.

Although he didn't know why, this report came a little earlier than he remembered.

In his previous life, these reports came ten days after the launch of God's Domain. Because of the entry of these large financial groups, virtual games received widespread attention. The entire virtual game industry was ignited, and the few remaining popular virtual games closed down and merged into God's Domain, instantly increasing the number of God's Domain players and making competition more intense.

Virtual games have a common characteristic: resources are limited. But in the same town, where there were originally a few thousand people, the number of players suddenly increased to over ten thousand, and the number of people competing for resources also increased, so the price of goods would naturally rise.

"So that's how it is," Shi Feng suddenly realized.

No wonder there were more people buying the Faint Light Design. It turned out that these large financial groups were entering the game, and 800 million players were pouring in. These players were all level 0, so they naturally had a lot of need for equipment. Naturally, they would buy the Faint Light Design at any cost, forge a large number of Faint Light Chestplates, and make a fortune.

"What a pity, these newcomers have come at the wrong time." Shi Feng felt sorry for the newcomers, who had come at the wrong time. They happened to be playing after the first evolution of God's Domain, which meant they would have a hard time.

The upgrade of God's Domain was an evolution of the game itself, but people did not yet understand the meaning of this, and would only understand after experiencing it.

The reason Shi Feng used the word "evolution" instead of "upgrade" was because evolution represents adaptation and survival of the fittest. When players live in God's Domain, the main system is constantly collecting various data. When this data reaches a certain level, it will transform from quantitative change to qualitative change, which is the upgrade and evolution.

Virtual reality is about allowing players to experience the ultimate real and fantastic world, but the process of evolving from virtual to real is too difficult. Not to mention this kind of surreal world with magic and superhuman beings. That's why the main system exists. Its purpose is to make God's Domain more real and constantly improve and evolve God's Domain.

Shi Feng felt that he should be the culprit in promoting this evolution.

Because clearing the Hell difficulty team dungeon happened to be one month after the launch of God's Domain, and then God's Domain began to upgrade. Now, he had just cleared the Hell difficulty team dungeon, and the system upgrade was immediately announced, speeding up the progress considerably.

Thinking of this, Shi Feng suddenly felt that he needed to be more careful in the future.

If he hadn't been lucky this time, meeting Aqua Rose of Twilight Echo and making a profit of more than ten million, which still felt like a dream, it would be almost impossible to earn so much in the future.

If he hadn't made a fortune this time, this entry of large financial groups and system evolution would have seriously disrupted his plan to rise in God's Domain.

After reading these reports, Shi Feng continued to exercise his body. This was a daily routine. Now that large financial groups were entering the game, each financial group had poached many old-generation game experts and newcomers with great potential. There were even many masters of martial arts competitions. Their level of playing God's Domain was not something ordinary people could compare with. It wouldn't take long for them to become experts. If they had the right guidance, their speed of improvement would definitely be rapid.

The arrival of these people could be said to be a huge shock to God's Domain.

In order to better maintain his advantage, Shi Feng had to exercise his body more diligently, accelerate the absorption of energy from nutrient solutions, provide more nutrition to the brain, and improve brain activity. This would also better improve his combat strength in God's Domain.

After completing his morning exercises, Shi Feng planned to go out today to buy some more nutrient solutions and find a new house with a good environment. Always living in this kind of rented room with a very bad surrounding environment was not good for his health. Now that he had a lot of money, he should move to a new place.