Chapter 121 New Stage

After announcing their identities, the Jinmen Star garrison became extremely respectful and immediately allowed them passage. Possessing the Goresgold Insignia, Han Xiao held an extraordinary position in the eyes of the Godoran people, allowing him to move almost unhindered within the Garton Star System.

Countless players crowded at the portholes, gazing at the magnificent exterior of Base Number One.

Built over the course of a year, Base Number One resembled an alloy castle. Han Xiao was well aware that this was an era that judged by appearances, so he made the exterior very beautiful and full of technological flair.

If he wasn't concerned about leaving players with the impression that he was narcissistic, he would have liked to paint his own handsome figure on the exterior walls of the base.

The fleet smoothly landed at Black Star Base Number One. During construction, Han Xiao's blueprints had reserved a huge hangar, more than enough to accommodate sixty or seventy ships. Even the largest fortress-class flagship had its own dedicated giant dock.

*Chi chi chi-*

The air pumps made noise as the hatch doors slid open one by one. Hundreds of thousands of players stepped into the hangar hall, looking around curiously. Heads bobbed, densely packed, giving the feeling of the Spring Festival travel rush.

At this moment, Phillip's voice echoed in the hangar hall, suppressing the noise and reaching everyone's ears clearly.

"Welcome back to Base Number One, buzz. New mercenaries, please open your communicators and receive the manual verification program, buzz..."

As he spoke, the communicators of hundreds of thousands of players suddenly rang out in unison.

Crazy Blade took his out and saw that a new program had been added to the communicator. After opening it, he found that it was the Black Star Army's mercenary identity verification program, as well as some auxiliary functions, such as querying the base's functional areas and querying information in Phillip's database...

Basically, it was a guiding tool that also had the function of teasing the AI.

This was a subprogram that Han Xiao had created for Phillip. Players could use the program to inquire about their various deeds and merits in the Black Star Army. Since players were also free mercenaries, the merits they accumulated had to be calculated separately, so this was convenient for management, overall planning, and also for players to inquire about their accumulated deeds.

To enhance players' sense of accomplishment, they needed to see real-time feedback on how their missions added to the Black Star Army's accomplishments, without any behind-the-scenes operations, transparency, and openness.

Players had remuneration from the [Hoddlerias Operation - War Employment], and they had purchased communicators back on the Godora mother planet, which had already become standard equipment.

The market price of communicators was very cheap, and it wouldn't be good for Han Xiao to raise the price if he resold them, so he simply didn't do this business.

Base Number One was only built after the 1.0 version update by high-level player groups such as Crazy Blade, Haotian, and King's Landing, so they were only now receiving the subprogram.

"So this is the Black Star Army's headquarters. It's kinda cool."

"Strange, this base doesn't seem to exist in the videos from the previous version." Someone stared at Meatbun, who covered his face and walked away.

"Hey, it must be a change in the version update. It's not the first time we've encountered this."

Including Crazy Blade and others, all the players were visiting Base Number One for the first time, and they were quite excited.

The purpose of Base Number One was to let players regard this place as their faction's main city. Having a headquarters would make people feel that this force was high-end and reliable, thus generating more sense of belonging.

With the guidance of Phillip's subprogram, Han Xiao didn't need to explain it himself, so he ignored the players and let them move freely.

These players' former main city was Aquamarine Star, but now, their main city was his own Base Number One. They needed to familiarize themselves with the new main city and get through the confusing period of changing main cities.

...

Back in his room, Han Xiao dealt with the backlog of affairs from this period, such as applications from free mercenaries to join the group, and some new employment invitations.

After the Godora celebration, he showed his face, and the business awaiting processing soared exponentially. There were even invitations for him, a mercenary, to do advertising endorsements, which was simply insane.

However, after taking a look, the other party seemed to be an arms company, which made it reasonable.

Having recruited hundreds of thousands of players, and taking advantage of the soaring reputation and popularity, Han Xiao decided to recruit as many free mercenaries as possible. Although players were good, they were limited by version updates. He liked to plan ahead.

—Using players to expand the Black Star Army's business, improve its reputation, and indirectly attract more free mercenaries. This was also a chain of interests.

The backlog of employment invitations was countless. Phillip sorted them according to the difficulty of the employment, making the layout clear at a glance.

Most of the employment missions would be provided to players. Only a very few high-reward, high-difficulty, high-level missions required his own or the cadres' intervention.

Due to the "borrowing a chicken to lay eggs" business model, players going to different places to do employment itself had the meaning of exploring the interstellar space. The locations where the missions were carried out originally had events and plots, which could make up for the Black Star Army's lack of background and bring secondary income to the players.

Moreover, the players had only just entered the interstellar space and needed a stable activity area to familiarize themselves with the environment, and needed plot lines to guide their actions.

And NPC resource locations like Sunil Star had most of the functions that players needed, and happened to have plot lines.

If players were seeds, then NPC resource locations were soil with fertilizer.

Sunil Star was the first pilot area that Han Xiao had prepared, and it was time to fulfill his promise to Melos.

Han Xiao pondered.

"From now on, the plan will enter a new stage."

...

"Black Star, you were looking for me?"

Melos pushed open the door and entered.

Han Xiao carefully looked at Melos. Compared to when he had just followed him a few years ago to become a mercenary, Melos's aura had become more composed. Mercenaries did not lack opportunities to fight, and Melos's strength was slowly improving in each employment.

"Melos, I promised you that I would bring you tens of thousands of Supers and solve the problem of Sunil Star once and for all." Han Xiao paused and smiled. "In the name of the Black Star Army, I'm lending 200,000 people to Sunil at the most basic remuneration standard. During the execution of the mission, these mercenaries will accept Sunil's deployment."

Melos was stunned for a moment, then suddenly overjoyed.

He followed Black Star because he believed in this promise, and he had finally waited for the day when the promise would be fulfilled!

At this moment, a surge of emotion welled up in his heart, and he almost couldn't help but draw his sword for Han Xiao.

—What would he do with the sword? He didn't even know.

Barely suppressing his excitement, Melos said excitedly, "I'll immediately notify my people and have them issue a formal employment invitation designating the Black Star Army."

"Alright, but I have an additional condition." Han Xiao nodded.

"As long as it's within our ability, we will definitely agree to it."

"It's not a big deal. I just want to get Sunil's approval to build a Black Star branch base on Sunil Star."

Han Xiao showed a harmless smile.

Every NPC resource location was an excellent place to provide benefits to players. As long as a branch base was established, it would indirectly be considered Black Star's "territory."

"No problem." Melos directly agreed. After thinking for a while, he added, "This will be beneficial to us and not harmful. The higher-ups won't reject you."

Because of the Godora medal, Han Xiao's reputation could be said to be a golden brand in the Garton Star System. He estimated that he could even get a 5% discount if he went to the street to buy fruit.

After sending away the excited Melos, Han Xiao opened his communicator and clicked on Phillip's feedback interface.

All players who had received the subprogram were displayed in real time as red dots on the map. Han Xiao was best at virtual technology, which was a disguised form of monitoring.

It wasn't that he didn't trust the players, but to prevent them from getting lost.

On the map, players were scattered in various areas of Base Number One, with the most people in the store area.

Seeing this, the corners of Han Xiao's mouth slightly curved, revealing a smile of harvest-like joy.

"The backlog of inventory finally has a sales channel."

...

Base Number One was divided into different areas. The store area allowed players to buy inventory goods. After paying, Phillip would take out the goods from the warehouse, fully automated.

At this moment, countless players were lined up in long queues in the store area.

The production line of the workshop factory had never stopped producing, accumulating a large number of mechanical equipment. The types of these machines had been carefully selected by Han Xiao and were very suitable for the players at this stage. They could replace the players' entire set of equipment.

Other players didn't have the same officer-level armor as Crazy Blade and others. They had a great demand for more advanced equipment. Where there was demand, there was a market. Even if there was no demand, he had to create demand.

As mechanical equipment was sold, the sufficient inventory was like a bewitching *****, draining most of the players… wallets.

The operating income soared at an incredible rate, and this money flowed into Han Xiao's private account. One million Enas? That was just a fraction!

However, although these inventory equipment were mass-produced products, their quality was not too low, and the technical level of the equipment itself was higher. The price was not too low, so most players, even if they spent almost all their money, still didn't have enough to replace their entire set of equipment.

In particular, the expensive full-body armor tempted the worms in the players' stomachs.

When players were short of money, the first idea that came to mind was to quickly do missions!

Phillip's subprogram listed the acceptable employment list, densely packed and dazzling.

Most of the employments had considerable remuneration. Phillip, according to the program set by Han Xiao, explained that this was the benefit brought by the Black Star Army's reputation and connections. Only mercenaries who joined the Black Star Army could enjoy such good employment missions. If they were free mercenaries, they could only run around and sell their lives for meager remuneration.

The reason why Han Xiao asked Phillip to emphasize this was because this was one of the core attractions of the faction, reminding players of what aspects they were enjoying the benefits brought by the faction. Moreover, in the eyes of the players, the Black Star Army was still a growing faction, and doing things for the Black Star Army was a win-win situation.

"So many rewards."

"The best employment missions must have a lot of people fighting for them, but the failure penalty is also quite high."

Most of the players immediately felt the benefits of being a mercenary.

The most obvious thing was that the rewards for these interstellar employments far exceeded the rewards for their missions on Aquamarine Star. Moreover, they could now choose missions freely and had a lot of initiative. This made the players, who had once been racking their brains to trigger missions, very happy.

Each employment mission could be participated in by multiple people, with different upper limits on the number of people. If the players wanted to accept an employment, they first had to submit an application through the subprogram, and then Phillip would calculate in the background. If the players met the requirements, the application would be approved according to the order in which they were received, and the players could officially get the mission.

This was because it took into account the difficulty of the employment mission. High-difficulty missions naturally had richer rewards. Many players wanted to snatch high-remuneration employments, but their applications were all rejected.

Phillip explained.

Han Xiao set up a faction level system, providing players with a channel to ascend within the system. Starting from "one star," the higher the level, the higher the authority and treatment. The individual level was also the application standard for employments of different difficulties—meaning that players had to complete enough low-difficulty missions to increase their credit level before they were qualified to accept higher-difficulty missions.

This was to protect the reputation. Han Xiao knew the players too well. They liked to mess around the most. If the employment mission failed, it would damage the faction's reputation. They shared honor and shared loss, so this kind of safeguard was needed.

In addition, Han Xiao also set up another system—players could browse the employment list anywhere, but they had to be in the base to accept employment.

It was said to verify the mercenary's identity and prevent the communicator from being stolen, but it was actually to prevent the players from always wandering outside, and let them return to the main city every now and then to cultivate their feelings… mainly to let the players spend money.

If people didn't come back, how could he make money?

On the other side, the high-level players had different moods.

"The way to accept missions has changed..."

They followed Han Xiao to do missions in version 1.0, but now they had to accept employment on their own. The most intuitive feeling was that the faction's power was growing.

At this moment, a new employment was pinned to the top of the subprogram's employment list.

[【Sunil Rescue Operation - Large Employment】]

[Mission Introduction: Sunil Star is suffering from the troubles of misfortune. Under the suggestion of Black Star cadre Melos, it has decided to issue a designated employment to the Black Star Army, soliciting a large number of mercenaries to solve the disaster of misfortune once and for all.]

[Mission Requirements: Go to Sunil Star and solve the source of misfortune.]

[Number of Recruits: 200,000 people]

[Note: This mission is a large employment. Completing this mission will improve the reputation of the Black Star Army, add new benefits, and open a third base.]

"Wow, recruit 200,000 people? That's half the number of the entire army!"

"This is a new big event."

"Sunil? Misfortune? Isn't this the plot that Meatbun encountered in the early days of the Black Star series videos? So there's a sequel."

Many players immediately became curious.

The remuneration was not high, after all, Sunil was living a tight life, wishing to split one Enas into five petals. Han Xiao gave Sunil a preferential price, and the other party could barely afford it. However, since this was a large employment, the experience reward was very sufficient.

A large employment involving 200,000 people was undoubtedly a major event comparable to the main storyline in the eyes of the players. Many players liked to join in the fun, and it was not a problem to gather 200,000 people.

Among the hundreds of thousands of players, the proportion of casual players was higher. Compared to professional players and guild players with clear goals, casual players had slightly weaker adaptability.

The interstellar map was extremely vast. Casual players saw a large number of acceptable missions in a short period of time and gained super high freedom, which would lead to a period of confusion. They didn't know what to do.

And this Sunil employment played the role of half a "main storyline," with the effect of pointing the way:

—Don't know what employment mission to choose? Then just do a large employment with 200,000 people. There's safety in numbers, so there won't be any mistakes.

Just in case, to ensure that the benefits could attract a sufficient number of players, Han Xiao also added a faction favorability reward and modified the mission description, emphasizing that this employment could allow the faction to grow, so as to give players more motivation.

However, he had worried too much this time. The recent awarding ceremony had caused a new round of sensation on the forum. Players realized that Han Xiao had already become a big shot in the universe, adding a lot of legendary and lofty colors.

It could be said that the players had watched Han Xiao grow up all the way, and they inexplicably had a sense of relief. The players were willing to fight for the Black Star Army.

Even if the remuneration was not much, many players would participate in missions that could make the Black Star Army grow.

Han Xiao's actions over the years had subtly and initially established feelings in the players' hearts.