Building a Gaming Empire From Scratch

When Henry hung up the phone, Lincoln’s mood improved considerably.

The idea of taking the players to the sky was a spontaneous one, but if it could be implemented, it would be awesome!

If it weren’t for the fact that it was still the working hours, he would have gone to urge Zhou Jingzheng to quickly finalize the outsourced orders.

Lincoln’s laboratory can do everything, but that doesn’t mean everything is suitable to do.

Sometimes, there’s a Pacific Ocean’s distance between “can do” and “suitable to do.”

For example, airbags for airships – he could do it, but it wouldn’t be worth it.

Not only would the cost be many times, but professional manufacturers might be able to complete it in a week, while he might not even be able to finish it in a month.

So, for this kind of simple stuff, it’s better to place orders directly.

And it’s not just airbags; many things require external help.

Some can be done in the factories Lincoln bought, while others are just outsourced altogether.

Lincoln’s lab only works on those things that have been phased out and can’t be found in the market.

Moreover, Lincoln has certain modification and upgrade needs, which he has to take care of himself.

Only when everything is sorted out can they all be assembled together.

This means that they have to rent an additional space and all his orders require expedited processing, which means extra costs.

The money spent on the entire process may exceed the value of these antiques by tens of times.

However, Lincoln wouldn’t even blink an eye at spending this money.

Not because it’s peanuts compared to his net worth.

But because – he doesn’t even have to spend his own money.

Strictly speaking, making these things is for the company’s new game, and even the extra expenses for pulling players into the sky are for publicity and Cloud Dream’s brand image.

So, these are all public expenses.

“Yes, public expenses!” Lincoln repeated, quickly becoming self-assured and righteous.

“Uh-huh, public expenses!” Mavis had no idea why Lincoln suddenly blurted out these words, but it didn’t stop her from unconditionally supporting him.

“Haha.” Lincoln reached out and patted Mavis’s pink head, “So Mavis, work hard! Continue perfecting the architectural details, and I’ll set up the fire and security equipment.”

“Okay!” Mavis nodded obediently.

Lincoln then opened the map of the park, pondering where to set up armed supply points for players.

Although watching the players fighting barehanded with ten-meter-high dinosaurs was interesting, Lincoln felt a bit guilty about it.

So if the players managed to land on the island, dodged dinosaur attacks, and made their way to Jurassic Park, he should provide them with weapons, vehicles, and other equipment to help them explore Dinosaur Island. It’s only fair.

The truth is, the actual area of Jurassic Park is not that large compared to the whole Dinosaur Island.

It’s not Lincoln’s procrastination that has caused the ongoing rushed construction.

In the initial plan, the park only occupied a small portion of the island.

Most of it was devoted to raising dinosaurs.

Actually, the expansion of Dinosaur Island’s area and the increasing number of dinosaurs is also one of the reasons behind Lincoln and Mavis’s delayed progress.

So, vehicles and weapons are essential.

Having them will encourage players to explore Dinosaur Island further.

Oh, and the Easter egg weapons prepared for players should be stored in advance as well.

The first ten thousand weapons should have a number on them as a small reward for the early-adopters.

As Lincoln laboriously worked, the number of wing-suited players flying overhead began to diminish gradually.

Having had enough of the Pterosaur pounce combo, and slowly mastering better flying skills, everyone began to descend towards the ocean surrounding the island.

They attempted to utilize the water’s cushioning effect to land successfully and then swim ashore.

Then, they met even more tragic deaths than they faced with the Pterosaurs.

Just the words “successful landing” caused a considerable amount of death – if it weren’t challenging, there wouldn’t be so few real-life examples of this.

Most players ended up dying when they hit the water’s surface.

But William, true to his reputation as an outdoor sports expert, successfully landed amid the attention of a large number of viewers in his live streaming room!

With a perfect posture, avoiding the reefs, and sliding more than forty meters on the water’s surface like a skimboard, he finally floated steadily on the sea.

The applause in his live streaming room immediately erupted:

“Invincible! The boss is the boss!”

“What is professionalism? This is professionalism!”

“Landing! Landing! The coastline is in sight! Charge!”

William, the one who completed the challenge firsthand, was more excited than everyone else!

Most viewers in his live streaming room didn’t truly understand how difficult the challenge was; they were just there for the excitement.

But William knew very well!

Let’s put it this way, he would never dare to attempt this challenge again in real life.

Even if he could successfully complete it in the virtual world several more times, he would never dare to try replicating it in reality.

Before, maybe he would’ve tried it.

But after meeting Miss Miaomiao, he had already stopped his endless pursuit of “extremes” and realized that the meaning of life cannot only be sought in the most extreme challenges.

There are some other things worth spending one’s precious and limited life on.

Now, staying on the small platform and watching his Miss Miaomiao through the telescope is such a presence.

So being able to complete this challenge and experience this feeling through the virtual environment, really brings him endless joy and satisfaction.

But William couldn’t cheer, he immediately struggled to take off his flight suit – water had already started to seep into it!

He decided to celebrate when he got ashore.

After taking off the flight suit, the next step was to – swim!

In order to avoid the hidden reefs near the coast, his landing position was still quite a distance from the coast, but this distance didn’t pose a challenge to him.

However, he didn’t swim too far before he noticed something outrageous: more and more people were joining him, and some were even closer to the coast than he was.

He was sure that when he was in the sky, all the nearby players had vanished and been reborn.

After a brief thought, the answer automatically surfaced in his mind: these players all came from the merging of other mirrors.

Entering the water directly was not easy, but when the number of players attempting it at the same time was large enough, even if the probability was terrifyingly low, a considerable number of successful players could be generated.

It was normal for some people to choose landing points closer to the coast than he did.

“Alright, let’s have a swimming race then.”

William gathered his strength and sprinted!

At first, everything went smoothly, and he even caught up and surpassed many players.

But when he was approaching the 150-meter line, there was a sudden sound of huge water splashes and player screams not far ahead.

William quickly raised his head, but saw only a rapidly thinning pool of blood on the water surface. The player who had been at that spot was gone.

“?” William hesitated, “Is there, a trap?”

In that moment of hesitation, not far to his right, another player screamed “Ahhhh fu*k” as they disappeared above the water, leaving only a pool of blood.

All William saw was a huge splash and a blurry shadow.

He stopped completely, no longer swimming forward, and calmly opened the live streaming interface to ask, “Did anyone see what happened?”

Players discussed among themselves:

“I think I saw… an electric saw?”

“No, it’s a shark, right?!”

“It’s a circular saw blade! I saw it very clearly!”

“You saw it clearly, my ass! Which electric saw eats people? That person was clearly eaten by a giant fish!”

“Electric saw? Shark? Eating people?” William was full of question marks.

In just a moment, another player nearby met their fate.

After thinking about it, he took a deep breath, dived into the water, and tried to see the danger below the surface.

But the moment he opened his eyes underwater, a giant shark with a round, saw blade-like toothy maw burst into his field of vision!

It was almost less than five meters away from him!

“What the glug glug glug-” William was shocked by the bizarre appearance of the shark and opened his mouth to blurt, “What the hell is this thing.”

But he forgot that he was underwater and took a few big gulps of water right then.

William waved his arms and legs trying to dodge, but comparing agility with a shark underwater was not a good choice –

The ancient oddity – the Helicoprion (spiral-toothed shark), swam past his belly, bringing out a large splash of blood.

William noticed himself entering a [bleeding status], but didn’t die immediately.

As his eyes followed the fleeing shark, he realized that there were many more sharks than just this one! A dozen sharks were attacking players on the water’s surface like crazy!

The Helicoprion turned around in the water and lunged at him again. William glanced at his health and decided to give up treatment.

But just before he died, a massive shadow suddenly rose from behind him, covering not only himself but also the shark in front of him.

William hesitated for a moment, then quickly turned his head to try to see what it was, but only saw a deep crimson “cave” and the vaguely visible teeth at the edge of his view…

“What the glug glug-” The exclamation was drowned in the water.

The next moment, everything went black.

As soon as he opened his eyes again, he was in a bustling amusement park.

“F*ck!” William forcefully pressed his hand to his chest, calming his rapidly pounding heart, and quickly took a few deep breaths before finally recovering his composure.

“What the hell was that?!” He had already realized that he had seen a huge, gaping mouth in the last moment!

He and the shark were both swallowed in one gulp by that giant mouth!

But the mouth was so huge, and he was so close to it, that he couldn’t see the whole picture. All he saw was half of that dark red throat and a deep, vast oral cavity.

Leading straight to the belly of that enormous beast.

There was a commotion in the live streaming room:

“Damn! Scared me to death!”

“What a huge one! What the hell is that?”

“I found the shark! It should be a Helicoprion, a prehistoric shark! I don’t know what that mouth was, but there aren’t many types of large sea creatures in prehistoric times. Considering Lincoln’s taste, I dare to bet on a Canglong (sea dragon)!”

“Canglong! Mom! Boss, can you go back and get eaten again? The kids want to see the Canglong! Please!”

“Go feed the dragon! I’m kind-hearted and can’t bear to see it starving.”

“You go feed it yourself then!” William had a few curse words in his heart.