Chapter 327: The Value of Player Qualification Token

Before a player in the world died, the world would not produce a new player.

In other words, those who hadn’t become players when the game first opened would have almost no chance of becoming members of the player population afterward.

For those who had neither become monsters nor players, there were only three ways for them to become players.

The first was that after they killed a player, they would automatically be granted Player Qualification;

The second was the Player Qualification Token that Joo Joowon already knew about, which could be obtained from Dead Man Treasure Chests;

The final method was that after a player was killed, if the Dead Man Treasure Chest did not produce a Player Qualification Token, that qualification would instead be randomly granted to someone who had not become a player.

This situation resulted in a shortage of Player Qualification Tokens on the market.

The game didn’t open a new world every day. Sometimes, several years could pass without a single world being transformed into a game world. Therefore, it was easy to imagine just how scarce Player Qualification Tokens were.

It had to be understood that in old game worlds, even the most down-and-out players were actually not weak. They either had exceptionally strong life-saving abilities or extremely powerful combat abilities. After all, under the game’s survival-of-the-fittest mechanism, anyone who had managed to retain their Player Qualification could not possibly be a weakling.

Once these people established their own factions and settled into stable lives, and when the new game expansion still hadn’t arrived after a long time, they would naturally begin developing other aspects of their lives.

After all, although reality had become a game, everything that existed in reality had not disappeared. They weren’t emotionless characters being controlled through a computer screen. Players still had desires, would meet people they liked, and would have children.

After enjoying the benefits of being a player themselves, how could they be willing to let their children become mere beasts of burden the moment they were born?

If their children had good talent, then there wasn’t much to worry about. Whether or not they had Player Qualification would not have too great an impact on them. With their own natural talent, they could still become powerful figures in their own right.

However, if their children didn’t have good talent, then becoming a player was the only way to guarantee that they could become someone who controlled the fate of others in a world where the strong were respected, rather than a weakling who could be bullied at will. It would not be an exaggeration to say that Player Qualification was their only chance to change their fate.

And it wasn’t only players who needed it. NPCs needed it very much as well.

How could NPCs, who could only improve their strength step by step through their own efforts, not envy the advantage players had of being able to level up as long as they had enough experience points?

Geniuses were already a minority, but people who were truly willing to remain ordinary were also a minority. Most people had simply submitted to reality. Once they suddenly saw an opportunity to rise above everyone else, anyone would throw themselves into the struggle to seize it.

For all these reasons, Player Qualification became extremely expensive on the market. Especially for many players from game worlds that had been open for a long time and who weren’t short of money, they could often offer sellers an astronomical price that was impossible to refuse. As time passed, the price naturally kept rising.

This major piece of information left Joo Joowon so stunned that he was almost dizzy.

He had genuinely never imagined that Player Qualification would have this kind of restriction. He had originally thought there was some sort of underage registration protection setting, and that once children reached adulthood, they would naturally be able to become players.

Thinking about it now, that idea itself had actually been the problem.

To put it simply, in such a dangerous world, preventing someone from becoming a player was less an underage protection measure and more like abandoning them outright.

That made sense. Respecting the elderly and caring for the young was a virtue of humanity, but it was not a virtue of the game.

No wonder Risk Zones were willing to operate at a loss just to attract business.

As long as they found a new world, they would make a huge profit.

Joo Joowon couldn’t help giving a bitter smile. Although he had realized long ago that he had been somewhat reckless at the beginning, he had never realized that the consequences could be this serious.

If the Seong Seungmin he had encountered had not been backed by a powerful faction, his actions might have already placed Gaia in an unfavorable position.

He had been far too self-righteous.

Looking at the two Player Qualification Tokens in his hands, Joo Joowon’s feelings became complicated.

He had never expected that something he considered practically useless would actually be such a precious resource.

And those ordinary people who didn’t have Player status would probably only be able to live within the territories of Lord players in the future. If they had the opportunity to obtain a profession path, then perhaps things would still be manageable. But without one, as an ordinary person, surviving in a world like this...

And if someone didn’t have Player Qualification but could still become a supernatural being, then perhaps they were the NPCs that could be recruited into other game worlds?

Joo Joowon had also seen posts on the Lord Forum where Lords purchased NPCs with professions such as soldiers, slaves, and blacksmiths. The tone of those posts was no different from people selling items in a game. They didn’t treat NPCs as members of the same species at all.

Previously, Joo Joowon had been wondering how NPCs came into existence.

Now, it seemed that he finally had an answer.

However, whether this was something to be happy or sad about was difficult to say. Ordinary people didn’t even have the qualifications to become slaves.