Chapter 361: An Even More Despicable Duan Fei

Thanks to Wang Er’s explanation, Duan Fei and the others finally understood the background of this world.

According to the game’s setup, players would have a two-hour window for free activity every day from 2:00 PM to 4:00 PM.

During this time, players could move about freely, scout out the opposing side, conduct market research, inspect various projects, and so on.

Our own employees could also go out to move around and investigate, but these people only had one life, unlike players who could use money to revive.

Once the free activity time was over, the game would automatically jump to the end-of-day settlement screen, run a simulation based on the day’s events, and then transition to the next day.

Having grasped the situation, Duan Fei said to Wang Er, “During the activity period later, have everyone go out to investigate and expand our product’s brand awareness.”

“Aren’t you afraid the guys from the Madhouse will launch a surprise attack?” Wang Er asked, puzzled. “I hear those guys are crazy. They might pull something like that on the very first day. Employees can’t be revived if they die, and we even have to pay a death benefit.”

“That’s a good point. Alright, then have the other Servants go out and gather intel for now. I’m going to discuss something with President Wang.”

After the others had left, Duan Fei began to question Wang Er about the details.

“How much is the death benefit for employees?”

“Two hundred thousand. It can’t be changed, and you can’t buy insurance for it.”

“Two hundred thousand, huh…”

Each employee’s wages were paid daily, and the building currently had one hundred employees.

Each employee’s daily wage was three hundred, so the daily payroll expense was thirty thousand. Including equipment depreciation and electricity costs, the daily operating cost came out to over sixty thousand.

And on top of that, paying a two-hundred-thousand-yuan death benefit for a single dead employee was an unacceptable figure.

After all, they only had ten million in starting capital. If fifty employees died, they’d be completely wiped out and fail immediately.

But they couldn’t operate without employees, either. Employees were fundamental to the company’s operations. An insufficient number of them would bring the entire company to a grinding halt.

“Is there any penalty for firing an employee?” Duan Fei continued to press.

“Ten days’ wages as severance.”

“What if an employee resigns on their own?”

“Then we don’t have to pay.”

“Hmm… I see. In that case, what if I set the employees’ salaries to a negative number and then fire them? Would that work?”

Wang Er was dumbfounded, never having imagined such a line of thinking.

After a long moment of contemplation, he said with difficulty, “The Virtual World we’re in was created by Merlin and a few other Great Mages. A lot of things in it are based on reality, but aren’t entirely realistic. What you’re describing… might actually be possible.”

“Then let’s get to it!”

Giving it a try, Duan Fei discovered that employee salaries could indeed be set to a negative value, but only to a maximum of negative one thousand per day.

He quickly used a batch operation to set all the employees’ salaries to negative one thousand. Then, before the employees could come up and cause a scene, he fired every single one of them. He watched as the furious group of ex-employees stormed forward and slammed ten thousand yuan each in front of Wang Er and Yue Hua.

“What a trash company!”

“I hope you go bankrupt soon!”

“You just fired a great talent!”

Getting money thrown in her face, Yue Hua couldn’t help but say, “I know this is just the setting here, but it feels so hilarious. If it worked like this in the real world, I’d open ten companies a day.”

The physical cash vanished on contact, but the money appeared, solid and real, in the company’s account.

This one maneuver added a million to their assets and showed Duan Fei a clear path to riches.

Without another word, he immediately posted a new recruitment ad, hired another hundred employees at the highest possible salary, then adjusted their pay and fired them all.

And so, when the Lone Ranger returned from gathering intelligence, he was greeted by an exceptionally bizarre scene.

A constant stream of employees poured in through the front door of the company, while another constant stream walked out the back.

The smiles on their faces coming in were as wide as the tears streaming down their faces going out.

He stared dumbly at the whole affair until the free activity time ended. Only then did he walk into the company, where he was immediately staggered by the company’s balance.

“Twenty-one million! What did you do?!” the Lone Ranger cried out. “Did you rob a bank?!”

“You’re insulting my boss,” Yue Hua said, annoyed. “Robbing a bank isn’t as efficient as my boss. Boss, when we get out of here, can you help me manage my finances, too? After this mission, I’ll have a few thousand. Think you can turn it into a hundred million by next year?”

Wang Er had also suffered a Spiritual Shock. He was crouched off to the side, muttering, “Can you even do business like this? This shouldn’t be possible.”

Jinghong, who had also returned, nodded after learning of Duan Fei’s plan. “That’s you, all right. Always finding the game’s loopholes.”

“Don’t praise him!” the Lone Ranger shouted. “He’s the type of person who gets hanged from a lamppost!”

“But that’s what I admire about him—his shameless depravity.”

“…You’re all… every last one of you is a lost cause.”

Looking at Duan Fei, the Lone Ranger realized that compared to a truly great villain, he himself was still a bit too conservative.

‘I’ve only ever ruined a few hundred people’s lives. How can I compare to a guy who ruins thousands at a time?’

Before the free activity period ended, Duan Fei had already hired a new batch of employees.

Although this meant he had to pay their daily wages, he could get their labor for free, allowing them to accumulate a certain amount of Action Points.

Action Points were a special resource in this game. Employees generated Action Points by working, and these points could be used to perform special actions. The effect or success rate of these actions would be determined by the Servant’s traits.

For example, for a one-point Reconnaissance action, sending the Lone Ranger would definitely yield better results and more intelligence than sending Duan Fei himself.

Because Duan Fei was offering the highest possible salary, the one hundred employees were motivated to generate double the Action Points, for a total of 20.

After the free activity period, from 4:00 PM to 5:00 PM, players could spend Action Points to have their Servants carry out tasks. Each player could only act once, so with five players, that was five actions.

Having understood this part of the gameplay, Duan Fei saw a holographic 3D map materialize before him—a hologram of this entire Virtual World.

Because his companions had already done some free exploration, parts of the map were already lit up, revealing certain special buildings. The appearance of these buildings also unlocked new special actions.

“The Church, hospital, chamber of commerce, newspaper office, movie theater… We didn’t promote our products today, so we have no profit there. Let’s take out some money to buy a Magic Power pool and some decals; we need to start distributing our goods tomorrow. Then we’ll spend some Action Points and funds to run an ad in the newspaper. We need to start selling as soon as possible. By the way, have you found the Knight Order’s location?”

“No,” the Maid said, shaking her head. “We haven’t found it yet.”

“Too bad. I was hoping to have the Lone Ranger use Action Points to cause chaos at the enemy company, and then bribe the hospital not to accept their people. But no matter. We’ll save up our Action Points for now. There will be plenty of uses for them later.”

Watching Duan Fei excitedly plan his future moves, everyone except Jinghong felt a shiver run down their spine.

‘This guy… he seems even more despicable than the people from the Knight Order.’