Lilith struggled to maintain a proper smile, but inside, she was completely at a loss and thoroughly bewildered.
“Ahem... You don't need to pay too much mind to it. These are daily quests; just hand them over to them.”
Iluvia's gentle voice echoed in her mind at just the right moment, though her tone carried a calm composure born of experience:
“These God-Chosen Ones, in their original world, suffered long-term mental oppression from a class called 'capitalists'... um... similar to 'greedy nobles' in our understanding. They are a group of residents who crave 'quests' and 'rewards' to gain solace, possessing an extraordinary passion for 'labor.'”
Hearing this, realization dawned on Lilith.
“So that's how it is... I understand now, Mother Goddess.”
Looking at the players now, her eyes involuntarily softened with sympathy.
“They are all souls struggling amidst suffering, yet still actively seeking the meaning of life...”
With empathy for these “suffering souls,” Lilith then looked down at the quest content bestowed by the Goddess:
【Daily Quest: Repair the Dilapidated Temple】
【Daily Quest: Gather Dry Firewood from the Forest】
【Daily Quest: Haul Stones for House Construction】
【Daily Quest: Clear Overgrown Weeds Around the Temple】
【Daily Quest: Construct Habitable Houses】
...
Lilith: “???”
Are you sure this isn't a slave manifest?
Lilith fell silent for a moment.
No! Lilith, what are you thinking! How could you fathom Mother Goddess's wisdom? You must never doubt her!
It's very likely that there's a deeper meaning hidden in these quests to test me! Yes! It must be so!
She shook her head vigorously to cast those disrespectful thoughts out of her mind, took a deep breath, and turned back to face the restless crowd of players.
But... how should I say it?
Directly say, “Please go haul stones”...?
Would that trigger their already fragile minds?
While Lilith was agonizing, she didn't expect the players to take action first.
They surged forward like a tide, surrounding Lilith and West so tightly that not a drop of water could leak through.
This gave Lilith quite a fright.
Beside her, West reacted swiftly, instantly shielding Lilith behind him while glaring warily at this “aggressive-looking” mob of God-Chosen Ones.
“Saintess Miss! Quests! Give them to me quickly! My broadsword is already thirsting for blood!”
“Saintess Big Sister, got any quests? I can't wait to gain some EXP!”
“Do quests early to level up early! I'm still waiting to change class to Mage!”
“Exactly, exactly! Hurry up and hand over the quests to us!”
“Don't push, don't push! Queue up for quests, bros! First come, first served!”
“Wait! Stop crowding her, guys, I think we scared her?!”
“The knight guy is protecting her so closely! Look at that possessiveness—I'm shipping it!”
“Saintess Miss, can I touch you?”
“Wait, what?! Who the fuck touched my ass?!”
“Hehe, bro, you smell so good~”
“???”
“Hey, hey, hey, what's with that face? Is this knight guy's reaction really this realistic?”
“Holy shit?! Why is this knight NPC's gear so well-made?”
“Nonsense, how could an NPC be like you? But then again, can we steal his gear?”
Lilith: “...”
West: “...”
Lilith was dumbfounded. She had imagined many kinds of reactions: complaining, questioning, bargaining... but she had never expected a feverish scene like this, where everyone scrambled frantically for fear of missing out on manual labor.
As for the last few sentences, she automatically filtered them out.
West tensed up all over as if confronting a formidable enemy. Especially after hearing that last remark, he silently clutched the longsword at his waist tighter.
However, upon realizing that the God-Chosen Ones had no actual intent to attack or steal, he finally breathed a sigh of relief.
Bound by their status as God-Chosen Ones, West kept every fellow who tried to get handsy with Lilith at bay.
Yet he suffered terribly for it. He felt like a rare magical beast being gawked at in a marketplace, touched all over with hands reaching out from every direction.
What truly shook him to his core, however, was seeing a female God-Chosen One actually trying to reach toward his... lower half!
A cold sweat broke out across his back.
West cut off that evil hand with lightning speed. His cheeks flushed crimson, his mind engulfed in utter shock!
Goddess above... these God-Chosen Ones... their behavior was simply way too... unrestrained!
After that, West involuntarily stroked the hilt of his sword, his right hand tightening and loosening repeatedly over it.
If they hadn't been noble God-Chosen Ones, he would have sliced them down in a heartbeat.
He didn't dare open his eyes, hoping everything happening right now was just a hallucination.
West stood completely stiff, eyes squeezed shut, with only a single thought echoing in his mind:
Tonight, I must give my entire body a thorough scrubbing. Otherwise, I won't even have the face to look Lilith in the eye next time.
...
Divine Kingdom of Light.
Upon the Divine Seat.
Through Mikael's perspective, Iluvia took in everything happening before the temple, her lips twitching almost imperceptibly.
“Fortunately, these players didn't do anything too outrageous. Looks like the screening mechanism works after all.”
Seeing the players frantically fighting over quests, she felt secretly relieved.
Mmm... although West suffered a bit. I'll compensate him later.
“Still, I didn't expect Glorious Era to be so popular on Earth, far exceeding my initial expectations. Seems my previous ideas were still too conservative.”
Iluvia had originally thought it would be good enough if she could trick tens of thousands of players into joining and develop slowly.
Unexpectedly, the closed beta sign-ups for the first batch alone surged past the one million mark, causing the topic's popularity to explode.
Then again, thinking carefully, it made sense.
In a current virtual gaming market flooded with low-quality VR products featuring "5-minute trailers, 2 hours of gameplay, and filled with bugs for the rest," the sudden emergence of an epoch-making "masterpiece" claiming to be "100% realistic" naturally created a predictable sensation.
Therefore, to capitalize on this wave of hype...
Iluvia decisively chose to "up the ante," expending extra divine power to produce a "super high-definition" and "utterly breathtaking" cinematic cutscene for her grand appearance, all to tightly grasp the players' hearts right at the start.
After all, as a netizen of Earth in her past life, she understood all too well what it meant for "beauty to be justice" and "mind-blowing openings to retain users."
A stunning faction leader was, in itself, the best advertisement and source of cohesion.
In the future, every new player joining would "enjoy" the same goddess descent animation—of course, it couldn't be her actual self arriving in person every time; that would be too exhausting and a waste of divine power.
It was merely a pre-recorded "holographic projection" played on loop.
Indeed, that awe-inspiring appearance of the goddess following the game's opening was an additional "service" Iluvia had added on a whim.
Besides publicity considerations, as the core of the faction, letting players get to know their "top boss" early on was genuinely necessary, and who knows, it might even trigger some unexpected effects.
However...
Iluvia suddenly shuddered, recalling certain jaw-dropping fan creation trends on Earth's internet.
I hope there won't be too many strange fan works based on me... Right... surely not?
As for the crude beginner gear on the players...
Iluvia had crafted them "overnight."
To think that crafting these 200 sets of "beginner gear" had cost her a whopping 0.01 points of precious divine power!
Her Divine Ladyship was very frugal too.
Rate on N.U.
