Underground research institute, main hall.
At this time, Ask, who had rich experience in the game, had already analyzed the general outline of this change in his mind.
This is a classic large-scale mutation copy with three layers of structure:
The outermost layer, which is located in the main plane world, is a virtual town constructed by the consciousness of the residents and is filled with various "nightmare monsters".
In this level, players not only have to deal with attacks from monsters, but also have to guard against the infiltration of clones caused by psychic mutations.
If a method to detect the clones cannot be found, the only way for players to pass the level is to kill all the monsters in the dungeon before the team falls apart.
As long as all the monsters are killed, the residents of the town will wake up - of course, they will still be trapped in the ocean of subconsciousness. The real world is just a deserted town with no one in it except the monsters have been wiped out.
Therefore, this is an imperfect way to pass the game, and players can only end up with a bunch of Wizard Stone fragments to sell for money.
The second layer is the real town of Runefield, which was replaced by this mutation, and is located in the fog of the subconscious ocean.
If the players see through the replica's trick, the mutation will be confirmed by a certain algorithm, and these "smart players" will be teleported to the second level.
Here, players can find sleeping residents and learn part of the truth about the mutation.
As the players on the outermost layer kill more and more monsters, the sleeping residents on the second layer will gradually wake up.
Ask guessed that when the number of awakened residents reached a certain proportion, the real town would face a monster attack - after all, there were many strange psychic creatures living in the ocean of subconsciousness.
If all the players on this level are eventually wiped out, then they can only hope that the players outside can kill all the monsters and move on to the first way to pass the level.
If the players can resist the monster attacks, they can find a way to send the real town back to the main plane.
For example, among the awakened residents of the town, there is a senior scholar of the psychic sequence. He mentioned a method to restore the mutation, but this method requires a large amount of psychic spiritual materials.
Players can obtain enough spiritual materials by killing psychic creatures in the ocean of subconsciousness, and finally swap the real town and the virtual town to restore them. The residents of the town then return safe and sound, and players can also receive richer rewards from the Duke of Carinthia.
As a senior game practitioner + long-time player + professional player, although Ask was only guessing, he estimated the plot of the dungeon to be almost correct.
Of course, this still cannot reveal the truth about the mutation, so this copy has another core, which is the source of the mutation—the scientific research ruins of the ancient Solomon Empire.
This is equivalent to the EX hidden high-difficulty map of the dungeon. If the players have a high enough level of training to easily crush the extraordinary creatures, or have a strong desire to explore and are careful enough, or are just lucky enough, they can find the entrance to the underground in a remote warehouse.
It is conceivable that there must be more difficult to deal with high-level monsters in the research institute, as well as more generous rewards - potions or extraordinary equipment.