Dice In The Darkness: Cthulhu Calls

After confirming his skills, Wu Lei said with satisfaction, "How is it? How do you feel about the skills I've allocated for you? Now, Liu Xing, you can serve as the most vital doctor in the Cthulhu role-playing group. You'll gain protection from your teammates. It's a shame that your size and strength stats are so low. Your HP and damage are too low; basically, you're the type that would die if left alone. However, you have 50 credits now. At the start of the game, try to get some weapons and equipment. That should compensate a bit for the innate shortcomings of your character card."

Liu Xing nodded. Wu Lei was spot on. The strengths and weaknesses of his character card were evident. The strength lay in the fact that Liu Xing could act as an indispensable doctor in every Cthulhu role-playing team. He also had critical skills like psychoanalysis. Unless in dire situations, Liu Xing would be protected by teammates. But the drawback was his low HP and damage. Typically, a single attack from a Ghoul could potentially wipe him out instantly. That's why Liu Xing chose the 'Jump' skill, and his offensive capabilities were almost negligible.

Thus, Liu Xing's character card dictated he would be a team-oriented character. He began to hope he'd encounter reliable teammates.

Liu Xing and Wu Lei chatted a bit longer. Naturally, Liu Xing tried to glean as much personal experience about Cthulhu role-playing from Wu Lei as possible. And being a seasoned player, Wu Lei imparted a wealth of knowledge.

After politely declining Wu Lei's lunch invitation, Liu Xing returned home. He logged into the Cthulhu Role-Playing Game Hall and finished allocating his Skill Points on his character card.

Once done, Liu Xing fell into deep thought, contemplating how he should spend the next few days to live without regrets.

Bored, Liu Xing decided to browse the in-game store. He wondered what he could purchase with his 50 credits. Well, 49 credits now.

The Cthulhu Role-Playing Game Hall's store resembled other game stores. There were scrolling featured items at the top, and various items and gift packs mentioned by Shan He below.

To Liu Xing's delight, the gift packs were affordable, ranging from 10 to 200 credits. But after reading their descriptions, he felt they should be renamed 'Lucky Bags'. They resembled the random draw pools in mobile games. Each pool had a fixed set of items, and there was no guaranteed draw.

Like the 'Newbie Gift Pack' Liu Xing was considering – it allowed a draw of over fifty items, from a 5-credit Elder Sign trinket to a 1,000-credit character card. For 20 credits, Liu Xing could purchase this pack and randomly obtain two items. And he could only buy it once.

In theory, the least he could get from this pack were two Elder Sign trinkets worth a total of 10 credits, resulting in a 10-credit loss. But the odds of drawing each item were the same. Hence, getting two Elder Sign trinkets was highly unlikely, making the pack almost a guaranteed gain, unless one was exceptionally unlucky.

Considering his character card had a high luck stat of 80, Liu Xing took the plunge and purchased the Newbie Gift Pack.

He went out of his way to wash his hands, then lit some leftover mosquito repellent incense from last summer. After these "purifying rituals", he sincerely prayed to the great Cthulhu, hoping for some favor.

After all, this was the Cthulhu Role-Playing Game Hall. Paying homage to Cthulhu was only natural.

Ding.

Following the crisp sound, Liu Xing opened the beginner's gift package.

Upon seeing the two items he had drawn, Liu Xing heaved a sigh of relief. It seemed his luck was fairly good.

The first item was a bottle of green tea from a certain brand. However, this wasn't any ordinary green tea. It had the ability to restore sanity points. It could be used up to three times, and each use would recover 1d6 sanity points. Moreover, there was a 50% chance it could snap the player out of madness. In the world of Cthulhu RPG Game, it was a miracle potion. Typically, sanity doesn't recover on its own. Only when a player's particular skill surpasses 90 points (based on the Cthulhu RPG Game's settings, a skill exceeding 90 points means the player has achieved a master level in that domain, much like Mr. Yuan's mastery in the field of hybrid rice) can they earn a sanity restoration reward. Alternatively, players could undergo special psychological treatments. Thus, having this bottle of green tea was like an insurance policy for one's sanity.

The market value of this green tea in the game's store was as high as 200 points. Merely obtaining this bottle meant Liu Xing's beginner's gift package was already worth much more than its cost. However, the second item was even more valuable.

It was the Cthulhu's Candy, a piece of candy that promised unexpected results and was valued at 999 points.

Liu Xing was rendered speechless, he hadn't expected such a twist!

"Cthulhu's Candy" was a play on words. In a song about Cthulhu, there's a line, "I'a I'a.Cthulhu Fhatgn!" which essentially means "Long live Cthulhu". But when it was introduced to China, due to a humorous misinterpretation, the cute translator changed the lyrics to "Yiya, Yiya, Cthulhu is giving out candy". Hence, the joke "Cthulhu's Candy" became popular among Chinese Cthulhu enthusiasts.

Liu Xing had never imagined that even the Cthulhu Role-Playing Game Hall would adopt this joke. It appeared the Cthulhu Role-Playing Game Hall wasn't as serious as he thought.

"We're a game hall with a higher wipeout rate than the Main God Space. Can't we have a little fun?" Liu Xing mused, rubbing his forehead with exasperation.

However, the candy given by 'Cthulhu' left Liu Xing puzzled. The so-called "unexpected results" - could it transform him into a Deep One? Considering this, Liu Xing decided to stash the candy away, vowing not to use it unless absolutely necessary. The last thing he wanted was to inexplicably turn into a Deep One.

After browsing the store for a while, Liu Xing exited, primarily because he was short on virtual currency. However, this time he didn't leave the Cthulhu Role-Playing Game Hall but went to the society page to check the announcements. These announcements not only detailed which players would start the game on which day but also highlighted their strengths. For instance, Liu Xing was categorized as a support player.

Thus, Liu Xing marked his calendar for his next Cthulhu RPG Game session, which was in ten days. On that day, twelve combat-oriented society members would start the game.