Chapter 3UGEN
[Instance import complete.]
[Instance Blueprint: King of Fighters 97 MUGEN (KOF97MUGEN)]
[Instance Terms: Fighting Tournament — Omitted.
Tournament Management — Within the tournament arena and the management's jurisdiction, player-killing is strictly prohibited. If a player forcibly kills an opponent, no bloody treasure chests will drop. Furthermore, the player will immediately enter a 'red name' status and be pursued with full force by the officials. If arrested, the player will be forcibly stripped of all instance gains, forcibly imprisoned for the duration of the tournament, forcibly expelled after the tournament, and prohibited from participating in any future 'King of Fighters'-related fighting events.
This rule partially applies to interactions between players and NPC contestants. If a player kills an NPC contestant during or between matches, treasure chests will drop at a normal rate, but if discovered, the player will immediately enter the aforementioned rule process.
Three Sacred Artifacts and Orochi Hakkesshu — The inheritors of the Three Sacred Artifacts and the Orochi clan will all appear. An inevitable fated battle will occur between them. Broadly speaking, the 'Three Sacred Artifact Families' and the 'Orochi Hakkesshu' are two opposing factions. As players, you can try to join one, or remain purely neutral.
MUGEN — The mysterious term imbues the instance with 'infinite' possibilities. Some fighters from other worlds, originally belonging to other fighting blueprints and meeting the tournament's participation rules, will make unexpected appearances in the KOF97 tournament in suitable forms.]
[Instance Difficulty: C+]
[Main Quest: "Fighting Tournament KOF97" — Team Quest. Within 72 hours, find a way to obtain one "KOF97 Tournament Invitation Letter" issued by the organizers to qualify for the official tournament.
Basic Reward — Unknown, to be distributed based on tournament ranking after the main quest is triggered.
Side Quests / Holy Grail Missions: To be triggered.]
A cacophony of human voices!
This was Cheng Tian and Aileen's first impression after entering the instance.
Especially Aileen, who, with her naturally keen hearing, disliked being in noisy environments the most. Her two ears visibly drooped.
After looking around, Cheng quickly realized where he was.
This was most likely the registration queue for the KOF tournament.
He had only experienced this level of crowd once, at a Super Magic City anime convention. It was endless, people packed shoulder-to-shoulder, and the entire queue wouldn't move for ages.
Leveraging his high Charm of 40 points, Cheng Tian easily struck up a conversation with a young man next to him and quickly learned the specific details.
KOF97 is a world-class fighting tournament with extremely high commercial value. Most of the fighters who can participate have already achieved certain results in other competitions, or are veteran players who have left a deep impression on audiences in past KOF tournaments, thus qualifying them to participate.
However, from a commercial perspective, some excellent new faces can also stimulate audience interest. So, in addition to some established strong players, the organizers also released a portion of participation slots for open auditions to select players with sufficient skill or those who are more commercially viable.
As a team of 'wild' players, Cheng Tian and Aileen, like other players, were queuing to register. As for how to compete for the scarce participation slots, it would depend on the organizers' rules.
For players, if they were directly eliminated at this stage, it would mean that the main quest had not even officially triggered. Although they wouldn't have to go through the evacuation phase afterwards, they would only be able to spectate, and the final settlement would be considered a "trial failure."
This was clearly very important to players. If they couldn't get an invitation letter, they wouldn't even have the qualification to enter the main quest.
While Cheng was extracting information, the tournament staff also distributed registration materials, application forms, and a water-based pen to Cheng and his group, going down the line.
Because there were too many registrants, they couldn't explain to everyone individually. To save time, the organizers printed a large number of very detailed registration rule flyers that doubled as application forms, two-sided. The front side included information about KOF97 team formation.
The official KOF97 tournament format is a three-person team continuous battle, where defeating all members of the opposing team is considered a win. So, registration requires three main participants, with one substitute.
Normal matches only allow three main participants. Substitutes cannot be swapped in unless a participant has an accident, in which case the substitute can enter. The replaced participant cannot re-enter, and if another accidental reduction in team members occurs later, the team is not allowed to add new members again.
This was probably a new rule adapted for the player community, as it wasn't a purely original King of Fighters 97.
Cheng Tian and Aileen didn't hesitate, directly adding Bazett and Mina to their team roster, thus avoiding the need to form a pickup team with other players or NPCs.
But when it came to naming the team, Cheng Tian and Aileen had a disagreement.
Cheng Tian was quite abstract, intending to name it "Three with One" team, referring to three female warriors with himself.
Cheng Tian clearly recognized that he had no fighting ability and had no intention of arguing against it. There was nothing wrong with riding on the coattails of girls.
Aileen was probably led astray by Cheng Tian's thinking. After "World Tree," "Dragon King," and "Oriririri" were all rejected, she actually came up with a cute team name: "Sweet Home."
And Cheng, who had already realized Aileen was openly making a suggestive joke when he heard "Oriririri" earlier, greatly appreciated the name "Sweet Home."
"You can actually accept a name like that?"
Aileen, who had only said the team name playfully, looked surprised.
"Eh? You don't know about this instance?"
It was Cheng who was more surprised than Aileen.
"Sweet Home is the predecessor to Resident Evil, a rather depressing horror game instance."
And so, while waiting in line, Cheng Tian earnestly began to educate Aileen.
For some reason, Cheng Tian and Aileen were placed relatively early in the instance's queue. They only waited for about half an hour before it was their turn to submit their forms.
Actually, Cheng Tian found it a bit strange at this point. If it was just about submitting forms, there shouldn't have been any need to queue.
Sure enough, after submitting the forms, they weren't immediately allowed to leave. Instead, they were photographed on the spot one by one. Cheng Tian also noticed that several staff members, holding stacks of photos and with sharp gazes, were observing each registrant as if scanning them.
And when one of the staff members' gazes landed on his and Aileen's faces, there was a very noticeable pause. Then Cheng Tian saw this person motion to the staff member processing the forms to stamp a special green seal on his and Aileen's registration forms.
Subsequently, a staff member approached the two.
"You two, please follow me."