Jin was actually quite curious to see what Lung Junior had managed to make.
After all, Hashimi had told him that the boy, man, grandpa, and his group were likely the ones who were the most ahead of any team.
He'd played through a variety of scenarios created by inner disciples in the library, but he could barely stop his salivation as Lung Junior, after a brief break, reluctantly handed over his Room to Elder Pangzi, who viewed it quickly to make sure that it was going to be the same one submitted to the competition later, before handing it over to Jin.
Jin, for his part, breathed in deeply, knowing that he would have to maintain an immense amount of focus as he entered the room. He only had a bit less than an hour, after all.
Without further ado, seeing that it wasn't wise to test Elder Pangzi's patience any further, he put his hand on the Illusion Room and dived straight in.
-/-
There had been many considerations behind Jin's eventual usage of The Last of Us over any of the other games stuck forever in his head.
Left 4 Dead mostly shined due to its multiplayer settings. Unfortunately, the Elder working on the matter had not yet provided the requisite results, or he might have chosen this.
Ultimately, if multiplayer, which would have been the best option considering they were working with an army, was off the table, the choice fell to the next best thing.
Jin had been seriously considering Resident Evil. He knew that the more narrative-focused Last of Us might garner less respect from the cultivation population.
The only issue had been why he'd gotten entangled with Lung Junior in the first place… His zombies were never going to compare to those of the other disciples.
They just had different areas of expertise. Jin innovated, and the others copied and enhanced what already existed.
You wouldn't fight a boxer with only your fists if you'd only ever practised taekwondo. It was asinine.
Compared to Resident Evil, The Last of Us focused less on the combat quality and more on the story.
Conveniently enough, a good story was the only thing that Jin could rely on in this case.
It was as he dodged underneath the swipe of a zombie, only to be jumped by another from behind in the endless horde he was fighting, that he sincerely thanked himself for not having done Resident Evil.
As circumstances had conspired, the zombies and their development actually mimicked those in The Last of Us. Going blind and developing echolocation.
Additionally, if he had done Resident Evil and never stolen Lung Junior's data, he would have likely lost quite badly.
He had severely underestimated how much better Lung Junior's zombies were going to be in comparison to his own.
It was comparable in the sense that a Fiat Panda and a Bugatti were technically both cars. But that's where the similarities ended.
In comparison to the zombies he was currently fighting off now, alongside the help of his algorithmic soldier companions, what he'd created was just a stick figure mimicry.
Jin had thought that his photographic memory might close the gap of skill that existed between him and other disciples, but he'd either been severely overestimating his ability or underestimating that of everyone else. He'd thought that he'd correctly measured the average ability of inner disciples by analysing the scenarios of the library. But it was now obvious that only in competitions did everyone pull all the stops.
(Unknown to him, the zombies had actually been created by a core disciple belonging to the same family as Lung, which meant that Jin wasn't really comparing himself to someone on his level.)
If Jin had to nail down a core difference between what he and Lung Junior had created, it would likely be condensed in the fact that…
Whereas Jin had faithfully recreated the movements, attacking patterns and even sensory inputs that arrived when one confronted a zombie: the putrid smell, the stench, the stink, the grunting and shuffling. The empty look in their eyes.
The difference between what he'd made and what Lung Junior's team had made was that whereas Jin's zombies were simply an amalgamation of these attributes slapped haphazardly onto a simple stick figure, Lung Junior's zombie was a functioning whole.
To use a metaphor. Jin had a wooden bowl with unmixed flour, egg, yeast, water, salt, sugar and butter, while Lung Junior had a cake.
Sure, the ingredients were essentially the same. No one would argue that, but there was a process somewhere in the middle that differentiated the two to a vast degree.
Eating Jin's bowl of ingredients would give someone a stomachache, while Lung Junior's cake would, at most, cause one to gain a bit of weight because it was too delicious.
Jin sighed with a blank look on his face as his eyes passively scanned as much of his surroundings as possible as he whirled and twirled in the middle of the combat zone, using his special talent to record everything in its most minute details.
Even if he hadn't been forced to disclose The Last of Us as the final scenario he was going to use, there would have been no point in copy-pasting what Lung Junior was doing to any special degree.
Sure, spatially, they were inhabiting a very generic environment, likely taken straight from a template.
But the point, as it was always in the Illusion Room Sect, was the combat.
The soldiers were almost real, and Jin would not be able to add what they were missing.
The zombies were more than real. Hyper-real in a way. Perfected to a point where they were more zombie than a real zombie.
Even if Jin just stole everything and copy-pasted it…
He had no idea where he could even start improving it.
Meanwhile, he was sure that Lung Junior's team was still tweaking minor differences that he wouldn't know how to adjust because of his comparable lack of experience, but which would enhance the experience further.
He would just have to go with the original plan, then.
Take as many of the zombies as possible and put them into his scenario.
He just hoped that the obvious difference in quality between the movements of the zombies and the other characters wouldn't be too jarring.
His lance spun in his hand as if possessing a spirit of his own.
The sharp blade beheaded a zombie approaching from the front. The butt of the lance slapped a hand of an allied soldier out of position as the jaws of a Clicker closed down on nothing but air.
Jin entered the fray as an Illusion Room cultivator.
He didn't have much time, but what time he did have, he would have to use to experience the zombies through the only medium he had.
His own body.
As he entered a process of fighting until death in the ever-increasing horde and being ripped apart, a feeling that was eerily similar to how he imagined it to feel in real life, he wondered if Illusion Room cultivators were prone to developing a malformed relationship with death, considering how often they died to pursue their craft.
It was in this incredible state of concentration, enhanced by qi being channelled into the brain, that every second felt like a minute. Had Jin attempted this concentration technique before having reached the foundation establishment stage, he would have likely fried his brains, literally.
Now, however, he felt like he had opened his eyes for the first time in his life.
It was with incredible clarity that he was able to grasp and turn into data points his entire field of vision.
The way a Clicker moved while attacking a soldier. The way it stumbled after it was repelled. Several metres to the left, at the same time, a base-form zombie collapsed on the floor after being decapitated. The way another one managed to get at the throat of a soldier and ripped it out.
With every second, as long as he faced the right direction, Jin was consuming an incredibly large amount of data.
It was here that he had to thank Lung Junior and his team for being generous with the amount of zombies that they had sprinkled onto the battleground.
Each one of them was relatively complex. This he knew because he had already spent several minutes in the Illusion Room and hadn't yet grasped all of the movements and characteristics of a single zombie iteration.
The way they had likely done it was that they'd created a template of 24 hours of non-repeating movement per species, so Clicker and base-form, before having them all execute the movements and reactions in a non-synchronous pattern.
Therefore, if Jin had been stuck here with just one zombie, it would have taken him 24 hours to get all its movements copied down. Obviously, it would have been impossible to do since he didn't even have an hour.
If there were only two 24-hour sessions ingrained in two enemy varieties, and they were programmed not to repeat an action while another one on the field was currently committing to it…
Then, as long as there were more than 24 clickers and 24 base-form zombies on the field, Jin could see all of them at once, and then, in one hour, he would have all the data. Thankfully, according to Lung Junior's magnanimity, there were more than the required number of zombies on the field.
Of course, Jin was still constrained by a human view for the moment and thus couldn't keep all of them in view at the same time.
However, he was getting damn close, and as time passed, the percentage of the movement variations and other attributes that he had been able to record was steadily approaching half of those available.
It was then that it lagged, as some repetitions started appearing; however, later, he would be able to analyse the situation and infer the required missing movement if it occurred as a prerequisite as a second part in a three-part action.
60%
Jin kicked off the head of a zombie to jump high into the air and get an even better overview.
He crashed down onto a zombie and smashed its skull into pieces.
70%
A spin and an extension of qi through his weapon beheaded five zombies at a time, their heads falling to the ground with a satisfying synchronous thump.
80%
A few tugs and pulls saved a duo of soldiers from being ripped apart by a suddenly emerging new wave of Clickers. The two black-clad forms quickly returned the favour by saving Jin from a zombie that had been crawling towards him from the back.
90%
It was as more and more of his comrades died around him that Jin was pushed further and further back by the seemingly endless wave.
95%
He was the last one standing, and the timer was approaching zero.
He couldn't die now, or else he wouldn't get to restart again before being pulled out.
97.5%
He fought like a maniac, but eventually, inevitably, he was dragged down by the sheer mass of his opponents as they latched onto him and refused to let go.
99%
He fought to the bitter end on the ground, protecting his throat and head as his limbs were slowly but surely ripped away.
99.5%
One last effort, one last breath. He killed a zombie with his teeth, ripping out its spinal cord through the back of its neck.
He was ripped out of the experience and found himself gasping, actual sweat streaming down his body, in the office of Elder Pangzi.
The people in the room gave him concerned looks.
Then, when Lung Junior realised that Jin didn't look like he'd had a lot of fun in the Illusion Room, he sneered and snatched the artefact back, protectively cradling it in his arms.
"The punishment is complete; I'll see you on judgment day, Elder Pangzi," Elder Lung said stiffly before putting a hand on the shoulder of Lung Junior and walking out of the man's office.
"We won't bother you any longer," Elder Flower said, nodding at the fat Elder and doing the same to Jin.
Elder Pangzi's eyes stayed locked on the young inner disciple, a calculating look in his gaze.
-/-
Did you get what you needed?" Elder Flower asked. "I don't have the time to help you again, so you better give it your all," she warned seriously.
Jin, for his part, shook out his thankfully still present arms and legs. He cracked his neck.
"Thanks for your help, Elder Flower," he said before a small smirk blossomed on his face. "I think that the result won't be too disappointing," he said before they parted ways.
100%