Wang Xiaobin continued looking at the character designs for these main characters.

The protagonist played by the player was named Qin Yi, the captain of the AS-371-45 squad.

His Lark battle suit also had special painting, but unlike the flashy feeling of others, he only painted an ancient seal script character “Yi” (righteousness) on the right shoulder of his battle suit.

The ancient form of the character “Yi” is written as “義,” with a “sheep” character on top and an “I/me” character below.

The squad’s number meant that this squad belonged to the 371st starship of the Asian Fleet (abbreviated as AS), squad number 45.

Besides Qin Yi, there were four other members in the squad, each with distinct personalities.

Xu Kaile, optimistic, was a young man with delicate emotions, and his battle suit was painted with various anime-style cute girls.

Meng Yu, short in stature, taciturn, but very reliable in critical moments, had his battle suit painted with camouflage.

Zhao Yongxiu sometimes seemed childish, clumsy, a bit vain, very good at adjusting the team atmosphere, his battle suit looked like a mecha, emphasizing coolness;

Wu Shaojun, tall in stature, straightforward in personality, the oldest, the most trustworthy teammate, his battle suit had no special painting but had many scratches that hadn’t been specially repaired.

The story outline that was sent over clearly described the general plot process, but some details weren’t sufficiently refined, including dialogues that weren’t provided.

After all, this was only the first version, and it would need continuous refinement later. Wang Xiaobin’s opinions were also very important.

The story structure was simple, divided into five parts, each composed of real-time rendered cutscenes and in-game combat.

Since it was only a DLC affiliated with the game “Sea Fortress” and time was tight, there was no need to create particularly detailed cutscenes; real-time rendering was sufficient.

First Part:

AS-371-45 squad successfully infiltrated the insect nest, clearing larvae and worker bees on the periphery.

Being on the outskirts of the nest with few insects, it wasn’t a problem to kill all the larvae or worker bees if discovered, making the combat relatively simple.

During the mission, all team members could communicate in real-time through voice chat, discussing this operation and envisioning the scenario of killing the insect queen to end the war.

Artificial intelligence would continuously issue commands to the protagonist, analyze the battlefield situation, and guide the protagonist to make correct decisions.

Second Part:

After penetrating deeper into the nest, they began to encounter more and stronger insects, including hatching jumpers and self-destructing insects. The combat difficulty gradually increased at this stage, and most of the time, correct strategies had to be adopted. For example, self-destructing insects needed to be handled carefully; otherwise, the widespread acid splash after their explosion would cause serious damage to team members.

At this point, team members began to encounter some troubles and needed to help each other, but their overall attitude was still relatively positive.

The artificial intelligence would still guide the protagonist to make the best decisions, and following the AI’s advice would significantly reduce the combat difficulty.

Third Part:

The insect swarm continued to increase, gradually exceeding the squad’s maximum combat capability. While penetrating deep into the nest, they discovered fragmented limbs or battle suit pieces from other squads. The breathing time after battles became increasingly precious.

Some team members began to lose their emotional balance. After wandering in the depths of the nest for a long time without finding any trace of the queen, but seeing too many other dead squads, they began to question the combat success rate calculated by the artificial intelligence without logistical support, believing they would perish here.

However, the team members encouraged each other and persisted in moving forward.

The artificial intelligence still analyzed data and commanded combat as always, and in the face of the team members’ doubts, it maintained its initial stance.

Fourth Part:

The squad’s actions had already alarmed the insect swarm. Although the main forces of the insect race were not in the nest, even worker bees, jumpers, and self-destructing insects, if numerous enough, could pose a significant threat to the squad.

Countless insects poured in from all directions, completely cutting off the retreat path, so they could only keep moving forward. To block the insect swarm behind, a severely wounded team member stayed behind and detonated the miniature reactor in his chest.

After finally getting a moment to breathe, Qin Yi discovered that the squads that came to execute the mission with him and survived were few and far between.

More terrifyingly, the squad accidentally discovered fragments of battle suits deep in the nest. These were fragments of the Lark II type battle suit, indicating that humans had executed decapitation operations before, but had not succeeded, and the artificial intelligence had concealed this information.

The team members fell into complete despair.

The protagonist questioned the artificial intelligence but still received no answer. The team members found there was no way back and could only continue forward, deciding to complete their mission at all costs.

Fifth Part:

The squad followed the artificial intelligence’s analysis to advance circuitously in despair. To cover their comrades, team members died one by one.

The protagonist, with a resolve to die, wanted to fulfill his comrades’ final wishes. But eventually, he and another surviving teammate were still engulfed by the endless insect sea.

Strangely, these insects didn’t kill them but took them to the depths of the nest.

The protagonist finally saw the insect queen, its bloated, enormous body nauseating.

The two wanted to detonate the miniature reactors on their bodies to perish together, but for some reason, the artificial intelligence seemed to be disconnected or receiving strange interference, preventing them from controlling the detonation through AI.

The surviving team member was brought to the side of the insect queen. Whatever the insect queen did to him, he immediately let out a piercing scream and died just two minutes later.

The protagonist was also brought before the insect queen and similarly let out screams, as if countless needles were piercing his brain. But he didn’t die immediately like his teammate; instead, he persisted tenaciously.

He persisted in taking a pistol from the Lark battle suit, intending to fire a bullet through the chest armor’s fracture caused by combat to destroy the miniature reactor and trigger an explosion.

But this still didn’t succeed; the insect’s horny claws pierced his right hand, and the pistol fell to the ground.

In his dying moments, the protagonist felt a blankness before him, and the piercing sound causing his brain pain gradually moved away from him, as if it turned into a low murmur…

In the final moment, he felt a violent tremor around him, and the ceiling of the deep underground cave suddenly collapsed entirely. He seemed to see many soldiers wearing Lark battle suits rushing in, along with large drilling machines…

The story ended here, leaving an open ending.

In addition, the story outline also emphasized that there should be a lot of dialogue during combat or rest states, and each person’s dialogue should align with their character.

As the emotions changed through the five stages, each character’s dialogue would also change. Initially, everyone believed they could complete the mission, but as time passed, they became pessimistic and even desperate.

Furthermore, the story outline specifically emphasized a key piece of information:

At the beginning, all team members understood that this was humanity’s first decapitation plan against the insect race, with hundreds of squads executing this mission simultaneously. The artificial intelligence had roughly located the position of the insect queen, and the human main forces were in a decisive battle with the insect main forces on the planet, ready to provide support at any time.

Therefore, the squad members believed the mission had a high success rate, and once they successfully decapitated the insect queen, the war between humans and the insect race would see the dawn.

But as the battle deepened, the team members’ beliefs began to waver.

In battle, they also encountered members of other squads, some already sacrificed with only a few pieces of armor left, some perishing with insects in despair.

In the nest, they found some fragments of Lark battle suits, many of which obviously weren’t left from this operation, indicating that humans had clearly executed decapitation operations before.

The team members gradually felt they probably couldn’t hold on, becoming increasingly desperate, but with no way back, they could only continue forward.

During the intervals between killing insects, the team members discussed this life form:

The insect race almost had no individual consciousness, completely disregarding individual life and death to implement the insect queen’s will; They could share information through telepathy within a large range. The insect queen had a high intelligence level, so the insects’ tactical level was no less than humans.

Additionally, the insects’ weapons were organically integrated, their logistical requirements were extremely simple, and they reproduced very rapidly, making war of attrition meaningless.

Only by decapitating the insect queen could they fundamentally change the current unfavorable situation.

Therefore, although all team members were in despair later, feeling they couldn’t possibly return alive, they still resolutely executed the mission because their only meaning in life was to kill the insect queen.

As long as the mission succeeded, the war would end, making their deaths worthwhile.

But clearly, this mission was destined to fail, because if it succeeded, there wouldn’t be a story for “Destiny and Choice.”

…

After reading the entire story outline, Wang Xiaobin had a general idea of what he needed to do.

This story outline clearly described the entire game process, character settings, and even some dialogue details. Next, he just needed to refine the entire process and complete the dialogues.

However, there were still many mysteries in this story outline, and it ended with an open ending.

Did the insect queen ultimately die or not?

Did the protagonist survive or not?

This was not the first decapitation operation, so why did the artificial intelligence conceal this fact?

What was the relationship between the protagonist in this DLC and the protagonist in the “Destiny and Choice” storyline?

All these contents were related to the future storyline of “Destiny and Choice,” and Zhu Xiaocai didn’t want to reveal it at this time.

The DLC for “Sea Fortress” was meant to preheat the new game, serving as an introduction. These questions would keep players discussing, maintaining the heat.

To answer these questions, they would have to wait for the storyline of “Destiny and Choice” to be revealed.

Wang Xiaobin suppressed his curiosity and immediately began preparing for development.