213 Crime and Punishment

◎Give me the results◎

[System prompt: Players Qi Qiuxue, Li Yiqing, Liu Ge, Su Wen, Wu Shanyue, and Bai Shien each received three points of goodwill. At this point, all players' goodwill points are 100, and the mission is more than halfway complete.]

[The church will open in half an hour. Please hurry to the church and finish your prayers.]

The dawn of victory was clearly just ahead, but at this moment, there was no joy on anyone's face.

The last dungeon test was a huge blow to them. Even though they knew that everything was fake and a conspiracy of the Lord God, they still inevitably fell into the trap, began to feel sad and terrified, and fell into endless self-blame and internal consumption.

"What if", "if", "suppose", these ambiguous words full of uncertainty and contradiction repeatedly flashed in their minds, like a huge stone, squeezing their courage and hope.

Once a person has something he cares about, he will become vulnerable. The Lord God obviously understands this.

“…”

"Let's go." After another long silence, Qi Qiuxue spoke in a light and firm voice.

She held Li Yiqing's hand tightly, helped Wu Shanyue, who was secretly weeping, and called Liu Ge and Bai Shien, who were silent nearby. She gently patted Su Wen's shoulder and said, "Don't forget why we are here, and don't stop moving forward."

"We're almost there, hold on."

"good."

Their thoughts were briefly brought back to reality, and everyone nodded in succession, supporting each other and moving forward. It was only a few hundred meters from here to the church, but it seemed like they had been walking for a very long time.

When they arrived, the church door was already open. Qi Qiuxue took a deep breath, clasped her hands together and began to pray as usual. The church was unusually quiet today. There was no one there, and the nun who was always talkative was not there either.

"I pray to the gods to bless my soul, cleanse me of my sins, give me peace and comfort, strength and courage..."

The sound of prayers echoed in the huge church. God gave hope to mankind, but also brought down equal amounts of sin and suffering. Whether good or bad, everything in this world seemed to be nourishing food for God.

Qi Qiuxue had believed in her and hated her, but at this moment, she forced herself to block out everything, just calm down and pray devoutly for the last time.

The progress bar on the data panel began to decrease again as they prayed—

One centimeter, two centimeters...

Everyone's eyes widened, they were so nervous that they forgot to breathe, their hands were cold and shaking. They seemed to be at the junction of night and day, eagerly looking forward to the coming dawn in endless torture.

but--

Dawn did not come.

The progress bar stopped at the last second before it was about to clear to zero.

“…”

“…”

For a moment, Qi Qiuxue felt that her heart almost stopped beating, perhaps unconsciously. She slowly turned her head and saw her teammates with despair in their eyes, saw the panic written on their faces, saw them clasping their hands together again, praying miserably and painfully, hoping to eliminate the last bit of sin.

But it was no use, the effective number of prayers per day was only once.

All these struggles are in vain.

“Click.”

At this moment, the space quickly twisted and shattered, like a piece of burning paper. The flames quickly expanded and spread outward from the center, and the gap became bigger and bigger. Then, one after another, gods with snow-white wings, noble and sacred, and wearing masks appeared.

"Unfortunately, none of you made it to the mission successfully."

The god spoke softly, reading out the verdict on the "sinner": "Remember, players who have not completed the task will receive punishment from God, then-"

[Attention, attention. 】

The system's voice sounded in my mind.

[The current dungeon name is: Walking with the Gods.]

[It was detected that players Qi Qiuxue, Li Yiqing, Liu Ge, Su Wen, Wu Shanyue, and Bai Shien failed to complete the mission.]

[The system changes the copy name to: Crime and Punishment.]

"Let's play a game." The god waved his hand gently, and everything in front of him disappeared like smoke. When Qi Qiuxue and others came back to their senses, they had been teleported into another space. Here, everything was pure white, endless, with no visible boundaries.

"As we've said before, God loves the world. Even if you fail to complete a mission, we won't immediately rule that you've completely lost the dungeon. On the contrary, you still have a chance to successfully complete it."

"Come and try to defeat us," she said. "Each player will battle the god they've signed a pact with. Victory is determined by life or death. The living win, the dead lose. If both sides die, the player loses the match."

"But it's important to note that death here doesn't simply mean disappearing in battle or in a dungeon, but rather completely dying, whether in the game or in reality."

"You may decide yourselves in which order you wish to enter the battle." The god's voice remained calm, even tinged with a slight smile. "But please note that each battle is not a simple one-on-one."

"What do you mean?" Su Wen asked hurriedly after hearing this.

"Give me an example." The god spun his index finger around, and several little figures used for demonstrations suddenly appeared in everyone's sight. The god divided them into two groups, one for God and the other for humans.

Game 1: Humans die, gods win.

The second game: The gods who survived the previous round join a new battle, that is, there will be a situation of two gods vs. one human on the field. If the human side wants to win, it must eliminate all the gods present; otherwise, if the human dies, the two gods continue to join the new round of battle and fight against the human together with the new gods, that is, a 3v1 situation will appear.

In other words, the later you enter the game, the higher the risk you have to bear. In the worst case scenario, all the players in front of you will die, and the last player to enter the game will have to fight against six gods. In this case, it is simply a daydream to think about winning.

"How about it?" The god swatted away the villains before him and gazed at the players with a pair of calm yet cruel eyes. "Want to join our game?"

"This is your last chance. Win the game and the player will survive, become a First God, and realize their wish. Lose and they will disappear completely, losing their life and the chance to make a wish. There will be no room for maneuver."

"By the way, I remember each of you has a life-saving amulet in your hand."

The god chuckled and said, "In that case, it doesn't matter whether you choose to use the life-saving charm or simply admit defeat. Once the life-saving charm takes effect, it will directly send you out of the game. Accordingly, the god will be automatically declared the winner of that round. The victorious god will enter the next round and fight against the players who continue to hold on. In reality, innocent people will also be implicated by your decision."

"Of course, none of this has anything to do with you. Rather than dying instantly in this dungeon, covering your eyes and ears and cowardly surviving for a while before the end of the world might be a better option."

"It's up to you to decide what to do next. In any case, give me the results in half an hour."

【Author’s words】

Here it comes! There will be an update tomorrow!

Special thanks to zzzkx baby for the deep water. It cost you money again, hold tight!!! Also thank you to all the babies for the overlord tickets and nutrient solution, leaving comments and reading!