Chapter 3: Level 8 (3) This is Mystery
The pharmacist pushed up his glasses. "I can't tell whether the woodcutter's death was real or fake."
Gao Mengtang shook his head and sighed: "When we travel through time, we will bring all the surrounding objects with us, so what travels through time must be our real body. What dies is also our real body."
"But if you let them know that the lumberjack is really dead, the drunkard will be blamed, you will be blamed, and panic will spread. It will do no good but harm. It's better to lie to them and calm them down. Clear the level first, and then we can deal with the rest."
After listening to this, the pharmacist applauded: "Is this really your first time in a dungeon? You are calm and organized. I admire you."
Gao Mengtang smiled, and her dense eyelashes curved into crescents: "What are you talking about? This is a rookie dungeon, so of course this is my first time entering one."
"Of course." The pharmacist also smiled.
Go upstairs from the 1st floor to the 2nd floor.
Go up one more level.
It becomes the first layer again.
"Layer 1, layer 2. Layer 1, layer 2. Repeatedly. Is this a ghost wall?" He Lun's voice was full of despair. The straight and sharp number "1" was like a sharp knife stabbing into his heart.
Gao Mengtang did not think it was a ghost wall. He smelled blood only when he first went to the second floor. He did not smell it the next two times. This means that even if the floor is marked as "2", there are differences between the second floor and the second floor. However, the differences were not discovered.
He was still able to analyze the situation calmly, but the others were obviously not so calm. Some were sobbing, while others were staring at the ceiling with dead eyes.
Only the pharmacist was in good condition. He took out a draft book and wrote something: "Going up one floor from the first floor is the second floor. But going down from the first floor is the first floor. The triggering mechanism for going up and down is different... Let's go to the residential building on the second floor and take a look."
They climbed up one more floor. When they opened the door, the number 2 no longer made them happy. The players looked at the corridor numbly.
Click. Bang.
There were sounds of doors opening and closing. The "resident" of Room 4 came out.
His head was filled with syringes, the needles piercing from the top of his head and then out of his cheeks, mouth, and neck. The bloodstains were winding and connected like a spider web, and his bulging eyeballs were particularly eye-catching.
Gao Mengtang was walking in front and bumped into the resident of Room 4.
"Good morning! Or maybe, good evening?" Gao Mengtang stepped back a few steps apologetically, "Sorry, I bumped into you by accident. Did you change into a new hat?"
The next second, Gao Mengtang was grabbed by the collar from behind, and his feet left the ground and he ran wildly.
"Run!" Heron screamed like a whistle, "He's going to stab you with a syringe!"
Going down the stairs is faster than going up them.
When running away, He Lun did not have time to think about it and crawled down the stairs. Looking back, he saw the resident of Room 4 holding a syringe and chasing him all the way.
But at the corner of the stairs, there seemed to be an air wall, and resident No. 4 bumped into it and disappeared automatically.
After a narrow escape, He Lun breathed a sigh of relief and put Gao Mengtang down. "Brother, are you crazy? You still say hello to him?"
Gao Mengtang smiled apologetically: "I can't see clearly."
"Even if you can't see clearly, you should be able to feel the mental pressure, right? I see double now." He Lun pounded his chest.
Pharmacist: "Everyone, take a break and check your basic condition. If your mental state is too low, ask me for supplements."
In the system panel, there is a basic status bar for the player.
[000 Blind Basic Status]
Stamina: 20/50
Magic: 50/50
Spirit value: 999/999
Physical strength is a red bar, magic is a blue bar, and spirit is a white bar.
Being attacked, working for long periods of time, hunger, lack of sleep, etc. will deplete your physical strength.
Using some skills will consume magic power.
Feeling fear, being mentally polluted by monsters, feeling uneasy, getting injured, etc. will consume your mental value.
In the Black Tower world, if your physical strength or magic power reaches zero, you will not die immediately. The red and blue bars will recover at a slow rate, and recover faster when you rest. It is also easier to obtain potions that replenish magic power and physical strength.
Gao Mengtang, who had a thin and fragile body, sat on the steps to rest for a while, and his physical strength slowly increased from 20 to 25. The recovery speed was impressive.
What is truly fatal is low spirit value.
Only the spirit value will start to drop when entering the dungeon, and it will drop faster when encountering unexpected situations. And in most cases, it will not automatically recover.
If the spirit value is too low, the player may go crazy and die, be lost in the dungeon forever, or even... turn into a monster.
Pharmacist: "Everyone, please report your IOUs. If your IOUs are below 60, come to me to get the supplements. The quantity is limited. My IOUs are 82, so I am doing fine."
Drunk girl: “70.”
Heron: “66.”
Gao Mengtang: “999.”
He Lun raised his head suddenly: "Mr. Duo?"
Gao Mengtang: “Nine hundred and ninety-nine.”
“How many nines?”
Gao Mengtang: “Three.”
"Why don't you take a closer look?"
Gao Mengtang read it carefully, his lips moving in a standard way and his pronunciation clear as he slowly read out the three numbers: "Nine, nine, nine."
The pharmacist came back to his senses and smiled: "Mr. Blind, your eyesight..."
Gao Mengtang smiled bitterly: "I can see the system panel clearly and recognize Arabic numerals."
System: [174 Pharmacist applies to visit your homepage, do you agree? ]
After getting the consent, the pharmacist went to the homepage to check, and was so shocked that his jaw dropped. "It's really 999, but I heard that the highest initial value of the spirit value is only 300. The maximum spirit value that a player can reach does not exceed 900."
The homepage frequently popped up messages requesting access. The teammates took a look one by one and gasped in surprise when they found the three "9s".
Gao Mengtang held the rabbit and smiled to himself: "You guys always make a fuss like this, your emotions fluctuate greatly, and your spirit value drops quickly." "Keep a normal mind."
Keep calm? ! !
Facing a monster with an initial spirit value of 999, how can you remain calm?!
It’s such a niche language, so similar to Chinese, but I just can’t understand it.
Among the players, there was an inconspicuous thin boy who lowered his head, rolled his eyes from bottom to top, and stared straight at Gao Mengtang.
His ID number is [380 Weird Scholar]
The initial spirit value of the eccentric scholar is relatively high, at 150 points. He has the inherent attribute of [strong desire for knowledge] and is highly resistant to mental pollution. Sometimes when he sees monsters, his desire to research will be stimulated, and his spirit value will increase instead of decrease.
While staring at Gao Mengtang for a while, the strange scholar's spirit value slowly rose from 145 to 148.
[Strong Curiosity] This benefit attribute is incredible, and the negative benefit attribute that comes with this identity is also quite deadly.
When the thirst for knowledge is too strong, eccentric scholars are willing to give up everything for the truth, such as safety and life.
Knowledge occupied the brain of the eccentric scholar and made his emotional intelligence very low. After entering the dungeon, he spoke for the first time: "What are you outside the game?"
Gao Mengtang hesitantly uttered a word: "People?"
Weird Scholar: “Impossible.”
Gao Mengtang: "...Are you assuming my race? Otherwise, can you do a DNA test for me?"
The strange scholar stopped talking. He took out the research notebook that came with his game identity and flipped through it. He immersed himself in the ocean of knowledge and forgot everything else.
The pharmacist recovered from his shock and glanced at his watch. "Time is running out. Let's explore the dungeon while we are still in good shape. The longer we stay in the dungeon, the faster our spirit value will drop."
He was the first to push open the iron gate, and just as he took a step inside, his whole body paused.
The floor number becomes "3"
They arrived at the 3rd floor.
No one was happy. The floor changes were too weird. The pharmacist slammed the door shut, retreated to the stairwell, and gestured to everyone to calm down: "Don't rush in. First, figure out the pattern of floor changes."
"We walked up from the first floor to the second floor, where we saw a monster with syringes stuck in its head. We panicked and ran downstairs to the third floor."
He Lun: "Looking for a pattern? Go up one level, then down one level."
"It won't be that simple," the pharmacist waved his hand, signaling him not to speak, "We have reached the first floor both going up and down. The first floor is a very special floor..."
"Do you remember the pink shopping bag? There was a dead kitten in it." Gao Mengtang interrupted with a smile.
"We were on the second floor and I said the shopping bag was different from the one on the first floor. Then we went up from the second floor and the floor number changed back to the first floor."
The other players were still confused. Gao Mengtang didn't hear a response, so he continued, "The occupant of Room 4, whose head is full of syringes, is also different from the occupant of Room 1."
The pharmacist exclaimed, "I understand. The first floor is a template. If you find any difference from the first floor on the following floors, you need to go down. If they are exactly the same as the first floor, you need to go up."
To put it another way, the first layer is normal. Above the second layer, there will be "abnormalities" different from the first layer.
If you find something unusual, go downstairs. If you find nothing unusual, go upstairs. The player has to choose between going upstairs and going downstairs.
Because everything was normal on the 1st floor, I made the right choice every time I went upstairs, and the floor number +1 became the 2nd floor.
If they make the wrong choice, the floor number will return to 1. For example, when they are on the 2nd floor, they find the pink shopping bag but choose to go upstairs, and end up back on the 1st floor.
The quickest way to verify whether the rules are correct is to go to layer 3 and take a look.
The game didn't make it difficult for them. As soon as they entered, they saw the word "injustice" written in blood on the door of room 308. There was no such bloody word on the door of room 108.
If you find anything abnormal, you should go downstairs.
Push open the corridor door again, the floor number changes to "4"
He Lun jumped up and cheered, "The pattern is correct! There's hope for passing the level. You're amazing. You figured out the pattern so quickly. Blind man, you! Are! My! God!"
The players were all delighted, cheering and jumping around Gao Mengtang. Only the weird scholar in the corner was holding a notebook as thick as a brick, mumbling to himself.
"Origin, beginning, 000. Endless, 999. Blind, with eyes that do not look to the mortal world... Mastering the laws, seeing through the fog... He..."
The pharmacist came up to the strange scholar and asked, "What are you looking at?"
"Hush!" The strange scholar raised a finger, "Don't disturb him."
The eccentric scholar's finger was like a dry branch trembling in the cold wind, pointing tremblingly at Gao Mengtang across the crowd. The bulging blue veins on the back of his hand spread along his arm and all the way to both sides of his temples.
The bloodshot eyes were like a broken but bright light bulb. The eccentric scholar stared at Gao Mengtang, half in surprise and half in fear: "This is a mystery."
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