Chapter 173
With these words from the cloaked man, the peaceful and serene ink-wash lake suddenly changed.
Large swirling swathes of ink gathered together, then rose from the ground and condensed into a gigantic black fish monster in mid-air.
The fish monster was long and stout, with a large head, a long and sharp snout, and beady eyes that gleamed with a scarlet, ferocious light. It slammed violently into the stone floor tiles of the pavilion from below.
Bang!
Suddenly, Xie Xubai's body shuddered heavily along with the entire pavilion.
Bang!
With two impacts, the stone bricks Xie Xubai was standing on suddenly cracked, gradually opening wider with the violent impact. With a snap, large chunks of stone loosened and fell down in unison.
Bang!
After three blows, the floor tiles finally shattered, unable to withstand the force any longer, and fell away completely.
Xie Xubai's feet slipped and he fell into the empty air.
The fish monster was overjoyed. It slapped its tail on the lake surface and leaped dozens of meters into the air again, baring its blood-red maw full of sharp teeth at Xie Xubai, ready to swallow him whole!
Bang!
The fish monster crashed into an invisible barrier and fell heavily into the ink-wash lake, splashing up large, dark waves.
The fish monster was furious, splattering ink everywhere with its tail, yet it was unwilling to let go of the food that was about to be in its mouth.
The shadow was many times larger than the pavilion, and when it moved and lingered on the lake, it created a strong sense of visual oppression.
The piranha monster made no attempt to conceal its dangerous aura, occasionally surfacing to stare menacingly at the two people in the pavilion, revealing its greedy desire for flesh and blood.
A strong wind swept across Xie Xubai's calm face, causing his clothes to flutter and his hair to lift slightly.
The air was filled with the rich, ancient scent of ink, carrying a chilling coolness.
Seeing the ground beneath his feet shatter, Xie Xubai initially raised one eyebrow in surprise, but his expression didn't change much.
He was able to remain so calm, partly because he didn't experience a strong sense of weightlessness.
Secondly, he soon discovered that the chair he was sitting in, the chessboard in front of him, and the cloaked figure opposite him were all still in place.
Because at this moment, what is supporting them is no longer the pavilion floor.
Instead, there were countless pieces placed horizontally beneath the two of them, which had just acted as a barrier, blocking the fish monster's pieces.
These chess pieces are not normal sizes; each one has a cross-section as large as a bucket, and they are stacked on top of each other like a foundation.
The cloaked figure held a black chess piece, which was also black and emanated a crimson blood mist, as if the two were fused together.
Xie Xubai looked down at the soles of his feet.
Go generally uses two colors. Since the opponent has black, then he should be white.
As expected.
The white chess pieces rested on the soles of his shoes, radiating a hazy, soft white light.
But perhaps because they weren't carrying any pieces, the white stones were in a semi-transparent, blurred state, not real, like ice melting in the sunlight, ready to disappear at any moment.
The moment Xie Xubai stepped onto the chessboard, it was as if an invisible shackle had been placed on his body. That force seeped into his pores, penetrated his bones, and dragged his soul down heavily.
He couldn't get up, couldn't leave the chessboard, and couldn't use his strength to fight against the power of the rules.
A ferocious, man-eating fish monster roams the lake, with no obstacles for dozens of meters in between.
It's easy to imagine what will happen to them when these pieces that are holding them up completely disappear.
The cloaked figure asked leisurely, "What are you going to do, Xie Xubai?"
Xie Xubai remained silent.
The cloaked man smiled and said, "How about I tell you a way?"
"See those players? Aren't there many familiar faces?"
The cloaked figure lowered his voice and coaxed, "This time, the dungeon trial has removed regional restrictions. People from several continents have been randomly assigned to various game zones. Below is a place I randomly picked. But you are very lucky; almost all the players in this game zone are members from the Central Continent."
"During the trial at the hospital, your mental power exploded, infiltrated the system, broke through spatial limitations, and had a face-to-face, intimate encounter with all the viewers watching the live broadcast. It was a large-scale live teleportation event, and the effect was remarkable!"
I believe you can sense it yourself; many of those players are your followers, their unwavering faith so solid it's almost tangible.
"Those players who break the rules can't escape their inevitable death anyway."
The cloaked man's whitish eyes gleamed with intense malice: "Instead of letting them become nourishment for the dungeon and go to waste, why don't you use the power of faith to refine them into usable pawns to pave the way for the surviving players?"
"Isn't this what you and those other guys who followed in your footsteps have always done? To sacrifice a few to ensure the future of the many—what a moving, inspiring, and admirable spirit!"
The deliberately drawn-out tone was full of sarcasm.
Xie Xubai glanced at him indifferently: "Is your disdain for this place because no one is willing to sacrifice for a heartless person like you? Or is it that you don't even have one person who loves you?"
The cloaked man's smile froze abruptly.
Xie Xubai gave a cool, smirk: "How pathetic."
With a snap, the cloaked figure, who had been holding the table under his hand, twisted his fingers and broke off a small piece from the corner of the jade table, the veins on the back of his hand bulging.
He stared intently at Xie Xubai with the look of someone staring at a dead man, and said through gritted teeth in a gloomy voice, "You'll regret this."
Xie Xubai ignored him.
Now, the chess pieces hold the weight of their lives.
Besides winning and losing, Go can also end in a draw.
However, the chessboard in front of us appears to be a standard 19x19 board, but its edges are not closed.
This means that the real chessboard has no boundaries, and may be infinitely large.
As long as they have enough pieces, they can keep playing forever.
However, the game of chess has no time limit, but the dungeon trial does.
Does the cloaked figure's mention of "climbing the tower" mean that players can only clear this dungeon by reaching the top of the tower?
Since Xie Xubai wants the players to pass the level smoothly, he cannot think about delaying the time to achieve a draw.
He can't afford to waste time.
But the conditions for victory are not ambiguous; even though the cloaked figure did not explain the rules, they are clear and unambiguous.
—Eating a piece.
There is no limit to the number of pieces that can land on the board, but there are only ten pieces supporting each piece.
What happens to the player who loses ten pieces first?
Xie Xubai needed to verify his conjecture, so he re-engaged his consciousness into the world of the chessboard.
.
The toys on the nearby streets almost all stopped and turned to look at them.
Their faces reflected the innocent and cute smiles of the animated animals, which looked fake, but thick, transparent saliva seeped from their mouths, which were drawn with fake black lines, and fell to the ground with a splat.
If you listen carefully, you can also hear swallowing sounds.
The air was deathly still. A tall, thin figure in a black suit approached the female player's face, a chilling smile spreading across his face: "This beautiful and lovely lady, would you like to come with us?"
Where to go? Where to go?
What does "walking together" mean?
The female player glanced out of the corner of her eye at the bewitched player in front of her through the gap in their body.
The Slender Man was carrying a cart, and the players were walking towards it.
During the process, his eyes became increasingly vacant, his facial features sunken inward and flattened, his body gradually shrank, and his fleshy, smooth skin visibly became rough, no longer resembling human skin, but rather like...cloth?
Doll fabric!
They turned into dolls!
As the thin, ghostly figure drew closer, the pattern of the fabric on the back of the female player's hand became faintly visible.
Anyone who witnessed themselves transforming into a monster would probably be terrified.
But the female player suddenly sprang up and kicked the head of the approaching, thin, dark figure with a loud thud, and took the opportunity to pull her companion several meters away!
Upon discovering that half of her companion's body had been turned into a doll and she was barely breathing, the female player's expression turned serious, but she didn't panic. She quickly took out a purification item to suppress the contamination, while shouting to her teammates, "Identify the level of the monster in front of us!"
Two people reacted quickly and rushed over. One helped lift his unconscious companion and retreat, while the other calmly used an appraisal spell.
The All-Out Battle mode attracted half of the players, making this instance a massive event with nearly a hundred participants in just one game section.
But only a minority fight on the front lines of the first trial; most are just slackers who only experience the horror of the monsters on the live stream screen.
S-Rank Monster King Dungeon, Game House
The A-rank Ghost King dungeon alone is enough to intimidate most players. As for the S-rank dungeons, their true power can only be truly appreciated after entering them in person.
The air here is different from the outside world—heavy and oppressive. In every shadowy corner, it seems as if several pairs of clear, black and white eyes are lurking, grinning maliciously, as if they were pigs or sheep imprisoned in a fence, waiting to be slaughtered.
Seeing the gaunt, eerie figure smile and beckon to them, a chill ran down their spines and into their brains, raising goosebumps.
Countless players screamed in terror and fled in all directions in a panic.
Experienced people try to stop them, but they can't hold them back and have to let go.
This is an infinite world where life is a matter of life and death, and everyone is struggling to survive. Even a celestial being couldn't save a fool who insists on jumping into a monster's mouth.
Surprisingly, quite a few players stayed.
As the old saying goes, even if you haven't eaten pork, you've at least seen pigs run. Leaving aside the classic movie scenes of getting separated and solo-killed, just from the exposure to so many live streams, any viewer with a brain knows that you should never run around alone without the ability to protect yourself.
Some people are barefoot and unafraid of those wearing shoes. Since they don't have any points anyway, dying is fine; they won't mind being reborn.
Everyone was keeping one thing firmly in mind.
This trial instance has a player with a record of [9].
The dawn of victory is within reach, and regardless of whether they participated voluntarily or not, everyone's mindset has changed.
Faced with a monster that seemed almost invincible, he even felt a burning desire to fight.
The Speaker of Parliament gave a speech before the trial began to mobilize the entire population and boost morale.
With 150 million participants, the largest number of players are from the Central Continent, so there is a high probability of being matched with fellow players after random selection.
Therefore, the council chairman advised all players with lower ability stats that if they encountered danger, they should wait in place for three seconds unless the situation was extremely urgent. They had witnessed the power of unity in times of crisis, and if they were unsure of what to do, they should follow orders.
The players endured their fear and waited in place. Before long, the two teams arrived to take charge.
One team included the female player from earlier, and the other team was surprisingly made up of blondes and blue-eyed... foreigners?
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