What?! The Gamemaster And The Top Player Are Dating?! - Chapter 223

In every situation, it was better to solve the problem at hand rather than blaming the person that created the problem. This was something that both Li Ling and Zhihao believed in so, at this moment when Li Ling reminded Zhihao about the problem at hand, Zhihao felt a little guilty as he realized that his panic wasn’t going to help them win this thing.

Zhihao took a deep breath in and calmed himself down before speaking up, “So Alvi is acting alone and somehow, she had a connection to the dead company called LHA…?”

Li Ling nodded his head and almost wanted to sigh in relief as he saw that Zhihao had let the topic go.

“That’s right.”

“Wait…” Zhihao suddenly muttered out loud and everyone was silent as they looked at him curiously and noticed how his eyes widened in shock..

Li Ling could immediately guess that there was something Zhihao had noticed that they were all yet to realize.

“What is it, A-Zhi?” Li Ling asked.

“The final level,” Zhihao mumbled a response, “I think I know what the final level is going to be!”

“Huh?” Tian Xifeng tilted her head as she looked around, “Aren’t we already in the final level?”

Zhihao immediately shook his head as he explained in a hurry, “We are playing the five small screening tests that come before the final level!”

“Damn it…” Zhihao muttered to himself, “How could I not have realized it sooner?! This is so obvious!”

Kaoru was clearly confused as she stated, “Mastermo, I don’t understand you at all. What are you trying to say?”

“The winner at the end would get to enter the maze of death,” Zhihao spoke up as he tried his best to explain what it was that he had discovered, “This was what the system said at the beginning of the first competition. Do you remember?”

Li Ling frowned as he recalled hearing something like this, “That’s right. The system certainly said something of the sort.”

“One of the games that LHA released was called ‘The Maze of death’. Out of all of the other games, this one was much more of a failure. It was their lowest-rated game that was popular among only a handful of people. The game itself was quite interesting and challenging but it had time limits which frustrated most of the players who ended up abandoning the game because of it.”

“Were you a player?” Li Ying was the one who questioned curiously as she cut in between.

Zhihao nodded his head as he confirmed, “That’s right. I was included in the handful of people that actually enjoyed the game and tried to play it properly.”

“So… What you are trying to say is that this game has a connection with T.I.A.D’s final level?” Liang Feng asked cautiously.

Zhihao gulped in worry as he nodded his head and explained his reasoning for thinking as such, “The game was set up in a very different manner. You were given a number of set competitions where you compete with other players to win. They were called the screening tests and their purpose was to make sure that only the worthy players who actually have a chance of winning can get to the final level of their game. These screening tests had limited time and the more tests you solved, the lesser time you were given.”

“That’s exactly what’s happening!” Wang GuiYing announced as his eyes widened in shock.

Li Ling also nodded as he agreed with the man, “The more closer we get to winning the screening tests, the lesser time we have on our hands to complete the next test.”

“That’s why it’s important to solve the test fast,” Zhihao informed as he added, “At the end of each competition, the system announces the total time we have saved. In the original game, it was also something like this. The time saved in the screening tests were added up in the end and would result to more time given to you in the maze of death.”

“The maze of death also had a time limit?” Kaoru asked.

“It did. If I’m not remembering it wrong then the maze of death used to give you exactly ten minutes plus the time that you have saved during the screening tests.”

“Ten minutes?!” Tian Xifeng’s eyebrows creased together in worry as she frowned, “I feel like this game is trying to kill me with anxiety and panic.”

Li Ying rolled her eyes as she heard the woman complaining about the time.

Li Ying felt that the time given was the last thing they needed to worry about since the final level could only be solved by killing the gamemaster who just so happened to be her brother.

“I was one of the lucky ones who got to enter the maze of death and let me tell you… It’s not a pretty place.” Zhihao’s face cringed up as he recalled the memory where he had once played this game and gone through something that he could only consider as torture.

“This could help us,” Li Ling spoke up and everyone turned their heads to look at the man, “If the two games are really that alike then it gives us an advantage since A-Zhi already knows what happens in the maze of the death.”

“That’s what I’m thinking about as well but…” Zhihao suddenly sighed as he added with a bit of worry, “If the final maze of death is the same as the game then it won’t be easy even if we know how to play it.”

“But the information can be used to help us up to some certain extent, can’t it?” It was Zhou Xinyi who asked as he carefully thought about it.

“The final maze of death is just as dangerous as the name makes it sound. In the original game, it was a large building filled with deadly traps. One of the players was given the role of sheep while the rest were given the role of wolves. If you were a sheep, you were supposed to hide from the eyes of other wolves who might kill you and if you were a wolf, your mission was to hunt down the sheep. While this hunting game continues, the building you were in would also constantly change and lay traps that could be deadly for you. At the end of the day, you were supposed to look out for the traps as well in order to stay alive, but if no wolf managed to kill the sheep by the end of the game, all wolves in the game would automatically be killed as the final rule.”

“So if someone killed the sheep, all others would automatically pass the final level?”

Zhihao shook his head with a sigh, “I wish it was like that but no. That’s not it. The wolf that kills the sheep would be the only winner while all the other wolves would once again meet their fate of being killed by the final rule of the game. If you can’t hunt and kill, you’ll become the hunted. This was a rule that set all conditions against the players.”

“But it can’t be…” Liang Feng suddenly muttered as he thought about it deeply, “If it was still just a virtual game that did no damage to the real body of the player then this rule would have been accepted but… Our current case is different.”

“That’s why I don’t want to believe that my theory is true,” Zhihao responded as he added, “In the game itself, the scene of players brutally murdering other players, losing their sanity, and dying a gruesome death due to the traps were more than enough to traumatize a person. If such a game were to be organized in the real world with no change in rules, wouldn’t that be simply illegal?”

“This makes me wonder,” Kaoru spoke up and her face looked to be complicated as she continued, “How come there is no one else here? I’ve been noticing it for a while but the game came out of the device, however, why is it that we are the only ones looking to be affected? Why is there no one else panicking?”

“That’s a good question,” Zhihao nodded, “I have also noticed it. Such a big thing has happened and there is no panic among the people. The whole city is pretty much empty.”

“It’s really weird…” Li Ying also added, “It’s like everyone just straight up disappeared from this city.”

Zhihao’s eyes widened a bit as he commented, “Just like what happened in metropolis.”

Wang GuiYing couldn’t help but feel a shiver go down his spine as he remembered the time when they had played together in that level.

“But that’s impossible,” Li Ling pointed out, “That was a game and this is the reality. To evacuate the whole population is not something possibly, especially not if the reason behind it is a simple game.

Zhihao gulped as a scary thought went through his head, “How can we be sure that this is real?”