After Baron Xushinige finished speaking these words, the forty-seven newcomers concentrated here, including Xia Li, followed him into the depths of the forest under the leadership of Rom and Nefiria.
After advancing approximately one li along a path paved with pebbles, quite a few people suddenly let out cries of surprise.
In front of them appeared a green light wall that seemed both present and absent.
“This is…” Xia Li was just about to open her mouth to ask when Xushinige had already preemptively given the answer.
“This is the periphery of the ‘Limbo’ area. Crossing this green light wall counts as entering the influence zone of the ‘Game,’” the baron said, “There are still two similar light walls ahead, yellow and red respectively. And the area before the red light wall and after the green light wall is called ‘Limbo’… you can also call it the ‘boundary line.’”
“In other words, a buffer zone between the outside world and the ‘Game field’?”
“You are correct, clever Miss,” Xushinige nodded with a smile, “The humans of the Golden Age of civilization established these ‘Game areas.’ Through systematically utilizing the ‘Extra-Rational Power’ that exists only on the planet Elysia, they could even to a certain degree distort the physical laws within the area. However, this also means that isolation must be properly done between the inside and outside of the Game areas… although it seems they did not succeed.”
“Did not succeed?”
“One mainstream hypothesis regarding the collapse of civilization in those days is that after interstellar shipping was severed due to the Confederation civil war, because of the loss of technical support, certain particularly complex ‘Game fields’ suffered fatal malfunctions,” Xushinige’s assistant Rom explained, “These malfunctions ultimately led to the uncontrolled spread of ‘Extra-Rational Power,’ causing technological civilization to ultimately become the exclusive possession of the ‘people of the heavens.’”
“Indeed, there are still at least a thousand remnants of ‘Game fields’ that have lost their functions in various places on the planet—however, a portion of them may be one-time fields, and not necessarily all caused by the great collapse of those days.” Xushinige said, “Of course, the Game field we are clearing today is a normally operating repeatable field.”
“In other words, these ‘Games’ also have the distinction between one-time and repeatable?”
“Exactly. The difficulty of ‘Games’ was divided by the designers of the past into six ranks, in order: ‘Soldier,’ ‘Knight,’ ‘Bishop,’ ‘Castle,’ ‘Queen,’ and ‘King.’ One-time fields are not common, often of greater difficulty, and basically all belong to the ‘Queen’ or even ‘King’ level. After successful clearing they lose their functions and gradually turn into ordinary zones, but the rewards are also extremely rich.”
“Then conversely, repeatable fields account for the majority, difficulty is generally rather low, and after a period of time they will restart?” Xia Li guessed, “Probably, the restart time is also inversely proportional to the difficulty?”
“Completely correct, your wisdom makes this one quite admire you!” Xushinige said in a slightly exaggerated tone.
Although she clearly knew the other party was deliberately flattering, Xia Li had to admit that this baron’s honey-smeared mouth was indeed very capable of pleasing girls—many of these girls he had gathered were probably also persuaded in this way.
“The simplest ‘Soldier’ level can reopen one week after the clear ends; ‘King’ level often requires one to two years.”
“But because the people who successfully clear are not many, the actual open time of ‘King’-level labyrinths is actually more than ‘Soldier’ level,” Rom interjected, “Many Seekers of insufficient ability who also dare not take risks make a living by grinding low-difficulty Games, and even fight among themselves for quotas.”
“Tch, those wastes have no future.” Nefiria coldly snorted.
“Wait, Games also have quotas?” Xia Li asked.
“Yes. Although a portion of Games can be carried out by one person, the majority require gathering enough people before they can begin—from two or three people to over a hundred people varying. It is said there are also large-scale Games that require five hundred or even one thousand people to carry out, but this one has never seen them,” Xushinige shrugged his shoulders, “Of course, the sizes of Game fields as well as the peripheral ‘Limbo’ areas also differ greatly. The ‘Secluded Forest Girls’ Academy’ we are participating in today counts as medium size; to begin the Game, at least fifty people are required.”
“No wonder you had to gather so many people before setting out.”
“Correct, and the requirements here are not limited only to these. The specific requirements… are here.” After walking to the front of another yellow light wall, Xushinige stopped before a black obelisk two stories high and placed one hand upon it.
Then, several swaying rays of light converged in the air above the obelisk, and a series of green characters quickly appeared.
Game Name: “Secluded Forest Girls’ Academy.”
Difficulty Rank: Bishop-level (LV3).
Number of Players: Minimum 50, maximum 100.
Game Mode: Survivor-type.
Number of Times Game Has Been Held: Cumulative 101 times, successful 99 times, failed (total wipe) 2 times.
Cumulative Average Mortality Rate per Field: 3.2%.
Whether Advance Prepayment of Rewards Is Allowed: Allowed.
Special Rules and Unconventional Threats: Present.
“Mm… it really doesn’t look very terrifying.” After quickly browsing through these characters, Xia Li muttered.
Although a 3.2% mortality rate was not considered low even on a battlefield, as the name implied, “Death Games” themselves were aimed at killing people. “Only” dying this little already counted as acceptable enough.
Of course, the people who breathed a sigh of relief were not limited to Xia Li alone.
The majority of the people in the loli legion Xushinige had assembled, after seeing these characters, also revealed expressions of relief.
“Everyone, as you can see, this ‘Game’ is one I specially selected. Its characteristic is that it has special clearing techniques; as long as one strictly follows the clearing process, there is even a high probability of clearing with zero deaths—this is also the reason I specially had everyone aspiring to step onto the path of Seekers come here to clear it.”
“Sounds good.” Xia Li said.
“Judging purely from data analysis, I think what this guy said may be the truth… but my intuition believes that things are probably not that simple,” Weeping of the Shadow muttered, “Under normal circumstances, the Game designers of the past would add large numbers of variables into the Games to reduce repetitiveness and avoid players groping out various obvious ‘no-damage clear’ processes. After all, if everyone is only grinding monsters according to a process, what fun is there left in this Game?”
“But these mortality rate numbers can’t be fake, right?”
“Uh, that indeed will not be. Game statistical data absolutely has no necessity for any falsification.”
“Then this can at least prove that, in terms of results, this Game is not particularly dangerous—at least by the standards of Death Games it is so.”
“I do not deny this kind of result, but my intuition…”
Just as Xia Li was carrying out this intracranial conversation with the sword on her back, a yellow double-decker bus suddenly drove out from the forest ahead.
Xia Li immediately recognized that this thing was precisely the school bus she had most commonly seen in her previous life.
“Everyone, take your equipment and board the vehicle in an orderly manner.” Xushinige said, “The Game is about to begin.”
After walking up onto the double-decker bus, Xia Li discovered that some things were placed on the seats of the bus; the majority of them were blue-and-white striped sailor-style dresses, plus pink backpacks and sailor hats, seemingly girls’ school uniforms, while a small portion were white shorts for males and light-brown shirts hanging staff name tags.
On the second floor of the bus there were also several changing rooms.
The intention of this design was extremely obvious: to begin the Game, one had to go in and change clothes.
“Eh… in this case, the armor I spent money to buy…” When the other lolis one after another entered the changing rooms, Xia Li was a bit dumbfounded.
“No problem, the Game only requires putting on the uniform to begin. It does not prohibit putting armor, bulletproof vests, combat gear, or other equipment on the outside,” Xushinige said to Xia Li with a smile, “At most it just looks a bit mismatched.”
“Whew… that’s good.” After obtaining the other party’s guarantee, Xia Li selected a school uniform close to her own figure, quickly changed in the changing room, then put her purchased armor back on over it.
When she returned to the first floor of the bus, the vehicle doors had already automatically closed, and on the large screen in front of the vehicle, lines of text appeared one after another.
Welcome everyone to formally begin the Game!
Survival-type Game Background Synopsis:
Saint Lian Academy is a boarding-type girls’ aristocratic school, located deep in a forest far from all the hustle and bustle of the marketplace. But one day, when the young ladies returned to school after the end of the holiday, the academy was suddenly surrounded by a bizarre white mist and lost contact with the outside world, while mysterious shadows also appeared in the surrounding forest.
Very clearly, some existence beyond common sense is approaching this academy step by step in the darkness. And what the female middle school students trapped in the forest must do is find a way to hold out until the sunrise five days later under the threat of this bizarre existence. At that time, all the demons and monsters will dissipate along with the first ray of sunlight.
Do your best to survive!