1:00 am, reality, Bai Liu's apartment.
Du Sanying was already deep asleep. Bai Liu and Tang Erda were sitting on opposite sides of the coffee table. On the table were many stacks of documents and information.
Tang Erda placed an ashtray by his feet, filled with many stubbed cigarette butts. There was still one burning in Tang Erda's mouth as he frowned, looking at the material on the table. "This is what I just had Su Yang print out and send over regarding the information of the Yangguang Apartment Complex's owners."
"If it's really as you've analyzed, then the characteristics of the group of homeowners from the unfinished Yangguang project should be in line with the prototype image of the Russell Cemetery Guild."
Tang Erda paused for a moment in his speech. "But the strange thing is, if these people are actually players in the game, their living patterns are too…"
Bai Liu lowered his gaze at the material. "Ordinary, right?"Going to work, getting off work, eating, living, taking leave—there were nearly no traces of this group of people joining a strange game. They were just a group of exhausted, ordinary people, struggling to survive.
"Right. Game players are more or less a little extreme, wanting to use game props that are outside the rules of reality to escape the pressures and punishments of the real world, like the Fanatic Lambs we encountered in the past." Tang Erda pinched his eyebrows. "But although this group of people has been under heavy pressure, there are absolutely no such signs."
"This is also the reason why we didn't find anything unusual during last year's investigation. They completely didn't seem like game players."
Bai Liu pulled out a few documents and lowered his head to read them, asking as he read, "Captain Tang, if you were a homeowner of that unfinished building and you entered the game, what would you do?"
Tang Erda was only slightly startled, then answered without hesitation. "Use points to exchange for props to trace the tracks of the developers who fled and drag them back."
Bai Liu pulled a document from the pile he was reading and placed it in front of Tang Erda. "Is that so?"
A newspaper clipping was attached to the document—[Unfinished Yangguang Building Project developers suspected to have turned themselves in to the authorities, stating that the embezzled funds were no longer in their possession and had long been transferred away to an overseas shell company].
"After the developers turned themselves in, all their assets were mortgaged to cover the shortfall of the Yangguang project, but it still fell far short. In the end, they were sentenced to life imprisonment." Bai Liu raised his gaze to look at Tang Erda. "Now the developers have been arrested, but that doesn't make any difference. You still have to repay the loan every month, still have to painstakingly earn points in the game, and survive. What will you do next?"
Tang Erda fell into thought, and for a while, he didn't know what he should do, feeling a sort of emptiness, like there was nowhere to settle. He slowly started to say, "…I might continue investigating the developers' affairs…"
But halfway through, he stopped.
"Investigating the developers has no meaning. Even if you kill them, it would be useless, only wasting points. Once the money goes overseas, it's like a drop in the ocean. After three years, it's probably been laundered several times, and the chances of recovering it are extremely slim." Bai Liu calmly analyzed. "The only thing that can solve their predicament is money."
"The points earned in the game can be exchanged for money, but they are a lifeline. They have to play the game once a week to survive, so they probably wouldn't dare touch the points they've saved. They can only, and must, rely on working to earn money to pay off their mortgages."
Bai Liu met Tang Erda's gaze. "What you said actually isn't wrong. They're merely a group of ordinary people. They only wish to live an ordinary life, but these sudden extreme emotions brought on by the incident pushed this group of ordinary people into the game."
"The game doesn't have the solution to solve their problems, instead giving them a huge burden. Despair and pressure piled up like a rolling snowball. Balancing work and the game is a level of life intensity no normal person can endure."
"They entered the game to escape reality, yet in the game, they still have nowhere to escape. So, they joined Russell Cemetery."
Tang Erda, his expression serious, picked up the newspaper. "These people all have stable jobs, families, normal social connections, and friends and relatives. They are all facing the same problems together. According to my understanding, even if they encountered some difficulties, they shouldn't have collapsed so quickly, reaching this point in just three years."
Bai Liu looked at the black-and-white photo in the newspaper. These were all people who jumped from the building last year. He quietly said:
"What caused them to collapse may not have been three years."
"But thirty years."
Bai Liu's gaze fell on a black-and-white photo of someone named [Wang Shuping], with the newspaper beside it labeled [Thirty-Year Loan]:
"Whether in the game or outside of it, a problem lasting three years might not be a big deal, but if there's no hope in sight for thirty years, it becomes an enormous test for ordinary people. With a mortgage, at least there's a visible path to repayment, but in the game, there's no visible hope. I think this is the main reason their spirit collapsed."
Bai Liu looked at Tang Erda. "Not everyone is as tough as Captain Tang, able to endure hundreds of worlds in the game without seeing any hope."
Tang Erda fell silent. He extinguished the cigarette in the corner of his mouth, leaning back on the sofa and exhaling a mouthful of smoke. Then he suddenly asked, "Bai Liu, if you were the guild master of Russell Cemetery and wanted to save these people, what would you do?"
"Use every method to win the league once." Bai Liu pulled out the documents of the homeowners one by one, quickly scanning through them. "Only winning the game once can solve the problem of money, and the game can be solved in one go."
"Points can be used to repay the loans, solving the problems of the ordinary people within the guild, but that desire—"
Bai Liu looked at Tang Erda. "I think that guild master probably wants to wish everyone to leave the game."
"This isn't a game where ordinary people can survive. Ordinary people in this game will either go insane or die. He wants everyone to keep living, so he must have everyone leave the game. Aside from winning the league, there is no other way."
"This naive idea clearly shows they haven't heard Captain Tang's story. They're probably a fairly young person." Bai Liu's motion of shuffling through the homeowners' documents finally slowed. He pulled a sheet from the stack, placed it on the coffee table, rotated it 360 degrees, and pushed it in front of Tang Erda. "This person—can Captain Tang investigate his information in detail?"
Tang Erda's gaze fell on the document Bai Liu slid over—
[Unit 2701 owner: Yuan Guang — leader of the group of affected Yangguang homeowners].
The last day of the preseason and midseason tournaments, in the Wandering Circus meeting room.
Tang Erda, who had spent all of last night going through documents, rubbed his temples and closed his eyes to rest. Bai Liu, who had been up until 4 am last night reading the information, was holding his chin with half-closed eyes, while Mu Sicheng, Liu Jiayi, and Mu Ke had long been waiting in the meeting room. These three looked relatively alert.
Wang Shun pushed open the door and came in. He looked around and sighed, "Today we're facing off against Russell Cemetery."
"Before heading to the viewing pool, I first have some good news to announce."
Wang Shun tapped and opened the system panel. "As mentioned before, after the last tournament, Guild Master Bai's popularity ranking rose to 73, making him the first player on our team to hold a death immunity card."
"And today, we have our second player with a death immunity card."
Wang Shun's gaze slowly moved toward Mu Sicheng. "The delayed effects of the last tournament, combined with God Mu's recent outstanding performance, raised your popularity to 98. Congratulations—you've earned a death immunity card."
Mu Sicheng was stunned, seemingly not fully processing it. Then he suddenly clenched his fist, jumped up, and shouted, "Yes!"
"I've already emphasized the importance of the death immunity card to all of you many times. Your focus shouldn't be solely on the current match; you also need to look ahead and consider future games. If we win this match, next we'll compete in the challenge matches against the eight major guilds selected for the midseason tournament."
"Today is also the last day of the midseason tournament. Not counting today's matches, based on the current point standings, the top eight guilds in total points are—"
Wang Shun tapped the system panel:
"1st place, Killer Sequence2nd place, King's Guild3rd place, Deer Hunter4th place, Golden Dawn5th place, Gambler's Alliance6th place, Kabbalah7th place, Heaven's Freemasonry8th place, Invisibility Cloak."
Wang Shun looked at everyone. "These eight teams, no matter which one, are top-tier powerhouses, and almost all of them have a full roster of death immunity cards. So even though we have already secured a spot in the playoffs, we can't slack off in today's match. We not only have to win, but we have to win beautifully in order to gain the audience's support and try to earn death immunity passes for all our team members in this match."
"And to accomplish this point," Bai Liu slowly opened his eyes, "we must first take out the player with the fog-type skill."
"If we let the opponent successfully use their skill to obscure the map and the audience's view, it will not only make the match harder for us but also prevent the audience from seeing what's happening, let alone gaining their support."
Bai Liu stood up and glanced around calmly. "Get ready—we're going to leave."
Everyone replied in unison: "Understood!"
Bai Liu turned around and walked forward. Tang Erda got up and, with big strides, walked beside Bai Liu. He leaned his head down and asked in a whisper, "After looking through the information last night, did you get anything?"
"Didn't get anything," Bai Liu replied lazily. "Aside from knowing that Yuan Guang and I had the same profession."
Tang Erda's expression tensed, and he instinctively asked, "Same profession? He's also involved in smuggling?"
"No." Bai Liu glanced at Tang Erda from the corner of his eye, half-smiling. "He's a graphic designer."
On the other side,
Yuan Guang sat nervously on the bench, shaking his leg, clenching his fists tightly, and taking deep breaths continuously, but his face was still flushed a purplish red.
Shi Qian, beside him, watched—both annoyed and amused. "You're supposed to be the guild master. Can't you show a bit of the presence of a commander when you're on the field? Is it reasonable to be this nervous?"
"From elementary school to university, and even at work, I've had to go on stage countless times to give speeches, introduce myself, and so on…" Yuan Guang slowly turned his head to look at Shi Qian. "Right now, I get just as nervous as when I go up to present my ideas to the chief designer."
Seeing Yuan Guang like this was truly pitiful, and Shi Qian couldn't help but bring it up again: "Two teams advance from the preseason. Even if we don't play this match, we can still make it to the playoffs. Why don't we just for…" feit.
"No!" After Yuan Guang's voice calmed down a little, he looked at Shi Qian. "We must fight this match."
"If we forfeit this match and go straight to the playoffs against the major guilds, a lot of our team members will definitely die, and we still aren't guaranteed to win. The Wandering Circus is the guild with the most funds we've faced recently. Both the team members who have already died and those who are about to die require compensation. Otherwise, their families won't be able to pay the mortgage, and many people have already missed this month's payment. If we don't win this match's gambling pool…"
Yuan Guang bit his lip hard and exhaled. "In short, I will definitely win this match!"
Shi Qian pretended to be annoyed as she retorted to Yuan Guang: "What, you? It's not just you—it's the two of us who will win this match!"
Yuan Guang was quiet for a moment. "Thanks. Originally, we were just colleagues, and it was I who dragged you into this mess."
Watching the people from the Wandering Circus approaching in the distance, Shi Qian also nervously clenched her sweaty fists and exhaled. "Base real-life relationships in reality and base game relationships in the game."
"We're standing here now." Shi Qian turned her head and smiled at Yuan Guang. "Then we're no longer colleagues, but comrades in arms!"
Shi Qian confidently said, "We will definitely win!"