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Mu Ke quietly moved behind Charles.
He didn’t know the identity of Charles who suddenly appeared but Mu Ke could sense from the current situation that Bai Liu would receive Charles’ help.
“I don’t think being obsessed with a man and being fascinated by a horse you bet on every year according to the season is the same thing.” All the emotions on Hearts’ face were deeply hidden but there were undercurrents surging in her burgundy eyes. “Don’t compare your animal nature to me, Charles.”
“Then I apologize for my indecency.” Charles bowed while his smile widened. “For me, animal nature is a positive word. I appreciate people with an animal nature.”
Hearts was silent for a moment. She realized that Charles was determined to fish out Bai Liu. Once this man made a gamble, no one could stop him.
She didn’t hesitate to turn to Titan. “Titan, besiege them.”
A huge black sphere fell from the sky like a black hole. It was about to swallow Charles, Wang Shun, Mu Ke and his group behind him.
However, Charles wasn’t flustered at all. He raised his cane toward the falling black sphere.
The black sphere swallowed along the cane section by section. It was about to touch the tip of Charles’ nose when he took off his top hat. He dragged the black sphere back along the cane while flipping over his top hat and pressing it against the black sphere.
As if by magic, the black sphere was restrained by the top hat and pressed into Charles’ white glove. It turned into a black, bouncing ball in the palm of his hand.
[System notification: Player Charles has used the skill Phantom Eater.]
[This skill can devour the opponent’s skill in reverse at the moment of attack, converting it into some type of magic item that can be stored.]
“It is useless to activate skills against me.” Charles threw the bouncing ball in his hand with great interest. Then he took off his white gloves, wrapped them around the ball and placed it into Wang Shun’s pocket along with the gloves. “It is dirty. I will give it to you.”
Wang Shun, “????”
He had long heard that Charles was a trivial person but he hadn’t expected it to reach this point—he didn’t want it just because it bounced twice on the ground without any dust.
Out of nowhere, Charles slowly conjured a pair of white gloves and put them back on. He raised his hat to Titan and Hearts and smiled in a reserved manner. “Queen, allow me to retire first.”
Then Charles turned around, extended his elbow to Wang Shun, raised his chin slightly and gestured politely twice, tapping his elbow twice with his index finger.
Wang Shun was confused before realizing that Charles was telling him to hold him.
= = This person really had many things…
Wang Shun complained in his heart but he obediently held Charles’ arm and Charles walked forward with satisfaction.
He headed over to Mu Ke and smiled. “I believe you have seen my sincerity toward Bai Liu. You shouldn’t mind going to No Man’s Land together with us, right?”
Mu Ke had waited for this President Charles with bated breath for a long time. By this point, he had stabilized himself and didn’t panic or act rude. He held out his hand without humility and spoke very sincerely, “I don’t mind at all.”
“You are welcome to come with us.”
The No Man’s Land.
The moment Charles intervened in this matter, the ordinary audience members, who had been afraid due to the strong blockage of a large guild, now came over.
Due to the twists and turns in Bai Liu’s containment, the popularity in the forum had reached the limit. A lot of discussion finally broke out and this made ordinary players curious about this matter.
A large number of ordinary spectators sneakily followed behind Mu Ke’s group. They pretended to be passing by while actually following them all the way to No Man’s Land.
They couldn’t be blamed for pretending. It was because the people of the Kings Guild also followed. The crowd who came to eat melons didn’t dare to be too public.
The two camps faced each other at the entrance of the No Man’s Land, where not even a single ghost could be seen. Charles and Hearts stood in front of the guild members and faced each other. It was as if they could fight at any time.
The spectators next to them were excited yet silent. The league hadn’t even started and they were already eating wave after wave of melons.
In the No Man’s Land, the old television sets flashed with static and noise. From time to time, under the black and white stripes, the distorted shadow of a person could be seen crashing against the TV screen. Most of them were calling for help.
The hoarse and desperate voices passed through the damaged speakers on both sides of the TV, stretching out into a strange sound where the original words were unable to be heard. There was an unspeakably, eerie sense of infiltration.
The players trapped in No Man’s Land appeared intermittently in the black and white televisions, like ominous videos used to commemorate their deaths.
The No Man’s Land was flanked by dazzling, white, smooth walls. The old FM TVs were stacked horizontally and formed a mountain of TVs that stretched to the deepest part of the No Man’s Land.
No one knew if there was an end to the No Man’s Land because no one had ever reached the end.
This place was called No Man’s Land but it wasn’t uninhabited. Rather, it was full with people who had exhausted everything and still wanted to live desperately.
These people lost their names in the game and their right to exist as human beings. They could only become monsters who forget their way in the noisy old TVs.
It was the first time Mu Ke had come to this place and he was shocked from the bottom of his heart, especially when Wang Shun sighed and told him that many of the players in No Man’s Land were newcomers playing the game for the first time.
“If newcomers who enter the game can’t get the recognition of the audience and don’t receive points from the audience, they won’t be able to buy items and it will be very difficult for them to pass the level.”
Wang Shun’s eyes were filled with deep pity. “They will quickly fall into the No Man’s Land. The only thing they can do is delay the process of gradually being alienated so that they don’t die as quickly.”
“It is very painful. They don’t have any hope and just rely on their instinct to struggle in the game, waiting for someone to save them.”
Mu Ke stared blankly at the mountain of TVs and asked softly, “Is it… like me in Siren Town?”
“Yes,” Wang Shun replied. “If Bai Liu hadn’t saved you at the time, this place would’ve been your graveyard.”
“On many occasions, these people don’t need a lot. Just giving them a few points is enough for them to see the light of day again and climb out of this cemetery that is the No Man’s Land.”
Wang Shun turned to look at Mu Ke and sighed deeply. “It is a pity that few people in this game have such kindness.”
“Not everyone is as lucky as you to have a Bai Liu who would forcibly break through the dimensions to save you.” Wang Shun let out a long breath before a small smile finally appeared on his face. “Perhaps now, many people will be rescued because of Bai Liu.”
The crowd whispered about what Charles and Hearts were going to do.
Hearts glanced at the mountain of endless TVs before turning to the still smiling Charles. “Are you sure you want to waste so many points to fish Bai Liu out of this junkyard?”
“It isn’t a waste,” Charles retorted with a smile. “All consumption that pleases me is reasonable entertainment. Isn’t Bai Liu very interesting?”
Hearts didn’t reply to this question. “You are a really incomprehensible man.”
Charles bowed and accepted the words. “Thank you for the compliment.”
“How many points are you going to spend until you stop?” Hearts asked.
Charles straightened up and looked at the pure white background of the No Man’s Land. He turned the diamond ring on his thumb and squinted. “—Until I see Bai Liu reappear in front of me.”
Mu Ke took a deep breath. He stood in front of the guild members and gave an order on behalf of Charles. “Wait. Charles will transfer one million points to you but there are limits to these points. You can’t spend recklessly.”
“The only function of the points given to you is to charge the players in the No Man’s Land. Each small TV will be charged with 5 to 10 points. During the time when you are charging points, you must like and bookmark it until you see the small TV go out.”
“Mark the positions of the small TVs that don’t go out after 10 points and hand it over to me. I will conduct a secondary analysis of the player inside and determine if the player is suspected to be Bai Liu. Then we will carry out a secondary round of charging points as required.”
Mu Ke stepped forward and gave way to Wang Shun behind him while giving an introduction. “This is the data analyst of our guild, Wang Shun. The data of the small TVs will be handed over to him to figure out the statistics. After a comprehensive analysis, we will screen the small TVs in the No Man’s Land three times.”
“As for our famous number four on the rising stars list, Mu Sicheng—” Mu Ke glanced at Mu Sicheng, who had his head lowered silently for a while. “He will guard the entrance of the No Man’s Land to prevent the Kings Guild from interfering with our actions.”
Mu Sicheng raised his head and looked at Mu Ke with an air of gunpowder.
He took a deep breath and turned around irritably, not refusing or agreeing. He did get up and stand at the entrance of the No Man’s Land, chin slightly raised as he met the eyes of any foreign guild members.
Mu Sicheng sensed Mu Ke’s hostility toward him, which made Mu Sicheng very unhappy. The thing that made him even unhappier was that at this time, Mu Ke was really much more organized than him!
After speaking, Mu Ke glanced around at the guild members in front of him. “Is there anything you don’t understand?”
The guild members listened stupidly.
They had been in the Scavengers Guild for so long and had never seen one million points. Now each of them was going to get it and they had to spend it all to save a person they had never met. They could’ve never imagined such an exciting thing in several lifetimes. They were all dizzy and almost unstable on their feet.
The onlookers next to them heard this and were even more stunned. They looked at Charles, who was wiping his cane like nothing had happened. Then they stared at the No Man’s Land where TVs were piled up like mountains without any end.
Charles… was joking right?
At least tens of millions of points had to be spent to find someone among so many TVs!
Soon, they discovered that Charles really wasn’t joking.
The guild players walked up to Charles one by one in turn, trembling as they held up their system panels and waited for the transfer. Once the transfer was successful, they walked away in a daze.
Tens of millions of points were transferred but from beginning to end, the curvature of Charles’ smile hadn’t changed.
He gently patted the stunned guild members on the shoulders. “Now, find your hidden guild leader.”
***
The temple.
In the middle of the table was a card that was suddenly flipped over. The character on the card was a gentleman pulling his hat down to cover his smiling face.
The man with the hood covering his face thoughtfully tapped his finger on it and said with a smile, “Interesting. There is a magician card that doesn’t belong to the werewolf camp or god camp. The situation has changed.”
“Do you still want to play any cards, Prophet?” He asked with a smile.
The prophet was silent for a moment. “No.”
“The field has become chaotic like this..” Beneath the hood, the man’s eyes moved between the werewolf, the hunter card, the witch standing beside him, the rose card that was about to disappear and the magician card that suddenly appeared. Then he showed a smile that wasn’t afraid of the world being in chaos. “Then I will add more chaos.”
A brand new card appeared between his index and middle fingers and he placed it on the right side of the werewolf card.
The eyes of the prophet changed slightly the moment he saw the card.
It was a card that was different from the other cards. It didn’t follow the rules. The moment it was placed on the table, the character on this card was suspended on the table like a pop-up book. He held a fancy, horned toy gun and ran around the table.
He wore a pair of over-the-top pom pom pointed boots, fluffy, bright red carrot pants, puffed sleeves on his upper body and a lace neckline that wrapped around his entire neck.
A two-pointed, two-colored hat with bells hanging from it jingled as he ran.
His face was covered with thick white oil paint from his face to his neck and a bright red circle was outlined around his mouth. His eyes were drawn over in black pen and hid a pair of green eyes while small, golden curls shone on the top of his head.
This was obviously a clown.
The clown held up his horned gun and shot it all over the table. The moment he saw a card, he shot wildly at the face of the character on the card and let out a creepy, sharp and piercing laugh of pleasure.
The clown made a mess on the table before standing on the werewolf card with his head tilted. This was the only character card that hadn’t been destroyed by the gun.
“King!” The clown jumped happily, opening his green eyes that were as bright as jewels. Then he lay down on the werewolf card, curled up against the face attached to it, pressed his face against the werewolf and laughed. “King! Found my king! (English)”
“What did you do to the clown?” The prophet’s tone had a rare solemnity. “This isn’t the normal state in which the clown first appears in the game. The clown seems to remember Bai Liu but in this timeline, Bai Liu and the clown haven’t met once.”
The man sitting opposite him crossed his hands on the table and smiled. “Are you afraid? Do you think that the clown’s influence on Bai Liu will turn him into Bai Liu (6)?”
The prophet coldly retorted, “You are breaking the rules of the game.”
“I never break the rules of the game.” The man released his folded hands and smiled. “I just released the clown card in advance but didn’t let him appear.”
The prophet stopped as he was about to speak. “What…” Does that mean?
Before he could ask, the prophet suddenly paused and stared in disbelief at the man sitting across from him. “You… put him in the No Man’s Land?”
“Yes, the first single player game I made the clown log into was a level three game. He was naturally trapped in it and couldn’t get out. Soon, the audience lost interest in the poor and unskilled clown who couldn’t pass the game and they left him in the No Man’s Land.” The man spoke with pity.
The prophet’s voice trembled slightly. “…How long has he been in the game?”
The man answered casually, “He has lived with those monsters… for almost 10 years. I didn’t really let him die and now he is almost crazy.”
The prophet stared at the person across from him. “Why does the clown remember Bai Liu?”
The man leaned forward and approached the prophet. “I decided to give him hope so he could persevere in the level three game that tortured him to the verge of suicide. I decided to give him hope so I let him dream every night.”
“The clown in the dreams will see a man called Bai Liu (6) coming to save him like a god, taking him to kill all sides and be invincible, becoming the champions.”
“This person completely understands him, agrees with him and appreciates him. This man is the only one in the world he can follow. He is the most loyal clown and this person is his king.”
The man looked down at the clown on the table. “This dream made him persist until now.”
The prophet closed his eyes and his breathing became stagnant. “You made the clown… dream about the contents of other timelines. However, this timeline is completely confused and Bai Liu didn’t save him…”
“The clown waited in the game for the Bai Liu who didn’t appear for 10 years…”
“Congratulations, now his waiting has finally ended.” The hooded man smiled more happily. “Bai Liu will appear in the No Man’s Land and save him.”
“Have you heard a fairy tale?” This person abruptly brought up another topic. He was obviously very interested in talking about this fairy tale with the prophet and continued without waiting for the prophet to answer. “The story is called The Fisherman and the Devil.”
“Once upon a time, there was a clown-like devil who was sealed into a bottle by God. He was in so much pain that he couldn’t escape. No one could see or feel his pain. He could only survive due to the illusions in his dreams.”
“He made a wish in his heart that if the man rescued him in the first year, he would give the man money to spend all his life.”
“Unfortunately, that man didn’t show up. In the third year, the clown thought that if the man rescued him at this time, he would play in the league for that person and become that person’s subordinate.”
“However, that man still didn’t show up. In the sixth year, the clown thought that if the man rescued him at this time, he would willingly be the man’s dog and sell his soul to the man.”
“That man still didn’t appear.”
He looked at the prophet, the curvature of his mouth unchanged. “It is the 10th year and the person the clown was waiting for finally appeared. What do you think the clown will do to Bai Liu, the king he has been waiting 10 years for?”
The prophet opened his mouth. “He will kill Bai Liu.”