Infinite spooky game

"If the Mother Goddess doesn't allow us to see her, we will naturally get farther and farther away from her. The snow-capped mountains don't welcome us, so we naturally can't see the snow-capped mountains during the day. We can only let nature take its course and impress them with our piety."

Tashi muttered a long paragraph in a mysterious voice and continued to walk on his own. The sturdy and huge herd of yaks walked behind him, forming a moving hill in the white world.

The players didn't dare to follow them no matter what.

Walking further and further in the endless darkness, until you can no longer see any landmarks in the distance, that will be a sign of being lost. After wandering in the snowy mountains for so long, everyone more or less has a fear of being lost forever.

"It seems that you have all discovered that we have been walking in the opposite direction." Zhou Ke half squatted down and looked at the footprints on the snow. "When moving forward, the center of gravity of the body leans forward, and the forefoot part of the footprint is usually deeper, while the heel gradually becomes shallower.

"When you move backward, your body's center of gravity moves backward, and the indentation on your heel becomes more obvious. The indentation on the forefoot may be shallower or even have drag marks due to dragging or lack of thrust. And look at these footprints—"

"All the footprints were made when we were walking backwards." Dong Xiwen squatted down, observed the ground for a while, and made a judgment, "Does that mean we have been walking backwards all night? It's better to just keep walking in the same place.

"What kind of a messed up mechanism is this? This dungeon has done everything it can to increase the difficulty for us, even including a setting where the more you walk, the farther you are from the destination."

"Mirror." Fu Jue said suddenly, "It is known that the scene in the mirror is opposite to the outside world, and perception will also be disturbed due to visual errors, which is basically consistent with the situation we are facing now."

Dong Xiwen nodded in agreement: "You're right, the 'mirror' seems to be one of the important clues in this dungeon. It looks like it should be here. Isn't there a mirror in the inn at the foot of the mountain?"

He just agreed casually, but Lin Jue adjusted his glasses and thought: "I think we should go back to the inn. The mirror in the inn may be the key to breaking the deadlock."

……

[January 2014, 1, at the Snow Mountain Camp:

[The date is written randomly. Actually, I couldn't tell the exact time in this instance since I climbed the snowy mountain. It was always dark. I could only guess based on my body feeling that 24 hours had passed. But why wasn't it morning yet? When would it be morning? We had no idea.

[Let me first talk about what happened yesterday: Zhou Ke used the hymn to attract the sinners of the entire Shangri-La, forcing Lin Jue to activate the identity card effect on himself, and added the main task of "killing Lin Jue". We made an agreement that if we still can't find a way to pass the level by the day of the next day, Lin Jue will commit suicide.

[I don't understand why Lin Jue would be coerced by that massacre player, but from what I know about him, he may have thought about this route a long time ago, and Zhou Ke's behavior was just the last straw that pushed him to make a decision. But does a person like him really want to die here in such a sloppy way? I feel sorry for him, it's not worth it.

【After summarizing, Alexei, Zhang Hongbin and I were all affected by the dungeon mechanism and "turned back into children", with our memories regressing and our thoughts becoming childish. Lin Jue believes that climbing the snow-capped mountains can help slow down the process of aging. Whether it is to avoid "transformation" or to deal with the dungeon mechanism, it is time to take the next step - we climbed the snow-capped mountains in the evening.

[What's worse is that we seem to have lost ourselves in the mirror world without realizing it. We are clearly moving forward, but in the end we are moving backwards, getting farther and farther away from our destination. We plan to go back to the inn at the foot of the mountain. There seem to be some mirrors there, which may be the key clue to the way to pass the level.

[Fortunately, no matter what, looking at the current sky, it is still early for dawn. We are all still alive, and will continue to survive for a while until dawn comes. ]

In the time and space where Qi Si was, Chu Yining's diary refreshed a new page. Qi Si flipped through it for a while and learned about Zhou Ke's movements in another time and space.

Almost as he guessed, Zhou Ke, Chu Yining, Lin Jue and others were in the same time and space. After obtaining the [Ink Soul Scroll], Zhou Ke successfully used the tape recorder to take advantage of the situation and coerce Lin Jue to achieve his goal.

At this point, the ending of Zhou Ke's world line will be no surprise. The fate of those players twenty-two years ago will be directed along a predetermined trajectory, and there will be no other choice.

The light above gradually dimmed, and it was almost dusk. All the people who had climbed the snow-capped mountains gathered in the temple.

Fu Jue and the others arrived a step later, and entered the temple gate in the heavy snow. At the moment they arrived, there were several more layers of bones in the sacrificial pit, and only one-third of the distance from the ground was left. It must be Fu Jue's contribution.

Jiuzhou Tingfeng and others who followed Fu Jue had different expressions for a moment. Some of them already knew some of the secrets, while others looked as if their faith had collapsed.

But everyone knew that they were in the common danger of the snow-capped mountains and faced the irresistible threat of death. Fu Jue held the final decision-making power on the trolley problem, and they had no right to worry about the details.

After everyone sat down in the open space near the temple gate, Fu Jue stood up and walked towards the back of the temple. When he passed Qi Si, he paused slightly and said, "Qi Si, I want to talk to you alone."

"It just so happens that I have something to tell you." Qi Si stood up and said with a smile.

He had already guessed what Fu Jue was going to say, so he followed him confidently and, through his soul blade, instructed Lu Li and Xu Yao to keep a close eye on the others.

This temple hidden deep in the snow-capped mountains is a complete empty shell. Apart from a wooden frame, there is no other furnishings. It looks like a hollowed-out skeleton, with its spine standing tall in the cold wind.

The courtyard was filled with sacrificial pits, and there was almost no place to stand. Qi Si and Fu Jue climbed the escalator in the corner to the second floor platform, one after the other.

On the second floor, there was a row of rooms with dilapidated windows and doors. An old lama was sitting cross-legged in the room, his wax-dried flesh stuck to his bones, shriveled and rotten.

Qi Si stood outside the door, looking sideways at Fu Jue with an interested expression: "Speaking of which, I'm very curious. If there is anything, we must talk to them alone and not let them know."

"Sacrifice and offerings." Fu Jue said calmly, "According to the mechanism of this instance, we need to kill a large number of people and fill up the sacrificial pits before we have a chance to pass the level.

"It is known that those who have been killed will seek revenge on their murderers at night, and our ability to fight against ghosts is limited. Therefore, I hope that we can gather information as soon as possible and calculate the balance point between the number of sacrifices and the ability to escape."

What Fu Jue said was exactly Qi Si’s assessment of the situation.

The Snow Mountain dungeon lets players know through dreams at night that all the killed people will gather in the Snow Mountain to find and seek revenge on their murderers; however, the next morning, the lamas tell players that they need to kill a large number of people to fill the sacrificial pit in order to have a chance to pass the level.

This is equivalent to putting a dilemma in front of the players: killing is a crime, so how many people can you kill and how great a crime can you commit in order to win?

Most players who enter the final copy can look at life and death calmly. Moral issues are not taken into consideration. All players need to calculate is the comparison between risks and benefits.

Qi Si raised his index finger and tapped his chin, then smiled and said, “Compared to the balance point, I think it is more important to calculate how many more people need to be killed to fill the sacrificial pit.

"That shouldn't be a very small number. If the final instance is a means for the rules to reclaim the entire world, even if we fill it with everyone in the world, it might not be enough."

"Not necessarily." Fu Jue shook his head slightly, "This copy exists in different time and space, and there is a sacrificial pit in each time and space. The number of sacrifices required should be the total number of people divided by the number of time and space.

"If the total number of people is fixed, the earlier the sacrifice is performed, the more options there are."

His tone was extremely calm, as if he was just talking about simple math problems rather than real human lives.

When the decision was made in the name of the future of the world, it seemed that as long as the giant ship called "human destiny" could continue to sail, any number of lives and deaths could be called necessary sacrifices. Qis laughed: "It's interesting, those people regarded them as saviors who could save them from danger, and made the decision to fill them into the sacrificial pit without any hesitation.

"No matter how many people the so-called massacre players cheat or kill in the dungeon, it's still not as many as the number of people you sacrificed in one decision. It's quite ironic, isn't it?"

"I will kill all my puppets." Fu Jue seemed not to hear Qi Si's sarcasm, and continued speaking in an unchanged tone, "The death of the massacre players is not a pity. I use the Xila Guild as a banner to gather these low-value unstable elements under my command, and use their lives to exchange for the survival of innocent people. This is in line with the principle of pragmatism."

Qi Si understood, still smiling: "I understand, I will first detonate the insomnia bacteria and kill a thousand people. If a thousand people are not enough, then ten thousand people."

He paused, then changed the subject: "But there is one thing that I cannot help but be concerned about: What position does the ancestor god occupy in this sacrifice? The sacrifice, the priest, or the one being worshipped?"

"The one being worshipped." Fu Jue raised his eyes to the peaks of the snow-capped mountains in the distance, his glasses reflecting the pure white light of the snow. "He is a god worshipped by the lamas in this world. If we want to do anything to him, we can only lure him out by offering sacrifices."

"That's a good idea." The smile on Qi Si's face finally became sincere. "Then I wish us a happy cooperation in advance."

The world line has developed to this point, and there is no room for maneuver. If left alone, the ending will most likely be the same as the first era. After the end of the world, the ancestor gods will create a new world, and all other creatures will be reborn.

If the gods want to change their fate of being devoured, they can only kill the ancestor god and replace him in the doomsday. Currently, the players are in the open, and the ancestor god is in the dark. No matter how many plans there are, they cannot be implemented unless the ancestor god appears through sacrifice.

This was an open conspiracy. As a tool chosen by the rules, it was the duty of the Ancestral God to accept the sinful sacrifice. Even though He knew about Qi Si and Fu Jue's plan, He could not ignore it and would have to join the game.

The conversation took only ten minutes from beginning to end. Many important matters were often decided decisively because both parties had made the decision before the negotiations began. The so-called discussion was nothing more than a euphemistic notification.

Lin Chen sat blankly on the threshold of the temple, looking sideways at the two figures standing on the second floor. Seeing Qi Si coming down the stairs, he quickly looked away and stared at a small piece of residual snow that had melted on the ground.

He was not ignorant of what Qis had done.

Those players kept cursing Qis as a massacrer and a madman. He heard and saw it all when he was collecting information. Anyone who was not a fool could guess the truth.

But before he saw Qi Si harming people with his own eyes and obtained solid evidence, he always had a glimmer of unrealistic hope, that maybe everything was just a misunderstanding, a smear campaign by hostile forces with ulterior motives.

He is not a brave man, and is even a little cowardly. He never has the courage to question or resist. He only forces himself not to dwell on dilemmas, just like an ostrich in the desert that will bury its head in the sand when in danger, deceiving itself and others by pretending that everything is fine.

Even though he knew that Qi Si was not as selfless and pure as he imagined, he was still used to deceiving himself: Qi Si had his own reasons for doing what he did, just to sacrifice a few people and benefit the majority in the trolley problem. After clearing the final instance, he would revive everyone...

But after seeing the corpses piled up in the ice pit and hearing Qis's nonchalant tone, Lin Chen could no longer turn a blind eye.

The false veil of the past was torn apart, the illusion was shattered, and for the first time he had to look directly at the real Qi Si——

The young man, whom he regarded as a kind and righteous savior, was actually an out-and-out madman who disregarded human life.

Was it painful? Was it sad? Lin Chen was stunned for a long time, and what he felt most was a sense of relief. The unresolved issue had been resolved, and he didn't have to deceive himself anymore.

The remaining question is: How should he face Qi Si?

"People should be responsible and remember favors. You also said that if someone helps you, no matter what the motivation is, you should not harm them."

His mother's words echoed in his ears, and Lin Chen discovered that the problem that he had been unable to solve had an answer long ago.

No matter what, Qis saved him three times, and he owed Qis three lives. Until he paid off the debt, he should belong to Qis.

At worst... I can pay with my death.

"What are you thinking about?" Qi Si's voice sounded at the bottom of his mind, as light as ever.

Lin Chen closed his eyes and answered truthfully: "I was thinking about the sacrificial pit and the people who died in it."

"Oh?" Qi Si did not comment and motioned for him to continue.

Lin Chen swallowed his saliva and asked, "Brother Qi, the lama said that he would use the dead to fill the sacrificial pit. Will you kill more people?"

"Yes. This is a joint decision between Fu Jue and me." Qi Si said with a smile, "So, are you going to oppose me?"

Silence spread in the temple. The wind and snow on the mountain grew stronger, blowing against the doors, windows and wind chimes, making sharp and strange sounds.

After an unknown amount of time, Lin Chen said in a very light voice: "Brother Qi, I still owe you three lives."

……

On the other side, Zhou Ke and others gathered in the inn at the foot of the mountain.

Seventy-two hours have passed since we first climbed the snow-capped mountains, but the sky above us has remained dark from beginning to end, as if we were in the polar regions in winter, and there would be no sunlight for months.

Lin Jue wrapped himself in a blanket to keep out the cold, and a hint of worry finally appeared in his calm eyes: "I suspect we are trapped in the darkness, and the day will never come again."

Xiao Fengchao, who had been slumped on the sofa, stood up at the right time and raised the white card between his fingers: "Here is a worse news: I just read the fortune for several people whose birth dates are known, and everyone's destiny line is broken here."

As he spoke, he formed a black card in his hand: "I was wondering if I could change my identity card in time, such as [Forbidden Scholar], maybe I could disturb my fate a little bit."

“No need.” Lin Jue shook his head gently, “We all climb the mountain together. If we encounter a new death point——”

"Fu Jue." He turned his head to look at the young man in a black suit beside him, "Please kill me as soon as possible."

Fu Jue's pupils shrank slightly: "Senior, why..."

Lin Jue raised his hand and made a gesture to signal silence, and said calmly: "Using my death in exchange for everyone else's survival is in line with the principle of pragmatism." (End of this chapter)