secret dice.

Chapter 513 Life Diary

Zhuge Qian's diary looks thin, but it is very thick when you turn the pages, as if it is endless.

The previous patriarch of the Zhuge family was probably in his seventies when he disappeared. Judging from the content on the first page, he obtained this diary when he was middle-aged, and over the decades, he must have recorded tens of thousands of pages.

Of course, daily diaries usually don't have much useful content. They basically just record what you ate today, who you met, and what family affairs you handled. Occasionally, they would record some important events, such as the marriage of a younger generation in the family, the birth of a child, the death of an elder, etc.

How should I put it? Most of the diaries seem to be the life experiences of an ordinary old man. Major events in the cultivation world are rarely mentioned. Even if they are mentioned, they are mostly just mentioned in passing. There is no sight of the secrets that everyone expects.

"The contents of the life diary can be modified..." Zhuge Zi said, "You can add to it, or delete it. But no matter how you modify it, the records in the diary must be true. False things cannot be recorded in the diary."

In other words, the old man may have deleted some content that he didn't want people to see, and the previous life experience should not be able to see any clues. Everyone turned to the back, and finally, after skipping countless pages, they saw the record about the maze.

"I entered the Endless Maze. Not long ago, I heard from Elder Yuan that a little girl from the Hell Creek Family of the Federation had gone through this mission. According to the current intelligence, this maze should not have been cleared yet... I don't know if I can get out."

"There are eight people coming in with me, three independent cultivators, three official members of the Yuan Xiu Association, and two children from large families. One is Chen Jin from the Chen family in Zhuque Town, and the other is Ling Yue from the Ling family... I heard Ling Ao mention this girl before. She seems to be a newly rising genius of the Ling family. She joined the royal family at the age of 20 and has a promising future."

"After a brief discussion, we decided to explore together. However, this maze is too big, and the walls are extremely hard and immune to energy attacks. The nine of us have tried various methods. Even my percussion cannon can only leave a mark of more than half a foot deep on the wall, which is far from penetrating. In addition, the damage to the wall will heal automatically and cannot accumulate at all."

"Unfortunately, although I am at the peak, as an illusionist, my physical destructive power is weak. If it is the violent output of Master Yuan, I don't know if I can break it."

After reading this, everyone looked at Yuan Lao, who spread his hands and said, "I've tried it too. The energy basically dissipates when it touches the wall. It's impossible to move it at all with just a pair of bare fists..."

"Indeed..." Zhuge Zi nodded. "Even if you use a Noble Phantasm, energy attacks are basically ineffective. Physical attacks and attached attack effects are also useless. Grandpa's piercing cannon is a rare, purely physical killing Noble Phantasm, and it is of legendary quality. All functions enhance direct destructive power. If even that can't be shaken, then there's basically no way you can break the wall."

After hearing what everyone said, Luo Jun looked at his treasure box.

Because Yuan Lao was always by his side, he had not tried to destroy the wall, but without the support of Yuan Qi, it would be difficult for him to destroy the wall with his pure flesh... But if he used the Wanjun Hammer...

However, even if the destruction is successful, if there is no target, in such a large maze, smashing a few walls will be of no help. What's more, the walls have self-healing functions, and the damage cannot be accumulated. It is better to wait until more information is obtained.

Everyone continued to flip forward, and the next few days were all spent exploring the maze. They discovered two relics, which they exchanged for supplies, but they were not enough to sustain the consumption of nine people.

Finally, after five days, the team began to fall apart, and everyone decided to split up and act separately. Whether or not they could find supplies depended on their own abilities. Every week, they would return to the place where they parted ways to share intelligence. If they did not return, they would be assumed to have died in the maze.

As the most powerful peak warrior, Zhuge Qian was naturally a sought-after figure. In the end, everyone drew lots and decided that Chen Jin would work in a team with him.

"Today is the seventh day since we entered the maze, and also the second day of our separate operations."

"I don't know if it's an illusion, but I feel like my luck has gotten better since we separated. I found a relic this morning and exchanged it for supplies. In the afternoon, I came across a treasure chest. The treasure chest was guarded by a group of man-eating flowers. Chen Jin used his ability to burn the flowers clean. We easily opened the treasure chest, and inside were three silver ingots and a pile of copper coins."

"When I killed monsters before, they would drop ancient coins like this. I don't know what they are used for. But the mission rules show that there is a shop in the maze. Could this be used to buy things in the shop?"

…………

"Today is the eighth day since we entered the maze, and the third day since we separated."

"Very good. Today we came across an endless store. We exchanged the silver ingots and copper coins we obtained these days for more than 5,000 yuan and browsed the product catalog. Sure enough, there are clues about the exit here, but it costs 100,000 yuan, and it can only indicate the direction of the exit within one hour. It seems that leaving here is more difficult than imagined."

"There's no other way. We have to make sure we survive first. We spent over a thousand dollars and exchanged for three days' worth of food each. I don't know when we'll be able to find a store next time, but the things we exchanged can't be stored in the treasure box, and it's inconvenient to carry too much. If we eat sparingly, we should be able to survive a week."

…………

After reading this, Ma Qiao and Sun Xiaowei both looked at Luo Jun.

It must be said that Luo Jun's storage space treasure is really convenient. Without it, they would not be able to exchange so many supplies at once.

Of course, it's not just this, there's also a badge worth three thousand dollars a day, a video recorder that can record maps... The combination of these pieces of equipment means they have basically no pressure to survive.

According to the diary, the group action only lasted a few days before they had to split up due to the shortage of survival resources. However, Luo Jun's treasure and operation allowed him to easily support a team of four, as if he had already prepared for this maze...

Could it be that he knew what the mission was in advance and made a plan?
Continuing to flip forward, there was nothing noteworthy in the next few days, until the twelfth day.

"Today is the twelfth day since we entered the maze, and the seventh day since we separated."

"We returned to the place where we separated as agreed and waited for a day until the other four groups returned."

"We were divided into five groups before. In addition to my group, there are three pairs of pairs, one with two official staff members, one with two independent practitioners, and one with an official staff member and an independent practitioner. As for Ling Yue of the Ling family, she took the initiative to request her own group. This time, in addition to Chen Jin and me, Ling Yue and the official group and independent practitioner group are all back, and in the independent practitioner group, only the independent practitioner has returned."

"According to her, they encountered a powerful monster, the official was killed, and she managed to escape with great difficulty."

"We expressed our regrets and exchanged information. Except for us, the other groups did not encounter any shops. It seems that shops in the maze are not common."

"But Ling Yue came across a treasure chest, which happened to contain a lot of supplies, so we don't have to worry about food shortages for the time being."

"The two officials looked very bad. They only found a relic and exchanged it for some limited supplies. They managed to hold on until now. We gave them some food, and they survived."

"As for the surviving cultivator... her name is Aliang. I don't know if it's because there's only one person and the pressure on resources is relatively small, but she looks pretty good. But she seems to be frightened and a little absent-minded."

"This also makes me a little puzzled. Although the monsters we encountered along the way were not very weak, it should not be too stressful for a person of the Condensed Mind Realm to deal with them. If we can't defeat them, we can at least bypass them or escape. That official was also a sheriff of a big city with a lot of practical experience. How did he get killed?"

"Under our questioning, Aliang replied that the monster he encountered this time was completely different from the previous ones. It had an irregular body and a very strange shape, which made people feel physically uncomfortable when they saw it."

"Indeed, although the monsters in the maze are bizarre, their shapes are still harmonious and regular. The monsters she described are of a different style and are more like chaotic creatures."

"Chaos creatures occasionally appear in Chaos Missions, but this generally means that the Chaos Mission is contaminated... Could it be that the reason why no one has ever cleared this endless maze is because of the involvement of Chaos creatures?"

…………After reading this, Luo Jun looked at Yuan Lao in surprise: "Isn't it normal for there to be chaos creatures in a chaos mission?"

As soon as he said this, everyone else looked at him in surprise, and Ma Qiao even shouted, "Boy, you don't run into chaos creatures every time you go on a mission, do you?"

"That's not the case..." Luo Jun waved his hand. The last time he encountered a Chaos Creature was in the No. 6 Amusement Park, where he was almost tricked by a Chaos Creature. And the first time was at the Midnight Hotel. Now that he recalled it, it should be full of Chaos Creatures... If Midnight was counted, they had met not long ago...

"Your situation is rather special." Elder Yuan waved his hand and said, "Your first mission was a strange talk about rules. Such missions are basically in disaster areas invaded by chaotic creatures. Therefore, the rules you see often have contradictions and even contain traps."

"We named those twisted creatures Chaos Creatures because they only exist in Chaos Missions. Although the word Chaos is in their names, Chaos Creatures and Chaos Missions are essentially opposites. Chaos Creatures always tend to invade and tamper with the rules that destroy Chaos Missions."

"Generally speaking, the rules of a Chaos Mission should be clear and logical. Only after the invasion of Chaos Creatures, the Mission is polluted, and then contradictions and false rules appear, causing the difficulty of the Mission to increase significantly."

"So, the rule-based and weird-story-type missions are all contaminated?" Luo Jun suddenly realized.

"It can be said that the Rule Talk is the most severely polluted task by the Chaos Task. It has lost its original task characteristics, and all rules can only point to survival." Mao Xintong on the side also explained: "The rules in the task will try their best to ensure the survival of the participants, but at the same time, the invading Chaos creatures will also try their best to lure the participants into traps. Therefore, the upper and lower limits of the Rule Talk are very different. If you take the right path, ordinary people may survive, but if you make the worst choice, masters may be doomed."

"So, the maze has also been polluted?" Luo Jun thought of the strange creature that exploded the gold ingots, and the thugs and merchants in the black shop. He thought these chaotic creatures were just strange monsters, but he didn't expect that they were actually signs of pollution.

"This is normal." Elder Yuan nodded and said, "If it was an ordinary task, there is no reason why no one has solved it for so many years."

"Don't worry about it, let's continue reading the diary!" Ma Qiao suggested.

Several people continued to flip forward, and after Zhuge Qian and others exchanged information, they separated again. Zhuge Qian kindly asked Aliang if she wanted to join him in a group, but was rejected. She chose to continue exploring alone.

In the next few days, there were no special encounters. Zhuge Qian just kept exploring and collecting supplies to survive.

At first, they made regular appointments to meet, but soon, people from other groups stopped coming back, and the area near the meeting point had basically been explored.

During this period, they also encountered black shops, killed chaos monsters, saw the introduction of the Void Pass, and concluded that the combination of black and white shops could help them leave the endless maze.

But no matter how hard they tried to kill monsters, search for treasures, and crack mechanisms, they could not earn enough money to exchange for the final treasure.

Finally, after more than a month, there were only four survivors left.

Zhuge Qian, Chen Jin, Ling Yue and A Liang.

It was somewhat surprising that Aliang, who had lost his partner in the first few days and explored alone, actually survived.

After discussion, the four decided to leave the area.

In the next few days, they acted as a group, exploring and entering new areas. At first, they were similar to the previous areas, with monsters and shops, and then...

"Eh?" Zhuge Zi, who was in charge of turning the pages, was startled, because after a certain page, the diary was torn...

All that can be seen are the scraps left after the pages were torn off. There are a total of more than ten pages, and the papers below are all clean and have no writing on them.

Obviously, the dozen or so pages that were torn off were the last records of Zhuge Qian’s life!

"This Senior Zhuge is too torturous!" Ma Qiao said angrily, "Why did he tear it apart when we were about to see the key part?"

"He didn't tear it!" Luo Jun shook his head.

"How do you know it's not?" asked Macho.

Of course Luo Jun knew that since Zhuge Qian wanted to keep this diary on purpose, he must be trying to convey a message. How could he possibly tear up the diary himself?
The only possibility is that someone, or something, destroyed the diary after his death!
But this diary is in the treasure box, how could someone else destroy it?

No... Luo Jun frowned and looked at Zhuge Zi: "Can you try to put this diary into the treasure box?"

Zhuge Zi nodded, tried it, and then showed a surprised expression: "Unable to collect..."

"Sure enough!" Luo Jun narrowed his eyes. "Strictly speaking, the relics in this maze are not treasure boxes, but some kind of maze props that simulate treasure boxes. Even the treasures that were opened in the treasure box are counterfeits made based on the originals! This is why these treasures cannot be taken out of the maze, and the relics cannot be opened with lock-picking treasures, because these are not real treasures at all!"

"You mean..." Mao Xintong frowned and said, "This diary was also created by the maze, and these lost pages were torn off during the copying process?"

"It's very likely." Luo Jun nodded: "And this just shows that there is important information hidden in the last dozen pages that were torn off!"

"But it's useless no matter how important it is..." Sun Xiaowei said dejectedly, "We will never see it..."

"I don't think so." Luo Jun shook his head: "Have you ever thought about this question? If you want to hide the information, why don't you just destroy the diary and only hide these key pages?"

"Is it a restriction of the mission rules?" Zhuge Zi looked at Luo Jun.

"I don't think so..." Luo Jun said, "Since this mission is confirmed to be contaminated by Chaos creatures, it means that the rules we see are not completely accurate. Moreover, under the rules, there are at least two forces competing, namely the mission itself, and the invading Chaos creatures."

"The mission itself should be to help us get out, so they will provide us with help. The functions mentioned in the rules should all be for this party."

"As for the Chaos Creatures, they probably want to kill us. They are not written into the rules, and they are sabotaging us in secret. If my guess is correct, the black shop not mentioned in the rules, and the army of Void Monsters that Sister Mao saw, should all be on their side."

"At present, it seems that the chaotic creatures tore up the diary. The reason why it was not completely destroyed was probably because it was hindered by the power of the mission itself. If this incomplete diary is really the product of the collision of authority and power between good and evil, then I have a bold guess..."

At this point, Luo Jun picked up the diary and looked at everyone: "If the maze itself wants to maintain the original rules, then it will definitely preserve the complete diary as much as possible. These missing pages may appear in other forms!"

(End of this chapter)