Chapter 102 A Game for All

On the noon of the fifteenth day, according to the previous pattern, the black butterfly on the inside of the wrist would remind its owner of the upcoming game by heating up. Bai Xiao had grown accustomed to clicking and checking the countdown on her personal panel whenever it heated up.

However, today, past twelve o'clock, the black butterfly on her wrist hadn't flickered or heated up at all. Bai Xiao opened the game's personal panel, but no countdown appeared there either.

Had the game ended?

Impossible. For some reason, she just felt that this game couldn't possibly end so easily.

While she was lost in thought over the game's anomaly, a bedraggled group of survivors was heading up the mountain far from its base.

This survivor group was precisely one of the large units Xu Jiye had been worried about for several days.

Originally, the branch of the Disaster Relief Department where Xu Jiye was stationed had planned to transfer to Mian Mountain in ten successive batches. A few days ago, the second batch had already reached a township closest to Mian Mountain, less than ten kilometers from their destination.

But a sudden, freakish wind nearly capsized the fleet, causing more than half of the people and supplies on board to fall into the water.

The gale, accompanied by heavy rain, made it impossible for people to keep their eyes open. The originally calm and vast surface of the water had transformed into a man-eating sea because of the rising wind.

As the wind rose and waves surged, the water's surface fluctuated violently. The gathered fleet was forced to scatter, with everyone barely able to look after themselves, let alone have the strength to rescue others.

One surging wave after another followed. Submerged villages, buildings, trees, and other debris tossed and turned with the waves, turning into hidden killers beneath the water.

People who fell into the water but were protected by life jackets were dragged down and suffocated by plastic or ropes tangling their feet due to this special underwater environment. Others were pierced through the body like arrows by underwater steel bars or sharp objects driven by the water's impact.

Less than a third of the people made it back alive to the previous safe resting point.

After the wind stopped, these survivors had planned to regroup and set out again, but they hadn't expected that as the gale retreated, an even more terrifying tornado would make a bold entrance.

And the location where they were staying happened to be right in the path of that final hurricane's impact.

Although they discovered it in advance and left by boat, the hurricane was fast and had a large diameter; less than half of them survived.

The remaining people's frantic escape completely deviated from the original route. Combined with the loss of maps and other supplies, they ultimately lost their direction entirely.

For several days, they wandered aimlessly like headless flies, and their remaining supplies were also exhausted.

Just then, they encountered survivors who had escaped from some branch in the city. This group had originally planned to go to West Mountain, but because the hurricane forced them off course, they ended up closer to Mian Mountain. So, they simply changed their target to the new location.

The two groups merged into one team and painstakingly reached Mian Mountain at noon the following day.

As soon as they entered Mian Mountain, Xu Jiye received a report from the sentries. He quickly assembled his troops at the mountain gate to welcome the arriving survivors.

Seeing his major movement, the residents of Mian Mountain followed to see what was happening. When everyone saw a large group of filthy refugees arriving on the mountain, their faces turned pale one by one.

Instead of the expected large unit carrying a vast amount of supplies, they got a crowd of refugees in rags. This was hard to accept for the residents of Mian Mountain, whose supplies were already stretched thin.

No one was willing to give these people housing or food, even though the troops led by Xu Jiye had guns.

So what if they had guns? Could he kill everyone? Didn't the soldiers he led need to eat and sleep? Would they be willing to share Mian Mountain's supplies with these people?

The only valuable resource these refugees had was the boats they arrived in. They were willing to let the residents of Mian Mountain use them unconditionally, hoping only to exchange them for some food.

Ultimately, the two sides reached a temporary agreement: the new survivors would contribute their boats for everyone's use, and the residents of Mian Mountain would provide them with one meal a day, provided that they all participated in the construction of Mian Mountain and the labor of obtaining food.

Since there were truly no extra houses on the mountain for living, Xu Jiye brought out the troops' tents to let the survivors stay in the plaza temporarily. As for the housing issue, they could only choose to go up the mountain to fell trees and build wooden houses themselves.

At midnight, in a place invisible to humans outside the planet, a flash of white light enveloped the blue planet, though it disappeared in the blink of an eye.

At that moment, all adults, whether asleep or awake, were forced into consciousness. A translucent blue screen appeared before everyone simultaneously.

At the same time, an announcement echoing across the globe declared to all of humanity—the Hunting Ground game system has descended upon the Blue Star in its entirety.

Most people thought they were dreaming when they heard this announcement. Even if some could distinguish whether they were dreaming or awake, they couldn't understand what the announcement about the game's descent meant.

Only the players who had been previously selected to participate in the game understood that the scope of the game had been upgraded.

Bai Xiao also fully understood the meaning of some of the dialogue between the three masked men in the previous game. The first three games were all test games, and the people selected for testing were guinea pigs. Their role was to allow the game system to obtain certain data, which was likely preparation for this full-scale descent.

Only one thing remained doubtful: what did those three people mean by the planet's progress being too fast? One of them had clearly said there should have been two more test games, but because of this progress, the test games were canceled.

So, what exactly did "progress" refer to? Was it the progress of the game's descent? Or the progress of the world's changes?

No one could answer her questions.

For others who hadn't encountered the game, the game system was like a virus forcibly implanted into the human body. It completely disregarded whether the host could accept it; once its program started, it ran continuously.

They didn't know yet that, so far, there was no way to stop this virus-like game system other than death.

While most people were still in a daze, processing the information, an even more terrifying scene appeared before everyone—whether they were lying in bed or sitting, the next second after the announcement ended, they were forced into an independent pitch-black space. In this small world, there was only darkness around each person, and no other living creatures.

A new game announcement rang in people's ears.

【Hunting Ground system connection successful. Please confirm whether to participate in the Global Game. Selecting 'Yes' will grant game eligibility. Players who select 'No' or fail to make a choice within the specified time will lose game eligibility. Countdown: 30 seconds, 29, 28...】

Those who chose 'No' or failed to make a choice when the countdown ended were not killed by the system as in the previous test games. Instead, they were kicked out of that black space. At that time, they didn't know exactly what that light tap of their finger had made them lose.