Chapter 83 - Mastermo Feels The Excitement

Nothing worked. 

Nothing works. 

There is nothing that he could do. 

Zhihao felt his brain freeze up when he looked into the pitch-black eyes of the Akuma. 

He felt like this Akuma was going to pull something on him. It was a gut feeling that didn't seem to go away. Maybe it was due to the way the Akuma looked at him, maybe it was the darkness of the eyes that seemed to seep through Zhihao's skin and sting him. 

Mastermo had never felt this feeling. 

This bone-chilling fear.. 

This blood-raising excitement. 

This was the reason why he was playing. This adrenaline rush, this thoughtlessness, this fear that paralyzed him, he was looking for something like this, and now he had found it. 

Zhihao had always been in a room, a confined space where he felt trapped, and inside this room, he felt nothing. Absolutely nothing. He was bored every day. Bored of doing this and doing that. Nothing seemed to be exciting anymore and that was when he laid his hands on his first gaming console. That was a moment he'd never forget. 

It was an excitement, a thrill, an adventure. He was overwhelmed with all the feelings that swelled up inside him and he was instantly addicted. He found the calling of his life and he was sure that he was never going to lose it yet not everything you hope happens and one day he lost the excitement. 

He became a professional gamer and finally attained that title of the top player he had always wanted, he was happy but after that initial happiness had faded off, he felt empty. If he had no other goal, what was he supposed to do? 

He felt like the room, he was confined in was still there and he was going to be once again trapped inside it. 

It was empty, a life without ambition. He played a lot of new games and even replayed old ones. He tried everything he could to revive the interest and the emotions he felt but nothing happened. 

He started getting bored of games, something he never thought was scientifically possible. 

The games became predictable and no matter how much he won, he'd never be satisfied with his victory. He started looking for challenges, but he found none. If games couldn't give him the challenge, the other players should have, yet there was no other player who was on par with him and so he remained the reigning champion who couldn't be beaten by anybody. 

At one point in time, Zhihao thought he should just delete his ID and make a brand new one from which he'll start from the beginning, yet even after doing something like that, he found no thrill. 

This was when the news of a new RPG went viral. 

At first, Zhihao really wasn't interested in the game since it was released by a partnership of two companies, one of which belonged to Zhihao's father. 

However, it was still a game and there was a chance that Zhihao might find something interesting in it. Even if the chance was small it was still something, not a complete zero, and so, Zhihao decided to try out the famous game. 

On the first day itself, he fell in love with the game and the rest... It was a story that need not be told. 

Zhihao looked at the demon god in front of him that was ready to attack him at any given moment and he felt it. He felt the adrenaline rush throughout his body. He felt like beating this demon god would be his biggest feat for this entire month and it was enough to inspire him. 

Zhihao waited for the demon god to attack first and the onlookers felt like this man had gone crazy. Why in the hell would someone wait for the other to attack? Wasn't it always best to attack someone first when they were planning their attack? Take them by surprise, wasn't that the norm? 

Had Taki gone insane?!

If this demon god attacked him with all his power, who knew if Taki's bone dust would be left behind, or would it also be flown away by the breeze? 

This demon had gone crazy and everyone who saw it would say the same thing, all except for the demon king who felt proud of his son at this moment. 

They were demons so it naturally a fact to be proud to say that there was nothing that they were afraid of and although this was mostly the case, in front of this demon god not many demons would say that they were unafraid and maybe only Taki would do something like this. 

He was proud of his courageous son. 

Akuma didn't attack directly, but Zhihao still felt something. 

Something was happening and he got to know it only when he saw his health status bar that was depleting at a fast rate. 

"Wait..." Zhihao looked around and soon noticed something. The air was different, it was creating an illusion of the things around them moving in a swirling manner and it wasn't because the things were actually moving, it was because of smoke. 

Not the white smoke, but the visible heat waves. 

The land was heating up. 

"Alvi, what is happening?" Zhihao asked, but he got no response and his eyes wandered around in search of a little ten-year-old girl and a handsome human, however, they were both missing, "What the...?!" 

Zhihao was sure that those two were there just a few minutes ago, so where had they ran off to now? 

Li Ling was not one to run away without saying anything and Alvi was a bot so he didn't even need to say how incapable she was of running away from the players. If the two had left their place, it meant something had happened. 

They had either moved to find a safer spot or someone had kidnapped them and if it wasn't one of those two, it might have been Li Ling who had decided to wander off to somewhere. 

Zhihao wanted to search for the two, but he wasn't in a position where he had the leisure time to go off leaving this fight behind. Even if he wanted to do that, he was afraid that this demon god wouldn't be letting him get away so easily. 

Thankfully, even without Alvi's help, Zhihao was able to get the answer to his question, thanks to his dear father who was as eager as ever to help his favorite son. 

"The heat is rising." The demon king spoke up, sweat starting to form on his forehead, "If we don't stop it, we'll be standing on lava." 

This was never a good sign. 

Zhihao didn't have enough time to think and he used his gambling bar for the first time. He felt kind of stupid for using it for something trivial like this. He bought a heavy heat resistant armor, better than the armor he had purchased when he was in the dragon's illusion level. 

The armor was a piece of high-grade equipment that cost a lot of T-points and although Zhihao's heart ached to say goodbye to the T-points, he still felt like it was worth it, after all, this was high-grade defensive equipment we were talking about. 

He didn't even know he'd ever come across this armor, since last he checked, it was out of sale in the in-game shop. 

This was the crimson red armor that could withstand any type of heat unless it was the direct heat 1 inch away from the sun, and Zhihao was sure that he would never have to go that close to the sun just to burn this armor off. 

When Zhihao wore the crimson red armor, he thought he would stop the depleting health bar, but he was wrong in assuming that. 

This was fire from hell and maybe it was just as strong as the heat from the sun. 

Zhihao used Taki's ice power again and wrapped the armor with a thin layer of ice that no matter how much would melt, it would keep recreating itself, and so by doing this, he was able to save his health bar however, this was not a plan that would last for too long. 

Using this ice power meant health depletion, but the percentage was still lower than how fast the heat from the ground made it go down. 

At this moment, Zhihao really felt like cursing someone, and that someone was Taki who seemed to have all these impressive powers yet with such a low health condition all of the power was nothing more than waste. 

Akuma growled and it looked like he was laughing at the reactions he got as if he were taking revenge for his lost arm. 

Zhihao didn't know what to do and he didn't have enough time to make up a plan, but he knew that he had to somehow stop the heat from rising any further and he had to do something fast cause he also had to keep his health bar in mind. 

His stamina was already at 40% so he really didn't have time or energy to waste anymore. 

At moments like this, he felt like it was better to have a half-baked plan than a fully thought out plan. He'd depend on his instincts and hope that he wins. 

This was the feeling gaming brought you and this was the rush of adrenaline Zhihao was hungry for. 

He wanted it. He wanted it more. He loved it, not knowing what the ending was going to be and not knowing if he was going to get out of this alive. 

At this exact same moment, somewhere else in the wilderness, Li Ling and Alvi arrived at a desolated hut hidden among the thick trees. 

"How did you know this place?" Alvi asked. 

It was not completely impossible for a player to know this place beforehand, but if a player knew this place it meant the player had a few conditions he/she needed to fulfill and Li Ling fulfilled none of those conditions. 

There were only two conditions. If one of them was filled, it was okay and if both of them were not completed it meant the player was probably cheating. 

The first condition was that the player had played this level before and Alvi had all the information on these two players so she knew that this was not the case. 

The second condition to know things beforehand was if you were the Gamemaster or if you were related to the Gamemaster. 

Alvi had no way of checking if this second condition was fulfilled by this player, but as long as her data read, the Gamemaster was already playing a game in another level so it was really impossible for him to be here unless he was playing two levels at the same time with two different accounts. That possibility wasn't too out of the blue and it was something that could very well be possible however it was something hard to believe. 

"Let's tell Mastermo that you told me about this place." Li Ling smiled as he spoke. 

He was threatening her with that sweet face and smile of his. 

To threaten a bot and tell her to lie for you? One would have to be stupid if they wanted to do something like that or maybe someone will need to be intelligent enough to try such a thing. 

"You're really suspicious," Alvi commented with a grin. 

She was cautious of this player who seemed to know a bit too much not only about this level but also about the game and her. He was really not someone whom she should mess with. 

"Now let's get Hasumi out, shall we?" Li Ling asked, but it wasn't a question he was looking to get the answer to. 

Alvi was silent.