Volume 3 - CH 12

Playing Fish Trapped in Secret Room

Book 3: Glory on the Other Side

Chapter 12

Ai Qing muttered,  “Based on the current scores, K&K must win the next two

matches in order to be the first to qualify.”

Bug echoed her comment, “All five Buff players are ranked in the top twenty,

they’re just as strong as K&K.  It would be very difficult to win two consecutive

matches.  It would be even harder if they get a difficult mission.”

Everybody knew that K&K indeed had three aggressive fighters.  Dt was even

ranked at the top.  But other K&K players, formal or alternatives, were all too

weak compared to the three, all ranked after top twenty.

“What are the ranking of the other two K&K players?”  Ai Qing was concerned.

Xiaomi answered,  “Demo is 46.  One is 71.”

Ai Qing nodded.  Indeed, they were weak.

A bit nervous, she stood up in the VIP area.

“Is the match so intense now?”  The commentator seemed to be very interested

in the gossip about the relationship between SP and K&K.  He kept staring at the

area where Ai Qing’s group was at.  “Even our SP manager can’t sit still now?”

Ai Qing was dumbfounded.  She couldn’t sit down right away to confirm the

commentator’s guess.  So she could only bend down and lean on the back of

the chair in front of her to pretend that she didn’t hear anything.

There were two live broadcasting monitors on the stage, focusing constantly on

the two teams with the highest scores.

At the moment, the five thirty plus year old men that composed Buff stood up.  

They carried their own keyboards and mice towards K&K, guided by the staff.

The eight teams on stage were all switching stations for their next matches.

The camera quickly swept through the players.

Dt’s finger slid lightly on the keyboard to get familiar with the keyboard.

Grunt licked the left side of his lip with the tip of his tongue.  He laughed when

he saw their thirty something opponents use rulers to measure the size of the

computer monitors.  They were too serious.

The countdown began.

The large screen displayed some words slowly: Counter Terrorist Night Battle

Counter Terrorist Night Battle?  Ai Qing breathed a sigh of relief.

This mission was very simple:

Find enemies on patrol in the city and kill 100 enemies to win

Kill all five members of the opposing team to win.

At the last second of the countdown, Dt began giving commands to his teammates,

“One four, All A.”  A meaning attack.  D meaning defense.

All A meant all players would launch attacks.

One four meant that he would kill 100 enemies by himself.  The other four players

would pursue and kill the opposing players.

……

One: “Roger!”

Demo:  “Roger!  Do I hide if I can’t win?”

97:  “Perhaps you should hide right now.  Little Demo, your rank dropped to 46 already.  

You should give it 120%.  Captain, good luck.”

Grunt: “May the goddess bless you.  My honorable captain.”

……

The screen went completely dark.

One light beam flashed through, then the five players were dropped at the end of

a broken road.

Was it a new map again?

Dt quickly recalled the competition with Tatami last time, Ai Qing reported the city

name and the characteristics instantly after the map opened.  It was a very useful

skill, because one needed to have played many different games before being able

to instantly identify the city the map was based on.

Unfortunately, there was no Appledog in his team.

Five seconds later, all players disappeared from view.

Their spawn was at the end of a broken road followed by the ocean.  The waves

behind them crashed against the broken road in the night.  He walked forwards alone.

He had only $5000.  The system automatically gave him a knife and a pistol. He

could only buy one item set from a list of three.

A scoped assault rifle + rope + machete.

Light machine gun + the whole set armor.

Light machine gun + 2 flares.

The first choice was all offensive weapons.  The second gave increased protection.

The third gave tools to easily escape a confrontation.

Obviously under the current situation, being by himself without his teammates to

cover him, the second and the third choices were the most suitable.  But instead

Dt picked the first choice without any hesitation.  To him, offense was equivalent

to protection.

He couldn’t even see his own fingers in the darkness.

He could only see objects at a range of about 2 meters.

There was no indication of life within a range of 5 meters on the life detector.

He was moving forward in the darkness.

Grunt:  “Enemy is at east side.”

Dt:  “Ok.”

The distribution of military forces in the game was preset: The east and west

sides were for one team.  The south and north sides were for another team.

Since the east side was the enemy’s, so was the west side.

He followed the coordinates and walked westward.

He needed to rush over there and kill 100 enemies before the enemy started

to defend.

Only the sound of his footsteps came through his earphones.

When he entered the west side, red dots appeared on the life detector.  He

instantly jumped back ten steps.  “Position?”

97:  “North.”

So they were on the northern side of the map?  Then these were enemies.

Dt found a good angle and bent down to hide. Two red dots pinged on his life

detector again.

He changed the assault gun to his knife.

The moment he rolled out, a hand grenade flew over him, exploding in half a

second behind him.  He jumped forward, somersaulting again, and jumped on

top of the opponent.

A face was in front of him, he cut his throat in one smooth motion.  He changed

to the machete as the blood began to spurt.  He turned his hand to block the

other opponent.  The opponent didn’t expect that he could change weapons so

rapidly and rolled over to the corner covered in blood.

The audience exploded in excitement.

The sound of his breath was getting heavier and heavier.

Was he injured?

His health was dropping.  It was a slight injury.  He still had 70% of his health.

He frowned and changed the machete to a pistol.

The opponent was very fast.  No wonder they were the toughest opponent

Solo’s team ever faced.  

As his character took heavy breathes, he felt that his agility had decreased

dramatically.   He followed the trail of blood, bent, and moved forward.  

“Change to four one.  I will attract enemies at the west side.  You guys kill 100

enemy soldiers at east side.”

“OK, give us four minutes.”  Grunt gave him a quick response.

It was very obvious that no matter what weapon the enemy used, be it a hand

grenade, or machine gun, or sniper rifle, or mortar, but honorable captain,

please hang on……

……

Another huge round of cheers burst from inside the arena.

Too wonderful!

“Nice!  Dt killed two opponents.”  The male commentator watched the screen.  

“Ah?  Where are Dt’s teammates?”

“They’re not showing on the life detector.”  The female commentator added.

The system would switch screens only when there was fierce battle.

Obviously, only Dt had exchanged fire with his opponents.  The screen showed

Dt alone standing near two fresh corpses.  

The large screen focused on Dt’s closeup.

He still didn’t have any expression.  He stared at the life detector without blinking.  

Even the commentators couldn’t tell what he was thinking about.

In the game, he was standing behind an array of containers continuously switching

weapons from large to small, from gun to knife……

“It’s one four!”  Ai Qing suddenly understood. “No, no.  It’s one four or four one.”

Buff must know that there was an ambush at the west side because of the fierce battle earlier.

With only three people left, they couldn’t spread their remaining forces.

Nobody knew the opponent’s positions, they could only guess.

If they chose the east side, then it would be a 3v4 in K&K’s favor.  If Dt regrouped,

then it would be 3 vs 5 and Buff would definitely lose.

If they chose the west side, then it would be a 3 vs 1 in Buff’s favor…...Dt could

only fight by himself and stall long enough for his teammates to finish the mission.

“Knife, machete, pistol, assault rifle……”  Ai Qing quickly converted his items to

cash.  Then she knew that the last item he had was the rope.

He didn’t have any explosive weapons.

His health was at 70%.  The player’s health was directly correlated to their agility

and power.  So his agility and power was only at 70% of its full value.

Once they attacked him, he would face three full-health enemies carrying many

explosives.  He would die eventually.  It was only the matter of time.

It all depended on how long he could hang on.

Hung on until…...Grunt killed 100 enemy soldiers and won the game.

On the screen.

The man continued to switch the weapon in his hand. He was waiting, waiting quietly……