Chapter 931: Chapter 885: Startled Awake
[Trap Square]
[Life is full of traps, and so is here. Congratulations on arriving at the Trap Square. In this room there is a ghost that has laid traps in advance. If you are unlucky enough to fall into a trap, your life will end here. If you leave this room without ever stepping into a trap, you will receive a reward]
The first half of the Trap Square’s introduction was the same as what 007 had sent them in the group chat, but the latter half wasn’t in the board-square description.
[Three trap-triggering actions have been set in this room. If these three trap actions are triggered in the room, you will be erased]
The condition was a bit tricky. If the trap the ghost set was something like breathing or blinking, then the chess piece entering this room would hardly be able to avoid it. But Gu Mian figured the ghost wouldn’t set such a harsh condition; it had to leave some way out for whoever entered the room.
Besides, the chess piece had to stay in this room for quite a long time, only able to leave when it was their group’s turn to act in the next round. They had to avoid triggering any trap actions for that whole duration.
Staying completely still was impossible, because when heading to the next room the chess piece had to move, and that would involve actions.
Gu Mian thought of that Trap Square directly beneath Room Four’s starting room; the two chess pieces that went in had both died within a very short time. Maybe the trap actions in that Trap Square were extremely easy to trigger.
The trap actions in different Trap Squares might not be the same, but that wasn’t something Gu Mian needed to worry about.
He saw a ghost with a sultry figure standing in the middle of the room. Right now this ghost was twisting its body, swaying left and right as it walked toward them.
After a few steps, once it saw clearly who had come, the trap ghost’s movements suddenly stopped. Its ass was still provocatively stuck out; paired with that terrifying face and expression, the pose looked downright bizarre.
Next to him, Liu Ruyan hadn’t moved at all since entering the room. She looked very eager to participate in the trap ghost’s little game.
"You don’t see such a lively ghost very often." Seeing that the game couldn’t get going, Liu Ruyan started critiquing the trap ghost.
"Because if it isn’t lively, it might die." Gu Mian turned his head to glance at Liu Ruyan. "You’d better not move either. You saw the rules of this room—if a trap is triggered, it’s not the ghost that makes a move, the instance will directly erase you."
"I saw." Liu Ruyan was still maintaining the exact posture she’d had upon entering. "That’s why I haven’t moved at all since I came in."
Liu Ruyan was very smart. She knew Gu Mian could stop a ghost from killing her, but he might not be able to stop the instance itself from erasing her. So when she saw the rules upon entering, she prudently chose not to move.
"But what did you mean when you said the ghost would die if it wasn’t lively?" She couldn’t turn her head, so she had to stare straight ahead at the trap ghost while talking to Gu Mian.
At that moment, from the corner of her eye, she noticed Gu Mian starting to move.
Gu Mian strode over, covering three steps in two, and stopped in front of the trap ghost, pressing it: "One of the trap actions you set is normal walking, isn’t it?"
Is that it? Liu Ruyan pondered, but she really hadn’t expected Gu Mian to swagger over there like that.
"Didn’t you notice? The rules in this room are a bit different from those in the previous ones." Gu Mian turned to look at Liu Ruyan. "In those rooms that had dangers, the subject was always ’chess piece’, and the rule was ’if the chess piece does such and such, it will die.’"
Take the two separate grids, for example; it clearly stated "When there are two or more chess pieces staying in this room, only one can leave alive," rather than "Only one living creature in the room can leave alive." That phrasing excluded the ghosts from the rule.
But this room doesn’t.
Listening to Gu Mian, Liu Ruyan recalled the description of this room. Sure enough, the entire thing never mentioned the word "chess piece."
The final rule was simply: "Three trap-triggering actions have been set in this room. If these three trap actions are triggered in the room, you will be erased."
It never said only chess pieces would be erased.
Which meant that if a ghost triggered a trap action in this room, it would be erased too. So that’s why this ghost was walking with such a sultry gait?
No wonder Gu Mian said it might die if it wasn’t lively.
But in fact the ghost could just stand still. Unless one of the trap actions was "remaining completely still for more than a certain amount of time will get you erased"?
Thinking of this, Liu Ruyan mimicked the trap ghost’s earlier movements and took a few steps forward, her motions twisted to the point of being unbearable to look at.
"I didn’t expect that the moment you entered this room you spotted the flaw in the rules. So these trap squares actually have a trick—so long as you keep doing exactly what the ghost does, the trap actions won’t be triggered." Liu Ruyan kept her twisted posture; speaking took some effort.
"Actually, I started suspecting it before we even stepped into the trap square. Do you still remember the description of the Gold Coin Square?" Gu Mian said to Liu Ruyan.
Because they had never entered a Gold Coin Square, everything they knew about it came from the information 007 sent in the group chat.
Liu Ruyan only remembered it was a good square that gave Gold Coins; she hadn’t paid attention to anything else.
Before she could scroll back through the group chat, Gu Mian continued, "The Gold Coin Square, as its name suggests, is a good square that gives you Game Coins. You don’t need to gamble with the ghost, do Q&A, or play imitation games. As long as you stay in this room, you can get the reward."
With Gu Mian repeating it like that, Liu Ruyan basically remembered everything: "Right, that’s more or less how the Gold Coin Square was described."
"You don’t need to gamble with the ghost, do Q&A, or imitate it." Gu Mian repeated that line once more. "The game’s already in the ninth round now, and a bit under half the squares have been explored by players. During this period we’ve had gambling-type Honest Squares and Q&A-type Question and Answer Grids."
"There are repeated squares on the board. Out of sixty squares, twenty-six have been unlocked, close to half. Theoretically, all types of squares should have shown up by now, but we still haven’t seen any imitation-type squares. So before stepping into the trap square, I suspected the trap square might be related to imitation, since we didn’t know its exact contents before entering."
Imitation... and a rule that includes the ghost as well... Liu Ruyan analyzed what Gu Mian had said, so after entering this room and reading the rules, Gu Mian had combined these two pieces of information and basically figured out how to clear this room.
If the ghost triggers a trap action, it dies too, so as long as you keep imitating the ghost’s actions, you’re safe.
At this moment, Gu Mian forced the trap ghost again: "Aside from normal walking, what are the other two trap actions you set?"
The trap ghost didn’t dare not answer and had no choice but to speak honestly: "The three actions are normal walking, looking back, and standing still for one minute..."
Hearing that, Liu Ruyan twisted her body and walked a few more steps.
While Liu Ruyan was walking in that twisted way, a door appeared behind her, and Hao Laoshi walked in from behind the door.
As soon as he came in, he saw 007 moving around in that bizarre posture and was so startled he shuddered.
Gu Mian stopped him in time: "Don’t move."
Hearing that, Hao Laoshi, who had just been about to step back, froze rigidly in place. Now he also saw the rules written in the room; after reading them, he didn’t even dare speak and could only look at Gu Mian with pleading eyes.
"Just copy me. As long as you don’t walk normally, don’t look back, and don’t stand still for a full minute, you won’t die." As she spoke, Liu Ruyan walked a few more steps exactly like the ghost. She seemed to have gotten the hang of it now.
"Is that so..." Hearing this, Hao Laoshi hurried to imitate Liu Ruyan’s movements and walked a few steps around the room.
The ghost beside Gu Mian also took the chance to twist a few times; if it stayed completely still for a minute, it would die too.
"Has the fourth group already finished their move?" Gu Mian looked at Hao Laoshi, who had just entered the room. Hao Laoshi had once again ended up in the same room as them, and Gu Mian guessed Guigu had used a designated-steps opportunity. After this, their three chances to designate steps should all be used up.
Just now she’d been talking with Liu Ruyan about the trap square and hadn’t noticed the messages 007 sent in the group chat.
Opening the group chat, she saw that 007 had already posted the situation for each group this round.
"Group Two moved up another square this round; they’re now right next to our starting room." Liu Ruyan looked at the messages in the group chat. "We originally guessed the treasure chest would be in that square, but there’s nothing there either... So why has Group Two kept walking in a straight line toward our room? Could it be that Group Two’s Chess Player sees the treasure box square’s location as being in our starting room?"
"It doesn’t look like they’re heading for the treasure chest; it’s more like they’ve been aiming at our starting room from the beginning." Gu Mian also read the messages in the group chat.
"What are you talking about? Wasn’t Group Two wiped out?" Hao Laoshi asked in confusion.
He still didn’t know what the current situation on the board was.
Gu Mian gave Hao Laoshi a simple explanation. He listened in a daze, and even while listening to Gu Mian he didn’t forget to shift his position now and then.
"Since Group Two can already see the treasure chest’s position, entering our starting room to kill our Chess Player does them no good and just wastes their action opportunities." Liu Ruyan frowned. "Unless Group Two’s vision shows the treasure chest near us, and in order to prevent us from getting to it first, they want to kill our Chess Player in advance."
"But from the position they revived, Group Two needs three turns to enter our room and kill our Chess Player. After killing our Chess Player, they still have six turns left, which means they must get the treasure chest within those six turns." Gu Mian quickly analyzed the current situation on the board. "Starting from our room, the squares reachable within six turns are all very close to the square Group Two revived on. Excluding the top row whose contents are fully revealed, the furthest square is the fourth from the left on the second row, and it only takes five turns to reach it. I’ve calculated it: when Group Two revived, it would also have taken them five turns to reach that square from our square. But after that, we didn’t move in that direction, which means the distance between us and the treasure box square has increased. That gives Group Two even less reason to come kill our Chess Player; it would only waste their action turns."
