Chapter 1715: Final Chapter · To the Shore Arc [58] · "To Be Able to Battle You
"Oh?" Alger tapped his fingers on the table, "Go on."
"We have pinpointed the location of the bullet. As long as we notice the bullet drawing near, we will choose to spin the cylinder, preventing others from taking the fatal bullet... This will turn into a pure probability game, depending only on where the position lands after spinning." Su Ming’an picked up the handgun, weighing it in his hand,
"But I’ve thought of a way to decide the winner in one round."
"Mr. Alger, I will shoot at you. But this round, I won’t tell you whether I’ve spun the cylinder or not."
"Then, I, you, and Miss Chang Yue won’t check the position of the hammer afterward. We won’t know if the gun we’re holding has a bullet. When it’s our turn, we simply make a judgment about who to aim at."
"And so it goes, until a death occurs."
Immediately, Su Ming’an moved the gun behind his back, gesturing whether to spin the cylinder, constantly keeping it hidden to ensure nobody, himself included, knew the current number.
Chang Yue listened, her eyes slightly brightened. This sounded like a pure luck game, where they neither check the hammer position nor spin the cylinder... pure intuition would decide fate. In this format, she also had the possibility of winning. After all, it was just a gamble on luck.
Alger, upon hearing this, squinted his eyes and let out a cold laugh, "Alright."
Heidi Doya chuckled when she heard this, "It seems you have your own rules, which is fine. There can always be additional rules within the game. In that case, I’ll respect your choices... Please."
Chang Yue sat upright with caution.
Su Ming’an, maintaining his hidden gesture, fired a shot at Alger.
Empty chamber.
"No spinning of the cylinder." Chang Yue received the handgun, hesitating a bit at the lack of visible numbers but still aimed it at Alger and fired.
"Click."
Empty chamber.
Chang Yue wiped her forehead and breathed a sigh of relief.
The gun reached Alger’s hands, the numbers still concealed.
Alger squinted his eyes; he was sure Su Ming’an had set a trap for him. Life and death hinged on this round.
If Su Ming’an hadn’t spun the cylinder when he fired earlier, then when the hammer reached Alger, it would land precisely on the deadly "position 1." But if Su Ming’an had spun it, the hammer would randomly land, reshuffling the probabilities.
Alger looked up at Su Ming’an. The other’s expression was calm and unwavering, with joined hands on the table and eyes as deep as an unfathomable cold pond, revealing no information.
Alger furrowed his brows, his hand trembled slightly before he turned the gun toward Su Ming’an.
"Did you spin it?" Alger asked.
"Who knows." Su Ming’an smiled.
Alger gritted his teeth.
The best move was to point the gun directly at Su Ming’an. Whatever Su Ming’an’s strategy, this shot wouldn’t kill him...
Wait a minute.
Alger suddenly realized something.
—There was a possibility that if he aimed at Su Ming’an, it would be he who died instead!
He stroked the silver lacquered gun, cold sweat suddenly streaming down his forehead.
—That hammer’s number might be exactly 6!
If he fired at Su Ming’an, in the next round, Su Ming’an would receive the killing bullet and shoot him!
The only way to solve this was to spin the cylinder or skip his turn, and Su Ming’an had deleted the option to "spin the cylinder," leaving only "skip his turn."
So, if the hammer’s number was 6 and he skipped his turn, the killing bullet would fall into Chang Yue’s hands, whose target was also him!
Therefore, if the hammer’s number was exactly 6, he was already doomed. If it was 1, then Su Ming’an had lost.
But Su Ming’an also spun the hammer randomly, how could he be sure the number would be 6 and not 1? If the number was 1, it would be Su Ming’an who died!
It was purely a gamble on luck! At 6, Alger dies. At 1, Su Ming’an dies.
Alger pursed his lips, sweating profusely, and suddenly sneered, "Let me see what trick you’re playing."
He regretted it.
He immediately flipped the gun and looked at the number the hammer pointed to—
6!
Instantly, a tremendous panic seized him.
... It wasn’t 1, which meant Su Ming’an must have spun the cylinder, but spinning was purely random. How did Su Ming’an manage to ensure that after spinning, the number would end up 4, turning into 6 at Alger?
Is it really purely a game of luck?
Is Su Ming’an truly betting on a 16.66% probability and just happened to get it right?
Alger repeated the rules, trying to find the trap in Su Ming’an’s strategy: "Each round, the person whose turn it is must do two things... First, publicly declare your target: will you shoot yourself, or another player... Second, secretly decide whether to spin the cylinder..."
In that instant, he suddenly realized!
When exactly did Su Ming’an spin the cylinder?
—Was it before speaking, or after speaking?
The rules require that the cylinder must be spun after "publicly announcing your target", so when exactly could Su Ming’an have spun the cylinder?
...
[Su Ming’an picked up the pistol, weighed it in his hand: "But I thought of a way to decide victory in one round."]
["Mr. Alger, I will shoot you. But this round I will not tell you whether I spun the cylinder."]
["Then, I, you, and Miss Chang Yue, thereafter we won’t check the position of the hammer, being completely unaware of whether there’s a bullet in the gun while in our hands. When it’s our turn, we simply make a judgment—who to aim at."]
["Thus, until a dead body is born."]
[Immediately, Su Ming’an placed the pistol behind his back, making a gesture to indicate whether he spun the cylinder.]
...
Inertial thinking would make people assume that Su Ming’an spun the cylinder after finishing his speech.
But actually, right after saying "I will shoot you", Su Ming’an could have completely executed the "spinning the cylinder" action.
The action of spinning the cylinder is completely silent, without Heidi Doya announcing, others cannot determine whether the cylinder was spun.
Alger slowly said, "After you finished that sentence, you immediately turned the cylinder, found that it was 4, and within two seconds, you thought through the subsequent words—you needed to draft the following rules in such a way that could trap me into a deadlock."
"You did not... design all the rules from the beginning. You made up the following ’game’ rules on the spot after seeing the result."
Su Ming’an slightly nodded, with a demeanor of having everything under control: "The rules require spinning the cylinder only after ’publicly announcing the target’. When I said ’I will shoot you’, that was precisely the ’public announcement’. At that moment, I had already completed the prerequisite condition of the rule."
He paused slightly:
"Then, while continuing to speak—my fingers silently turned the cylinder."
A chill ran up Alger’s spine.
"The spinning is completely silent. So, when I was saying those subsequent words—" Su Ming’an smiled, "the cylinder had long stopped spinning. The number pointed to by the hammer was already an unchangeable fact."
"And when my fingers felt the spinning stop... about two seconds, I saw that number."
Alger’s throat dried up: "... What is it?"
"4." Su Ming’an said, "So, when I said ’from now on, we won’t check the position of the hammer’, I already knew the hammer was stopped at 4."
He lifted his eyes, his gaze like a mirror, reflecting Alger’s suddenly pale face.
"—Thus, when the gun reaches your hand, the hammer must point to 6. And the bullet, always at 1."
Alger’s breath stalled.
Su Ming’an wasn’t certain that the number would be 4.
If the drawn number was 4, then Su Ming’an would use number 4 as the reference point, and within two seconds devise a game rule that could trap Alger in that position. If the drawn number was 5, Su Ming’an would use number 5 as the basis, and within two seconds ponder a game rule that could trap Alger.
Su Ming’an only needed, within the two seconds after the spinning stopped, to quickly deduce the subsequent movement path of the hammer based on the number seen, and then—improvise a "rule" that could lead this path to Alger’s despair.
"Mr. Alger, I will shoot you."—Everything said before this sentence was thought out in advance by Su Ming’an. But, after uttering this sentence and after the cylinder spun, all of it was improvised.
People’s habitual thinking believes that no one can, within two seconds, speak, spin the cylinder, and devise a new game rule ensuring the enemy’s death. Including Chang Yue, who thought that Su Ming’an proposed a purely luck-based game.
But actually, before the rule was spoken—"luck" had already been determined; the number was already drawn by Su Ming’an.
Su Ming’an didn’t need to predict the future, nor manipulate probability. He only needed, once the result had been produced, to weave a "gamble" with words that sounded fair, exciting, and full of grandeur, leading Alger to step in.
Su Ming’an’s eloquent words about "courage," "luck," and "the real Russian roulette" were provocative appeals that made Alger’s blood boil and unable to refuse, all performed on the basis of already knowing he would win.
Alger’s fingers suddenly tightened, the silver-painted pistol in his palm becoming chilly with cold sweat. He stared intently into Su Ming’an’s calm eyes, trying to find any trace of disguise.
But there was none.
In those abyss-like black pupils, there was only an almost cruel clarity.
Silent, serene, profound.
As if containing all the softness and hesitation.
As a top-ranked player, Alger had actually considered this possibility, guessed that Su Ming’an might spin the cylinder in advance. But he hadn’t expected—Su Ming’an would shoot the arrow first and draw the target later.
Alger’s face was pale, teetering, suddenly he gave a bitter smile.
"...I lost."
He lost willingly.
He could indeed refuse the extra rule Su Ming’an proposed, which would render Su Ming’an’s trap ineffective, but Su Ming’an grasped his humanity—Alger, Number One Player wants to play a pure luck Russian roulette game with you. If you win, you won’t bear any guilt for killing the Number One Player. This is a fight between the brave, would you refuse?
Of course, Alger couldn’t back down.
From the moment Su Ming’an smiled and proposed to gamble on luck—for Alger, it was already an irrevocable dead end.
"...I was destined to lose." Alger said.
Su Ming’an was silent for a moment, then replied slowly, "Yes."
Two words, nonchalant.
Alger suddenly laughed lowly, the laughter dry, "So, from the moment you smiled and said to me ’let’s gamble on a real Russian roulette’... no, from even earlier... when you chose to shoot yourself last round without spinning, transferring the pressure to Chang Yue, and predicted she would spin— you were setting up for this moment. You calculated Chang Yue’s fear, calculated the exposure of the bullet’s position, calculated that I would be cautious due to the bullet’s clarity, and calculated..."
"...calculated that I couldn’t possibly refuse your public challenge."
Su Ming’an proposed "gambling on courage," how could he shrink back?
But he didn’t know, this wasn’t a pure courage gambling game at all, it was a set-up trap.
Su Ming’an didn’t exploit rule loopholes, nor did he use force. He merely exploited the fundamental fact of "who Alger was." Alger overlooked Su Ming’an’s strongest point—not intelligence, not through the deduction of numbers and probability, but with his eloquence in human nature and adaptability.
In the end, Alger couldn’t withstand the pressure and decided to break Su Ming’an’s proposed rules by privately checking the numbers... but it was too late. Before the game began, at the moment Su Ming’an fiddled with the magazine, Alger had already lost.
Alger raised his eyes and gave Su Ming’an a deeply complex look.
The humiliation of defeat, awe at the intellect, the mocking of destiny’s trickery...
He once thought he needed to "let" Su Ming’an win, to exchange for a chance at rebirth and saving his sister, but now he realized... Su Ming’an could completely win.
For someone so terrifying, able to formulate a rule ensuring certain death within two seconds... Su Ming’an was indeed a genuine "player." He maximized the game’s rules, even jumped out of the game, and wrote his own rules, luring opponents into the trap.
Alger raised his gun.
He held it level, weighing it.
Then, he pulled the trigger on himself.
"Click."
The expected empty gun.
Su Ming’an took the handgun and aimed it at Alger.
—This was a bullet ensuring certain death.
"Host." Alger looked up, "Can I pull this trigger myself?"
Heidi Doya’s eyes flickered, she smiled and said, "According to the rules, you can’t, but... Your defeat is already certain, if the opponent agrees, you can commit suicide. Remember, you’re not allowed to use this chance to shoot anyone else, only suicide is effective."
"Alright." Alger extended his hand to Su Ming’an.
Su Ming’an did not hesitate, he tossed the handgun to Alger. He was well aware of the rules, so he knew Alger had no turnaround space.
"I lost to you." Alger raised the gun, the corner of his mouth curled into an almost rebellious arc, "But at least, this last shot, let me pull it myself."
He turned the gun, pressed it against his chin. This action was exactly the same as when he chose to "shoot himself" before but now the meaning was entirely different.
This moment, is acceptance and curtain call.
He looked at Su Ming’an, for the last time, as if passing on some kind of mission.
Suddenly, Alger laughed:
"This is the last time, right? Number One Player."
Su Ming’an quietly watched him, nodded.
Alger pulled the trigger, not looking at Su Ming’an, but gazing into a void, as if looking at someone far away. His scarlet eyes glimmered, but after a moment, he lowered his gaze.
"Is this the last freeze frame?" Alger said lightly, "No more reincarnations after this?"
Su Ming’an knew what he was asking. He was asking, if I die, will I still be remembered, will I still be reborn in some story.
"Yes." Su Ming’an said, "This is the last time."
Alger smiled.
"Hm... Go for it, defeat that arrogant Prophet." Alger said, "You’re scarier than a deity."
"Su Ming’an, you are a frightening person. You calculated everything."
He paused: "But you also missed one point."
"What?"
"Actually, I..." Alger said, "I really envy you. Envy that so many people are willing to sacrifice for you, envy that you carry the expectations of the entire world and still made it here... This envy even evolved into jealousy. I long to be close to you, to understand your qualities, and I deeply hate your excellence, longing to defeat you."
"You previously subdued me, I promised to do everything to help you clear this game. But this game round you decisively refused this concession behavior, insisted on a fair confrontation with me... This shocked me. So, even if you didn’t need to provoke me... I would also agree to your gamble."
"Then do you regret it?" Su Ming’an said, "You were originally a member of the Peak Alliance, could have had an infinitely bright future, but you chose betrayal, stabbed me in the back, joined the Eighth Thrones, and were ultimately kicked out by Atlanda... Do you regret it?"
Alger was silent for a moment.
He suddenly laughed out loud:
"Haha, hahaha—!"
"If I say ’I regret it’ here, apart from mocking and funny pity from the audience, I will get nothing!"
"I don’t regret it! Su Ming’an! I’m very happy to have gambled with you once!"
"I’m even more relieved, I made a pact with you... Even if I die, you must help my sister... Gedoria, she is innocent! She is still waiting to wake up!"
"Su Ming’an, being able to battle with you makes me very happy! Getting here, I do not regret, Alger never regrets!!!"
...
"Bang—!"
...
A deafening sound.
Blood splattered, staining the silver gun body red.
The body of the red-haired young man fell backward, heavily into the chair, then slipped to the floor. His eyes open wide, pupils quickly dilated, the corners of his mouth left a manic smile.
The room was filled with faint smoke and the smell of blood. Heidi Doya remained silent, Chang Yue covered her mouth.
...
[Player Alger is dead.]
[Current team survival count: 13/15]
...
The cold system prompt sounded.
Su Ming’an looked at the body rapidly losing temperature, a young life just declaring arrogantly moments ago, in a blink turned into a streak of blood under rule.
His hands were trembling... Was it due to the excitement of victory? Due to the pride of the successful strategy? Neither.
The black in his pupils twitched slightly in the dim light, the obsidian-like eyes swirled with complex emotions, eventually becoming a very soft sigh.
Alger.
There are all kinds of people in this world; one cannot demand everyone support and uphold Su Ming’an. Alger is not a complete villain, nor a good person. He just lived out his true desires and form. Wanted to get stronger, so he turned to the High Dimensions. Wanted to save his sister, so he was driven by Atlanda. A misstep led to this outcome.
He wasn’t any noble, great... He wasn’t a human "hero" embodiment like Lü Shu and Yamada, he was a notably outstanding individual among the tens of thousands of self-serving ordinary people.
He didn’t die because of stupidity or a mistake, but based on a clear judgment. This man definitely can’t be considered a good person, perhaps labeled as a "traitor," but finally his performance couldn’t be entirely called that of a bad person. He was genuinely selfish, as the world never offered him warmth, and lastly, he tried all he could to protect his sister... Gedoria. With the contract in place, even if Alger is dead, Su Ming’an will save this innocent girl.
However, at least wait until everything is over, when Su Ming’an has the time.
At least, this outcome for Alger’s smiling reason before he died, would be one of them.
...
"Ding dong!"
[You obtained a prop (Strawberry Rabbit Button)]
[Strawberry Rabbit Button (White Level): "Brother, I found rabbits like strawberries too."]
[Spirit +5]
[Special Skill (Cute Strawberry Rabbit): Summon a white rabbit, the rabbit has no attack characteristics, disappears after a period of time.]
[Note: Every time beside the ice coffin, Alger often manifested a white rabbit named Jiangjiang, he mimicked Jiangjiang speaking, hoping his sister could hear and wake up. This was a rabbit they once raised together that left with the broken family.]
...
Heidi Doya picked up the silver lacquer handgun, gently wiped it clean, and placed it back on the table.
"Click."
