A Survival Game Where You Have to Fall in Love with a Madman - Chapter 21

The eight players sat gathered around the circular layout, each deeply submerged in their own calculations. Absolute silence gripped the chamber.

Breaking the stillness, the raven-masked figure spoke, its voice low, gravelly, and harsh. “The operational parameters for this deployment are extraordinarily simple. It is the classic game you all know as Werewolf.”

It let out a strange, jarring laugh. “Distributed here are exactly eight role cards. The configuration consists of two Werewolves, one Seer, one Witch, one Hunter, and three Villagers.”

Upon hearing the breakdown, the timid, soft-spoken girl visibly flinched. Her complexion drained of color instantly, and her gentle voice trembled with palpable terror. She wrapped her arms tightly around herself, curling her small frame deep into her chair.

In stark contrast to her vulnerability, the remaining participants reacted with varying degrees of calculation:

• Zhang Wei and Liu Xin displayed flashes of overt shock across their features.
• The woman with the shoulder-length hair grew noticeably tense, shifting slightly.
• The man in the business suit and the young boy remained inscrutable, their faces completely locked down as they processed the parameters.

Meanwhile, two individuals appeared entirely detached from the unfolding horror, sitting in absolute composure as they passively indexed their surroundings. These two pillars of unbothered calm were, naturally, You Yan and He Yanqing.

The entity in the raven mask and black leather gloves suddenly raised both hands high above its head, mimicking a maestro orchestrating a grand, macabre symphony. His deep, resonant voice held a terrifying, chilling authority that easily bypassed the physical barrier of his mask.

“There will be only one match in this instance. The specific chairs you currently occupy correspond directly to your designated role cards. The time limit is precisely four days. Throughout this duration, you must utilize any means at your disposal to secure a victory condition.”

“If no faction has secured a definitive victory by the conclusion of the final day, every single survivor will be purged directly into the labyrinth. Only the winning faction will be granted the strategic navigation prompts necessary to escape. Furthermore, any player exiled via the daily vote will be cast into the labyrinth precisely at 12:00 PM on the day of their elimination. The daily game cycle will officially initiate at 10:00 AM each morning.”

He paused briefly, letting the weight of the mechanics sink into their minds, before continuing: “Therefore, your objectives are twofold: you must not only claim victory within the game mechanics, but you must also successfully navigate your way out of the labyrinth on the final day.”

You Yan tapped his fingers rhythmically against his knee, his eyes downcast as he systematically cataloged the incoming data. He shifted his gaze toward the wall, where a stark black clock was mounted. The hands pointed directly to 9:30 AM.

“Additionally, precisely at 12:00 PM every day, a minimum of one player must enter the labyrinth. If your assembly fails to elect a target for exile via the voting process, the System will directly execute a randomized selection.”

With those final words, the entity slowly lowered its hands, its hidden gaze sweeping across the room to savor the kaleidoscope of panic etched onto their faces. The corners of its mouth twitched upward into an imperceptible smile. “With that established, you have a thirty-minute window. Please begin familiarizing yourselves with one another.”

The Mechanics of Deception

You Yan analyzed the parameters internally. Within the Main God instance framework, veterans with superior capability evaluations possessed the authority to inspect the status panels of lower-ranked players.

Logically speaking, a verbal round of introductions was an exercise in futility. However, this could be interpreted as a form of ‘structural balancing’ offering the weakest players their sole baseline method to glean information regarding the rest of the group.

Yet, a fatal flaw remained: if a high-tier player chose to fabricate their profile, how could an uninitiated novice possibly differentiate fact from fiction?

The System is intentionally strangling newcomers, You Yan deduced. It behaves as though it’s terrified of someone among the uninitiated.

The highest-rated player in this room is undoubtedly He Yanqing.

Within the brief three minutes of his silent deduction, several players had already begun aggressively pulling up the status panels of those around them. You Yan was well aware that his own metrics were completely transparent to the remaining seven participants; he had zero data privacy to speak of. Consequently, attempting to construct a lie was entirely counterproductive.

Seeing that no one was willing to break the ice, the muscular Zhang Wei took the initiative. His massive 193 cm frame made the metal chair look like a piece of children’s furniture.

“Zhang Wei. 35 years old. Fitness instructor.” He tapped his thick, calloused fingers against the armrest, his voice dropping into a menacing growl. “In the last instance, two of my teammates were slaughtered. The perpetrator is sitting right at this table.” His gaze scraped across You Yan’s face like a serrated blade.

You Yan remained entirely expressionless, mindlessly twirling his scalpel as flashes of silver light danced fluidly between his fingers.

In a social deduction elimination game, being targeted with a personal vendetta was an exceptional liability. It was an incredibly dangerous position to be in. Concurrently, the remaining players shifted their eyes back and forth between Zhang Wei and You Yan. To them, this sudden friction was a massive advantage it guaranteed that at least one exile vote would be directed away from themselves.

Right at that moment, a frustratingly familiar, mocking voice cut through the tension, carrying a subtle undercurrent of a warning:

“Allowing personal grudges to dictate your choices in a game like this will only guarantee your own spectacular downfall.”

You Yan snapped his head up, his gaze locking directly onto the source. He should have known. The speaker was indeed He Yanqing, whose face maintained that characteristic, infuriatingly smug half-smile that practically begged to be punched.

Upon hearing He Yanqing’s intervention, Zhang Wei’s coiled back muscles locked up instantly. The raw hatred he harbored toward You Yan was unexpectedly diluted by a sudden, inexplicable wave of unease.

He was forced to calculate the strategic risk: If You Yan’s role card actually belongs to the Town faction, and I blindly vote him out out of spite… wouldn’t I be actively destroying my own survival probability?

The rest of the table fell into deep contemplation as well, the minor flashes of opportunistic joy vanishing from their expressions in an instant.

Meanwhile, the live bullet-chat (danmaku) floated lazily across the interface:

[User ID: Sephiro]: It’s fine, just go ahead and do it boldly. Leave the consequences to karma. [User ID: Lyric Without an Ending]: Ahhhhh God He’s commentary makes me laugh so hard, but I have a feeling the one who actually deserves to die is someone else entirely. [User ID: Zhi Zhao]: Stop spamming the chat, you guys are actively tanking my video rendering quality!

“I assume I don’t need to waste time on a formal introduction,” He Yanqing continued, his tone thoroughly casual, as though the entire matrix of the game was already nested firmly within his palm. “After all, there shouldn’t be a single person here who doesn’t recognize me, right?”

Faced with his arrogant claim, the table remained dead silent, no one quite knowing how to construct an appropriate response. It was an undeniable fact his reputation across the instances was staggering. He was the absolute dark horse that had violently shattered records three months ago; his name was common knowledge. If anyone truly didn’t know him, they were effectively living under a rock.

The Remaining Layout

A composed, thoroughly deliberate male voice broke the silence. “Pei Baiyang. Corporate employee. 26 years old.”

The man in the business suit crossed his long legs, his sharp gaze glinting behind his gold-rimmed glasses. “I was simply on my way to the office when I was abruptly pulled into this instance.” He smiled, exposing a sharp canine tooth. “As a point of reference, precisely twenty-five hours have elapsed since I successfully cleared my previous instance.”

This statement was loaded with strategic subtext. You Yan immediately began calculating the implications: The system cool-down window for instance initializations spans twelve hours. The clock in this room reads 9:30 AM, which dictates that Pei Baiyang secured a rest window of over twelve hours. His capability ranking is highly likely second only to He Yanqing among the eight of us.

The abilities granted by the System were heavily correlated with a player’s real-world profession prior to entering the game. ‘Corporate employee’ was an incredibly broad, ambiguous umbrella term. He was intentionally obfuscating his specific profile to keep the lower-tier players in the dark.

“Who gives a damn how many hours have passed since your last instance? Stop wasting our time with useless data, move on to the next person,” Zhang Wei barked impatiently.

Pei Baiyang merely adjusted his gold rims with elegantly sculpted fingers, his expression unchanged as he lapsed back into a calm silence.

The blonde girl tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear. “Chen Yiyi. 22 years old. I’m a kindergarten teacher. I was working a night shift when suddenly…” Her voice was exceptionally soft, but she was cut off by a sudden, violent fit of coughing, her hand flying to cover her mouth.

As she did, a fresh, stark laceration on the inner matrix of her wrist was inadvertently exposed to the table’s collective vision. Once the coughing subsided, she looked around with a distinctly pathetic, vulnerable expression, whispering softly, “I’m so sorry… my health hasn’t been very stable recently.”