Clearing the "Birthday Deathiversary" Instance

The livestream viewers watched as the newcomer first grabbed at his hair twice, his face full of irritation. Then he hurried out of the bedroom, went to the door of the bedroom opposite and knocked, carried a corpse out from inside, and rushed to the kitchen to take a pot of stew from the fridge. He then sat down at the dining table, lit the nine candles on the cake, made a wish with solemn devotion, blew out the candles, and began eating the cake.

While the bullet comments were still baffled, a white light flashed, signaling that the instance had been cleared.

The livestream fell silent. A second later, question marks filled the screen.

[???]

[????]

[?????]

[??????]

The dense mass of question marks showed just how unsettled the viewers were.

[Wait, what? Huh? He cleared it just like that???]

It took a long time before someone finally asked the question, but it was exactly what everyone watching was thinking!

With that pot of stewed meat as a warning, Xu Xi didn't dare think too deeply about whether the cake in front of him contained something equally revolting. He only scooped up a little cream from the edge.

Bracing himself to make the sacrifice, he took a bite. Before he could even make out the taste, he noticed his surroundings changing.

Two faint, indistinct figures gathered on the chairs where Dad Tong's and Mom Tong's corpses had been placed, and the figure of a child appeared where he sat. Though he couldn't make out any of their faces, he could sense that all three were smiling.

He could even hear a chorus singing the birthday song. Finally—

"Son, happy ninth birthday!"

Instance cleared.

A white light flashed beneath his feet. Before Xu Xi could react, the scene before him changed.

Xu Xi's eyes widened involuntarily. He slowly pressed a hand to his chest, where his heartbeat had suddenly fallen into disarray, and stared in disbelief at the sight before him.

A vast staircase shone with brilliant golden light before him. Each step was taller than he was, winding upward in layers like the spine of a great dragon, stretching into the sky beyond sight as though it would never end.

The oppressive feeling of its immense size left Xu Xi dizzy. He instinctively wanted to take out his phone and photograph the sacred, awe-inspiring scene before him.

But when his hand found nothing, he came to his senses.

He wasn't in the real world.

Once the initial shock of the enormous stone steps had subsided, Xu Xi looked around. He was standing on one of them, with no end in sight before or behind him, and no edge visible to either side.

He even had the feeling that the golden light radiating from the massive stone steps was all that illuminated this empty space. Otherwise, nothing but darkness would be waiting for him.

After comparing their height to his own, Xu Xi knew he couldn't climb these steps. Against this endless space, he was like a speck of dust, tiny and insignificant.

Fortunately, Xu Xi wasn't left at a loss for long. Several pieces of information automatically surfaced in his mind.

From that information, he learned that this was the God Hunt Game's Player Space.

Within this space, players experienced none of the negative sensations such as hunger, drowsiness, or fatigue. It was as though their bodily functions had been frozen in place.

If they were injured in an instance, even if they lost their hands or feet, they would be automatically healed upon returning to the space, as long as they still had a breath left.

Though the enormous staircase appeared endless to the naked eye, it actually had a fixed number of steps: nine hundred and ninety-nine in total.

Players could climb the staircase by clearing instances. As long as they reached the final step, they could not only leave the God Hunt Game but also make any one wish of it. No matter what the wish was, the God Hunt Game could grant it.

Like the pollution in the real world, the Floor Count was determined by an instance's difficulty. The harder the instance, the more floors players would climb after clearing it; conversely, the easier the instance, the fewer floors they would climb.

"..." After going through it all, Xu Xi couldn't help rubbing his chin. The game was a little stingy with its benefits.

Players risked their lives clearing instances and climbing nine hundred and ninety steps, only to get one wish? They ought to get three at the very least!

After quietly grumbling to himself, he looked up at the towering steps and thought, In fact, probably very few people can successfully climb to the top.

He had already experienced one instance, and as far as he was concerned, that instance had been twisted enough.

He had died a full eight times!

Eight whole times!

He had died so many times he was almost used to it... My ass!

There was even less need to mention the other players, who had no special abilities. Their margin for error was practically nonexistent.

But speaking of his own ability, Xu Xi sighed softly.

He still wasn't sure how many more times he could resurrect after death. At present, there were three possibilities regarding this ability—

First, the ability had a fixed total number of uses, and he had already used it eight times.

Second, the ability had a fixed number of uses per instance and could reset in the next one. Judging by the outcome of the previous instance, he could die at least eight times in a single instance.

Third, he could use the ability an unlimited number of times, with no limit on its uses.

If Xu Xi had the choice, he would naturally hope for the third. Failing that, the second would do.

If it was the first... then things were very bad.

He could only be as careful as possible and avoid dying easily.

And what he had to do now was wait quietly for the next instance to begin.

Of course, if he wanted, he could also enter an instance ahead of time.

But he had just gone through his first instance. Even though his body didn't feel tired now, a faint sense of mental exhaustion lingered.

Xu Xi would rather use this interval to get some proper rest.

Curious about this space, he began looking around, focusing on the step beneath him.

The staircase below seemed to plunge into an abyss, its bottom nowhere in sight. Someone afraid of heights would probably find their legs going weak just standing here.

Xu Xi cautiously made a motion as if going down the stairs and took a step forward.

He didn't actually intend to go down. He was only stretching out his foot to see whether a barrier or something would stop him.

After all, he had no idea how many times taller than him a single step was, and there was nowhere to get a handhold. He didn't want to fall to his death for no reason.

He didn't want to be crippled by a fall, either!

Sure enough, the moment Xu Xi stretched out his foot, a flash of golden light blocked his path.

After testing it in various ways, he discovered that he could only move around on the step where he stood.

He turned his head and looked to either side. Unable to see any difference, Xu Xi had no choice but to pick a direction at random and try walking that way.

Waiting idly was still waiting. He might as well take a walk; perhaps he would even find something extra.

What Xu Xi didn't know was that, while he explored this space, the real world outside had erupted into an uproar over his first instance.