Trapped in the Dungeon!

"Shancheng, I was just looking for you!" Itō Hidetaka caught hold of Shancheng Kojirō.

"We're out of time! What on earth have you been doing?!"

"Why has our economic index fallen instead?!"

"Did you pass my instructions along?"

Faced with this barrage of questions, Shancheng Kojirō hurriedly held his display up in front of Itō Hidetaka.

The first news item on it read:

[Breaking news: Eastern Ocean Island police confess to accepting bribes from their leader, Itō Hidetaka. The culprit behind Dongying's turmoil has been identified.]

[Legal exposé: Itō Hidetaka and his staff are vampires who hold human rights in utter contempt!]

[International special report: Itō Hidetaka, leader of Eastern Ocean Island, has imposed a 24-hour workday in his country, gravely violating the Blue Star Human Rights Convention!]

[The World Peace Organization has issued a statement declaring that Itō Hidetaka's actions have seriously undermined the planet's stability!]

[The International Tribunal announces that Eastern Ocean Island's accelerated production is suspected to be the result of Itō Hidetaka's strong intent to wage war! The International Tribunal has convicted Itō Hidetaka of plotting war.]

[Bribery, exploitation, destruction—he is Eastern Ocean Island's devil!]

Negative news blanketed the screen, and reading it all made Itō Hidetaka's head start to swell.

"Why is this happening again?" Itō Hidetaka demanded furiously.

"Weren't the domestic media supposed to be under control? How can there still be negative news like this?"

Shancheng Kojirō was panting heavily. When he heard Itō Hidetaka's question, he felt rather helpless.

You burned the bridge after crossing it and tried to make institutions like the police and the courts your scapegoats. Of course they'd expose you.

Our hold on Eastern Ocean Island was already hanging by a thread. A move like this, made without regard for the consequences, was bound to be the last straw that broke the camel's back.

"Mr. Itō, please keep reading..."

Itō Hidetaka continued scrolling down and found several digital documents further below.

"Proposal to impeach Itō Hidetaka by the Eastern Ocean Island Land Workers' Union!"

"Proposal to impeach Itō Hidetaka by the Eastern Ocean Island Chamber of Commerce!"

"Proposal to impeach Itō Hidetaka by the Eastern Ocean Island Film Association!"

"Proposal to impeach Itō Hidetaka by the Eastern Ocean Island Four-Island Federation!"

Hundreds of impeachment documents filled the screen before Itō Hidetaka like a dark, oppressive mass, leaving him suddenly short of breath.

"Mr. Itō... every industry on Eastern Ocean Island has completely broken with us..."

"We... we've completely lost control of Eastern Ocean Island," Shancheng Kojirō said helplessly.

"The mission is already over, really."

"We... failed the Raging Waves dungeon this time too."

Shancheng Kojirō's words struck Itō Hidetaka like a heavy punch.

Itō Hidetaka had been on edge this whole time, and the sudden blow left his mind blank.

Once his mind had gone completely empty, he listened quietly and realized he could indeed hear the other challengers wailing outside the Command Room.

"It's over..."

"It's over? Just like that?"

He sat on the sofa, dumbstruck, unable to find any words for a moment.

It's over. It's all over.

After working so hard for so long and exhausting every scheme, we still ended in failure.

Now Itō Hidetaka had no choice but to think about his future.

Although carrying out mission two had been the Emperor's will, the Emperor certainly wouldn't take the blame.

When the time came, all the blame would surely fall on him.

Failing the mission could mean the erasure of more than ten thousand lives!

If something like that came to light, how could he, Itō Hidetaka, continue living in the Dahe Settlement? He would be knocked clean off his pedestal!

Suddenly, a cold gleam flashed in Itō Hidetaka's eyes!

No!

That's not right!

If we'd really lost control of Eastern Ocean Island, the mission should have been declared a failure.

In that case, my points should have been deducted, and I should have been teleported out of the dungeon.

How could I still be sitting here?!

This Shancheng Kojirō must be muddying the waters!

Itō Hidetaka's mind was already somewhat muddled, and now he even thought that the Shancheng Kojirō before him might be a fake, an NPC Lin Ye had sent to impersonate him.

In an instant, Itō Hidetaka seized Shancheng Kojirō by the collar and roared:

"How dare you lie to me! If we failed, why are we still in the dungeon?"

"Was it because you didn't follow my orders, so you came here to fob me off?!"

Faced with Itō Hidetaka's interrogation, Shancheng Kojirō was displeased, but he remained polite.

"Mr. Itō... I don't know why the dungeon hasn't closed yet either, but that's the truth."

"Bullshit! Baka!" Itō Hidetaka's spit splattered right onto Shancheng's glasses.

"You... are you Lin Ye's spy?! Speak! Are you a spy?!"

This time, Itō Hidetaka's words enraged Shancheng Kojirō as well.

He suspected that Itō Hidetaka had lost his mind and was still living in a dream.

He had personally handled every operation, unlike Itō Hidetaka, who had been giving orders remotely the whole time.

The Arsenal's Command Console had completely lost its connection to Eastern Ocean Island!

Their loss of control was a nail already hammered into the board. It was truly foolish to still be hung up on this.

Bang!

Shancheng Kojirō punched Itō Hidetaka square in the face, knocking him to the ground.

In the real world, the Firmament was watching, so he couldn't hit people. Fighting and causing trouble were very likely to draw immediate, severe punishment from the Firmament.

While they had been carrying out the dungeon mission, the Firmament hadn't allowed challengers to hurt one another either. Besides, with the Emperor's written orders in place, he couldn't defy Itō Hidetaka and could only obediently do as he was told.

But now that the mission had failed, none of that mattered anymore.

This interval before they were teleported out of the dungeon was a gray period outside anyone's jurisdiction. He had absolutely no reason to show Itō Hidetaka any more respect.

"Enough! Itō Hidetaka, you've gone mad!"

"We're both Level 2, and the dungeon is over. What gives you the right to order me around?"

With that, Shancheng Kojirō hauled Itō Hidetaka up from the floor and slapped him across the face.

"If we'd failed the original mission, we would only have lost 100 points each, and no one would have died. It was because you insisted on having your own way that the mission changed, and now many of my students are going to die because of you!"

"How do you still have the nerve to stand here shouting?!"

After venting his fury, Shancheng Kojirō stormed out and slammed the door behind him.

The beating Shancheng Kojirō had given Itō Hidetaka cleared his head considerably.

He gritted his teeth, then gently touched his aching cheeks, his heart full of resentment.

The slap itself was nothing, really. Under the Firmament's rules, any injuries suffered in a dungeon would be completely erased the moment he was teleported out.

As for Shancheng Kojirō openly assaulting him like that, the Emperor must have seen it too. Once they were out of the dungeon, justice would be done.

The only thing Itō Hidetaka was puzzled about now was why he still couldn't be teleported out of the dungeon.

"Firmament! Why am I still in the dungeon? Has the mission not failed yet?"

[Firmament notification: The challengers have lost control of Eastern Ocean Island and cannot overtake Eagle Sauce economically within the allotted time. The mission has been judged a failure!]

[However, within a dungeon, its special settings take precedence over the basic settings! Because of a special setting created by this dungeon's designer, Lin Ye, the challengers' points have not yet been deducted, and the surviving challengers have not yet been teleported out of the dungeon.]

"Setting? What kind of setting could there be?"

Itō Hidetaka was suddenly seized by another ominous feeling.

After his experiences in these two dungeons, Lin Ye's special settings had left a psychological scar on him.

These strange, devious settings were Lin Ye's specialty. And every one of them had a world-shaking effect on a dungeon's progress.

[Designer Lin Ye believes it is unfair for challengers to harm dungeon NPCs without consequence: challengers can simply walk away after hurting dungeon NPCs, while the NPCs are powerless to do anything;

Therefore, in this dungeon, if a challenger deliberately harms a friendly NPC, the dungeon's closing time will be extended.]

"Extend the dungeon's closing time?!"

A chill ran through Itō Hidetaka's entire body.

If that was true, didn't it mean Lin Ye could trap challengers in his dungeon?

Nothing like this had ever happened in all the years dungeons had been developing on Azure Star!

"That's completely unreasonable!"

"This is nothing but a Dungeon Designer maliciously tormenting challengers."

[After a strict review, the Firmament has determined that this setting is entirely reasonable.]

[The purpose of the Firmament's dungeons is to provide challengers with a world close to reality, thereby improving Azure Star's technological capabilities in every field. Mr. Itō Hidetaka's deliberate harm of friendly NPCs has gone against that original purpose and is also highly likely to affect his way of life in the real world. The Firmament believes he should receive additional punishment.]

The Firmament's explanation left Itō Hidetaka even more confused.

It's wrong to deliberately hurt NPCs too? Plenty of previous dungeons actually had similar settings!

How did it become expressly forbidden here?

Could Lin Ye be the Firmament's own son?!

Even so, he understood the basic point.

To put it bluntly, even though they had lost, they couldn't leave the dungeon now. They had to stay and continue suffering.

He clenched his fists and roared.

"Lin Ye! Damn you!"

This was naked humiliation!

The mission has already failed, so what am I still doing in the dungeon? Sitting quietly and waiting to die?

Lin Ye just wants viewers all over the world to see me making a spectacle of myself in the dungeon!

"Firmament, how long will this dungeon last?"

"Surely it can't just go on endlessly like this?"

[Firmament notification: The dungeon's duration will be extended until the special events triggered by the challengers in the dungeon have completely ended!]

[The challengers still have two special events to complete:]

[Enemy of the World] and [People's Uprising]!