Between Seconds

In Birmingham, United Kingdom, the city had changed since the old days. If you had to compare it with what it used to be, there were more skyscrapers, and they were taller. Almost all the little houses in the old district had been replaced...

The Pitch Black arcade stood in the center of Birmingham. Since cars had long been banned from the city, Heming and the others had no choice but to walk there...

There was only [?] day left before the second stage began. Heming, Rie, Zeng, and Deng had all passed the first round of tests. [?] days before the second round began, the organizers would contact them.

The streets were lined with all kinds of shops: clothing stores, jewelry stores, souvenir shops...

"Since we've come all the way to the United Kingdom, should we buy some new clothes? Do you think what we're wearing doesn't suit the place?" Zeng suggested they go shopping for clothes.

Heming looked at the black staff uniform he was wearing and decided it was probably time to change. Rie didn't mind, since she had brought plenty of clothes. Heming murmured that he didn't care, and the four of them went into a fairly large clothing store...

As soon as they entered, several enthusiastic salespeople came over. One of them asked in Chinese, "May I ask what style of clothing you're looking for?"

Heming nodded at the salesperson to show that they could understand Chinese.

Zeng and Deng wanted to look around by themselves, while several salespeople surrounded Rie and kept introducing clothes to her.

Heming felt the credit card in his pocket. He figured he probably wouldn't have to pay, since he had just seen Deng feeling for his own credit card...

Heming looked around and eventually picked out a gray suit in an inconspicuous corner, without paying attention to the price...

Only when it was time to pay did Heming realize that the suit he'd picked cost [?] U.S. dollars...

Five outfits cost [?]. You could imagine how expensive everything in a place like this was. Deng clearly didn't seem to care, while Rie looked a little embarrassed. She was the only one who had picked out two outfits.

Zeng noticed Heming's confusion and walked over to him. "I can earn hundreds of thousands from a single mission, sometimes over a million. And my expenses are usually reimbursed, so you don't need to worry about the cost."

Heming nodded. So that was how it worked...

When they reached the city center, Zeng found a pretty good hotel and booked two rooms. Then the four of them grabbed a quick bite in the hotel restaurant.

After they finished eating, Rie suddenly stood up and called out, "Then let's go to the arcade!"

Heming, Zeng, and Deng exchanged smiles. Maybe they were all thinking the same thing: what a gaming fanatic...

The Pitch Black arcade was on Birmingham's central street. It was directly connected to arcades throughout the United Kingdom. That was how Pitch Black operated: each country had different games, and you could only play that country's exclusive games by visiting it...

This style of operation had created a new kind of person: the chasers. They traveled all over the world just to play all kinds of different games...

The arcade had clearly just been renovated. It was much bigger than the arcade in Okinawa, Japan. A sign at the entrance read, "Welcome to City of Death."

On the first floor, Heming and the others used their personal registration cards to exchange them for Between Seconds game cards. When the four of them handed over their cards, people nearby cried out in surprise...

Why? Heming knew, of course. It was because of their registration cards. Rie's was gold, marking her as a representative in the national gaming competition. Zeng and Deng's cards were silver-gray, marking them as top-level amateur gamers. Heming's was the most impressive: a black card, given to him by Kuo Ming. It marked him as a senior employee and game tester for Pitch Black...

To have so many experts show up at the same arcade was astonishing. You could imagine how intense this game of Between Seconds was going to be.

Upstairs, the staff gave the four of them two two-person pods. Although all four wanted to act together, that was how the game was designed. Even if they entered in two-person pods, they wouldn't appear together once inside the game. They could only contact each other by radio; they had no way to get in touch with anyone else. So, for Heming and Rie, and Zeng and Deng, meeting up in the game might take some effort.

There were [?] hours until the game began, but they could enter their pods and read up on the game first.

After saying their goodbyes outside, the four of them entered the pods. The game had to be completed within [?] in real life, while [?] days passed inside the game...

There were six types of enemies to choose from: the biohazard series, dinosaurs, aliens, monsters, machines, and beasts...

The enemy type with the most votes would appear in the game. The setting was always an artificial city, and the victory conditions were to survive for [?] days or eliminate all the enemies.

There were no specific weapons in the game. Anything you could pick up could be used as a weapon. The realistic damage system was set at over [?]%, and for women the damage system was set at over [?]%. If this was your first time playing, you also had to undergo a special nerve test...

Players' appearances were completely modeled on their real selves, but their clothes, occupations, and weapons were assigned at random. Some were good, some bad.

As in other games, once you died, you couldn't enter the game again...

There were [?] minutes left until the game began. Players could enter now...

Heming gently hugged Rie and said, "Be careful. It's going to hurt!"

Rie nodded and kissed Heming, making him blush. Then they entered the game.

"Players, please choose the type of enemy you'd like to face."

Heming looked over the descriptions of the different enemies and chose the biohazard series without hesitation. Zombies were the most challenging opponents—or at least, that was what Heming thought.

"Please wait..."

"The enemy type with the most votes is..."

"The biohazard series."

"Now show us your own style of play!"

After entering the game, Heming looked at his clothes and found himself wearing a blue police uniform. He immediately took out his radio to contact Rie.

"Hello? Hello? This is Heming. Rie, can you hear me? Rie, can you hear me?"

"Pant... Hello... This is Rie. Something is coming toward me. I'll find somewhere safe, then contact you again."

"Okay. Be careful." Heming put away the radio and checked what he had on him.

A [?] pistol, 12 bullets, a baton, and a belt-mounted flashlight.

It wasn't bad equipment, though a knife would've been even better. Heming looked around and only then realized how dangerous his situation was: he was on the roof of a high-rise. There were no zombies up here yet, but it wouldn't be much fun once they came up.

Heming looked around. He had only three possible ways down. The first was through the door, but that was no longer an option; he could already hear the zombies' low growls. The second was through the ventilation ducts. That could be safe, or it could be dangerous. Fortunately, he had a gun, and a gun was the best weapon to have in a ventilation duct. The third option was to make his way down by jumping from one rooftop to another...

Heming didn't wait for the zombies to reach the roof. He ran over, shut the door, and climbed into the ventilation duct.

First, Heming had to find a map of the city. His first destination would be a department store or supermarket. He could find a map there, and maybe pick up a few good knives to use as weapons.

The ventilation duct was fairly spacious. Heming searched for somewhere to climb down, but dozens of zombies were guarding each of the openings he found.

Heming continued searching through the ventilation duct. His goal was clear: find a suitable place to climb down, then figure out what to do next. Staying in the duct forever wasn't an option.

Suddenly, a scream came from a duct some distance away. Someone had probably been surrounded by zombies.

Without thinking twice, Heming hurried in that direction.

When Heming reached the spot, he saw a Black woman fighting several zombies hand-to-hand with a kitchen knife.