All or Nothing

Xia Lun wiped the blood from his cheek, picked up the game card on the table, and pushed open the door leading to the basement.

GOOGLE searched TWKAN.

Although blood was flowing from the corners of his eyes, his nostrils, the corners of his mouth, even his pores, his expression remained blank, as if he did not care about the bleeding at all.

The basement was pitch-black. Yet the moment Xia Lun stepped inside, a cold beam of light suddenly shone down from above, accompanied by an automatically playing mechanical voice. "You have no more than 2,160 hours left to live."

Xia Lun acted as though he had not heard it. Lowering his head, he carefully inspected the red game card in his hand. After confirming there was nothing wrong with it, he placed it on the table in the basement.

"Replay the diagnostic recording." He raised his head and spoke to the speaker protruding from the wall.

—Click.

"Six months, Mr. Xia Lun. You have at most six months left to live. Please forgive our ignorance, but..."

"Can my lungs be replaced?"

"Strictly speaking, your lungs are quite healthy right now. The source of your suffocation and bleeding symptoms may, perhaps, possibly... lie beyond the scope of current medical theory."

"So is there any treatment?"

"I'm sorry, Mr. Xia Lun, but my colleagues and I have done everything we could."

"..."

Distorted by the recorder's static, the conversation sounded as eerie as the final gasps of a dying man.

Xia Lun stood expressionlessly before the table and quietly listened to the recording he had already heard countless times. Then, he lightly pressed the stop button on the speaker.

Click.

—Three months ago, Xia Lun had accidentally swallowed some water while swimming.

He had assumed it was nothing, since choking on water while swimming was normal. But a few days later, he suddenly began coughing up blood. Within weeks, it rapidly worsened until he was practically bleeding from all seven orifices!

There was no doubt about it. He was dying!

Xia Lun had not lived long enough, and he did not want to die. Thus, as soon as his symptoms began worsening, he immediately sought out nearly every medical resource he could find.

However, whether they were renowned medical experts or well-funded research institutions, all of them were helpless before Xia Lun's condition. They could not even identify the cause. All those experts could do was delay the disease's deterioration.

Even the most optimistic experts believed Xia Lun had no more than six months to live.

Death had arrived without warning, and modern medicine was helpless against Xia Lun's lung disease.

"This recording was from three months ago." Xia Lun muttered as he switched on the light beside the table. "That means I have at most ninety days, 2,160 hours. If I account for becoming incapacitated, the time I have left to save myself is even shorter."

Click.

Light fell from above, illuminating the somewhat spacious dark room.

There was only a full-length mirror, a reddish-brown solid wood table covered with assorted items, and a game pod.

Dim blue light gathered over the reddish-brown table. Arranged neatly upon it were a revolver, two boxes of bullets, and three bottles of milky-white potion.

Beside them sat something completely out of place with its surroundings: a rather crude-looking wooden box.

—Xia Lun had taken his sudden terminal illness rather calmly. After all, worrying would not help.

But that did not mean he was unwilling to struggle a little longer.

Although modern medicine was helpless against his illness, there were still plenty of unscientific methods in this world...

Following the desperate logic of trying any doctor when one was gravely ill, Xia Lun had attempted everything from witchcraft and folk remedies to burning ashes to ward off evil, even energy fields and other mystical methods. The results were obvious.

Not only were they useless, they were harmful.

In the end, Xia Lun had exhausted every method he could think of. He knew he was probably doomed.

As a transmigrator, Xia Lun was no stranger to death. After dying in his previous life, he had been reborn in this other world, one similar to yet different from Earth. He simply had not expected his second life to be nearing its end so soon after it began.

Facing death once more, he had thought he would be frightened into a mental breakdown, unable to eat or sleep. Yet, to his own surprise, after losing every possibility of a cure, he had instead become calm.

"This is what they mean by practice makes perfect." Thinking of that, Xia Lun could not help making a grim joke.

As soon as he said it, he choked and began coughing.

Warm blood spilled from the corners of his eyes. Pain as fine as sandpaper traveled along ruptured capillaries and into his nerves. Blood dripped onto the floor, and pale pink bubbles burst as soon as they touched the ground.

Xia Lun endured the intense suffocating sensation surging toward the back of his head, wiped the blood from his face, walked to the table, and picked up a bottle of milky-white potion.

With a pop, he flicked off the stopper using his thumb, then tipped his head back and drained it without hesitation.

The potion tasted awful, bitter and cloyingly sweet. But once it entered his stomach, the intense suffocation vanished in an instant, like haze scattered by a breeze.

Xia Lun turned to look into the mirror. His reflection was covered in blood and looked rather horrifying.

He shook his head, then set down the bottle.

—Two months ago, when Xia Lun had exhausted every possible option to no avail, he had unexpectedly purchased several bottles of "Underwater Breathing Potion" at an underground auction.

The principle behind the potion was completely unknown, but it allowed people to breathe directly underwater, which greatly alleviated Xia Lun's lung condition.

Xia Lun had been overjoyed. After repeated investigations, he finally confirmed that the potion came from a game that had long since been banned.

Thinking of this, he looked up at the mirror again.

In the mirror's hazy reflection, the blood-red game card on the table stood out like a knife.

—That thumb-sized game card contained the "game," and within that game lay the hope of his recovery.

According to Xia Lun's investigation, the game called "Investigator" had been released half a century ago and had long since been banned by the Grand Alliance.

The official reason was player safety. The game was excessively realistic, and if a player died within it, they would suffer brain death in reality as well.

According to news reports Xia Lun had collected, a shocking global mass-death incident had occurred during Investigator's open beta.

On the very first day of the open beta, nearly 30% of players suddenly died while playing. Among those fortunate enough to survive, many later developed severe irreversible mental illnesses.

Ultimately, over 90% of the participants in that open beta died directly or indirectly because of the game.

Newspapers at the time called the incident the "Death Game Incident."

This was not some sensational urban legend. As far as Xia Lun knew, the "player" who had supplied the Underwater Breathing Potion to the auction had been committed to a mental hospital after suffering a breakdown several weeks ago. On the very night of admission, that person died of sudden heart failure.

However, that was not the real reason the Grand Alliance had banned Investigator.

—This game could not be called merely a game at all!

Cases and reports showed that among the few survivors of the Death Game Incident, some had displayed physical abilities far beyond ordinary people. A handful had even gained unbelievable supernatural powers.

There had even been cases of terminal illnesses being cured!

Under the local laws of the Grand Alliance region where Xia Lun lived, possessing an Investigator game card was illegal. But Xia Lun was about to die from a terminal illness, so he could no longer worry about such things.

Simply put, if he did not enter the game, he could enjoy the rest of his life and await death in peace. If he entered the game, he would be gambling with his life, facing almost certain death.

Should he accept his fate, or go all in? That was the question.

Xia Lun hated waiting for death. He would rather die from recklessness than cowardice. Even if he died, he wanted to hold the initiative in his own hands!

"Better to die standing than kneeling," he muttered.

He took a deep breath, picked up the cold game card, and shoved it forcefully into the game pod's card slot.

In an instant, the game pod's gentle green indicator light turned into a blinding crimson glow. An unsettling, grotesque atmosphere silently spread through the basement like icy mist rising in winter.

Xia Lun glanced at the clock. It was exactly one in the morning.

"You have no more than 2,159 hours left to live," the mechanical speaker reminded him.

Xia Lun shook his head. He did not enter the game pod immediately. Instead, he first considered his objective and the resources still available to him.

"In short, I need to find a supernatural method within the game that can cure my terminal illness within three months."

As he thought, he picked up the crudely made wooden box from the table.

As someone who firmly believed in planning before acting, he naturally could not enter a dangerous death game empty-handed.

After deciding to enter the game, he had undergone special training in advance. Besides that, he had acquired weapons and "game items." This crudely made wooden box was a game item he had purchased from other players at a huge price.

The box's effect was quite simple: items placed inside it could enter the game with the player.

Xia Lun opened the box. Inside was already a finely crafted short sword wrapped in silk.

He examined it for a moment, then took out the short sword and silk and placed them on the nearby table.

He took out the medicine for his lung disease and placed it at the bottom of the box. Next, he set the short sword beside the medicine. Then he picked up the revolver, loaded it bullet by bullet, and placed it on top.

The revolver Xia Lun had chosen was a single-action model. This old-fashioned weapon had a very stable mechanical structure, was unlikely to misfire, and was not easily damaged. Other than being difficult to shoot, it had no other flaws.

There was still some empty space in the wooden box, so Xia Lun opened a box of bullets, took out six rounds, and unhurriedly tucked them into the remaining space.

However, Xia Lun did not fill the box completely. After all, making full use of space could not come at the cost of being unable to draw his gun or grab his sword in an emergency.

After finishing everything, Xia Lun closed the pale yellow wooden box again. Taking a deep breath, he hugged the box and climbed into the game pod.

It's time to go all in!

The next instant, cold darkness abruptly swept over his consciousness.

Cold, shaking...

[Welcome to Investigator!]

[Generating Game ID... 4812]

[Checking attributes...]

[Checking items...]

[Confirmed: You are carrying the memory item Voidwood Box. Items inside the box have been confirmed.]

Lines of pale text emerged from the darkness like water stains. Along with them came the increasingly clear sound of howling wind and rain pattering against wood.

The next instant, thunder exploded and the darkness scattered. A longship flying a skull flag burst through the waves, while the text dissolved into white spray like rain.

As the text vanished, Xia Lun's viewpoint suddenly pulled forward above the longship, overlooking the entire deck.

The atmosphere on deck was oppressive and tense. Several pirates armed with whips and short blades were driving a group of scantily clad prisoners to pull the ropes at the stern, stabilizing the ship's structure.

Another massive wave crashed in from below. The longship instantly lost balance, and everyone staggered and fell to the deck. The spray transformed into lines of text once more.

[You have obtained Temporary Language Comprehension!]

[Background Introduction: You are a navigator aboard a whaling ship. After half a year of grueling labor, you were finally able to return home fully loaded. However, on the journey back, a group of fierce pirates raided and seized your whaling ship, intending to sell you as slaves.]

[Yet, whether by luck or misfortune, you encountered an unprecedented storm at sea. To survive the crisis, the pirates had no choice but to release some experienced sailor prisoners from their cages to deal with the storm. You are one of those chosen.]

[However, perhaps the storm and the pirates are not the greatest threats. In the shadowed corners of the cabin that even dim light cannot reach, grotesque and evil things are quietly brewing...]

[Your personal information is as follows]

[Name: Xia Lun]

[Game Rounds: 0]

[Specialization: Pending Evaluation]

[Traits: Pending Evaluation]

[Skills: Pending Evaluation]

[Mental Health: Calm]

[Physical Health: Seriously Ill, Suffocation (not long left)]

[Memory Points: 0]

"Hard to port!" On the forecastle deck, the bald female pirate captain shouted down below. "First mate, have your brother make those people hold the ropes steady! Another big wave is coming!"

"Hard to port!" The Black first mate shoved the wheel hard. Thick-necked, he whirled around and roared, "You heard her! Pull the ropes, now! Whoever slacks off gets killed! Move!"

His roar was quieter than an insect's wings amid the raging storm, but the small Black pirate at the stern still heard the order.

He shot the pirate captain a vicious sidelong glare. Then his eyes shifted toward the exhausted prisoners with barely contained excitement. Grinning, he raised his whip and lashed it toward the crowd.

"Move, pigs! Pull with all you've got if you don't want to die!"

Amid the whip's shrill crack through the air, Xia Lun's viewpoint abruptly dropped and plunged directly into the prisoners.

[Scenario Objective: Survive for 6 Days (1/6)]

The next moment, Xia Lun abruptly opened his eyes!