A Desperate Gamble

Xia Lun wiped the bloodstains from his cheeks, picked up the Game Card on the desk, and pushed open the door leading to the basement.

Although the corners of his eyes, his nasal cavity, the corners of his mouth, and even his pores were bleeding, he remained expressionless, as if completely indifferent to the bleeding.

The basement was pitch black, yet when Xia Lun stepped into it, a cold light suddenly shone down from overhead, accompanied by an automatically playing mechanical voice: "You have at most 2,160 hours left until your death."

Xia Lun acted as though he had heard nothing. Lowering his head, he focused on inspecting the red game cartridge in his hand. Confirming it was correct, he placed the game card on the table inside the basement.

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

Click.

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

"Can we change the lungs?"

"From a strict medical definition, your lungs are quite healthy right now. The source of your asphyxiation and bleeding symptoms perhaps, roughly, maybe... exceeds the explanatory scope of existing medical theory."

"So, is there any treatment strategy?"

"I'm sorry, Mr. Xia Lun, but my colleagues and I have already done our best."

"..."

Against the backdrop of the rustling phonograph, the dialogue was as eerie as the dying gasps of a moribund person.

Xia Lun stood expressionless before the desk, quietly listening to this recording he had already heard countless times, and then he gently pressed the stop button on the phonograph.

Snap.

Three months ago, Xia Lun accidentally choked on a mouthful of water while swimming.

He originally thought it was nothing; after all, choking on water while swimming was quite normal. Yet a few days later, he suddenly developed symptoms of coughing up blood, and within the span of a few weeks, that coughing up blood rapidly progressed to the point of bleeding from nearly all seven facial orifices!

Without a doubt, he was dying!

Xia Lun had not lived enough and did not want to die, so the moment his symptoms began to worsen, he immediately sought out nearly every medical channel he could find.

However, whether it was renowned medical experts or heavily funded research institutions, all of them were helpless against Xia Lun's condition. They could not even figure out the cause of the illness; all these experts could do was merely delay the deterioration of the condition.

Even the most optimistic experts believed that Xia Lun had at most six months left to live.

Death arrived unannounced, and modern medicine was completely helpless against Xia Lun's lung disease.

"This recording was from three months ago." Xia Lun muttered to himself while turning on the lighting switch beside the desk. "In other words, I have at most ninety days left to live—2,160 hours. If I factor in the possibility of incapacitation, the time I have to save myself will be even less."

Clack.

Light fell from high above, illuminating the somewhat empty darkroom.

Inside the darkroom stood only a full-length mirror, a brownish-red solid wood desk laden with various items, and a Game Pod.

The dim blue light gathered on the brownish-red desk, upon which were neatly arranged the following items: a revolver, two boxes of bullets, and three milky-white potions.

Beside these three things lay something whose art style completely clashed with the surrounding environment: a wooden box that looked somewhat crude.

Xia Lun took the matter of his sudden terminal illness quite in stride; after all, worrying was useless.

However, this did not mean he did not want to struggle a bit more.

Although modern medicine was helpless against his condition, the world still possessed plenty of unscientific paths after all...

Clinging to the principle of seeing any doctor when in desperate straits, Xia Lun tried metaphysical methods including but not limited to witchcraft folk remedies, burning ashes to ward off evil spirits, and even energy magnetic fields. As for the results, well, they were obvious.

Not only was it useless, but it was also harmful.

Finally, Xia Lun exhausted every method he could think of, and he knew he must be done for.

As a transmigrator, Xia Lun was no stranger to death. After dying in his previous life, he had been born into this different world that was somewhat similar yet different from Earth. He just hadn't expected that not long after his second life began, it was about to reach its end once more.

Facing death directly once again, he had originally thought he would be frightened to the point of a mental breakdown and restless nights, but to his own considerable surprise, after losing all possibility of a cure, he had instead grown calm.

This is what they call getting used to it the second time around. Thinking of this, Xia Lun couldn't help but tell a cold joke.

At this point, having choked, Xia Lun couldn't help coughing.

Warm blood welled from the corners of his eyes, and a sandpaper-like micro-pain traveled along his ruptured capillaries straight into his nerves. Drops of blood pattered onto the floor, and the surging pink bubbles shattered the moment they hit the ground.

Xia Lun forcibly suppressed the intense sensation of suffocation surging straight to the back of his head, reached out to wipe the blood froth from his face, walked over to the desk, and picked up a bottle of milky-white potion.

With his thumb, he popped the cork with a bang, and then without a moment's hesitation, he tilted his head back and drained it in a single gulp.

The potion did not taste good; it was astringent and cloying, but as the medicinal liquid entered his stomach, the intense sensation of suffocation vanished instantly, like haze blown away by a breeze.

Xia Lun turned his head to look at the mirror. The self in the mirror had a face covered in blood and grime, looking rather terrifying.

He shook his head, then put down the potion bottle.

Two months ago, when Xia Lun had exhausted all methods yet ultimately gained nothing, he had accidentally purchased several bottles of Underwater Breathing Potion at an underground auction.

The working principle of this potion was completely unknown, but its effect allowed people to breathe directly underwater, which happened to greatly alleviate Xia Lun's lung condition.

Overjoyed, Xia Lun conducted successive investigations and finally confirmed the source of the potion: a game that had long since been banned.

Thinking of this, he once again raised his gaze toward the mirror.

In the hazy reflection of the mirror, the blood-red game card on the desk was as glaring as a knife.

That game card, no larger than a thumb's cover, stored that very "game," and within the game lurked the hope of his recovery.

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

The stated reason on the surface was to protect player safety, meaning that because the game was excessively realistic, if a player died within the game, they would also suffer brain death in reality.

According to news reports collected by Xia Lun, during the open beta of Investigator, a large-scale death event that shocked the world even occurred.

On the first day of the open beta, nearly 30 percent of the players suddenly dropped dead while playing, and among those who managed to survive by chance, a massive number successively contracted irreversible and severe mental illnesses.

In the end, over 90 percent of the participants in this game's open beta died unnatural deaths directly or indirectly caused by the game.

This incident was also referred to by the newspapers of the time as the Death Game Incident.

This was not alarmist urban legend; as far as Xia Lun knew, the Player who provided the Underwater Breathing Potion to the auction house had been admitted to a psychiatric hospital just a few weeks prior due to a mental breakdown, and on the very night of admission, that person died of sudden heart failure.

However, this was not the true reason why the Grand Alliance banned the game Investigator.

--This game simply could not be called a mere game!

Cases and reports indicated that among the few survivors of the Death Game Incident, some people displayed physical fitness that surpassed ordinary humans, and among them, a scattered few even acquired incredible supernatural abilities.

There were even cases where terminal illnesses were cured!

According to the local laws of the Grand Alliance region where Xia Lun lived, possessing a game card for Investigator was a violation, but now Xia Lun was about to die from a terminal illness, so he could no longer afford to care about such things.

In short, without entering the game, one could enjoy the remaining life and wait peacefully for death; whereas entering the game meant risking one's life, a slim chance of survival.

Was he to choose accepting fate, or a desperate gamble? That was the question.

Xia Lun loathed sitting idly and awaiting death; he would rather die from recklessness than from cowardice, and even if he were to die, he would seize the initiative in his own hands!

"Dying on one's feet is better than dying on one's knees," he muttered to himself.

He took a deep breath, picked up the cold game card, and forcefully pushed the game card into the card slot of the game pod.

In an instant, the soft green light of the game pod indicator turned into a dazzling, glaring crimson, and an unsettling, grotesque atmosphere silently enveloped the entire basement like a cold morning mist rising in winter.

Xia Lun glanced up at the clock; it was precisely 1:00 AM.

"Until your death, there is a maximum of 2159 hours remaining," the mechanical announcer reminded.

Xia Lun shook his head; he did not rush to enter the game pod, instead first pondering his objectives and the resources still at his disposal.

"In short, within three months, I must find a supernatural method in the game sufficient to cure my terminal illness."

While pondering, he picked up the somewhat crudely crafted wooden box on the table.

As someone who firmly believed in planning before making a move, naturally he could not possibly go play a dangerous death game empty-handed.

Upon making the decision to enter the game, he had undergone special training in advance; besides that, he had also procured weapons and a Game Item--this crudely crafted wooden box was a Game Item he had acquired from other players at a heavy cost.

The effect of the wooden box was quite simple: the items inside the wooden box could enter the game along with the player.

Xia Lun opened the wooden box, inside of which now rested a finely crafted short sword wrapped in silk.

He examined it for a moment, then withdrew the short sword and the silk, placing them on a nearby table.

He took out the medicine for lung disease, placing the liquid at the very bottom of the box; next, he placed the short sword beside the medicine; subsequently, he picked up the revolver, loaded it bullet by bullet, and placed it at the very top layer of the wooden box.

The revolver Xia Lun chose was a single-action model. The mechanical structure of this old-style weapon was quite stable, making it resistant to accidental discharges and damage; aside from a relatively high shooting difficulty, it had no other flaws.

At this time, the wooden box still had some spare room, so Xia Lun opened the bullet box, took out six bullets, and then leisurely jammed them into the remaining space of the wooden box.

Yet Xia Lun did not stuff the wooden box completely full either; after all, the premise of fully utilizing space was that it must not hinder drawing the gun and taking the sword in a critical moment.

After finishing all this, Xia Lun closed the yellowish wooden box once again, then took a deep breath, cradled the wooden box, and crawled into the game pod.

"The time for a desperate gamble has come!" he thought to himself.

The next instant, a chilling darkness abruptly swept over his consciousness.

Cold, swaying...

[Welcome to play Investigator!]
[Generating Game ID... 4812]
[Detecting attributes...]
[Detecting items...]
[Confirmed that you carry the keepsake Voidwood Box, items inside the box confirmed.]

Lines of pale characters emerged from the darkness like water stains, accompanied by the gradually clearing sound of howling winds and the patter of torrential rain lashing against wood.

The next instant, a thunderclap exploded, the darkness instantly scattered, and a longship flying a skull flag violently broke through the waves, the characters turning into white water droplets like rain along with the splashing spray.

As the characters dissipated, Xia Lun's perspective abruptly pulled forward above the longship, overlooking the entire deck.

The atmosphere on the deck was oppressive and tense, with a few pirates wielding longwhips and short sabers driving a group of scantily clad captives to pull the ropes at the stern in order to secure the hull structure.

Another giant wave struck from below, the longship instantly losing its balance, and everyone stumbled and fell to the ground, the water droplets turning once again into lines of characters.

[Temporary Language Comprehension gained!]
[Background Introduction: You are the navigator of a whaling ship. After half a year of arduous toil, you are finally able to return home fully loaded. However, on the return journey, a ferocious band of pirates plundered and occupied your whaling ship, intending to sell you all as slaves.]
[Yet whether by luck or misfortune, you encountered an unprecedented marine storm. To weather the crisis, the pirates had no choice but to release some of the experienced sailor captives from the cages to deal with the storm, and you are precisely one of the chosen ones.]

However, perhaps storms and pirates were not the greatest threats; in the corners of the cabin where the dim light struggled to reach, grotesque evil spirits were also quietly brewing...

Your personal information is as follows:

Name: Sharon

Game Round: 0

Specialty: Pending Evaluation

Trait: Pending Evaluation

Skill: Pending Evaluation

Mental Health: Calm

Physical Health: Critical illness, Asphyxia (Running out of time)

Memory point: 0

"Hard a-starboard!" on the forecastle deck, the bald female pirate captain shouted down at the people below. "First Mate, tell the lot your younger brother's managing to hold the ropes steady! The next big wave is coming!"

"Hard a-starboard!" The Black First Mate shoved the helm fiercely. Thick-necked, he whipped his head around and roared, "You heard 'em, pull the ropes fast! Whoever's slow gets killed, move!"

His furious roar sounded even fainter than the beating of an insect's wings amidst the clamor of the raging storm, but the scrawny Black pirate at the stern still heard the order.

He cast a vicious sideways glance at the pirate captain, then rolled his eyes, looking toward the exhausted captives with a hint of agitation. He grinned, raised his whip, and lashed out fiercely at the crowd.

"Move, you swine! If you don't want to die, pull with all your might!"

Amidst the sharp whistling of the whip's tip tearing through the air, Xia Lun's perspective plummeted abruptly, plunging straight into the midst of the captives.

[Scenario Goal: Survive for 6 days (1/6)] ```

The next moment, Xia Lun snapped his eyes open!