Earring Woman's face flushed red with anger. She pointed at the slightly plump No. 015. "Now I suspect you're an Assassin. Why else would you single me out for no reason?"
"Shut up!" No. 018, Bald Scorpion Man, roared. "I already fucking told you not to waste time here! The vote's over, so what are you still arguing about? Get moving!"
Earring Woman glared defiantly at Bald Scorpion Man, but ultimately said nothing.
She felt that, as a veteran player, she deserved courtesy from a newcomer like him.
She didn't care at all whether she was in the right.
Still, they really didn't have much time for this game. They needed to get started as soon as possible, so they couldn't keep wasting time here.
With that in mind, she swallowed her anger.
"If no one objects, I suggest we move in single file. Whoever's at the front clears the thorns, and we rotate every half hour. The first person moves to the back, and the second takes over clearing the path," Zhao Xun suggested, taking the opportunity.
"You don't get to call the shots here!" Bald Scorpion Man glanced at Zhao Xun with disdain.
Earring Woman's reaction had been immensely satisfying, and he had even less regard for Zhao Xun, who was also a newcomer.
This was the perfect chance to put the other players in their place and take control of the group.
Zhao Xun wasn't angry. Instead, his smile deepened. "Sure. You make the arrangements, then."
"We'll go single file," Bald Scorpion Man told the others. "I'll be second. Sort out the rest yourselves."
With that, he stood before the Thorn Thicket, leaving room for one person ahead of him.
"After all that, he picked the exact same formation," the slightly plump No. 015 muttered.
Zhao Xun, standing beside her, heard it. He shrugged indifferently and said nothing.
To conserve their strength, they only needed to clear a path wide enough for one person. This was the best approach to begin with. Unless Bald Scorpion Man was an idiot, he couldn't possibly choose anything else.
However, by putting himself second, Bald Scorpion Man clearly intended to use someone else as a guinea pig.
After all, none of them knew what dangers lurked in this vast expanse of the Thorn Thicket. The first person to try would face the greatest risk.
The other players glanced at Bald Scorpion Man, who had already taken his position. They could all guess his intentions and felt somewhat displeased, but getting moving was more important, so none of them said anything.
In the end, Cloaked Man, a veteran player, took the lead.
Zhao Xun stood fourth in line.
He looked at Cloaked Man at the front, guessing that his cloak might offer some protection.
Otherwise, even a veteran player wouldn't volunteer to be a target.
Cloaked Man must have been confident in his defenses to make that choice.
Once all eight of them were in line, Cloaked Man took out a meat cleaver and tried cutting through the thorns ahead.
The thorns were easily severed. They weren't as tough as expected, and nothing unexpected happened.
Everyone breathed a sigh of relief. Cloaked Man kept working, and the others followed close behind him, slowly moving forward.
As Zhao Xun walked, he surveyed their surroundings.
The Thorn Thicket was enormous, its end almost impossible to see.
Even a fool wouldn't believe there were no dangers lurking within it.
Still, the Thorn Thicket wasn't suitable terrain for large beasts, so they didn't need to worry about those animals. What they needed to watch for were little creatures like insects and rats.
Zhao Xun looked down at the path beneath his feet, constantly monitoring the ground.
As he stayed on guard, he began analyzing the rules of this game.
Although the number of Assassins was unknown, there had to be at least two. Otherwise, rule ⑤ wouldn't exist.
There probably weren't more Assassins than Knights. Otherwise, the faction with hidden identities would have too great a chance of winning. That put the number of Assassins somewhere between two and four.
The easiest way to identify the Assassins among them was to find the Princess and then watch for anyone who tried to attack her.
But that also came with a great risk.
Once the Princess was killed, the Knights would lose all hope of clearing the game.
The more troublesome method was to observe the other players' interactions, looking for strange exchanges or gestures.
They were all strangers, so there was no possibility of them having shared tokens of recognition. Besides, the rules specified a "system-assigned secret signal," which usually meant certain phrases or gestures.
But unless those gestures were particularly conspicuous, or the words particularly strange, they wouldn't be easy to spot.
During the argument just now, for instance, Zhao Xun had been watching everyone else, but he hadn't noticed any unnatural gestures or especially noteworthy remarks.
Nor could the earlier show of hands tell him who was more likely to be an Assassin.
The Assassins might have refrained from voting to avoid exposing themselves.
Or they might have voted enthusiastically to encourage everyone to act together rather than seek out the Assassins first.
The vote wasn't much use as a point of reference.
Also, the rules placed particular emphasis on the importance of cooperation. There would likely be tasks later that required several people working together.
Until then, even if he identified an Assassin, it would be best not to rush into attacking them.
Otherwise, they might be unable to advance to the game's final stage.
What concerned Zhao Xun most was that the rules used a "friendly reminder" to stress the importance of finding the right Prince.
The most straightforward interpretation was that there were several Princes in the castle, but only one was the true Prince.
But if that was all there was to it-if the true Prince could awaken the Princess while the false Princes couldn't-then trying each Prince in turn would eventually awaken her.
At worst, they would waste some time. There seemed to be no need to add such a "friendly reminder" to the rules.
So Zhao Xun suspected two possibilities.
First, a false Prince would harm the Princess, making it impossible to awaken her afterward.
Second, a false Prince could awaken the Princess, but that "awakening" would be unsuccessful. For instance, she might become mentally impaired or fall into a vegetative state afterward.
Only if a false Prince awakening the Princess carried some kind of risk would it make sense for the rules to stress the true Prince's importance.
In other words, they had to be cautious when choosing a Prince.
After the group had advanced for half an hour, Cloaked Man stopped what he was doing and headed straight to the back.
He didn't exchange a word with Bald Scorpion Man. He didn't even glance at him.
Clearly, he was dissatisfied with Bald Scorpion Man too. He had merely kept quiet for the sake of the group.
Bald Scorpion Man was annoyed by Cloaked Man's attitude, but he could also tell that Cloaked Man was a veteran. If the man dared to show that kind of attitude, he must have some ability to back it up.
So, instead of treating him as badly as he had the other players, Bald Scorpion Man held his temper and asked reasonably politely, "Could you lend me your cleaver? I don't have anything on me that can clear these thorns."
I don't know whether something went wrong with my computer or the author dashboard crashed. Either way, I tried for over an hour and still couldn't open it (*)
Then I tried transferring the document from my computer to my phone and copying it into the mobile author dashboard. For some reason, the paragraphs merged (*)
I separated them again, but I was in a hurry and didn't check too carefully. I hope I didn't put any breaks in the wrong places.
I've never posted an update this late since starting this book, and I feel awful. Not having a backlog really is a killer.
Before you continue