Chapter 420: Alien Land (IV)
Strictly speaking, the essence of this alien game is a data protocol.
In the eyes of Yan Zhen and those players, everything, the mysterious dungeon, medicine, props, treasures and monsters, are all presented in a form that complies with the environmental data protocol.
If you just blindly immerse yourself in the atmosphere of the game, you will become a chess piece controlled by the game. Only when you find the rules can you move forward smoothly in this strange world.
Yan Zhen and Liu Xingquan walked into the room in front of them. On one of the doors of this square room, a skull pattern was pasted by the little spider. There was an "X" drawn on the blood-stained skull, and the warning meaning was self-evident.
"There is a monster behind this door." Liu Xingquan said.
Yan Zhen said, "This is obvious." He stared at the icon again and again.
Liu Xingquan said: "Don't tell me you are going to push open this door and commit suicide."
"Yeah." Yan Zhen said, "I really want to know what's behind this door and how dangerous it is."
"Don't commit suicide!!"
"I know." Yan Zhen took a step back and looked at the remaining two doors. "Both intelligence have been marked, which means that the reconnaissance capabilities of the spiders on this floor have been used up."
"Yes."
"Since there is already a hint of a monster in the room, it means there may be monsters in other rooms as well. We will have to rely on our luck from now on."
Liu Xingquan silently drew the monster logo in the square on the paper.
They had only walked for a few minutes when they came across a monster sign. This silent monster sign was, in a sense, more terrifying than a real monster. Spider-Man warned them of a monster, but what about the next room? How many monsters were hidden in this endless maze of rooms? How many dangers were hidden behind these doors?
Originally, they could open the doors of one room after another and explore as if nothing had happened. But now, it seemed that there was a monster hidden behind every door like the one now.
This is a psychological trap deliberately set up by the game developers to make players experience the pressure of unknown fear as they move forward.
Yan Zhen and Liu Xingquan looked at each other. Yan Zhen said, "Don't you want to know how strong the monster is?"
"In no mood."
"Really?"
"In no mood."
"Okay." Yan Zhen said, "Anyway, I think we will run into a monster sooner or later."
"Please don't set random flags when you are adventuring." Liu Xingquan walked around the room, observing the walls around him.
He said to himself, "Now actually every time we enter a room we have to make one of three choices. Except for the door we came in through, we have to move forward among the one-third choices."
"This room is marked with a monster. It's a choice between two."
"Well, the key is our next path. How many rooms are there on this floor?" Liu Xingquan stood at a corner, looking at the patterns on the wall. All the stone walls were carved with the same pattern, and the theme was a winged goddess falling from the sky. This should be the background story of this alien game. Liu Xingquan touched the uneven and rough surface of the stone wall, checking it one wall at a time.
Yan Zhen pulled the little spider's legs. It pretended to be an ordinary spider again, and no matter how Yan Zhen pulled its legs, it didn't make a sound. Instead, it showed Yan Zhen the fine and sharp teeth on its mouthparts, indicating that if Yan Zhen continued to play with its body like this, it would make him bleed immediately.
Seeing that this tool spider, which had limited reconnaissance opportunities, just lay down and started working after finishing its work, Yan Zhen had no choice but to put it in his pocket.
Afterwards, Yan Zhen picked up the grid diagram drawn by Liu Xingquan and took a look. Now there is no doubt that the maze is not a nine-square grid, but a grid with more specifications than this. He thought about it and raised his head to signal Liu Xingquan that we can set off again.
Liu Xingquan took out a pen and drew a mark in this room. All the maze rooms were almost identical, so in order to avoid going back, they left a mark in each room.
The two-member team decided to maintain the existing exploration strategy and find the end of the maze.
The fifth room to the right from the starting point was marked as containing an unknown monster. They deduced the direction based on the grid drawn by Liu Xingquan, with "north at the top, south at the bottom, west on the left, and east on the right", and pushed open the door to the south of the fourth room.
The new room was empty.
They pushed open the door to the right (east) of this new room.
There are no monsters, and it is safe to enter. The sixth square room is still empty.
After walking forward two more rooms, Yan Zhen picked up a key in the eighth room they passed.
The note on the key is: [A key used to open a lock, even a mentally retarded person knows how to use it. ]
Yan Zhen looked at it silently and threw the key into his bag.
"What do you think we should do if this maze has no end?" Liu Xingquan suddenly said.
"This spider pretending to be dead said that it would scout each floor for us twice, which means that each floor of the maze has a range." Yan Zhen said, "I think we are about to find a breakthrough."
"If only it were as easy as you say." Liu Xingquan sighed and pushed open the door on the east side of the room.
A monster suddenly appeared from behind the door and pounced on Liu Xingquan.
"This is truly a breakthrough!" Liu Xingquan shouted.
The uplifting battle music sounded in the room, and Yan Zhen and Liu Xingquan found themselves being pulled into a ridiculous battle scene. They were facing the monster diagonally. The monster was a strange orange slime monster, with at least five or six eyes on the rolling slime, and it opened three bloody mouths at the same time and roared threateningly at them.
[The slime monster launched a mental threat to Liu Xingquan.]
[The timid Liu Xingquan is trembling. ]
Liu Xingquan shouted: "Who is trembling?! Who is timid? Why can't I even move!"
Yan Zhen said, "I see there is a mental intimidation status above your head, and your movements are restricted." He raised the wooden sword, "It seems that the battle mode is still RPG turn-based. Now it's my turn. I choose to attack."
[Yan Zhen launched an attack on the slime monster! ]
[Slime Monster - 3 HP]
The angry slime monster sprayed acid at Liu Xingquan!
[The slime monster launched an acid attack on Liu Xingquan. ]
[Cowardly Liu Xingquan -2 HP]
Liu Xingquan angrily said: "Why are you targeting me?!"
"It's okay, Liu Xingquan." Yan Zhen waved the wooden sword again, "Hold on! I will avenge you!"
After Yan Zhen hit it three times repeatedly, the slime monster let out a scream and disappeared before their eyes.
At this time, Yan Zhen was not injured at all, and Liu Xingquan's health was only at a precarious 2 points. This meant that if the slime monster on the opposite side attacked one more time, Liu Xingquan would die on the spot.
"Can you see that I'm going to die?" Liu Xingquan said.
Yan Zhen took out an apple and said, "Here, this is for healing."
"I have it." Liu Xingquan took out his apple and took a few bites. The apple disappeared in his hand and his health was restored.
The initial health of Yan Zhen and Liu Xingquan in the status bar is 10. Judging from the slime monster they encountered, the monster's attack can take them away in just a few hits.
This hectic battle did not gain them any experience points, but the slime monster dropped two items after its death.
The props are a [page fragment] and a [mealworm].
Liu Xingquan picked up the fragment of a book page, on which was written a passage:
[The stars flow under her feet,]
[Across the sea of thunder and fire,]
[Flying through the gravel corridor,]
[The roses and stars adorn her wings.]
"What's this?"
Liu Xingquan shook his head. "Maybe it's a clue to the game's puzzle. What's that in your hand?"
"Breadworms." Yan Zhen read the notes, "Common feed. Although this mealworm is still alive, even a moron would know how to use it."
"I don't know if it's my illusion," Liu Xingquan said, "the programmer of this game is very unfriendly."
"Hehe." Yan Zhen touched his chin and stared at the mealworms in his hand for a while.
He took the little spider pretending to be dead out of his pocket, picked up the mealworm and shook it at the little spider.
The big eyes of the little spider, which had been lying down pretending to be dead just now, suddenly lit up. It stretched out its legs, grabbed the mealworm, stuffed it into its mouth, and began to chew it with relish.
"Mm, not bad, not bad," the little spider muttered as he chewed.
"Oh, you finally spoke." Yan Zhen said with a fake smile, "Since I found you a meal, would you like to scout a few more rooms for us? For example, find the room that contains the entrance to the next level of the maze."
The little spider burped, "What are you doing? Take a break first. What's the point of doing so much work? Take a break first!"
"Spit out the mealworms you ate!" Yan Zhen lifted the little spider upside down and shook it vigorously, "Spit it out!"
"Why are you shouting so loudly?" The little spider said, shaking his limbs. "I don't have enough physical strength to do it."
"Not enough physical strength?" Yan Zhen stared at it and said, "In other words, if your physical strength is increased, you can scout a few more rooms for us, right?"
"That's the theory," said Spider-Man.
"How do you increase your stamina?"
"Just like before, give me a few more mealworms." The little spider covered his face and said shyly, "My physical strength will probably increase a little."
Yan Zhen put it down, turned to Liu Xingquan and said, "We can use feeding to upgrade this reconnaissance spider and expand its reconnaissance range."
"But you need new mealworms." Liu Xingquan was still carefully looking at the fragments of book pages in his hand.
"So we have to fight a few more monsters?"
"The most important thing for a novice in an RPG game is to have sufficient supplies," Liu Xingquan said. "We only have one apple and one bottle of water left. One apple is needed to kill one monster. I think this situation is very bad. If we encounter two slime monsters like the one just now, I'm afraid we will both die."
"The key is that there is no experience gained from fighting." Yan Zhen said, "It can be seen that players cannot upgrade within this game mechanism. We should rely on obtaining equipment and props in the maze to improve our combat effectiveness. Tsk, it seems that Fan Yingjie's team has taken advantage of the super weapons. In this case, I guess Bai Lianlian and Song Jiarui's team is likely to know spells such as healing. For a team that lacks supplies and medicine, knowing healing is cheating!!"
"Captain Yan, it sounds like our team is in a really bad situation." Liu Xingquan said expressionlessly.
"..." Yan Zhen said, "Liu Xingquan, do you see the round clock timer in our field of vision?"
"I see. Hmm? The needle clearly didn't move that far just now."
"It's killing monsters. Killing monsters will speed up the pointer." Before the encounter, the pointer was at less than 1 o'clock, but now it is at 3 o'clock. Yan Zhen suddenly said, "What will happen when this timer reaches 12 o'clock?"
"have no idea."
"Let's keep going." Yan Zhen whispered, "I think the original intention of this game may not be to teach us how to defeat monsters and become stronger."
"Are you sure?" Liu Xingquan looked at him. "If we don't kill monsters, we won't be able to obtain items, we won't be able to upgrade the little spider, and we won't be able to expand our team's reconnaissance advantage."
"Games have rules." Yan Zhen said, "Mr. Air told me that everything has rules. Rules are invisible walls that prevent you from doing whatever you want, but they also point out the way forward for you. Rules are often hidden in meaningless noise. Liu Xingquan, I have a feeling that this alien world has already shown us its rules, but we have not yet discovered its hints."
Liu Xingquan clapped his hands, "So, shall we move on?"
"Um."
Then, they found that the door facing east in the new room could not be opened at all.
They had reached a certain end of this level of the maze.
