Chapter 11

Terror Paradise Chapter 11

Proofreading: kukelekuuk00, Volly

“You are deeply in love with your job, a job requiring deep dedication and a sense of purpose . Using your video recorder you have shot countless scenes of carnage and called on people to gather up their conscience and stop their apathy . But, do you really care yourself? What are you exactly? A hypocrite hiding behind your mask or a true warrior?”

“As of this moment, a certain toxin is spreading inside your body and eating away your life . After you are conscious, your heightened metabolism will accelerate this process . You still have around 40 minutes to find the only exit out of this place . We shall see, whether the conscience of the person always hiding behind the camera will help him return to the side of his family . “

“Life or death, make your choice . ”

Feng Bujue was already on his feet and observing the situation around him by the time he’d heard half of it . He was still wearing the default gamer outfit of black t-shirt and long pants . Remembering a trick that a certain movie loves to play, he made a special effort to check his pockets, but it was empty as usual . The contents of his inventory was also the same, containing only the plastic syringe .

“I will choose your mom!” Feng Bujue swore once after listening to the tape . Since he was currently in single player mode, the system did not stop him from swearing . After that, he examined the properties of the walkman through the menu:

“Name: Walkman tape player”

“Type: Plot item”

“Quality: Rundown”

“Function: Used to play tape recordings”

“Can it be taken out of the level: No”

“Note: You’d better believe what the tape is telling you . ”

This was probably another one-time use storyline related item . Even though Feng Bujue had already committed every single word on the tape to his mind, he listened to it once again as a precaution, unconcerned about the one-two minutes that it would take .

After listening to it for a second time, he placed the walkman into his inventory, as it occurred to him that it would be safer if he brought it along with him, since there might be more than one tape in this level .

The room before him was very spacious and there were around twelve meters or more from the floor to the roof . Near the height of the roof were some huge ventilator fans . From them, it’s possible to see the sunlight streaming out, but there didn’t seem to be any climbable objects nearby . The roof of the warehouse was arched . Raising his head, he could see many brackets horizontal to the ground, to which were attached lit lamps . The walls were very sturdy, it seemed to look like a layer of metal plating, and possibly brick wall on the inside . Whichever it was, it was evident that Feng Bujue lacked the power to destroy the wall as a means to escape .

The system will never generate the sort of levels that can be completed in two to three minutes . If Feng Bujue had been carrying two unused charges of the “exploding god’s fist” skill and had already raised his combat expertise to “F”, the system would definitely have changed the level’s layout or made the warehouse’s walls twice as thick . In those conditions, Feng Bujue might, in theory, have been able to use his skill to escape directly . Though the activation rate for each fist is only 20% and he would not have been able to gauge the thickness of the wall before first hitting it, that possibility would still have existed in theory .

When the system generates a level, it definitely eliminates that sort of possibility . For example, the present Wang Tanzhi would definitely not encounter this sort of level . In short, levels that can be cleared using the initial state of a character when they first joined, no matter how small the possibility, will never be generated by the system .

Feng Bujue advanced forward . The middle of the warehouse was full of containers, stacked in three layers at the highest, but still relatively far from the roof . The containers are connected end-to-end with each other and were arranged tightly, forming the only path before Feng Bujue .

“Hmm…I’ve got a bad feeling about this . ” Naturally, the meaning behind Feng Bujue’s words was not fear; he was just not too optimistic about the potential rewards that could be obtained in the level . Despite what others might say, he felt that this sort of level, derived from “Saw”, would not cause too much of a fluctuation in terror value .

The opportunity to instill terror in a jigsaw murder game mainly lies in “time” . In these games, the threats are visible and the fear increases steadily with approaching death, there shouldn’t be any unexpected circumstances which might suddenly raise the terror value . Also, in the movies, the way for characters to escape is often “self mutilation” . Physical pain combined with a strict time limit tends to lead people to failure . But players in Terror Paradise, who would at most endure pain equivalent to being struck on the finger by a hammer, are not afraid of such a pain, even if it were to happen simultaneously to every bone in their bodies, they’d just grit their teeth and bear with it .

Moreover… As people who have watched this series will know, Jigsaw’s aim is not to kill someone, but to “save people” . He used pain to rescue people who don’t treasure their lives, allowing them to reexamine their lives and experience how valuable their lives were . As long as one is able to “follow the rules” and has the courage to mutilate oneself, then there will definitely be a way to survive .

After considering these factors, Feng Bujue was virtually certain that eighty percent of the level’s difficulty was in the “puzzles” .

The system would not create a situation where the player must die or lose . Probably not in the standard difficulty modes at least . The difficulty in every level is based on the capability of the player’s character, and only in the multiplayer modes will there be an increase in difficulty .

Faced with someone like Feng Bujue, whose character strength, besides stamina points, was not much different from that of a rank 1, the system could only offer up this type of levels to him/her . In his current state, it would have been impossible to make him fight . He would definitely not be able to defeat a system-generated rank 4 monster or a boss alone . Because of that, the way to clear a level becomes clear: Either one solves a puzzle, or one acts like the characters in the movies and uses one’s health points as a shield . If there is too much to handle then one should quit the level .

Not long after, Feng Bujue reached the side of a wall after following the path through the container . On the wall was a drawing of an arrow pointing to a door, which was diagonally blocked by a container . In front of the door was a very narrow gap, enough for someone to pass by tilting his body sideways .

Feng Bujue checked his health and stamina, both of which were almost full . While he was afraid that his health gauge would fall due to the activation of the “toxin”, there wasn’t any concern about his stamina .

He composed himself and adjusted his breathing . In his heart, it was very clear that once he opened the door, a “jigsaw” type of game would initiate and that he should make use of this time to focus himself .

After moving a few steps sideways and opening the door, he went into a new room . When he pushed the door open, he heard a “click” sound . It was apparent that something behind the door had been activated . After a few seconds, the new room lit up . After Feng Bujue had entered the room, the door closed by itself . He was unsure if that was a part of the mechanism or changes made by the system .

In the center of the room was a miniature wooden chair . On it was a doll wearing a black suit, one of its hands was carrying a newspaper . The doll’s build was reminiscent of a child, with a pronounced chin, weird hairstyle, white face, black sclera, blood-red pupils, spiral-shaped blush on the sides of the cheeks and red lips that were both wide and thin .

If this face were to appear in the middle of the night, it could be pretty frightening, but as of now, unless it jumped up and started biting people, no one would be afraid of it .

“Welcome, Arthur . By coming here, it shows that you did not choose to wait for death, so listen to the rules carefully . ” The recording in the doll’s stomach began to play at the same time the room opened . “You should have already seen a functional machine…”

Feng Bujue’s vision shifted to a machine not far away that appeared pretty similar to a washing machine . On the top of that machine was a circular opening as big as a plate that was enough to fit a person’s head . From within that hole, a sound came that sounded like some component was currently in operation . When Feng Bujue took a few steps closer to get a better look, he could see two rows of gears about half a meter deep from the opening . The middle was packed very tightly, leaving only a slit . The two rows of gears were currently rotating inward from both sides, like two waterfalls that were flowing together . Even though it did not seem particularly fast, but the torsion was very strong . The power of the machine was probably more than sufficient to crush wood or even scrap metal .

There was also a timer on the top of the machine near the opening . The time was set as five minutes, but it had already started to count down . Beside the timer was a weight indicator, the unit shown was KG and the needle was currently pointing at zero .

“This machine can crush objects and can also help you open the door leading to the next room . What you are required to do here is to throw objects with sufficient weight into the machine . Once you put in more than fifteen kilograms, the door will open . If you attempt any funny moves like cutting off the power or waiting until the timer reaches zero, this machine will stop…”

Feng Bujue’s vision had already shifted to another place . He was looking for tossable objects . It was clear that other than the small wooden chair and the doll, there were other objects too… . .

“Inside the cage welded on the floor is a Tibetan Monkey that has been deeply sedated, it weighs 10kg . Needless to say, the first thing which you might do next, would be to toss both the doll and the chair into it, but unfortunately, the weight of the two objects is 7 . 5kg…”

Feng Bujue took the newspaper from the doll’s hand, the headline reads “They are not your dinner!” The picture below showed a small monkey crawling in it’s cage and looking out, with the gaze unique to animals that calls for help . Undoubtedly, the author of this report had been Arthur Seagal .

“You condemned those poachers to ruin, and labeled people that bought wildlife products as opulent executioners . But when you travel under the pretext of interviews, you enjoyed many delicacies featuring endangered animals as main ingredients; Your wife’s closet contains more than one fur coat . You personally witnessed the killing of those animals, yet you continued to observe unconcernedly as a bystander . ”

“Now, you will have the chance to experience how a real executioner feels . Will you exchange this animal’s life for survival? Make your choice, Arthur . ”

At this point the recording abruptly ended, yet Feng Bujue was still looking at the newspaper . It seemed that his habit had relapsed again, he actually wanted to finish reading this system generated newspaper…