Chapter 22: Difficulty
Chapter 22 – Difficulty
While Misha was having a rough night, Pioneer was sleeping inside his new shielded tent.
It was 3 AM, and the night was not over yet.
*ZIIIII*
The reactive barrier around the tent sent out an electric shock toward an attacker. The dome of transparent shield shook and sent a warning toward Pioneer King.
In an annoyance, he woke up and took his handgun with him, thinking that a stray zombie or a mutant was attacking the barrier.
"Who the fuck do you think you are!? I'm going to bust your head open and piss into it!"
Pioneer loaded his pistol and got out of his tent, only to dumbfound at the sight before him.
A red tree with human arms and legs as branches stood outside of the barrier. It was the very same tree that Misha encountered and had been following her trace up until now.
Unfortunately for Pioneer, the traces led the tree to his tent.
The branches moved. Hundreds of human arms and legs kicked and punched the barrier in a frenzy, and its thousand roots were trying to penetrate the transparent shield.
The shield battery cell was getting dim each in every second. It was a matter about time that the shield would lose its power.
"Ugh?"
Pioneer was petrified. He stared at the tree in a daze as his mind went blank.
*ZIIII*
*ZIIII*
The shield grew dim. It was about to be disabled.
"Damn you!"
*BANG* *BANG*
Pioneer unloaded his bullets, which destroyed the shield from within the barrier.
The bullets hit the tree trunk and got stuck on the surface. None of them manage to penetrate it.
"Taste this! Flame Field!"
Pioneer activated his skill and enveloped himself in flame, yet the tree did not show a sign of fear.
*PU*
A sharp tree root exited the ground where Pioneer was standing. It stabbed through his crotch and pierced all the way, passing his innards, throat, and his skull.
As it entered Pioneer's body, the lone root extended its small branches, which began sucking all liquid they found.
Pioneer spasmed in shock, but he stopped moving after the body turned into a dried mummy.
After the gruesome torturing, in Pioneer's game vision, a black screen and a message appeared before him.
<<You have died>>
…
…
That night, all surviving players encountered monsters, mutants, or zombies while they were resting.
Majority of the players were killed during their sleep, but a few managed to scrap themselves out of the predicament.
Dove was one of the survivors.
Currently, Dove hid in a pile of a dung mountain of a giant creature that he discovered during the day.
In front of Dove, a three-head-snake moved around the mountain of dung in anger. Its body was riddled with bullet holes, and the surface of its skins had black marks from grenades or explosives.
The snake glared at him, wanting to bite him and taking him out of the pile of poop.
Several hours passed after the staring contest, morning arrived, and the snake chose to leave the place.
Dove stared at the snake without blinking until it left his sight. He spat out a piece of dirt that got into his mouth.
"I have to read more history books when I get back to reality. Aren't there monster encyclopedias in the years back then?"
…
The sunrise illuminated the traces of fighting and the struggling of all players.
At another side of the wasteland, Big Crotch was panting as he pointed his rifle at a monster in a 3-diameter crater.
It was a one-meter-size green egg with jelly tentacles within its mouth. This green egg found Big Crotch and his friends, who was sleeping in a group with a lighted campfire.
All seven of BC's friends were killed in their sleep and eaten by a dozen green zombies, who lay dead on the fields behind his back.
Big Crotch had 25 bullets left and a psychic skill that he believed he could use it one more time before he would collapse from the exhaustion.
The green egg monster, however, kept regenerating its shell and negating all damages he had done.
"I heard from the staffs that you bunch of eggs are persistence and annoying. Now, I know it's an understatement. You are damn stubborn pieces of rotten egg! Just die already!"
*TATATATA*
*CLANK*
No bullet left in BC's rifle chamber or magazine, yet the egg was still alive, and its tentacle still attempted to get up from the ground.
"[Gravity]!"
Big Crotch activated his character skill again. The extra weight was put on top of the egg, crushing it into the ground and expanding the size of the crater.
The egg cracked, but it kept regenerating back to fight the damages.
BC gulped down his last saliva while his trembling legs lost their strength. He stumbled backward on his butt as he was panting and sweating profusely.
Five minutes later, the egg rolled itself up from the crater and approached Big Crotch. It opened its mouth and spat its digestive fluid to repay the favor.
The fluid hit BC's face, which melted his skin on the spot.
"AHHHH!"
Seven tentacles extended from its mouth and wrapped around BC's head. It pulled the body of the green egg over.
The flower-like mouth of one-meter-egg opened wide and chomped down onto the head of Big Crotch.
*PAKI*
*CRUNCH*
*KRUCK*
<<You have died>>
…
…
…
Colony Putinof#13
Inside the pyramid, the government game company building, every administrator was monitoring the event.
"The first night of the test has been finished, sir. The Grand Marshal wants us to recheck the difficulty setting and said it was too difficult for the kids."
"How many survive?"
"Two, sir."
"Where are both of them at the moment?"
"Player Dove at in the 15th respawn area, but Player Misha is in Queen Egg No.2819's womb."
"… That boy-trap again?"
The administrative director, the same guy who told his staffs to ignore Mia's existence, looked at the logs of the activities in the past few hours. His frown deepened as his eyes flickered left and right.
Reading the logs of all combats, he nodded, "The difficulty is just right. These silver pants rich brats haven't learned about the right preparation or studied about these monsters before they began hunting. This is what I'm expecting."
"What should we report to the Grand Marshal, sir?"
"There is nothing wrong in this closed beta test. We have the right difficulty setting, and we are educating the spoiled rich brats. Killing them two or three times in the tutorials is a part of the education."
Gifts
-- Gift
received Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone 
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