Within the amusement park, everything—pots and pans, brushes and ink, all manner of fruits and vegetables, even vehicles—dashed about in chaos. Overhead, a city bus soared through the sky...
Against this spectacle, Ye Shu's gu-gu chicken form wasn't all that conspicuous.
She flapped her wings hard, battling free from the thicket. The grass was nothing but loose sand and rocks—not a single spot to hide. Her keen eyes settled on the gift shop across from the pirate ship, where a pile of ancient, dusty dolls stood waiting. With any luck, she’d slip by unnoticed.
"Cluck, cluck, cluck."
Darting into the shop, she leapt onto a shelf crammed with teddy bears and stuffed rabbits. Among all the ashen, faded plushies, one gleaming, feathered gu-gu chicken stuck out like a bead of blood in snow.
She bounded up onto the ceiling fan. Its blades were narrow, but with a little hunching, she could just scarcely obscure her silhouette from below.
At that moment, a swarm of players poured into the gift shop.
One had drawn 'wallpaper' for their form, and plastered themselves against the wall so seamlessly they were practically invisible. Another was an electrical box, simply hanging off the wall, blending into the background... One poor soul, who’d become a stuffed animal, burrowed headfirst among the others, desperately hoping to pass for dead stock.
The clock ticked down—ten seconds left.
Outside, across the plaza, players bounced and shuffled, desperately seeking cover.
Ye Shu tucked herself deeper behind the fan blade. As long as the hunters didn’t look up, she’d remain unseen.
Three minutes elapsed; the countdown ended.
A whistle blared.
All players' viewpoints zoomed out to a 50-meter radius. No one dared move—they crouched silently, guarding their meager patches of safety.
The chat buzzed in both world and local channels—the game didn’t restrict talking in the global feed.
[FerrisWheel]: Holy crap! The special effects in this game are unreal! I turned into the ferris wheel—there are even perks! I can see all the hunters from up here... I freakin' love it!
[Desk]: Nice knowing you, man. You’ll be the first sacrifice for the hunters.
[Tree]: First time in this game, kinda nervous. Any tips for calming down?
[TrashCan]: Bro, are you the third tree to the left of the drop-tower ticket booth?
[Tree]: ...How'd you know?
[TrashCan]: Can you please stop shivering? Branches are falling all over me—I'll get caught too at this rate.
Gunshots split the silence.
The local player count dropped to 9996.
The Hide-and-Seek Deathmatch had begun.
Having secured a hiding spot, Ye Shu received a private message from Su Bai.
[SexyRoachInBlackStockings]: Shushu, thank god they don’t block private messages—how would I survive without you? I'm stuck in A-101 as a goddamn semi-trailer... I just know I'm out first round. How about you?
Su Bai rattled on, venting her game-related woes.
[ImYourDad]: A-101, I drew... a live chicken.
Ye Shu glanced down at her chicken legs; even her comb quivered in resignation.
This round didn't restrict the use of contract beasts, but given the weird circumstances... It was better not to summon 'Big Beauty' for now!
[SexyRoachInBlackStockings]: Hahaha—so you're even more conspicuous than me? Forget it, I see a hunter close by—wait, why does he look so familiar... like I've seen him... somewhere...
Su Bai’s gaze crossed with the hunter's.
As she recognized his face, her heart slammed with terror.
Why... why was he showing up this early in the dungeon?!
This was the boss behind the curtain—the one said to only appear in the highest-difficulty death rounds. Did that mean all those rumors she'd heard before were lies?
Impossible.
Even worse... that bastard had a complicated, even deadly history with Shushu. Were it not for her own lack of power, Su Bai would've gladly floored the gas and run him down.
Lin Qingyue stared unblinkingly at the rusted semi, lifting his gun and taking aim.
Su Bai's heart thundered. If this bastard fired, she'd bolt—first-round rules meant players could still move as long as they weren't caught.
Lin Qingyue pulled the trigger.
Bang—
The bullet tore through empty space.
The big rig, parked between sightseeing trams, suddenly revved and bolted like a beast, vanishing past the horizon.
[ShoeLace]: Help—some poor truck is getting chased by a whole pack of hunters! Brutal.
[Toothpick]: Glad I'm a toothpick. All I need is a shadowy corner and I'm invisible.
[PlasticBottle]: I hid in a garbage pile—nearly got shot, scared me to death.
[ToiletPaper]: Can anyone relate? I got turned into a roll of toilet paper. A hunter tried to yank me out for snot, but the roll wouldn’t budge... He shot me twice! Please, someone save me—
That truck being hunted—could it be Su Bai?
Ye Shu wanted to help her... but a glance at her winged, feathered form convinced her otherwise. She wisely reconsidered.
Another burst of gunfire.
Player tally in A-101: 10,000/9,875.
Less than five minutes in, over a hundred players had been sent packing by the hunters.
Su Bai, with a deft swerve, managed to ram one of the hunters aside.
"Honk, honk!"
She was stuck in truck form—voiceless, all she could manage was a defiant blast of the horn.
The hunters, interpreting it as open retaliation, converged all at once.
Two shots from Lin Qingyue found her, and with others pressing in from all sides, escape was impossible. Su Bai cranked the engine, aiming her grill straight for that man.
Bang.
This time the shot landed. The truck shattered into fragments, vanishing from the funhouse floor.
Su Bai was gone.
At the same moment, Ye Shu watched Su Bai’s chat avatar turn gray, recognizing her friend's elimination.
Fifty meters away, a squad of hunters began moving in her direction.
Everywhere they marched: overlapping trees, toppled bins, elephant dolls in fountains—any player who looked even slightly out of place was unmasked at breakneck speed.
Footsteps and gunshots closed in, rhythmically merging.
Soon, hunters barged into the gift shop as well.
Guns up, they unleashed indiscriminate fire.
The first player to fall was the one soaking in the doll pile.
Ashtrays in corners, floor tiles disguised as planks, wall art pretending to be wallpapers—every target was systematically dispatched.
Still, Ye Shu stayed gold—perched on one leg, perfecting the art of avian stillness. Not one hunter looked up at the ceiling.
Indeed, the old gamer’s wisdom rang true: NPCs never look up.
"Nothing left here. Let’s move—we need to clear the grounds before that guy gets here," said a hunter, slinging his gun and exiting.
Ye Shu didn’t so much as twitch, her gaze locked on the distant threshold.
Within two minutes, the hunters returned, spraying the pitted walls and battered shelves with gunfire.
Even the wallpaper player was unmasked, fizzing out in a rain of pixels.
No hiding spot was safe—the hunters picked through everything, down to tissue boxes in the trash.
Ye Shu sent up a silent prayer—may their attention pass her by.
"All right, that should be everything!"
On his way out, the head hunter glanced up—just in time to spot a certain gu-gu chicken’s rear end peeking from behind the fan.