Chapter 1211: Black Card 9
Standing in the middle of the maze passage felt like standing between two towering buildings, with a wide and imposing commercial street underfoot, while on both sides were commercial buildings representing the city's face—though the size of the passages varied somewhat, even the smaller ones were far from narrow.
Such a massive maze had one hundred and sixty-two correct routes where the repeated sections were less than one-third of the total path length, not to mention the countless dead ends and misleading routes designed to confuse players.
If fifty-four people were scattered inside, running into two or three would be considered lucky, unless the starting points of the maze were not far apart.
But if that were the case, the linked props should have marked the positions of Liang Shuang and the other two.
Xu Huo had been in the maze for less than half a day and had already encountered over a dozen players, six of whom had died. This was already a significant proportion of the total number. If the encounter rate remained this high according to the rules set by the game, by the latter half of the game, the remaining players would have to rely on repeatedly touching walls to get their cards.
It was the same problem—this method wouldn't allow the cards to circulate.
One of the joys of the Poker Card Maze should be the ability to constantly swap different cards to obtain changing Instance information. If the cards couldn't circulate, what fun was the game? Ten days' time, even if they had to feel their way, they should have reached the end by then... So there should be more than fifty-four players in the maze.
Only players could make the cards circulate.
Additionally, although the cards displayed at the starting point were fifty-four, neither the Instance background nor the game rules explicitly mentioned the exact number of cards. Whether this had changed due to the Instance's upgrade was unknown.
However, if the Instance had more than fifty-four people, whether it was one deck or two decks made little difference, because the players who arrived first would soon fill in the card faces that had returned to the Instance.
In fact, verifying his speculation wasn't difficult—first, count the heads; second, look for duplicate cards.
Of course, the more cards a single player saw, the more cards would be randomly sent out, increasing the chances of getting duplicate cards.
The specifics would only be clear later.
Following the direction given by the clue card, Xu Huo moved toward the maze's endpoint while triggering the mechanisms on the maze walls.
After the White Card 9 was randomly sent out, the effect of the Mutant Plant Affinity was gone, but the probability of triggering traps remained high, along with some inconsequential effects like "Advance 100 meters" or "Retreat 100 meters."
Half a day later, Xu Huo picked a random spot to rest, replenished his energy briefly, and then set off again. However, in the following hours, he didn't encounter a single person, nor did he find the passage corresponding to his first card. Instead, he discovered the passage for Black Card 9 elsewhere—this was the second passage he had come across.
The process of walking was extremely monotonous, so during the journey, he took the opportunity to compile a plant collection of the flora inside the maze walls: capturing the moment they burst out of the walls.
The bizarre and varied plants were also a scenic feature of the Poker Card Maze.
At night, there was no lighting inside the maze. Some plants that thrived in the dark were noticeably more furtive than their daytime counterparts. They would appear in unexpected places at unexpected times, some even growing in patches out of the maze walls, disguised as inconspicuous grass. Walking into them initially caused no reaction, but they would attack when people let their guard down. The attacks weren't intense, mostly an inadvertent touch, but most of these plants were poisonous.
In some places, mushrooms with enticing aromas and seemingly delicious appearances would even grow.
Xu Huo picked a few to feed the King Fungus later.
After walking in complete darkness for less than an hour, a massive plant ball blocked the passage, about twenty meters high. In the center was a very solid sphere, while around the edges, vines carrying a sticky liquid lay on the ground or hung on the maze walls.
There were people inside, and at the same time, Xu Huo's linked props showed a companion's marker.
Xu Huo tossed a pebble at it. "Are you asleep?"
Inside the plant ball was a large round prop, and soon a loud voice came from within, "Old Xu, is that you!"
It was Jiang Zifeng.
"Why are you inside the ball?" Xu Huo asked from ten meters away.
"Haha! Bad luck. I thought the passage I found was a shortcut, but it turned out to be full of traps everywhere, and I got surrounded... Anyway, it's dark, so I planned to wait until morning. Besides, these mutant plants are a free guard for me." Jiang Zifeng chuckled.
"Your first card is Black Card 9?" Xu Huo raised an eyebrow.
"How did you know? Did you see that passage too?" Jiang Zifeng said. "If I'd known you were nearby, I wouldn't have left. We could have studied the mushrooms here together. I picked a lot just now—they look pretty tasty..."
"Don't you plan to come out?" Xu Huo said. "Isn't it tiring to talk through a wall?"
"I'm coming out now!" Jiang Zifeng replied. Several arc-shaped lights flashed across the plant ball, splitting the large sphere into several pieces that fell limply to the ground. Then, a liquid with a pungent odor sprayed from the center, and the mutant plants clinging nearby quickly retracted into the walls.
Jiang Zifeng put away his sprayer, clapped his hands, and grinned. "High-grade weed killer, specially bought. Works great on this stuff!"
Xu Huo saw he was unharmed. "Have you eaten?"
"Not yet. I had some snacks on the way, so I wasn't too hungry, but I'm about ready now." Jiang Zifeng said, pulling out his cooking utensils and a bag of brightly colored mushrooms, his eyes gleaming. "I've always wanted to try eating poisonous mushrooms to see if I really get hallucinations, but the medical care back home was too poor—I'd probably die. Being a player is so convenient; ordinary poisonous mushrooms can't do much to me!"
Xu Huo admired his courage in testing poisons. "What's the difference between eating poisonous mushrooms and regular ones?"
Jiang Zifeng thought seriously for a moment. "Not much difference. It's just especially thrilling when eating—you never know which bite will poison you. At first, it was a bit nerve-wracking, but later I found the feeling quite enjoyable. Interesting. Want to try some?"
He then used a prop to test the mushrooms' toxicity, only putting those with a toxicity level below 50% into the pot.
The electric pot's water boiled, and as the mushroom pigments seeped out, it turned an indescribable color, though the aroma was quite sweet.
"I've figured it out—any rule in an Instance that doesn't explicitly state its benefits is a trap," Jiang Zifeng said, taking out a bottle of wine and pouring a glass for himself and Xu Huo. "I got a clue on the wall earlier pointing to the endpoint's direction, but when I came out of the passage, I ended up going farther and farther away."
Xu Huo clinked glasses with him and said, "How can you be sure the clue you got was real?"
(Chapter End)