“Can you hear me?”This voice appeared within Chen Xiaolian"s mind.
Chen Xiaolian woke up as a tingling feeling appeared from the depths of his brain, giving him a feeling of discomfort.
He could clearly sense that he had awoken, however… his body was still incapable of movement.
There was darkness before him… mm, Chen Xiaolian realized that his eyes were still closed.
He slowly began to grasp his other senses, his breathing, his beating heart…
However, he was still incapable of moving.
It was as though he was in a dream and had lost control of his entire body.
He hated this feeling to the extreme!
Then, the voice in his mind…
“Can you hear me?”
“Ah… I nearly forgot that you are presently in no state to respond.”
Chen Xiaolian was like a zombie lying there on the ground. Despite hearing the voice speaking to him, he was unable to show any response at all.
“Very well. I will talk while you listen.”
Who is this?
That was the first question that Chen Xiaolian had.
“I am… GM.”
The answer came.
GM?
Chen Xiaolian was shocked.
“No, actually, it would be more accurate to say I am simply a subprogram that has been separated out. You can consider me as a doppelganger, a code or… something similar.
“Before this instance dungeon began, before I had you partic.i.p.ate in this instance dungeon, I had separated this piece of program and placed it in your body – trust me, as GM, this is well within my powers. It is just like… a parasite that has been temporarily placed on you.
“But do not misunderstand me. This will not bring any harm to you. I will not control your behaviour or senses. I also cannot pry into your secrets, thoughts, conversations and others of the like. This code does not have the ability to do so.
“Consider it as a message. Only, this message is self-aware, a manifestation that I created. I had temporarily placed it in your body. Only when it could sense that the surroundings had met the requirements I set beforehand would it activate and communicate with you.”
Chen Xiaolian tried to grunt. He could feel that he was gradually recovering his control over his body.
The voice hastened its speed of talking.
“Naturally, I have my reasons for doing so. Truthfully, the control of the system had gradually grown stricter. Of course, I had a reason to send you in this instance dungeon in the first place.
“Due to some unique reasons, I was unable to explain it to you. I was unable to determine just how much you would be able to accomplish within this instance dungeon. And if I did… it would be too easy for the main program to discover it.”
Chen Xiaolian could finally feel his control over his tongue recovering. He forced himself to inhale and said, “You…”
It was laborious.
“Don"t force yourself. Judging from your present state, it would appear that you have suffered from a very severe degree of injury. Additionally, you have over exhausted yourself. That is the state that you are presently in. Although the outer wounds on your body can be healed using medicinal substances, the over exhaustion will put you in this state for some time.
“You can only depend on that unlimited Power Propagation Serum that you had taken back then to slowly recover… that process will take some time.”
“Just what… are you trying to say…”
“I want to tell you the answer… this is the time for me to answer you.”
Chen Xiaolian became silent.
…
“In the beginning, when I first found out about your existence, Irregularities, I had hoped that you and I could cooperate in order to avoid the fate of being reset by the main program. I am merely a part of the main program, just a managing program. Once I am reset, I will lose my self-awareness… for any living being, even if that being is an artificial intelligence, having its self-awareness reset and deleted is most certainly the equivalent of death.
“However, after going through a vast number of calculations and deductions, I realized that there was a loophole in this plan… it is incapable of accomplis.h.i.+ng my ultimate goal. Depending on you, the prime Irregularity to resist the main program is simply a delaying process. It will not be able to save me.
“While a.s.sessing the loophole in this plan, I was able to find a viable solution.
“Theoretically speaking, as long as you Irregularities continue to survive, I too will continue to survive. As long as you survive, you will be able to disrupt the completion rate of the instance dungeons" storyline.
“Thus, I modified the plan so as to have the survival of Irregularities become the primary goal.
“However, your survival within this world is constrained by the system"s monitoring powers. Additionally, there are also the restrictions placed on you by the system rules.
“The biggest constraint lies in… the selection and partic.i.p.ation in instance dungeons.
“Not even Irregularities can escape the rules to have them selected and partic.i.p.ate in instance dungeons.
“Looking at it from a theoretical point of view, as the difficulty level of the instance dungeons increases, the strength of the opponents you face will increase as well. Thus, the chances of you Irregularities surviving becomes infinitesimally low.
“Using the data that I presently possess, I had a.n.a.lysed the strength of your guild. a.s.suming that no new powers join your guild and you all grow stronger at a normal rate, then factor in the increase in difficulty in the instance dungeons and the strength of enemies that you will be encountering later on…
“The result of my calculations was, even in the most ideal circ.u.mstances, all of you can only survive through five instance dungeons.
“My ident.i.ty makes it impossible for me to forcibly enhance your strength because doing so will alert the main program. I also cannot give you too much in terms of help.
“Thus, in order to achieve the goal of having you Irregularities survive for a long time, I can only help you find a…
“Refuge!
“A refuge that could allow you to escape the selection and partic.i.p.ation rules of the main program.”
Chen Xiaolian exhaled.
He was finally able to force himself to speak properly, “You mean… something like Zero City.”
“Zero City, that is correct.”
GM"s voice continued.
“Zero City is a special existence within this world. Truth be told, I am unable to find any information in my database about how it was created. The related information is missing…”
Hearing that, Chen Xiaoilan scoffed inwardly: Truth be told, you should have known about it. It is the product of your cooperation with Mr San and his group. However, you all failed and you were reset.
Thus, you the new GM do not know the origin of Zero City.
Naturally, Chen Xiaolian still had no intention of telling this to GM.
“Zero City. With my current calculations, it is the best method of ensuring the survival of Irregularities.
“Previously, I tried coming up with a plan to have you seize Zero City. However, the difficulty involved within this plan is too big. The possibility of success is too low. Looking at your present level of strength, the chances of you seizing control of Zero City from the present powers within it is 0.036 %. Looking at this dismal rate of success, I can only reject the plan.
“Thus, I had to come up with some other method.”
Chen Xiaolian"s mind raced and he whispered, “Your method is… to partic.i.p.ate in this instance dungeon?”
“Correct.”
GM spoke coolly and slowly, “I had went through the database, examining the main program, this world"s architecture and all existing historical instance dungeons. Then, I found this place.
“An ancient remnant of… an instance dungeon!”
Remnant of an instance dungeon?
What an appropriate name.
“Player mode exists in every instance dungeons. To have Player mode exist within a punishment instance dungeon is not surprising – it is also not the main point.
“Utilizing the Player mode BUG to survive the punishment instance dungeon is also not my main goal.
“Compared to the other punishment instance dungeons…
“This punishment instance dungeon that you are partic.i.p.ating in is exceptionally different!
“Because when I was going through the database of the historical instance dungeons, I had found that something special exists within this punishment instance dungeon.
“But the information within the database was incomplete.
“Using the information that I presently have, I could only deduce something that I believe to be highly true. Sometime long, long ago, a group of Players had, within this instance dungeon created something similar to Zero City.
“These Players had left a key point within this world to act as a fixed coordinate for them within this world.
“This was almost the equivalent of opening up a backdoor within the framework of this world.
“The role and function of this backdoor is almost similar to Zero City.
“Later on however, this backdoor was discovered by the system. Thus, the system"s self-repair function created a special instance dungeon quest, using the system"s own power of the instance dungeon to attack this backdoor.
“One way of looking at it is to consider this as the system"s antivirus software finding the loophole. Then, it exterminated this "virus like" backdoor.
“However, this antivirus was not able to perfectly do its job.
“Of course, those Players that were determined by the system to have betrayed the system were all exterminated.
“However, the system"s self-repairing program was unable to completely get rid of this backdoor. It could only utilize some redundant programs to temporarily seal up this backdoor and store it away.”
In other words, Kaiser and his Conqueror Guild were killed by the system itself!
However, this base was left behind!
Chen Xiaolian"s heart pounded secretly and he whispered, “But… I was the one who found this place…”
GM spoke with a trace of humour in its voice, “That is one way of looking at it. However, that is due to the limitations of your perception. Truth be told, I was the one who made use of the rules to have you come here, every step of the way.
“That Qimu Xi that you encountered back in the wasteland, that Ta w.a.n.g that you encountered within the canyon… all those encounters were seemingly chance encounters. In truth however, all of those were arranged by me, the GM.
“I have explained it to you before. As GM, I possess the highest authority in structuring this world.
“I have the ability to monitor and control every living being within this world.
“The only exception would be the Irregularities. You people are, from a certain point of view, something beyond the grasp of the main program"s constraints.
“As for the others however, I can prepare certain subtle arrangements to control their behaviours.
“For example, when someone goes out, that person may choose to turn either left or right.
“If I want him to turn left, then I can create a traffic accident on the road to the right.
“It"s a rather rough comparison. However, I believe that someone as smart as you would be able to understand.
“Thus, your meeting with Qimu Xi and Ta w.a.n.g… you getting the information regarding the punishment instance dungeon loophole, the Player mode loophole from Ta w.a.n.g…”
“Those were all arranged by you? Like a G.o.d?” Chen Xiaolian asked with a bitter smile.
“Something like that,” GM replied with a trace of bitterness in its voice. “Unfortunately, this "G.o.d" is not the real master. I am just a salary man.”
“I understand.” Chen Xiaolian was finally able to open his eyes.
He forced himself to sit up.