"You once escaped me unscathed, but that doesn't mean you're particularly clever.

You're keen on deducing objective facts, but can you accurately fathom the human mind?

Many have participated in my games before. These people, who destroy their own lives, have no respect for life whatsoever. What difference is there between you and them?"

Hearing this, Feng Bujue suddenly felt that the other party was alluding to something else. And the puppet's next words quickly confirmed his thoughts.

"When the shadow of the unknown lingers in the mind, most people feel helpless and afraid, which leads to anger and hysteria. All of this stems from their attachment to life.

But you... you don't confide in or ask for help from anyone. You just live numbly, living your usual boring life. You don't show that kind of human instinct, that strong will to survive.

Your behavior shows that you have no gratitude for being alive, which is a contempt for the laws of survival. Even a trapped beast knows to fight, but you are as relaxed and indifferent as if you have already given up.

I hate the ungrateful.

Did you think you could escape judgment by being fearless?"

Feng Bujue listened to the other party's narration, while also thinking... the last virtual character who saw through and mentioned his mental illness was X-23, but the puppet Billy had actually contacted him earlier. And in that script, Billy had already shown a certain ability to transcend the setting. Although the brain shadow thing can be explained as information detected by the game pod, or information mastered by the system after the neural connection, hearing these words spoken to his face still created a certain amount of psychological pressure.

Billy continued, "Death is always a surprise party, unless your heart is already dead.

But in my opinion, your heart is as vibrant as any normal person's, and your mind is far more active than theirs. You have the same joys, sorrows, and desires as others, but you don't care at all whether you will die in the next second.

Now, let's see if you can stick to this attitude.

Now, you must pay the price."

Under Feng Bujue's feet, there was suddenly a rumbling sound of heavy machinery starting to operate. The metal floor of the secret room then split, dividing into two with the entrance door as the central axis. The floor moved toward both sides of the room, but the speed was not fast, enough for Feng Bujue to jump to one side.

Below the floor was a pool filled with water, about the same depth as the height of the room, about seven or eight meters, enough to drown someone like Feng Bujue who couldn't swim.

"What's in this pool isn't water, it's gasoline. Soon, you will lose your footing.

As someone who can't swim, you need enough courage to fight against the instinct to struggle for survival and find the potion hidden at the bottom of the pool."

The puppet paused here, and then talked about some details: "When the floor of the room is completely retracted into the walls on both sides, the gasoline level will begin to drop. At the same time, the floor will close towards the middle again. When the water level drops to half of its original level, it will stop, and at that moment, the floor will be closed forever above your head. Even if you enter this room again, it will not open..."

Before he could finish, there was a splash, and Feng Bujue had already jumped into the gasoline pool.

He really couldn't swim, but he could hold his breath. He took a deep breath, puffed out his cheeks, and pinched his nose with one hand, and jumped into the gasoline pool with his feet down.

He sank rapidly to the bottom of the pool...

Based on the rules described by Billy, this game only had one chance, and one failure was a permanent failure. Before the sentence "Even if you enter this room again" was finished, Feng Bujue knew what the other party meant... Even if he drowned in the gasoline pool and was resurrected with a Contra Medal, and killed his way back from the corridor, the floor would not open again, because the floor would be "closed forever" once it closed again.

In addition, the water level was lowered at the same time as the floor closed, presumably to prevent Feng Bujue from returning to the surface after taking the potion, grabbing the edge of the floor, and climbing up.

Simply put, this game was roughly about letting a person who couldn't swim find an item at the bottom of a gasoline pool where the light above was gradually being obscured. If he drowned before he found it, that was failure; even if he found it and managed to get back to the surface by dog-paddling, and the floor hadn't completely closed at that time, it would still be impossible for him to reach out and grab the floor to climb back up.

Judging from the known information, the conventional way to pass the level was... jump into the gasoline pool, find the potion, put it in the inventory. Then, struggle against the instinct for survival at the bottom of the pool, drown in the shortest possible time, and finally use the Contra Medal's resurrection teleportation to leave.

In fact, for those who are good at swimming, finding the potion is not difficult. There is air in the space between the floor and the pool. As long as you are patient and allocate your energy reasonably, even after the floor is completely closed, you can constantly go back and forth between the surface and the bottom to exchange air and slowly摸索 (mōsuǒ - grope for) the location of the potion. After all, the area at the bottom of the pool is limited, and besides, after the water level drops to half, it is only three or four meters deep. At most, after a dozen or so trips back and forth, you can search the bottom.

Of course, this method requires attention to two points: one is to keep your eyes closed, and the other is to never let gasoline choke into your lungs.

The first point is common sense. Gasoline's irritation to the mucous membrane will cause burns. If it is a drop or two, rinse it with water immediately, and it will be fine after it evaporates on its own, but opening your eyes wide in a gasoline pool is definitely self-mutilation. Besides, after the floor is closed, there will be no light in this space, so opening your eyes will only result in darkness.

The second point is very unfavorable for Feng Bujue, who can't swim. Let's assume that he can struggle back to the surface of gasoline, which has less buoyancy than water, but a person who hasn't learned how to coordinate his movements with exhalation is likely to choke in this situation. If gasoline really gets into his lungs, then he can only wait to drown in pain.

Feng Bujue also knew these situations. While listening to the rules, he was already thinking about countermeasures.

When the floor started to move, Feng Bujue had already focused his attention on the bottom of the pool. The light shone on the bottom of the gasoline pool, first as a slit, and then became wider and wider. Because the location of the light was in the middle area of the ceiling, the entire bottom of the pool was illuminated before the floor was completely opened, but... from the top, it seemed that there was nothing at the bottom.

Feng Bujue was precisely confirming this that he jumped down decisively. His angle and direction of entry into the water were based on his reasoning about the location of the potion - the thing was in the shadow of the iron cage.