Seriously hardcore—this mystery box even contained poison like potassium cyanide.
Everly picked up a piece of torn cloth from the ground, carefully wrapped the vial, and tucked it into her pocket. Then she bent down again, picked up the sharp Nepalese curved machete, practiced a few flourishes with it, and used fishing line to fashion a simple belt, securing the sheath at the back of her waist.
Next were the food and water.
Food was manageable, but the water bottles were more troubleso. Although her cargo pants had large pockets and could barely fit everything, the heavy bottles would swing and drag at her legs, severely affecting her running speed. Everly refused to accept that.
She needed so kind of container.
Thinking this, she scanned the surroundings and noticed a tattered curtain lying on the floor. She walked over and pulled it up.
A cloud of dust burst into the air, scattering everywhere. Through the swirling haze, Everly spotted the second trap on the fourth floor—a huge hole in the floorboards.
To repeat, “Hunter” was genuinely insidious.
Only when that hole appeared did Everly realize that two traps had been set up around this supply point.
The first trap was above the door: anyone entering without caution could easily get drenched by the liquid in the basin overhead.
The second trap was placed along the only route from the entrance to the supply area. Judging from the traces, the hole in the floor had likely existed long before and was not man-made. “Hunter” had simply exploited it, covering it with a deliberately aged white curtain.
Even if soone managed to avoid the trap above the door, they would likely never expect that another danger was waiting right on the floor behind it.
This psychological strategy was truly perfectly calculated.
Everly clicked her tongue in admiration while spreading the curtain out on the ground. She placed the biscuits and drinking water onto it, then tied the four corners together in alternating knots, forming a sturdy and portable bundle.
After that, her gaze shifted to the basin hanging above the door.
The abandoned hospital floor was littered with all kinds of debris. Everly dragged a broken chair from the pile of junk and stepped onto it. Standing on the chair, she stretched out her arm and carefully removed the tal basin from behind the door.
Inside was more than half a basin of clear, viscous liquid.
The liquid was thick, far less fluid than water, and gave off no noticeable sll even when she leaned in. On closer inspection, a uniform dark, glossy film could be seen where the liquid had co into contact with the tal basin—similar to the oxidation layer ford when iron reacts with concentrated sulfuric acid.
From this, it was highly likely that the liquid in the basin was a strong acid.
Everly’s mineral water bottles were all made of PET material, which would be corroded by concentrated sulfuric acid. Fortunately, this was an abandoned hospital, and while there wasn’t much else available, there were quite a few glass reagent bottles used for storing chemicals.
Rembering that she had passed a room filled with rows of reagent containers on her way here, Everly hurried back, rummaging through a pile of long-dried, discarded bottles like a scavenger.
Before long, she was lucky enough to find an intact glass reagent bottle.
Carrying too much concentrated sulfuric acid would not only be heavy but also risky, so Everly did not intend to keep a large amount on her.
She ran back to the supply room, lifted the tal basin with both hands, and poured the liquid inside into the glass bottle. The remaining acid was splashed onto the ground and neutralized on the spot.
After finishing, she sealed the bottle, carefully stuffed it into her bundle, and quickly left the room with her supplies.
She had already wasted a bit too much ti—she needed to get out of the hospital imdiately.
…
Fortunately, from the mont Everly decided to go downstairs until she successfully exited the hospital, she did not encounter a single person.
Perhaps others had not arrived yet, or perhaps no one had yet targeted the hospital. In any case, avoiding conflict was good news for her.
She slipped into the forest with her bundle in hand.
By then, roughly forty-five minutes had passed since the start of the ga.
This ti, Everly chose a direction opposite the island’s center. From her earlier observation on the upper floors of the hospital, she knew that heading this way would lead her past two prison cells midway. The two cells were positioned left and right, perfectly flanking the route she intended to take.
Neither of those cells had been opened yet. If she moved fast enough, she could pass between them without alerting anyone and enter an uninhabited zone filled only with forest and scattered small concrete structures.
That uninhabited zone was Everly’s target.
Walking through dense forest was never easy. On one hand, she had to watch for traps; on the other, she needed to carefully conceal her tracks, keep her footsteps light, and avoid attracting attention.
Halfway through her route, Everly suddenly heard faint rustling footsteps nearby. She imdiately crouched low and hid herself in a thick bush.
She waited quietly.
After a mont, the source of the sound finally passed through the area near her hiding spot. Through the gaps in the leaves, Everly looked over and saw that it was two people traveling together.
One of them was the punk man she had seen on the bus.
The other looked to be around forty years old, wearing plain jeans and a solid-colored T-shirt. He had a scruffy beard and a simple, honest-looking face—soone who would naturally inspire trust.
Everly was certain she had never seen him on the bus.
The bus she had taken only had 30 seats, and it had not been full when it departed. Since there were 59 participants in total, aside from the bus passengers, there must have been other unfortunate victims abducted from elsewhere. This middle-aged man was likely one of those people.
Both of them wore tal collars around their necks. They walked side by side through the forest, remaining vigilant as they moved forward.
The punk man kept talking as they walked. Their voices ca in broken fragnts, drifting into Everly’s ears.
“…Thanks a lot just now. I’ve never been good at anything that requires thinking. If you hadn’t told , I really wouldn’t have been able to figure out that damn password.”
It sounded like the punk man had been able to escape his cell because the man beside him had given him the password.
“No need to thank . We’re all people who were unwillingly dragged into this ga. Since we’ve t, it’s only natural to help each other.”
The bearded man smiled kindly at the punk man.
As they spoke, the two of them just happened to pass by the edge of the bushes. Through the gaps between the branches, Everly unexpectedly caught sight of a tattoo on the bearded man’s arm—a Roman nural “XIII.”
Thirteen. A number associated with betrayal and bad ons.
The mont she saw it, a fragnt of mory flashed through her mind. Everly’s gaze sharpened instantly—she rembered now. This bearded man was not simple at all. He was likely a Butcher.
Among the five Butchers who entered the island in this round of the ga, one of them was known as “Judas.” He was twisted, cunning, and dangerously intelligent, soone who seed to enjoy dancing on the edge between life and death.
Judas had participated in multiple killing gas before. In past rounds, he would disguise himself as a regular player, form teams with others, and fight alongside them. After securing victory with his teammates, he would then turn on them and wipe out his own allies, ending the ga with a total team annihilation.
That was how he earned the na “Judas.”
And this ti was no different.
In the movie, after landing on the island, Judas did not act like the other Butchers. Instead, he wore a collar and disguised himself as a contestant, using his harmless-looking face and exceptional emotional intelligence to quickly recruit two teammates. He then proceeded to slaughter other contestants within the group, turning what could have been a unified survivor team into scattered fragnts.
Everly recalled that in the later part of the film, the male protagonist’s greatest crisis ca from Judas and his two teammates. And now that she thought about it, one of those teammates did match the description of a simple-minded, physically strong punk-type man—the sa one who had even taken a bullet for Judas during the final confrontation.
So that was it. No wonder the punk man was willing to protect him—Judas had once saved his life.
Seeing that there were only Judas and the punk man in the forest, for a brief mont, Everly felt a strong impulse—to rush out and eliminate Judas right there and then.
This wasn’t because she was especially eager to help others. Everly’s target was sothing on Judas himself—the remote control.
In order to perfectly impersonate a contestant, Judas had specially put on a player-issued neck collar. Aside from not being able to monitor the movents of the Butchers, the collar’s functions were identical to those worn by the players. In other words, when the countdown reached zero, the collars on the Butchers’ necks would also explode.
However, as the wealthy backers behind the ga, they naturally had certain privileges.
The organizers had prepared a remote control disguised as a necklace for the Butchers wearing collars. When aid at a collar and the button pressed, the collar would automatically detach. This ant that even if a Butcher had a bad start and failed to obtain extra survival ti, they would not die because of it.
The remote control had no usage limit and could be used repeatedly. As long as Everly got her hands on it, she and Misha would be able to remove the collars around their own necks as well.
Thinking of this, Everly felt a flicker of temptation—but quickly suppressed it.
Judas was not a harmless man playing at being a contestant. As soone bold enough to infiltrate the participant group alone, he had undergone strict combat training. He was far more dangerous than he appeared. Not to ntion, he also had the punk man beside him, soone who had already been successfully recruited.
If she rembered correctly, that punk man was also a notable combat asset in the film—possessing imnse strength and an unusually high pain tolerance. He had even once broken an arm and still managed to counterattack and kill his opponent while holding a blade.
Facing two such combat monsters, even with a bottle of acid in hand and her own combat training, Everly still had to carefully weigh the odds.
Moreover, along the way here, whether it was cracking the password or bypassing traps to obtain supplies, she had already acted far beyond what was “normal.”
The good news was that all of it could still be explained away as high intelligence and strong observational skills.
Compared to strategy-heavy gaplay, the audience of the killing ga preferred brutal, close-range combat. Once the contestants started fighting each other, attention focused on her kind of survival-focused “cautious” player should decrease significantly.
But if Everly exposed her combat ability now—letting the audience realize she was both intelligent and capable in a fight—that would make her far too noticeable. It would be detrintal to her future escape plan.
Stay calm. She had to stay calm… this was not the ti to step forward.
Everly held her breath and suppressed the impulse rising within her. She waited in place until the two figures had moved far away, then finally stepped out from the bushes.
The rest of her journey went smoothly, with no further encounters.
After another twenty-odd minutes of walking in the set direction, Everly finally reached her intended destination—the edge of the forest at the boundary between the third and fourth rings.
If she continued forward, she would leave the dense forest and enter a basin-like area with relatively sparse vegetation and a downward-sloping terrain.
There were not many places to hide in that lowland. Since it was still early in the ga, she could not rule out the possibility that players who had spawned near the outer ring might deliberately avoid the island’s center and instead search the edges for supplies. For now, Everly did not want to enter that exposed area.
Carefully, she stopped at the forest’s edge and selected a recognizable tree as a landmark. She dug into the layer of decaying leaves beneath it and buried most of her supplies—aside from the concentrated sulfuric acid, the Nepalese machete, fishing line, sharpened wooden stakes, and potassium cyanide.
Although these items were not heavy, carrying them all at once would still be a burden. They would slow her down and could even attract other contestants.
Before venturing further, she needed to hide this load first.
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