Editor: Izrate
I’m really sorry, guys but I’ve made a mistake with the main character’s name 
I’m so sorry, everyone >.< the first character of his name “单” is usually pronounced Dan, but a kind reader recently informed me that as a surname it’s pronounced Shan. That’s why his nickname is Shanzi I’m so disappointed in myself, but I hope you guys will continue to enjoy the novel after this blunder of mine QAQ Thank you for all your support, everyone! (His nickname finally makes sense now aaaaahhhhh)
“Click.”
The moment Scenario 2 appeared, everyone heard a clear, crisp click from the door – the door to the prison cell had been unlocked.
The entire prison was in an uproar. Countless uniformed prisoners ran out of their cells and swarmed through the hallways.
Seeing the chaos outside, Rice Lover asked in a somewhat feeble voice, “Are we… going out there?”
“Of course,” Unparalleled Dragon King replied, “You guys saw the System Scenario just now, right? This chessboard is cleared if we escape the prison.”
“But how are we going to escape? Even if we go outside, we don’t know which way to go. Right now, we don’t have any clues…”
“We do.”
Host suddenly spoke up. His voice was very deep, very steady, like a viola being played in the depths of night. Under everyone’s gaze, he pointed at the slip of paper in Shan Ziwei’s hands. He didn’t say much, but he got his point across.
“Here.”
Immediately, Shan Ziwei felt like the slip of paper in his hands was like a hot potato as Rice Lover and Unparalleled Dragon King both crowded around.
“’Wait for my signal, we’ll break out of prison together.’ … Haven’t we already had the signal? What else is there apart from that?”
Unparalleled Dragon King side-eyed host, silently asking for an explanation. Host didn’t speak, once again ignoring Unparalleled Dragon King.
Seeing how Unparalleled Dragon King and host seemed to be about to start going at one another’s throats, Shan Ziwei had to speak up to explain for host. His previous silence wasn’t because he didn’t want to speak, but because whenever he spoke the truth his SP would fall. He might as well just stay mute.
“This slip of paper means that we have at least one other accomplice. We probably met them last in the cafeteria.”
Seeing that his Diamonds SP and Clubs SP remained motionless, Shan Ziwei let out a short sigh of relief. That was dangerous. Luckily, this kind of exposition wasn’t counted by the system as a violation of his Scenarios.
“That’s right. It was probably hidden in the food. Just look at how dirty it is.” Rice Lover’s eyes lit up. “Let’s go check out the cafeteria.”
Unparalleled Dragon King was a little displeased. “We still have the same problem, though. We don’t have a map of the prison, how’re we gonna get…”
Unparalleled Dragon King’s words trailed off. Everyone looked at their own Scenario tab. A new Scenario had appeared on each of them simultaneously.
[Scenario 3: You have obtained the map of the prison. (01:30:00)]
“Welp. Now we’ve gotta go find that damn map.”
Unparalleled Dragon King walked to the bars and opened the doors as he spoke, “No matter what, let’s get out first. The system only gave us ninety minutes…”
“Ah!”
Rice Lover screamed in shock. As Unparalleled Dragon King opened the metal door, a passing prisoner had seen and thrown himself at Unparalleled Dragon King in a tackle.
“The fuck!”
Unparalleled Dragon King quickly dodged out of the way, just barely avoiding the tackle. The attacking prisoner used his momentum to enter the prison cell. He swept his gaze across the cell before lunging at the person closest to him, Rice Lover, with a malicious smile.
Rice Lover panicked. It was clear that this was the first time she had experienced something like this, scrambling to try to get something out that could help her. In comparison, Unparalleled Dragon King’s five chessboard experience shone through as he quickly whipped out a Scenario Card and utilized it.
“Thud!”
The prisoner was knocked against the wall by a long staff. Rice Lover gazed at the black-haired young man who stood in front of her with a slight blush. “Th-thank you!”
Host didn’t speak, and just continued silently attacking the prisoner. Unparalleled Dragon King tsked at having been a step too slow. Then he proceeded to vent his frustration caused by host stealing his thunder on the prisoner.
“Hmph! A pawn level mob like you dares act tough in front of me?!”
Unparalleled Dragon King had closed one eye, clearly using some sort of investigative skill. Afterwards, he drank a potion and swung his sword at the prisoner.
Shan Ziwei was just about to wake Little Gaia up to make “Three of Clubs – Investigate”, “Two of Spades – Heavy Blow” and “Two of Spades – Longsword”, but before he could say anything, he realized that his Toybox seemed to be able to read his mind. Gaia didn’t even open its eyes as it spat out the Scenario Cards he wanted before turning its head the other way to continue napping.
“…”
There was no time to ponder Little Gaia’s actions. Shan Ziwei used the three Scenario Cards, giving him the Investigate and Heavy Blow skills. He grabbed his longsword and closed one eye like Unparalleled Dragon King had done to get the information on the prisoner.
[Prisoner
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
Ksqf: Ktgff bo Vqjvfr
Jjafubgs: Ujkc
ZU: 100/100
SP: Spades (100[45]%), Hearts (100%), Clubs (100%), Diamonds (100%)
Vajcmf: Lbralif
Gfrmglqalbc: Ljr jikjsr kjcafv ab ygfjx bea bo qglrbc, ater, tf mjgnfv bcab tlr yjmx…]
Ktf Vqjvfr VU bo atf qglrbcfg tjv yffc mbggeqafv ys jiwbra tjio, mifjgis vef ab atf mbwylcfv foobgar bo tbra jcv Fcqjgjiififv Ggjubc Blcu. Vtjc Ilkfl uglqqfv tlr rkbgv jcv pewqfv lcab atf ogjs. Kb yf tbcfra, tf kjr nfgs ugjafoei ab atf rsrafw obg wjxlcu jii atf mtjgjmafgr ibbx nlgaeji. Mbg fzjwqif, lo la kjrc’a obg atja mifjgis ecgfjilralm jcv rbwfktja afggloslcu ojmf bc atf bqqbrlcu qglrbcfg, tf kbeivc’a tjnf atf gfrbinf ab jaajmx.
–– So, it’s because it’s virtual. That’s why it won’t work, hm.
The words flashed through his mind, so fast Shan Ziwei didn’t even register them. He glanced at Rice Lover. Rice Lover had finally managed to whip out her Scenario Card. Her method of attack was very interesting. She threw potions at the prisoner, and soon enough the prisoner gained a green tinge, clearly poisoned.
Under their combined might, that poor prisoner soon entered Spiritual Breakdown. He screamed in madness, charging at Unparalleled Dragon King with red eyes.
“Go to hell!!!”
Faced with the burly, charging man, Unparalleled Dragon King wore an expression of disdain. He stood there, unmoving. “Who do you think you are?”
Crack –
There was a flash of grey light and the prisoner fell down. His left leg had been caught in a trap. Unable to move, the prisoner knelt on the ground like a caged beast and started to slam his head into the ground.
“I was wrong I was wrong I was wrong – lemme out – let… me… out…”
Blood splattered across the ground and onto Shan Ziwei’s shoes. Shan Ziwei cringed away like he had been burned and Rice Lover was about to cry from the gruesome sight. Unparalleled Dragon King picked up the pawn chess piece on the corpse, admonishing them. “There’s nothing to be scared of. It’s all created by the system to try and scare you. You’ll get used to it soon.”
However, the slight tremble in his voice revealed his nervousness. Host put away his cross-shaped weapon and began rummaging through the dead prisoner’s clothes.
“Hey, what are you – “
The prisoner’s naked back was exposed to everyone’s eyes; a tattoo was etched across it.
“This is… a map?” Rice Lover muttered.
Shan Ziwei wanted to facepalm. There had to be a crazy fan of Prison Break somewhere in the game development team. He had a feeling when he had seen the prisoner description before, but now that his intuition had been right, he was truly at a loss for words.
Currently, there was still eighty-two minutes until Scenario 3 activated. Why were they given such a long time? Because they had yet to complete their mission – what was tattooed on the prisoner’s back was, in fact, only part of the map.
The four of them looked towards the sea of prisoners outside, truly feeling the evil of the game development team.
“I never ever want to see another puzzle… no, actually, I never want to see another tattoo again!”
Shan Ziwei felt that what Unparalleled Dragon King said was a big mood. Currently, there were four corpses lying in front of them, the tattoos on their backs flowing into one another. Don’t underestimate the effort it had taken them to collect these four corpses. They had defeated a total of sixteen prisoners and had to sort through the repeats and useless tattoos to just manage to complete Scenario 3 on time.
They could hold a corpse party in their cell room now. Being surrounded by a bunch of corpses was truly an experience. Staring as his Diamonds SP (Fear) fell by another small chunk, Shan Ziwei felt like his expression had gone numb.
He was wrong. He shouldn’t have thought that the tutorial stage was a nightmare. Compared to this chessboard, the City of Toys was like playing house with an angel!
[Scenario 3: You have obtained the map of the prison.]
[Scenario 4: You have finished preparations to break out of prison in the library. (01:00:00)]
When Scenario 3 activated, Scenario 4 immediately popped out. Shan Ziwei glanced at his SP gauges. None of them decreased, which meant they hadn’t violated Scenario 3. What they had in front of them was, indeed, the map of the prison.
From the map they had, it seemed that the prison was rectangular in shape. In the centre sat the cafeteria, surrounded by a ring of prison cells. In each corner of the rectangle, there was a different label: Production Room, Infirmary, Baths, Library.
“Alright, now that we’ve got the map,” Unparalleled Dragon King began, “Let’s head to the infirmary.”
“Huh?” Rice Lover expressed her confusion, “Aren’t we going to the Baths…?”
Shan Ziwei got it immediately – their Scenario 4s were all different! Basically, this was a mission with divergent tasks.
“I’m heading to the production room.”
Host announced curtly. He climbed onto the bed labelled with his name, quickly searching it before coming back down with a Scenario Card.
Shan Ziwei managed to see that it was the same Scenario Card he had found, “Two of Clubs – Prisoner’s Uniform”. Host used it without hesitation and suddenly, his shorts and tee turned into a zebra stripped prisoner’s outfit.
“Hey!?” Unparalleled Dragon King jumped up warily. They watched as host opened the metal door, preparing for battle.
Surprisingly, the prisoners didn’t attack host. The black-haired young man soon waded into the crowd, becoming a part of the sea of prisoners.
Shan Ziwei immediately understood what use “Two of Clubs – Prisoner’s Uniform” played. So the good and evil indicated on it affected stance, huh?
He also used his Scenario Card, and a new scenario appeared in his Personal Scenarios:
[Scenario Four: You’re wearing a prisoner’s uniform. Other prisoners feel like you’re one of them.]
When Shan Ziwei used Investigate again, the stance information on the prisoners had changed from “hostile” to “neutral”.
“I’m off, too, then.”
Shan Ziwei nodded towards Unparalleled Dragon King and Rice Lover, about to set off, only to be stopped by the only girl amongst them.
“Sh-Shanzi. You’re heading to the Library, right? Can I go with you?” Rice Lover asked carefully. “I’m a ‘rapist’ so I can’t stray too far from a player of the opposite sex, otherwise my Hearts SP will start falling. The places we have to go are close to each other, so can I go with you to the library first and then you head to the baths with me?”
… It seemed like being a rapist was pretty troublesome, too.
Unparalleled Dragon King Had originally wanted to recommend himself for the task of accompanying Rice Lover, but once Rice Lover finished explaining, he decided against doing so. The prison was rectangular, and they were each heading to one of the corners. Amongst the four places, the baths and library were joined by a shorter side, and so were the production room and infirmary. The system had given them an hour. With little information to go on, Rice Lover’s suggestion was the most appropriate for them.
She looked close to tears and Shan Ziwei couldn’t muster the heart to refuse, nodding his agreement.
“Alright.”
At this, Rice Lover happily changed into her prisoner’s uniform and left the cell with Shan Ziwei.
It wasn’t until they had left the prison cell that Shan Ziwei truly felt how immense and imposing the prison was. The grey colour scheme felt oppressive, and row after row of bars filled their sight. The halls were filled with prisoners running amok. There were fewer prisoners in the area near their cell, possibly because of their earlier killing spree.
Shan Ziwei easily avoided contact with the other prisoners, heading to the northeast corner of the prison, where the library was. Rice Lover followed suit. They ran for a while, and the prisoners around them slowly reduced in number until their environment seemed empty of human life.
In a very remote corner, Shan Ziwei and Rice Lover finally found the legendary prison library.
In truth, the place was just a tiny document room. There were very few books, but enough to fill all seven of the bookcases there. A chair was next to the door where a guy was sleeping soundly.
Hearing the two enter, the guy at the door rubbed his eyes, blearily looking at Shan Ziwei and Rice Lover. When he saw Shan Ziwei, he yawned and said, “GShanzi, here to borrow yet another book… Take whatever you want.”
Shan Ziwei and Rice Lover entered the library easily. Staring at the rows upon rows of books, Rice Lover clicked her tongue. “What preparations are we going to make with so many books?”
A lightbulb flashed in Shan Ziwei’s head and he went back to the entrance, waking up the guy there.
“Can I check my borrowing record?”
The guy took out a piece of paper without even opening his eyes. He fell asleep before Shan Ziwei even took it from him.
Shan Ziwei tugged the piece of paper out of the other’s hand. On it was a detailed record of what books “GShanzi” had borrowed and when. Shan Ziwei felt shudders running through him, accompanied by either excitement or fear. Looking at these records, it was like there really was a conman called “GShanzi” living in the prison. He was role playing this character, and creating their future through investigating their past.
“That Loud Number (2007-3-7, Water); In a Company of Three My Teacher Will Always Be There (2007-3-9, Gold), If You’re Ugly, You Should Read Books (2007-3-18, Sun), The Corpse on the Steel Case (2007-3-28, Earth), John Row-Leon’s Death (2007-3-31, Fire), The Dwarf and the Seven Fairies (2007-4-10, Gold), Column and Row Calculation Method (2007-4-13, Moon), The Woman in Three-Zero-Eight (2007-4-25, Earth).” Rice Lover was a little worried. “Time will be tight if we look through them all.”
Shan Ziwei stared for a moment before putting the records back.
“No need to look through them all. It’s number three bookcase, row seven, column eight.”
“How do you know?”
“From the book names. The dates are irrelevant for the most part. The last part in each set of information is a reference to the ancient way of referring to the days of the week, still used by Japan today. If you convert each of them to numbers with Monday as one and Sunday as seven, it gives you the position of the relevant word in each book title. A simple enough riddle.”
“Number… three… books… case…” Rice Lover ran back to look over the borrowing records again and came back with a face of awe and admiration. “You’re amazing!”
After being complimented by a pretty girl, even if he did his best to suppress it, Shan Ziwei couldn’t help but feel the flower blossoming inside him.
Then a certain hypersexual’s little flower was burst by Little Gaia. The silver-haired black-robed doll had woken up without him noticing and was staring at him with those colour-inverted eyes.
Shan Ziwei felt a chill run through him at that bewitching gaze. A strange sense of guilt welled up in him, like he had just been caught cheating on his partner by his kid. He cleared his throat, and explained, “If you play enough games, you start to understand the shi- cough, the way game developers make their games work.”
To get off that topic, Shan Ziwei quickly headed towards the bookcase and took out the target book. It was a white book and when you flipped to the first page, the first thing you could see was a sentence, like a motto: A true gentleman acts with their mouth, not with their fists.
Below that, it was signed “GShanzi”. Instantly, “wtf” filled Shan Ziwei’s internal narrative. He was about to breakdown, seeing his new Scenario.
[Scenario 5: You firmly believe that a true gentleman should act with their mouth, not with their fists. (00:10:00)]
Act! With! Their! Mouth! Not! With! Their! Fists!
–– Why won’t this game just let him fight mobs like a normal game!
“What’s wrong?” Rice Lover asked, worried, when she noticed the expression on Shan Ziwei’s face.
Shan Ziwei wore a numb expression. “… What do you think the success rate of biting a mob to death is?”
“???”
“Just kidding… ha… ha…”
#All he had to offer to the game developers was a sarcastic laugh#
Shan Ziwei closed the book that had attacked him with a “first page ambush”. He checked the time. There were thirty minutes before Scenario 4 would activate, so he turned to Rice Lover. “Let’s head to the baths.”
Rice Lover’s eyes lit up, hesitantly asking, “Have you finished your preparations?”
“The clues should all be in this book. I can read it along the way. We can always come back if need be.”
“Thank you!”
Rice Lover reached out her hand excitedly, seeming to want to grab Shan Ziwei’s hand in gratitude, but she was dodged by a certain panicking hypersexual.
“Sorry, I got too excited.”
Rice Lover seemed a little stumped. She seemed to think she had overstepped her bounds and didn’t think too much into the meme face Shan Ziwei had just made.
The two quickly left for their next destination, taking ten minutes to arrive at the other corner of the prison: the baths.
The prison baths weren’t split for men and women, only divided by timeslots. Under Shan Ziwei’s guidance, Rice Lover quickly found her bath bucket through the timeslot patterns, and checked what was inside.
Shan Ziwei stood at the entrance of the baths, reading the white paper book.
This really was a “white papers” book. It recorded “GShanzi”’s life. After finishing it, Shan Ziwei could only think: wow he (his Scenario character) really was scum.
“GShanzi” was a conman. Due to the sheer amount he had conned, he had been sentenced to life in prison. As an ambitious conman, “GShanzi” naturally wouldn’t be alright with spending the rest of his life in prison. He began to plan a prison break. To him, trickery was his biggest weapon.
Outside the prison, he had conned money. Inside, there was no money, so he conned people’s feelings.
His target was a new prison guard. After much effort, he had the prison guard wrapped around his finger, but they agreed to everything except helping him break out. Just as “GShanzi” planned to switch targets, the prison guard finally agreed and helped plan their escape: first create chaos, and then continue the plan in the cafeteria.
There was a Scenario Card inside as well.
[Five of Clubs – Art of Lying
Category: Control Skill
Effect: Make a target of distance 1 to you believe any one sentence you say with absolute conviction.
Description: Believe me, that’s a horse, not a deer]
This Scenario Card seemed OP. It somewhat comforted his low spirits from being turned into a scum person by the system.
Shan Ziwei put the book away, raising his head to see Rice Lover walk over with an expression of complete incomprehension.
“… What’s wrong?
Rice Lover glanced at Shan Ziwei once, then twice, before beginning to speak hesitantly.
“Shanzi, if… if I hug you, will you be happy?”
“… no.”
Shan Ziwei was both lying and telling the truth. He had hypersexuality so he wouldn’t be happy with being hugged, but his body would. Rather, his body would be a little too happy – so happy, his Hearts SP (Joy) would plummet!
Rice Lover seemed a little to take an emotional blow from Shan Ziwei’s answer. She bowed her head, seeming to make a decision.
“… I’m really sorry!”
Then, Shan Ziwei was tightly embraced by Rice Lover.
Currently in centralized quarantine! Sorry for the late chapter, guys orz
Next up, Scenario Twelve: Prisoner and Prison (3)
O.o …
O_O
Get better soon? 🧐
May you not die of boredom
Poor baby. I figured something like this would happen when they were alone together though. I mean, she’s a ‘rapist’, so it was likely she’d get a task that required her to intimately touch someone, and who better than our trembles-and-runs-from-all-physical-contact MC?
(but next chapter is Shan Ziwei going to have to seduce that new prison guard or something in the cafeteria? I will laugh if he does, and Gaia drinking vinegar is funny too)
Poor Shanzi…. Will Gaiabe jealous though?
Thanks for the update and stay safe<3
When you’re watched so much you can’t even receive compliments from others without waking up Little Gaia… poor MC lol >_<
Thanks for the chapter!
Next chapter?? 😶😞😱
Thank you for this.
Poor MC!! Gaia drinking vinegar is so cute.
Thank you so much for the chapter!!😍
Hope u stay safe!!
😬😬😬😬
Thanks for the chapter!!
Its like I worry about what Gaia would think rather than Shanzi…
Thanks for the chapter~ ( ^ ♡ ^ )/
As a violist, can I just say, I appreciate the viola love 🙂 usually we are the butt of the joke… and we ourselves know and tell most of the jokes, but I do appreciate it when viola is portrayed in apositive light. And personally I have allways described a really good and full viola sound as similar to dark chocolate, so it fits really well here 🙂 …
So, who will Gaia wants to kill first? xDD
Thx for the ch (ㅅ˘ㅂ˘) And stay safe~
o.o
Oh she is so courting death right now…
I hope It’s just a hug and nothing more.
Thanks for the chapter!
As a violist, feeling very appreciative of that metaphor lololol
Haha!! Jealous Gaia is so cute. Funny how he woke up now host is out of sight