Zhihao was a bit taken back. This meant that there would be a lot of mysteries, this also meant the difficulty level of every mission had been increased. This wasn't particularly bad news for Zhihao who was always looking for new thrilling adventures, however, for other players, who weren't as crazy as him, this was like throwing a bucket of cold water on their faces.
Zhihao, "But you would tell us about the mission, right?"
[Do you think I have nothing better to do?]
"..."
Zhihao wanted to fight the bot. What better job did she have? Wasn't she supposed to help them have a better gaming experience? This Alvi was much worse than the old system. At least, the system didn't talk back to them!
Li Ling, "Then how are we to know what our mission is?"
[When certain conditions have been met, you will get to know your mission]
"What are the conditions?"
[You have to survive for ten minutes inside the level.]
"Why do I feel like you are threatening me?" Zhihao voiced out his thoughts.
[What do you mean I'm threatening you? You are so ungrateful!]
"..."
[I'm just telling you what you have to do in order to get your mission.]
Li Ling, "But isn't staying alive for ten minutes easy?"
Alvi sounded a bit too creepy as she responded to him
[Easy? We'll see about that.]
She was threatening them and Zhihao suddenly wanted to write a petition to get the old system back in service.
[Now that you are all caught up with the new features, shall we move on to the lobby?]
"What lobby?"
[I'll show you.]
The screen suddenly changed and they were taken to a huge room with tunnels on every side surrounding it, with other players roaming the place. In front of them was a huge screen that displayed the list of online players. This list was arranged according to the player's rank hence, it came as no shock that Mastermo was on top of the list. Players like Wang GuiYing who hadn't logged in yet were offline and their names weren't included in this list unless they were online again.
Mastermo's name on the list didn't shock Zhihao but what really shocked him was the fact that there was one more name on the screen, above his and it wasn't included in the list. The name was displayed above the list and it read a two-character name: Bu Hui
Zhihao was shaken to the core. Li Ling had actually been right. The gamemaster was online and playing along with them and not only that, but he was somewhere around here.
[As you can see, there are two colored checks in front of each name]
[The blue check means the player is online but hasn't transmigrated into a level. The green check means the player has already started playing]
As Zhihao heard this, his eyes automatically focused on the check mark in front of Bu Hui's name. It was blue in color. He wasn't playing yet. This meant he was right around the corner, wandering around in this place just like Zhihao.
Li Ling broke out laughing as he saw the name on the screen and then Zhihao's shocked face.
"A-Zhi has a promise to keep now."
Zhihao gulped nervously, should he just play dumb?
"What promise?"
Li Ling chuckled, "You are going to chase after Bu Hui. You promised. Are you going to go back on your word now?"
Zhihao didn't have a thick skin like Wang GuiYing so he could not outrightly say no to it. He made a promise and now he can't go back on it. In Zhihao's dictionary, promises weren't something that were meant to be broken.
Zhihao, "But that means you will have to chase after your crush too."
[What are you guys talking about?]
"..."
There was no way Zhihao was going to confess everything to a bot.
Li Ling also seemed to ignore Alvi as he nudged Zhihao, "I'm already chasing after my crush. It's your turn"
"The only thing I see you chasing after is me and my crush on Bu Hui."
"..."
He wasn't entirely wrong.
Suddenly Zhihao found something to be not fitting in and his face betrayed his sudden confusion.
Li Ling, "What are you thinking?"
Zhihao, "Bu Hui."
"You love him that much?" Li Ling teased him playfully.
Zhihao, "It says Bu Hui."
"Huh?"
Li Ling was suddenly stunned on the spot, not daring to breathe.
Zhihao, "The last time I met him, his in-game name was still Gamemaster. How come it is Bu Hui now?"
Li Ling laughed awkwardly, "Didn't he tell you it was his name? Maybe he wanted to change it."
Zhihao found it suspicious and weird, "No way. I call him Bu Hui because that was the only thing I heard. It's not his real name so why did he change it?"
Li Ling thought that he had been found out and got ready to fall on his knees and apologize but before he could do so, Zhihao continued.
"Unless..."
[Unless?]
Alvi also seemed to be interested in the topic. If Zhihao could imagine Alvi to be a human at the moment, he would imagine her to be a little girl who sat by the side and enjoyed the show with a popcorn bucket in hand.
Zhihao, "Unless he did it for me...?"
Li Ling tilted his head as he couldn't understand what was going inside this man's mind.
"What do you mean?" Li Ling asked, thanking the heavens that he hadn't been found out this soon.
Zhihao's ears suddenly turned bright red as he responded with a flustered expression so clear that even his voice seemed flustered, "He remembered playing with me and changed his name because of it."
"Why is your face turning red?" Li Ling really couldn't understand what Zhihao was suddenly thinking.
"It means he thought of me... He remembers me!" Zhihao exclaimed like a little kid whose idol had finally noticed him from a crowd of thousands.
[He does?]
"Of course he does. Did you think he has dementia?" Li Ling immediately wanted to scold himself for letting his mouth run loose. It was all good. Zhihao hadn't noticed anything that should not be noticed, it was all well and good so why was Li Ling looking to dig his own grave?!
Zhihao, "He does! He remembers me and he changed his name for me! Maybe I'm not entirely helpless!"
Li Ling found himself at a loss on how to react but after a minute of pulling himself back together, he smiled and joined Zhihao's little celebration.
"I told you didn't I? You should try before giving up."
Zhihao, "You are right. I should give it a try."
[That's the spirit!]
Zhihao didn't know why but at the moment, he found the annoying Alvi's side commentary to be quite pleasant to the ears.
Li Ling, "But..."
"But what?"
"How are you going to chase him?"
Zhihao hadn't thought that far ahead. In fact, he hadn't thought about it at all because he never would have imagined things to go down like this.
[Maybe I can help.]
"Help?" Zhihao felt the likeability of this bot had increased as soon as he heard it offering them help.
[I can. If you want to be put in the same level as another player, I can pull some strings behind the scenes]
At the moment, Zhihao had forgotten that he was talking to a bot, all he heard was that this Alvi can help him and he was sold. Maybe the system upgrade was really a gift given to him by God who loved him a lot.
"Do it! Put me in the same level as Bu Hui!"
[Eh? Bu Hui? He has already entered a level.]
Zhihao looked back at the huge screen in front of them and found the blue check had suddenly changed colors and had become green in color.
[I can put you two together in another level when both of you are out of the levels.]
It sounded good. It wasn't like Zhihao was ready to meet the gamemaster this soon nor did he have anything he wanted to do when he met him at the moment, so he thought, it was for the best. Right now he'd play without thinking too much about it, and he would later think about what he wanted to say to the man when he meets him again. He'd have a plan ready for the next time the two get to play together.
"I will count on you with that, Alvi." Zhihao beamed and Li Ling wanted to laugh out loud at this reaction of the man.
Just how much did he look up to Bu Hui?
When Zhihao's eyes scanned through the players that were online, he found out that although Wang GuiYing and Zhou XinYi weren't there, there were other pro-gamers who took up the top ten spots. This included Yingli who was right below Mastermo on the list.
"Alvi, what are those numbers in front of Yingli's name?"
[That is the number of bets placed on the player. Positive bets are white in color and negative bets are red in color. The name of the players that placed a bet is hidden, they are given numbers.]
Zhihao was shocked and excited to see that Yingli had a lot of positive bets placed on his/her name but the number of players that placed a negative bet was far more than the positive one's, there was almost a difference of two zeroes.
This was the scene with the second-highest player, Zhihao could already guess what the numbers would be in his turn. It would be a shock if the number of negative bets placed on him didn't exceed a thousand digits.
The players had already started placing bets. Things were going to get really interesting from now on. This was going to be a place where every other player turns against the players who were ahead of them.
There was no way the other players could fight directly against Mastermo and win against him so now they'd take this twisted gambling means to eliminate Mastermo.
Zhihao was crazy for not disliking this. He wanted to see just how many people would bet against him.
[Are you both ready to transmigrate?]
Zhihao and Li Ling smiled and responded with an enthusiastic "Yes" at the same time.
[Good!]
The screen turned black and there were two sets of digits visible in front of them. One was white in color and the right one was red in color. Under both the numbers were buttons named 'bet'.
[Please wait for the next ten seconds. This is the period of voting.]
Zhihao clicked on the white vote button and Li Ling also voted on the white positive bet option. The two placed bets on themselves and watched as the number on the right rapidly increased.
Zhihao had guessed absolutely right when he thought there would be more than thousands of people who'd negatively vote for him. The number rose till 1562 and the ten seconds were up, meaning the betting time was over.
In that 10 seconds, the two players had accumulated a total of 1234 positive bets and 1562 negative bets.
The screen in front of them changed again as they immediately transmigrated inside the level.
[Welcome to the I-ranked level 1356: Unknown location]
Just like Alvi had warned them beforehand, there was no world background story that they got, but there was one thing they got. Alvi was transmigrated along with them as a small girl.
A short girl that was dressed in Lolita fashion, reminding Zhihao of Li Ling's sister.
Zhihao looked around and he found out that he was on a train. He looked at himself and then at Li Ling who was sitting beside him, they had changed appearances. There was one more person sitting beside them, a little girl named Alvi
[Would you look at that, I look cute]
"..."
Li Ling smiled as he heard the girl boasting about her appearance, "But not as cute as A-Zhi."
"..."