[The number of players on the 10th floor of Meta-Region 8 has reached 16.]
[All weapons will be locked inside your inventory.]
[All status window functions will be locked.]
[All pets will be teleported to another place.]
[Initiating randomized teleportation.]
And with that being the last thing that I saw, a bright light engulfed me and a few seconds later, I found myself in a desert.
"Are you fucking kidding me! Out of all the places on the map, you had to drop me right in the middle of the fucking desert!"
After venting my anger on the system, I looked around and surveyed my surroundings.
All around me, were golden sand dunes, covering the area as far as the eye could see. The sun was beating down on me and my surroundings, making the air look like it was wavering, afraid of something greater than itself.
I quickly took off the hoodie that I had been wearing since the start of my climb up the tower and tore it into a long strip, quickly wrapping it around my head and mask, blocking myself from the sun.
Now that I had adequate sun protection, as I had been wearing a long-sleeve shirt underneath the hoodie and I had also been wearing pants, I started trudging forward, leaving deep imprints on the sand dunes.
'Hoo, haa, hoo, haa, this actually makes the trial of stamina seem easy.'
After what could be considered slogging for 5 hours, I finally saw a ray of hope in the distance.
'Whew, I finally found a chest.'
I had designed this trial's structure to look like those old games that we learned about in game history after all, so of course, there would be golden chest containing loot around.
This had actually been one of only two floors that I had designed that took inspiration from those old games, with both of them being games that were popular in 2020, which had been called in game history, "One of the most iconic years for the gaming industry.'
Arriving at the chest, I unlocked it and peered at its contents.
...
...
...
'I guess I'm fu... sigh, well whatever, I guess it's better than nothing.'
The only thing inside of the chest was a medium sized waterskin that looked like it would last about a day and a half for a normal person. For me, a person with a much higher than average stamina stat, it would last me about 5 days before I would run out, but in reality, I could probably make it last 7 days. I had restrained myself from talking out loud this whole time to conserve saliva, and I could also use other methods like peeing on the ground and then sticking one of my clothes above it, waiting for the water to evaporate and recondense onto my clothes, and then slowly dripping this water into a cup to recycle some water back into my system.
I decided to take a small sip out of the waterskin, and then recommenced my slogging.
'Fu fu fu, I wonder how Hope's doing, after all, all of the ecosystems that I set up for the map of the 10th floor are all extremely harsh in their own right.'
What Shinobu didn't know was that Hope was indeed facing a much bigger problem than him at the moment.
I opened my eyes to find myself waist-deep in murky water. The ground under the water was made up of mud, and all around me were mangrove trees, their roots making small temples in the water.
After standing still for a few seconds, I decided to just walk in a random direction, but after a minute, I realized that there was a big problem. Every step that I took felt like I was pulling strong suction cups out of the water.
I stood there thinking for a while before I finally came up with a solution.
'I can't believe I didn't think of this beforehand, but I don't want to experience that torture again!'
'Ugh, but I guess it's the only way.'
I quickly submerged my whole body in the water, freed my feet, and then started swimming.
Back when I was little, (A/N: I don't know why she's referring to herself in a way that makes her seem so old even though she's only 13, well of course I do.) my dad had forced me to go to these swimming lessons with a private teacher who had been a gold medalist for swimming at the Olympics. I had complained about it every day, but my dad had always responded with, "Swimming is a good sport that strengthens every muscle in your body which is essential for a young lady like you so that you may have a good figure, and one day, it might save your life."
"To think that his words came true." I mumbled.
I continued to swim through the water.
Night time had just fallen.
In a matter of seconds, the air temperature had turned from scorching hot to freezingly cold.
Although the cold didn't really affect me that much due to my stamina stat, I still shivered, so I laid down on the cool, gritty sand and turned my eyes towards the sky.
'The night sky looks beautiful no matter how many times I look at it.'
One of the things that I had spent the most time on when developing the game had been the setting for each and every area, not neglecting any details at all. This, of course, included the night sky.
I had actually spent more time on the night sky than any other structure, as although I knew it would never be perfect, I still wanted to portray it as realistically as possible in my game.
Or course, it looked even more realistic now, even though it was still fake as we were in the "Tower of Ordeals" after all.
I smiled sadly at seeing my creation being portrayed so realistically and how I had never been able to come close to how real this was. I started counting the stars in the night sky. It wasn't long until my eyelids started drooping and for sleep to finally come.
Under the same night sky, a girl was swimming in a dark mangrove forest.
'How big is this fucking map! I mean I've been swimming freestyle at a 00:50 100 meter pace, but I still haven't seen another biome.'
(A/N: For those non-swimmers out there who are uneducated, a 00:50 100 meter pace basically means that you're swimming 100 meters in 50 seconds, which any decent competitive swimmer should know is a lot, lot harder than it sounds as the world record is 00:46. Of course, this is only possible due to the stat system!)
I continued to swim, bearing the immense fatigue building up in my muscles.
It was as the sun rose that I finally caught sight of some dry land.
"Oh beautiful dry land, I hope you never leave me again!"
I just layed there, sprawled out on the soft ground, a small smile appearing on my face, as I soon fell asleep. Even the rising sun could not pull me out of my slumber.
I suddenly woke up from my sleep, my perception having felt movement at the edge of my consciousness.
I pretended to still be asleep, but readjusted my position into one that was easy to attack from.
It took a little while for the person that I had "seen" to get up to me, as my perception while in my sleep had felt them coming at more than 150 meters away.
As their hand started nearing my mask, I quickly shot my hand up, grabbing their throat and squeezing.
Opening my eyes, I was shocked to see my sister's struggling face. Not noticing in time that it was too late, I could only helplessly watch as the light quickly left her eyes.