Chapter 196: Open the Box

The heavy tires of the bat-wing motorcycle crushed through the grass, its hellish engine fueled by demonic power spewing thick sulfurous smoke to provide immense thrust.

Behind the seat, a Gray Rain-brand iron ball, chained in place, rolled rapidly; as a liquid metal, Gray Rain could freely redistribute weight within the ball to flexibly adjust its rolling direction.

Boom!

The massive iron ball, carrying tremendous kinetic energy, struck Cliff's upper body precisely, sending him flying like a bowling pin.

True, Cliff could reinforce his defense using Six Styles: Iron Body and Armament Haki, avoiding serious injury.

But Iron Body immobilizes the user during activation; Li Cheng and Gray Rain timed their strikes perfectly, exploiting the brief lag between Iron Body's release and recovery to maintain pressure on Cliff.

Boom!

The iron ball struck again; during the brief pause, Li Cheng, riding the heavy bat-wing motorcycle, turned his head sideways.

In the distance, a hot-air balloon was slowly crashing—its crude construction and the color of its envelope confirmed it was the hot-air vessel Li Cheng himself had built.

The next cycle had already begun; a new player team had entered.

Something felt off.

Li Cheng, activating the Multi-Threaded Brain Domain Technique, thought furiously: according to Silver, only by killing everyone at once—including Cliff, the strongest—could they break the cycle.

Killing most would trigger a cycle reset.

The balloon's crash was clearly caused by Zhao Zijing in this cycle; she likely intended to pull the next cycle's team in.

The problem: in this cycle, Li Cheng and his team had not encountered their previous selves.

If Zhao Zijing had gotten lost in the grass and failed to meet the next team, it would be a repeated cycle.

If Zhao Zijing successfully joined the next team, it would create a new narrative branch—meaning at least two distinct cycle patterns existed.

As Li Cheng pondered, the iron ball struck again—but this time, the feedback felt different.

At the last instant, Cliff deactivated Iron Body, crossing his arms before his chest, attempting to withstand the blow solely with Armament Haki and raw physical defense.

Boom!

Cliff was slammed hard, his left arm clearly broken, bent at a grotesque angle.

Yet his face still wore a savage grin; he stomped the air, activating Six Styles: Razor, instantly altering his trajectory and landing in a depression.

This depression was the open-air grave where Li Cheng's group had discovered the Mercury Alloy Guild member 【Bismuth Yellow】 buried.

Cliff planted his legs into the ground, lifted Bismuth Yellow's metal tombstone with one hand, twisted his waist like a classical Greek statue, and aimed it at the incoming iron ball.

Clang!

The metal tombstone, like a racket, struck the Gray Rain iron ball dead center.

Gray Rain was flung backward—but as liquid metal, she instantly liquefied upon hitting the mud pit, reshaping like a water-filled balloon to dissipate the kinetic force.

Cliff's still-intact right arm, having briefly endured immense force, saw capillaries rupture beneath the skin; the entire limb appeared crimson with blood.

As if feeling no pain, he hurled the bent, deformed tombstone straight at Li Cheng on the motorcycle.

The tombstone sliced through the air, blocking the vehicle's path.

Braking was impossible; Li Cheng kicked the pedal, leaping upward as the bike tilted into a drift, skimming just beneath the tombstone's lower edge.

Man and bike separated; Li Cheng landed steadily, instantly feeling a powerful gust rush toward his face.

Cliff activated Six Styles: Razor, sprinting straight to Li Cheng's front and launching a right fist toward his face.

Instant Thunder, activate!

Lightning danced between his hair and fingertips; the Instant Thunder skill temporarily boosted his body speed, allowing Li Cheng to react in time and counter with a punch.

Their fists collided; Li Cheng retreated over ten steps, both elbow and wrist dislocated.

Cliff was about to press his advantage when he was drenched in black water from 【Death Curse Current】, and his chest grew heavy—

A gravity energy sphere clung to his chest, accompanied by a bomb weighing at least three kilograms.

Boom—

The bomb detonated violently, sending a rolling cloud of dust into the air.

Amid the dust, Cliff, still activating Iron Body and Armament Haki, remained standing, though a patch of his hair was burned away and his face was blackened.

"No motorcycle, no speed advantage—what do you have left?"

Cliff spoke, exhaling a cloud of black smoke like a cartoon character.

Compared to skills from the Killing Field system, Six Styles: Razor—a self-taught ability—had shorter cooldowns and fewer restrictions.

Without his motorcycle, Li Cheng was a stationary target before Cliff, who could freely use Six Styles: Razor.

"I still have this."

Li Cheng activated the 【Assembled Puppet】 effect, detached his dislocated right arm, realigned the bones, and reattached it, then said solemnly: "Cliff Duncan, age twenty-six, formerly resided in an apartment between Domino's Pizza and Central Railway Hotel in downtown Sydney, Australia.

His mother was a marketing manager for a travel company; his father was a high school teacher. He had five ex-girlfriends: Susan, Anna, Julie."

Li Cheng rattled off Cliff's detailed personal information; Gray Rain, climbing out of the mud pit nearby, heard it and froze, her expression stunned, instinctively exclaiming, "Holy shit, box!"

In the early days of the Killing Field game, too many players were tracked down and captured by corporations, gangs, mercenary groups, or even national intelligence agencies after leaking personal details.

Either killed and stripped of player status.

Or had their family and friends held hostage, forcing them into cooperation.

This history made every current player exceptionally protective of their personal privacy.

Any unauthorized attempt to uncover another's identity was equivalent to the highest-level provocation—capable of triggering a fight to the death.

While Cliff was still "alive," he paid part of his game currency as taxes to the Australian government each month, so his personal data remained protected by the Australian government.

But after the Mercury Alloy Guild vanished entirely for a full year, he was marked as deceased; some of his information was declassified and transferred to the Global Occult Coalition.

The GOC undertook protective measures for Cliff's parents, similar to the U. S. Federal Witness Protection Program—relocating them to another country under new identities.

This setup primarily prevented players from seeking revenge, killing entire families, and destabilizing societal order.

Li Cheng had no illusions of being a hero; he unhesitatingly recited every detail he'd seen on Zhao Zijing's tablet.

"You can't escape—but that doesn't mean we, the players who accepted this Killing Field mission, can't escape. The grass will keep cycling; as long as one of us leaves and returns to the real world to report what happened here—"

"What do you think will happen to your family and friends?"

Li Cheng, like a textbook villain, said solemnly, "The correct thing for you to do is sit down and talk cooperation. You don't want your parents to know you've been killing innocents here, do you?"

"Heh."

Cliff fell briefly silent, his gaze fierce and savage. "If I kill all of you, no one will know."

Before his words had faded, he raised his leg and side-kicked straight at Li Cheng's temple.

(End of chapter)