Chapter 137: Mosaic : You begged me!

The black tower's beep ends, and a blue glow shines in the spacious courtyard.

The burst of blue light grew brighter and more blinding. There were twenty blue membranes in total, but nothing was placed inside them. When Tang Mo opened his eyes again, he saw that the twenty blue membranes were floating with objects of a very different style. There were coloured stones of unknown use, some mallets, long nails with blood on them, and a small red dress.

The black tower's mechanical child's voice rang out -

"Ding Dong! Game 1, Number of players allowed to advance: 7."

Tang Mo looks closely at the twenty items, her eyes stopping at the second row.

There are two books!

It is a 5 x 5 checkerboard, with Tang Mo and the young man standing in the rightmost row. From their point of view, the board is divided into five rows and five columns, and on the second row, near Bai Ruoyao, there are two squares with two books on them.

As Mosaic's treasures are large and small, the blue film of light becomes larger and smaller as the items appear. There are twenty items in total, and only the second row, third column, and the second row, fifth column, contain books in the film of light.

Tang Mo heard a brief murmur and turned his head to look at his companion. The younger man had obviously seen the two books too, and he was surprised for a moment, then kept his composure. He looked cautiously at Tang Mo and found him staring at him too. The young man's face changes, his eyes darting to Tang Mo and Bai Ruoyao, his eyes suspicious.

All four players have seen the book, and Mosaic, who is sitting in the centre of the expectation box, slumps down on the table in frustration. Seeing that all four players were very alert and none of them made the first move, Mosaic said, "I've never seen humans so bored. Boring, boring, boring! End this boring copy, I want to start a fire, I want to play!"

When Mosaic said that, none of the players took her up on it.

Everyone is looking carefully at each item on this board and the pattern of light and darkness in the outer light film of the item.

The two books were clearly close to Bai Ruoyao's side, and if they wanted to get past them, they would have to waste at least three steps to get to the compartment with the books. Suddenly there was a rumbling sound and Tang Mo immediately gripped his small parasol tightly, only to see a blue film of light slowly appear in front of him and the young man.

On the other hand, on Bai Ruoyao's side, a blue film of light also appeared, standing between them and Tang Mo.

The young man exclaimed, "Is that rule nine of the game ...... that teammates can discuss countermeasures in private?" The young man didn't react for a moment, it seemed to be the first time he had seen such a simple and brutal method of "isolation" from The black tower.

Tang Mo has long experienced a similar rule in Pinocchio's honest card game: "Now when we speak, they should not hear us. Likewise, when they talk, we can't hear them."

The young man sniffed and looked cautiously at Tang Mo.

Tang Mo and the young man are each standing in the corner of the grid, with three squares between them.

With only five minutes of free discussion in total, the young man hesitated for a moment and decided not to waste any time: "My name is Liu Wansheng, you should have heard my name when you entered the copy. Now I just want to confirm one thing with you first ......" Liu Wansheng looked serious as he pointed directly at Bai Ruoyao at the other end of the grid, "Are you and that man teammates?"

Tang Mo: "No."

Liu Wansheng was a bit incredulous: "You came in together and from your conversation, you seem to know each other?"

Anyone who has made it to this copy is bound to be a player who has cleared at least one level of The black tower. Faced with the uncertainty of the game of The black tower and the need to solve it, the first thing that came to this man's mind was not to blindly solve the game, but to first confirm the identity of his teammates.

In Tang Mo's place, he would have asked the same question first. He asks in return, "So, are you and that woman teammates?"

Liu Wansheng immediately denied it: "Of course not. I accidentally entered this copy last week, and the next day this woman and her teammates came in, there were four of them, and just after they came in, they were mobbed and beaten to death by three werewolves and little girls because they picked up the little girl's matches. She and I didn't know each other at all, we were simply trapped in this copy for days together."

From Liu Wansheng's expression and tone of voice, Tang Mo doesn't think he's lying. He turns his attention to the young woman on the other side of the lattice. She looked pale and kept opening her mouth to say something, looking very anxious. Liu Wansheng followed Tang Mo's gaze and froze slightly when he saw Bai Ruoyao.

The baby-faced young man in the white jacket stood docilely in his own compartment, smiling and looking at Tang Mo. His female teammates kept talking to him, but he never responded. Instead, Bai Ruoyao blinked and opened his mouth to say something when Tang Mo and Liu Wansheng looked at him.

Liu Wansheng's scalp tingled: "He said you and he were teammates!"

Tang Mo: "......"

It's a good thing Bai Ruoyao opened his mouth wide and said, "We're teammates.

Bai Ruoyao's sudden, blanket statement, which he obviously couldn't hear Tang Mo's side of the conversation, almost made Liu Wansheng explode in disbelief, doubting his own teammate. But he soon calmed down and realised that this psychotic doll face was probably lying to him. If Bai Ruoyao and Tang Mo were really teammates, Bai Ruoyao should have chosen Tang Mo instead of the young woman when he chose his teammates in the first place (of course, he couldn't rule out the possibility that he was deliberately putting his teammates on the enemy's side so that he could play both sides together). In any case, his preference is that these two strange players are not really teammates, but probably have some kind of special relationship.

Liu Wansheng: "OK, I believe you and that guy are not teammates, now we are teammates. To be honest this game is a bit like flipping chess, but different. I've played a little bit of flip chess and in this type of game it doesn't matter how you play halfway through, it's the ending that counts. It says in the rules that all we have to do is give Mosaic the item in the light film."

The man spoke with reason, and although his forehead was covered in sweat, his mood was relatively calm.

What the other man had to say was also what Tang Mo had in mind, and he went along, "At the end of the game, whichever grid we stand in, as long as the light film of the grid is lit, and the light film wrapped around Mosaic is also lit, the contents of the grid can be given to Mosaic. Now, there are two books in all."

Liu Wansheng nods: "In my position it takes five steps to get to the nearest book. You are in a better position and only need three steps to get to the grid with a book. We can each take seven steps in this round, and I think it's better for you to walk to the grid with the book. Then there's the issue of the light film switching on and off ...... I'll sort this out. I'll be around to help see what's going on and make sure that Mosaic's grid is lit and the one you're on is lit too. Of course I can't guarantee it completely, we'll see what happens first in our first round of play."

Tang Mo raised an eyebrow and did not overrule the other's decision.

This Liu Wansheng is definitely on the level of all the players Tang Mo has seen. Indeed, Tang Mo is closer to the squares with books, and it makes more sense for him to take the squares with books. But keeping the film light and dark is not an easy task. Liu Wansheng strokes his chin and stares unblinkingly at all the squares in the field, memorising their current light-dark relationship and mumbling something as if he is calculating.

Tang Mo couldn't hear what he was saying, but from the look on his face, I could guess that he was calculating how the opposite side of the grid would move, how the grid would darken and lighten, how the situation would change. How could he control this so that Tang Mo's last move would be on the lit grid and Mosaic's grid would be lit?

The game is particularly simple, in that the player moves backwards and forwards through the grid, and each time they walk into a grid, the vertical and horizontal rows of that grid, all the grids, change colour. The film of light that was on becomes dark, and the film of light that was dark becomes light.

Yet the simpler the game, the more complex it is to play.

It couldn't be easier to let just one person play this kind of game. This is because one person can control where he or she goes. Once there is a second player, the possibilities of the grid change increase geometrically. Tang Mo looks at Liu Wansheng, sweating profusely and serious in his calculations, and he thinks for a moment without interrupting his opponent's reasoning.

If only Bai Ruoyao's team hadn't acted so casually and worked together, it would have been easy to get the book to Mosaic.

Yet both Tang Mo and Bai Ruoyao know that this is simply not possible. If the game could be solved by players working together, there is no way that so many people would have died before, nor would the game have been deliberately divided into two camps. There must be a reason for the two camps to exist.

The five-minute free discussion period ends and the blue film of light fades away.

At one end of the grid, Bai Ruoyao says something to the young woman, who closes her mouth and stops talking, her eyes red with anger and rage. At the other end of the grid, Liu Wansheng is rubbing his hands together, knowing that the chances of ending the game in the first round are very low and that in all probability this game is a test run for both sides, without any specific punishment.

The black tower beeped, "Game one, the game has begun! Please advance the number of squares in order of priority."

At the end of the sentence, a large blue number appeared on the heads of the four players present. Bai Ruoyao had a '1', Liu Wansheng had a '2', the young woman Lin Qian had a '3' and Tang Mo has a '4' on her head.

"Ask player 1 to choose a way forward."

Bai Ruoyao, with a big '1' on his head, smiles and takes a step forward. With this step, he just happened to be standing on the pane with the book on it. As soon as he stepped into this frame, the light film that had been on in this frame immediately turned off, and all the light films in the vertical and horizontal rows changed colour.

This is just the beginning. Tang Mo and Liu Wansheng look unchanged at this change and feel no pressure. Next it was Liu Wansheng's turn to move forward, and he advanced one frame, again changing the colour of all the light films in the vertical and horizontal rows.

The young woman bit her lip in silence and stepped forward a frame as well.

Finally it was Tang Mo's turn.

On the large grid network, all three players took up their positions and turned their heads in unison to look at Tang Mo.

Tang Mo had a small pink parasol hanging from his waist and his eyes were calmly looking directly in front of him, to his left, the only two directions he could choose to go in as a first step. Whichever way he chose, it didn't seem to matter much, as the game had only just begun.

Tang Mo's eyes swept over the three players one by one, and then looked at the two books that were wrapped in a film of light. Finally his eyes were directed at the little girl sitting in the middle of the grid, and he suddenly spoke, his voice calm: "If I take the last step and I am standing in the same grid as him, will the items in the grid be his or mine?" He was referring to Bai Ruoyao.

Bai Ruoyao first stares, then grins cheekily.

Mosaic was energised by the fact that someone was talking to him: "Of course it's his. First come, first served, you bad human, you don't even know how to do that, I despise you."

No one else understood what Mosaic's disdain meant, and Tang Mo, the only one who did, ignored her. He gave a soft "oh", still not advancing the number of frames, and asked a second question, "Give you the book and the game is over?"

Mosaic blushed: "I don't want to read the book! I don't want to I don't want to! I want to go and play!"

Tang Mo: "So if that happens. For example, in our current round, there are two books in the game. At the end of the game, let's say both of our teams hand you the book without any problems ...... So, who wins? What's the benefit of winning and what's the penalty for losing?"

Dumbfounded, the young woman said, "No, it's still possible! Can you just ask for such rules?"

Liu Wansheng did not expect Tang Mo to ask such a question so bluntly, and he looked at Tang Mo with dismay and scrutiny in his eyes.

Tang Mo calmly waits for Mosaic's answer.

But the young girl looked at Tang Mo with a strange look in her eyes as she listened to his question. After a while, Mosaic crossed his arms and burst out laughing: "Yes, you can ask, you can ask, I can answer, I know all these answers. But ...... why should I tell you! You're a big bad guy, you wouldn't let me talk before, you wouldn't act with me, you wouldn't play with me, you just knew to turn on the game. Now that the game is on and you got what you wanted, you want to ask me how to pass the game again? Beg me, you come beg me ......"

"Well, I beg you."

Mosaic: "......"

Liu Wansheng: "......"

Lin Qian: "......"

Even Bai Ruoyao didn't expect Tang Mo to say something so simple as a plea, and he froze for a moment before saying, "Hey Tangtang, I asked you to beg me before, but even if you didn't, you still hit me. There's no such difference in treatment!"

Tang Mo ignored Bai Ruoyao and looked at the confused young girl with great sincerity: "I beg you, tell me exactly how to pass the game, who wins if both teams pass together, what is the reward for the winning team and what is the punishment for the losing team. And ......" After a pause, Tang Mo's eyes were firm: "Is violence forbidden in this game ......?"

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Author has something to say.

Mosaic: QAQ he ...... he doesn't follow the script!

Big Turkey & Big Mole & Pinocchio & Mr Rabbit: Seconded QAQ!!!