Little Pink Starfish

The lich felt incredibly unlucky. Seriously unlucky. He regretted ever being tempted by the money—should’ve known greed never ends well.

He peeked outside. The place was already packed with strange and eerie Bix people. He’d long suspected these weirdos had some sort of special power or absurd luck, and now it seemed that hunch had been absolutely right.

He and Jack had just managed to sneak into Casey City and link up with their group, but not long after, they were completely surrounded by Bix.

What was even stranger was that these Bix, who looked utterly chaotic, undisciplined, and not particularly intelligent… were actually quite smart.

The lich had already vaguely sensed that someone was watching them before they even joined up with the mages and swordsmen. Clearly, they’d been marked the moment they entered the city. But the usually reckless Bix didn’t attack right away as expected—they waited for them to regroup, then surrounded the entire building.

“Do these aliens have some sort of special communication system? Feels like they surrounded us in the blink of an eye,” a swordsman said, clearly confused.

The worst part was—they had infiltrated Casey City. If they’d stayed back in Adrien City, where the number of first- and second-test players was much smaller, and with no respawn points, maybe they could’ve fought their way out. But this was Casey City, the hub of third-test players.

Unlike what the lich assumed, the players had indeed noticed him and Jack earlier. But since third-test players were still too weak, they hadn’t acted right away. They weren’t waiting for them to regroup—they were calling for backup.

If they struck too soon, they might startle the boss. And bosses in Bix Magic Cube were known for running away.

It was common knowledge on the forums by now—every NPC in the game, even mobs and bosses, could run. Every player knew this well.

Not to mention, back in Arzi Town, players had just witnessed firsthand how good these “NPCs” were at running and playing dead.

They figured there was no way they could win alone, so of course, they didn’t act rashly.

Even though the native inhabitants thought the Bix were lunatics with something wrong in the head, the players weren’t actually stupid. Charging blindly still required some basic sense.

And then, while waiting for reinforcements, they got a surprise—one red-named player ran into another group of red-named players.

Then… they realized even with backup, they might still not win.

Jack believed his disguise was flawless. Using a transformation potion from alchemy master Holm, they had altered their appearances completely. He was confident that his group looked nothing like they did during the assassination attempt on Eagle.

Besides, Rano Territory didn’t have many powerful people. Those who could possibly see through their disguise were all based in Golden Rose Manor and rarely left the grounds.

There should’ve been no problems. But the problems came anyway.

Not only did the Bix find them out, but no matter what Jack said, they were absolutely convinced that his group were the assassins.

Was the disguise not good enough? Was his persuasion lacking?

No—it wasn’t any of that. When facing the Bix earlier, Jack had even seen ridicule and contempt in their eyes.

Nothing he said mattered. They wouldn’t believe him. These aliens must’ve used some other way to identify them—something unrelated to appearance or speech.

“That little count having the Bix on his side… is really troublesome.”

Jack wasn’t worried about dying. Death didn’t scare him. He’d been a slave—someone who feared death wouldn’t have made it this far.

Everything he did for Viscount Frey was dangerous and high-risk.

“We need to prepare to retreat,” Jack quickly came back to his senses. “Leave anything we can’t carry. As long as the people get out, it’s fine.” He glanced outside at the swarming Bix. “The Bix aren’t strong individually. As long as we don’t get bogged down, escaping isn’t impossible.”

If just one person was caught, they probably wouldn’t make it. But since they were all here, the players trying to catch them all at once had inadvertently given them the chance to break out together.

There were too many elites. The players couldn’t handle them.

The high-level mage nodded without another word. A massive Frostbite spell froze over a thousand players on the spot—instantly turning them into sparkling icy powder.

Mages were different from other classes. Back when the players surrounded the Dragon Star Knights and Wallis, they could manage. But surrounding a high-level mage? Nearly impossible. Mages had too much AoE firepower, and third-test players were just too low-level to withstand that kind of magic damage.

And this was with Derin Hammerson, former member of the Royal Mage Corps, still holding back. If he went all out, these players wouldn’t even survive a few rounds.

He didn’t dare use everything. He had to save mana. If Sadin really showed up, he couldn’t be caught completely defenseless.

Even though one swordsman was unrealistically optimistic, saying Sadin would need some time to get here, Derin wasn’t reassured. He’d crossed paths with Sadin before, back when he was still in the Royal Mage Corps. Even back then, Derin had felt a subtle fear of him.

Sadin had let Derin go once over a few words, but another mage had died, and the whole thing was swept under the rug.

Sadin was terrifying.

“Go!” Derin shouted, clearing a path with Frostbite.

The lich didn’t need a second reminder. He darted forward like a shadow. He didn’t summon a single skeleton—not because he didn’t have them, but because he didn’t want to waste his precious mana. Most of his skeletons had already been wiped out by players, and summoning more required phosphorus flames, which he couldn’t afford anymore. He was too broke—couldn’t even afford materials to summon minions.

So he didn’t summon a thing. He just used his skinny, nimble body to squeeze forward at high speed—surprisingly agile for a mage.

Jack followed closely behind, flanked by four swordsmen hacking their way through the Bix that kept pouring in from all sides.

The players were shouting in chaos. Several had stepped up to give orders, and everyone was scrambling to block the path ahead.

Jack suddenly hesitated. He had a weird feeling. The Bix were too close—he could clearly see some of them opening their mouths and shouting something—but he could barely hear or understand what they were saying.

Their muttering, combined with their deranged expressions, made it easy to see why everyone thought they were mentally unstable.

From there, the player chatter exploded, and the absurd siege descended into madness…

Bix Magic Cube
SISIMO ^Chapter 37^
Latest Update: 2019-08-27 10:32:16
Jinjiang Literature City

Pei Sen only found out what had happened when the first and second test players resurrected and rushed back to Casey City to intercept the assassins. At first, he hadn’t paid much attention to people suicide-respawning to help out, since that kind of tactic was pretty common among players in all sorts of games.

A few minutes later, Sadin had already left the manor for Casey City. Then Bersa suddenly ran over, clearly just having cried.

“Young Master Eagle, the sensing magic crystal I left in the teacher’s lab shattered!”

That could only mean one thing—someone had broken into Kesso’s lab.

Under normal circumstances, mages wouldn’t randomly barge into Kesso’s private lab. But now, in a panic, some of them clearly had lost their heads. They couldn’t reach their pillar of support, Lord Kesso, and someone must’ve stormed in despite the consequences.

Bersa continued, “I have a friend in the Mage Tower who just contacted me using a magical sound-transmission tool. She said the tower is in chaos. A bunch of mages seemed to have been scared by the Bix in Adrien City, and that’s why…” She and her friend had matching low-end magical communication devices. These things weren’t very powerful—they needed magic to activate, didn’t work over long distances, and were nowhere near as reliable as a real transmission circle. But they were cheap. A real magic communication circle cost a fortune.

Pei Sen paused. Scared? What exactly did the players do?

He checked the forums, but the livestreams showed they hadn’t done anything too outrageous. A few had broken into homes, but the moment the system warned them that looting civilian property would make them enemies of Rano Territory, they backed off immediately.

They really hadn’t done anything… except suicide.

Wait a second. They did do something else… they all committed suicide.

Could it have been the suicide that was too bloody and terrifying? That didn’t seem likely. After all, Bix Magic Cube offered a suicide feature, and it didn’t require personal courage—just pick the option and the system would helpfully slit your throat for you. Sometimes players got stuck or trapped, and dying was the only way to get out.

Pei Sen himself had suicide-respawned before, back when he was captured by the Kui Wolf and sold off.

But suddenly he realized—there were quite a lot of first and second test players in Adrien City. If all of them killed themselves at once… yeah, that probably would’ve scared some people half to death.

Thankfully, those earlier test players rushed over in time. The third test players were all soft and squishy, under-leveled and fragile. The enemies could one-shot entire groups of them.

The first and second test players weren’t so easy to kill. They were higher-level and had spent their contribution points on armor and weapons. Even if their damage output wasn’t impressive, their defense was way better.

Eventually, they came charging in together and blocked the escape route Jack and his crew had worked so hard to open.

And then Sadin arrived. Then Ichabod. Then Aken.

Jack had a bitter smile on his face. He let out a deep sigh. He knew he wasn’t getting out of this alive.

With those three here, plus the Bix everywhere, and more people from Golden Rose Manor probably on their way, there was no more room to maneuver.

Casey City was just too close to the manor.

Only now did Jack realize the biggest mistake he’d made—he had been too confident. He shouldn’t have brought everyone to Casey City.

The city’s biggest flaw was its proximity to Golden Rose Manor. Adrien City was farther away, and if they had stayed there, Sadin and the others might not have gotten here so fast.

A high-level swordsman looked pale and asked, “How did the Bix contact Sadin so quickly?”

Jack shook his head. “It doesn’t matter how they did it anymore. What matters is we can’t resist anymore. Let’s surrender.”

A swordsman immediately refused. “No. I’ll never surrender, even if it means fighting to the last second.”

The lich was furious. “Are you an idiot? If we surrender, maybe your precious Viscount Frey will ransom you back! Isn’t that how you nobles always do it?”

Derin also looked uncertain. “But we tried to assassinate that young count… will they really let us go?”

Jack didn’t know how the lich found out about that. “Among nobles, there’s a custom not to kill those who surrender. There’s also the ransom tradition.”

Everyone breathed a sigh of relief, just about ready to lay down their arms. But then Jack added, “But that young count might not follow tradition.”

Everyone fell silent.

Why did he say the scary part last?

Jack went on, “He’s already razed Casey City and Arzi Town. He killed the city lord and the mayor. Why would you think he cares about noble customs?”

That kind of thing wasn’t normal. No noble would casually kill a fellow noble. Even Wallis, lord of Casey City, hadn’t believed Eagle really intended to kill him—right up until the moment he died.

It went against everything nobles were supposed to stand for. But Eagle Lano didn’t play by the book. When he said he’d kill you, he meant it.

After hearing this, everyone looked hopeless.

“Then why bother surrendering?”

“Because we can’t win. If we surrender, just say it was all my idea. That young count will definitely want to kill me. But you might have a chance to live.”

Say what you want, Jack was still taking responsibility. He had guts.

Though, there was something he didn’t say aloud—maybe the young count wouldn’t let any of them go. Maybe they’d all die.

But he could see it clearly—his group had already lost their will to fight. Even if they kept going, they wouldn’t die gloriously in battle. Even that swordsman who said he’d never surrender—Jack didn’t believe him.

Jack knew these people well. Viscount Frey wouldn’t send his most loyal knights to do dirty work. The guys he sent here were only good for one thing: hit hard, and if that didn’t work, run fast.

Now they couldn’t run anymore. Their morale had been crushed by the Bix. And the Bix hadn’t left, even after Sadin and the others arrived—they were still watching closely.

Jack was sure: once they were defeated or heavily wounded, the Bix would swarm in and finish them off.

Instead of dying miserably, why not take a gamble on surviving?

But the moment they prepared to surrender, the players around them were all stunned.

Surrender? That’s even an option?

They’d thought Sadin and the others were here as their friendly NPC reinforcements. All they had to do now was kill the world boss and get the loot.

Now the boss wanted to surrender?

No way. If they surrendered now, what was the point of everything they’d done up to this moment? All the time and effort, all the deaths—they’d be for nothing!

“Surrender? Who said you could surrender?! You tried to assassinate our young count and now you want to give up?”

“Brothers, kill them!”

“Kill them!”

“Kill them all!”

“Kill!”

Just as Sadin was about to accept the surrender, he froze and looked over—only to see the crowd of furious Bix charging forward again, screaming and slashing without hesitation.

Surrender? No such thing.

“Revenge for the young count!”

“Revenge!”

“Revenge!”

Jack and the others were shocked. What was going on? Why were these aliens so insanely loyal to Eagle Lano?

It made no sense.

It’s not like Eagle had treated them well. He worked them to the bone and barely paid them. How could they accept that?

Jack had even once considered driving a wedge between the young count and the Bix…

Could it be because of that personal steward of Eagle’s?

What was his relationship with the Bix, or rather—how did that steward, Pei Sen, manage to make these Bix so loyal they’d die for Eagle without hesitation?

Yeah, from their perspective, the loyalty of the Bix was beyond comprehension.

Unless… they were just following orders from the steward at Golden Rose Manor. That was the only explanation.

That Bix named Pei Sen—why was he so insanely loyal to Eagle?

“He’s only been at the manor for a few months.”

“Why…?”

“Could it be… because Eagle Lano is just too good-looking?”

Jack suddenly came to a realization. He remembered how Emperor Leiser had spent more than ten years obsessed with Eagle’s father, Burke Angre. All because of his stunning beauty.

“That Pei Sen… probably fell for the Lano family’s signature good looks too.”

“That would explain his fanatical loyalty.”

“And why these crazy aliens are willing to sacrifice everything for him.”

As the Bix charged forward again, shouting “Revenge,” Jack and the others realized—there was no surrendering now.

Jack sighed.

“Being good-looking really is a cheat code.”

It was completely, utterly unfair.