Afraid of achieving nothing. Afraid of making the wrong choices. Afraid that he might never give his all, leaving a lifetime of regret, and fading away in quiet desolation.

Compared to those torments, what was death?

Fu Miaoxue craned her neck to watch them deliberate, and couldn’t help interjecting: “Hey hey hey! You already have three Kings! Sure, a King has one chance to surrender — but nobody knows when you’ll actually run into an ally. What if you die before you even get the chance to meet each other?!”

In the Maze War, it was King versus King.

The odds of encountering an allied nation in a game weren’t exactly high.

Yan Qingwen cast a glance at the crowd in the distance.

Those people were also murmuring quietly among themselves. Though their voices were hushed, their expressions were anything but relaxed.

Anyone who had made it here had come through no small number of games and mazes — and everyone understood what a game called “war” implied.

Yan Qingwen said unhurriedly: “There are 241 people in total. Say each game accommodates ten people — then a King would need to lead their Subjects through at least 24 games to secure final victory. But if we split our forces, three Kings would each only need to win 8 games apiece to collect the puzzle pieces of the entire field. I imagine those people are also thinking about splitting their forces, to gain the maximum advantage.”

“Wow…” Fu Miaoxue blinked. “By that logic, if we gathered even more Kings — say, 12! — then each person would only need to win two games, and then when they meet their allies later, they just surrender back and forth and back and forth, and they’d easily win all the puzzle pieces!”

“How could that be easy?” Bai Youwei propped her chin in her hand, complaining slowly. “The total number of players doesn’t change. The more Kings there are, the fewer Subjects each can command — which means less support in each game. If someone else’s King has seven helpers and you only have one, how are you supposed to play? You’d get crushed.”

Fu Miaoxue pouted unhappily. “This is so complicated. Too few Kings and it doesn’t work, too many and it doesn’t work either. Du Lai isn’t even here — I don’t want to play anymore~ I’ll just pick Subject, you all do whatever you want!”

Bai Youwei narrowed her eyes at those words, not sure what she was thinking, but then she curved her lips into a smile:

“You sure you’re registering as Subject? Hm~ now that I think about it, the rules did say Kings can recruit Subjects… but that’s only when they have extra puzzle pieces to spare. You only have one puzzle piece — if you want to recruit Du Lai, I doubt you’d be able to manage it~”

Fu Miaoxue’s eyes lit up immediately. She said at once: “I’m registering as King! King! Final answer!”

What was there to fear with one puzzle piece? As long as she won one round, couldn’t she just recruit Du Lai right away?

Su Man didn’t know Fu Miaoxue, and had found this woman, shrouded head to toe in black gauze, rather unsettling. Now, hearing her announce she was registering as King, Su Man couldn’t help saying: “That makes four Kings then…”

Lu Yuwen looked over this group of people. He didn’t know any of them well — the only person he could really talk to was Su Man.

“I’ll choose Subject.” Lu Yuwen said. “I’m not particularly interested in collecting all the puzzle pieces. But I don’t want to be demoted to Commoner either, so I’ll choose Subject.”

He looked at Su Man and asked: “Which King are you choosing? I don’t know these people — whichever one you pick, I’ll go with you.”

Su Man looked hesitantly at Yan Qingwen, then at Bai Youwei, and in the end chose Yan Qingwen’s side.

Zhu Shu and Lu Ang were both gone. She couldn’t watch Yan Qingwen fight alone.

Shen Mo’s two former subordinates, Fang Yu and Yu Chaohui, naturally continued to follow Shen Mo.

Tan Xiao and Pan Xiaoxin went with Bai Youwei.

Fu Miaoxue gloated from the side: “Only two Subjects, and one of them is a kid — hahahahaha!”

“Unhinged,” Bai Youwei said, rolling her eyes. “I have extra puzzle pieces so I can still recruit Subjects. You don’t have a single spare piece — and you’re still laughing. You have some remarkable nerve.”

Fu Miaoxue bit her lip. “…Just you wait! My puzzle pieces will surpass yours sooner or later!”

—