After listening to everyone’s account, Teacher Cheng sighed deeply:

“The road ahead is long and arduous. To win every single one of these battles — it is no small undertaking.”

Du Lai, meanwhile, frowned at Fu Miaoxue and said: “In the next battle, find an opportunity to surrender.”

“Why?” Fu Miaoxue pouted. “Isn’t being a king wonderful?”

“No.” Du Lai was unusually firm, without his usual tendency to accommodate her. “If a king loses all their puzzle pieces, they die. Surrender in the next battle, then lose as a subject, and you become a commoner — completely out of the war.”

“But if we can win all the way to the end as kings, we’d have ultimate power!” Fu Miaoxue’s brow furrowed slightly, reluctant to give it up. “We could do whatever we wanted, play the games if we felt like it, stop whenever we didn’t, restore our bodies to human form, even bring back family and friends — it wouldn’t be impossible…”

“The way things are now is perfectly fine,” Du Lai cut her off. “Let someone else be king. It doesn’t matter if our bodies aren’t whole. It doesn’t matter if family and friends aren’t around. As long as we’re together, we can live well without being king. The only thing I know for certain is that I don’t want to see you take any risks.”

Fu Miaoxue was deeply moved by this. She buried herself in Du Lai’s arms with a soft sob. “Du Lai, I love you so much!”

Du Lai held her close. “I love you too.”

Everyone else: “…”

These two never had any regard for the people around them when they were being tender with each other.

“What a touching love story~” Bai Youwei said, her expression utterly blank as she doused their moment in cold water. “Though I should point out — players who become commoners have their puzzle pieces and items reclaimed. Are you certain you can live well in a world like this with no items at all?”

Du Lai: “…”

Fu Miaoxue’s brows shot up in outrage. “What is wrong with you! Why are you so irritating?!”

Absolutely ruining the moment.

Bai Youwei rolled her eyes. “I’m not half as irritating as you.”

Fu Miaoxue jabbed at a sore spot: “You *cripple!*”

Bai Youwei returned fire without mercy: “You’re all prosthetics.”

Fu Miaoxue shot to her feet. “You—!…”

Just as it was about to escalate into a full argument, Teacher Cheng hurried to his feet to intervene: “Oh, come now, no fighting… no fighting. Xiaodu, Xiao Shen, can’t you two step in?”

Shen Mo: “…”

Du Lai: “…”

Both their respective partners remained utterly silent.

Teacher Cheng cleared his throat and tried to reason with them: “As the saying goes — after weathering every storm together, when we meet again, we should let bygones be bygones! We are all compatriots, and with a great battle ahead, we should be joining hands, not quarreling over words. Come, come, let’s sit down… all sit down and talk calmly…”

Du Lai gave Fu Miaoxue a gentle tug.

Fu Miaoxue sat back down in a huff, quietly adding another mark against Bai Youwei in her mental ledger.

Shen Mo spoke calmly: “Let’s get back to discussing the game. Everyone should have noticed by now — judging from the wide variety of players in the qualifying round, the doll game has global reach. There is only one way to break free of this game system, and that is to become the final king.

No matter who that king ultimately is, as long as games no longer appear within their territory, the surviving people can go back to living quietly as before. But we all know in our hearts that this is not very likely — because no one can guarantee what the person who becomes king will do to this world.

If I were king, I would want the world restored to how it was, with the doll game erased entirely. I want to know — as kings, what kind of world would each of you want?”

Fu Miaoxue’s brow creased. “Are you kidding? If I became the final king, it would only be after going through countless life-and-death situations and exhausting effort to claw my way there. Only a complete idiot would use that supreme power to put the world back the way it was! I would hold the pinnacle of power, and no one would dare defy my commands! Otherwise what would all my suffering have been worth?!”

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