She did not answer.

The ball laughed. “The King who wins the war can do anything they want!”

— Not just *anything* — with authority this sweeping, the winner would be nothing short of a god!

Whoever they willed to live would live!

Whoever they willed to die would die!

Destroy the world, grant eternal life — all of it resting on a single thought from the King!

When that moment came, who would care anymore whether the Doll Games still existed?

Bai Youwei looked around her, and found that the people nearby had all changed. Their breathing had quickened; their eyes blazed with an astonishing light, as though fires had been kindled inside them — a fierce, burning desire to win the game.

The ball had successfully ignited the opening movement of the preliminary round. It had stirred within every player a fighting spirit!

Bai Youwei watched the crowd in silence.

This was going to be a chaotic free-for-all. She needed to find allies as quickly as possible.

Unfortunately, out of the thirty players, she could only identify two of Shen Mo’s subordinates — she believed their names were Fang Yu, and someone named Hui…

The situation was not looking good. In a voting-based game like this, having no allies was almost a guaranteed loss.

Bai Youwei knit her brows tightly, turning over in her mind how to find an opportunity to approach those two and establish contact.

Just then, the ball leaped back onto the rooftop of the cylindrical house, its tone grandly self-satisfied:

“The game now begins. Please return here in 8 hours for the first round of voting. For now, you may all go to your rooms to rest — your rooms contain food, water, and a map of this island.”

The moment the words landed, more than a dozen people bolted into the surrounding trees!

These were the players who hadn’t managed to conceal their numbers in time. Having heard the full rules, they were desperate to find cover.

Shen Mo’s two subordinates rushed off as well. One of them glanced back at Bai Youwei before leaving; his companion urged him on: “Hurry! There might be new clues in the rooms!”

The first man hesitated no longer and left with his companion.

Bai Youwei stayed where she was, frowning slightly.

They trusted Shen Mo — but not necessarily her. And there was a good chance their eye colors differed from hers, which would make them opposing factions by default. All the more reason they had no need to come over and speak with her.

They were Blue Eyes…

Which meant her own eyes must be either red or yellow.

When player number 17 had seen her, he’d shown visible fright — and at that point, he didn’t yet know the game’s rules. What eye color would frighten a person, instinctively?

Certainly not blue — blue eyes were common enough abroad.

Bai Youwei considered this.

She knew that followers of certain faiths believed red eyes to be a symbol of the devil.

Following that line of reasoning, there was a strong likelihood her eyes were red.

Though she couldn’t rule out yellow either… what if player 17 was simply the type to overreact? She’d need to find another way to verify.

By now the plaza had almost emptied. Bai Youwei wheeled herself into the trees to look for her room.

A stone-paved circular path wound through the forest.

Bai Youwei felt she had gotten a pretty clear picture of the ball’s preferences.

It had an obsession with all things circular. The cylindrical house at the center, the round plaza, the circular ring of trees surrounding the plaza, the circular stone path winding through the forest — and if she wasn’t mistaken, the beach beyond the forest was probably another ring, and the entire game map was one enormous circle.

She hadn’t gone far along the path before she spotted another cylindrical house — the same shape as the voting house in the plaza, but squatter and rounder, with a sliding door and no windows.

She rolled up to take a look. The ugly little house had a facial recognition system; it would not let her enter unless it identified her face.

—