“Just now, it was Sin’s time, but this city was too quiet.”
“That’s not Sin’s style, and it definitely isn’t his level.”
Perfect Life moved swiftly, like a whirlwind, weaving through the city streets, replaying the past twenty minutes in his mind, pondering countermeasures.
“There are only two possibilities: either he caught someone, or he didn’t.”
“The first means the game doesn’t broadcast to all players when someone is caught, and Sin must have changed his usual gameplay habits.”
“That’s good news, because it means for sure he didn’t catch me.”
“And the second possibility...”
Perfect Life’s brow furrowed deeply as he thought.
He refused to believe that someone like Sin would be incapable of finding other players. The only explanation was that this strongest player had a different understanding of the game.
Moreover, this game was a zero-sum game!
Zero-sum game: the sum of all gains and losses of the players equals zero in the end!
If the captor catches someone, he gains a point, and the caught player loses a point.
In ten rounds with ten players, each player only has one chance to score actively—that is, the one time they act as captor.
After that, no more opportunities. So logically, one should try to score as much as possible. If Sin didn’t catch anyone at all...
Perfect Life didn’t see that as a good thing at all.
—So what was Sin’s real thought process? Why was it so hard to see through?
His game time had already started for several minutes, but at this moment, his mind was not focused on game content; he only thought about Sin.
What exactly was that man thinking?
The obvious optimal solution was to catch everyone, and never be caught in any round.
But what if Sin didn’t think that way?
As the world’s second-ranked player, Perfect Life had long wondered—why wasn’t he number one?
It wasn’t arrogance but a truly perplexing question.
His profile didn’t appear clearly on the game’s top leaderboard, but some well-informed people knew about his existence.
His identity was the most forbidden presence in this world, someone who couldn’t be openly acknowledged.
His existence violated human ethics but was once considered the direction of human evolution.
He was— a genetically engineered being!
Through gene editing technology, he combined all the recognized superior genes within human understanding.
Cancer resistance, disease resistance, elimination of all congenital illnesses, extremely attractive appearance, top-tier intelligence, strong physique...
Everything good that people could think of was gathered in him!
After many large-scale experiments and in vitro cultivation, with a mortality rate over 99.99%, only he survived.
Afterward, related experiments were universally condemned, and gene editing technology was banned worldwide.
If anyone in this world could be called a child of gods, it would be him.
He lived up to expectations: healthy, precocious, never losing since he had memory.
But Perfect Life didn’t let this pride him; he remained self-reflective, absorbing the world’s civilization achievements, constantly pushing his own limits.
Until the game arrived.
He became one of the first selected players.
He cleared the game perfectly.
He found every perfect solution to the game, even reaching the “god” level early on.
But when the game rankings were released, he was second.
?!
He couldn’t believe the result; it wasn’t a blow, but he warned himself not to get discouraged and to learn from worthy rivals. So he carefully investigated Sin’s data.
The result was strange indeed.
That guy named Sin was almost the exact opposite of Perfect Life.
He was jealous, greedy, wrathful, arrogant... every mask he wore represented the most primal sins in human hearts.
He was full of desire, shamelessly showing his vices openly.
Those were exactly the qualities people despised, loathed, and fought desperately to eradicate.
Yet, he was so powerful, with overwhelming strength, perfectly clearing the game continuously, taking the number one spot.
He even named himself directly “Sin”!
Deep down, Perfect Life felt this might be a test from heaven, a contrasting foil.
And conveniently, they were the world’s first and second.
Looking down at his hands, one black and one white, shining in harmony.
Would black defeat white, or would white defeat black?
With version 2.0 of the game, rankings would now have reward effects, officially turning it into a competition between players!
And this time, the game was purely a place for players to perform freely—and he had been matched with Sin...
The more he thought, the more immersed he became. Suddenly, his body froze sharply, stopping in place despite moving at high speed.
He wouldn’t use his eyes to distinguish which player was disguised. Moving fast, he didn’t need to see; his yin-yang hands were his detector!
His yin-yang hands told him that the surrounding energy flow seemed to have shifted...
Just now, didn’t someone strange brush past him?
It seemed... they were wearing a mask???
Setting aside all distractions in his mind, he snapped his head around sharply to look at the clearly odd person.
That person was just walking forward with the crowd, nothing unusual.
But when Perfect Life teleported in front of him, he suddenly saw a dark green mask!
Perfect Life: ?
Lu Ce acted like he didn’t see him at all; the dark green mask still had that deadfish eye expression, silently walking forward.
Perfect Life: ......
“Hey, I’m asking, friend, what are you doing?”
“Sin!”
Lu Ce didn’t hear him, continuing forward.
Perfect Life was helpless and took a step forward, using his black hand to press on Lu Ce’s shoulder.
“Are you not going to say something?”
Lu Ce finally turned his head. The dark green mask showed a deadfish eye expression.
“What’s up?”
The one sentence left Perfect Life dumbfounded.
He even suspected he was hallucinating and had mistaken the person, but the yin-yang hands definitely wouldn’t lie!
“You... aren’t you... wearing a mask right now?” Perfect Life pointed at Lu Ce’s dark green mask, looking a bit incoherent.
“Do you know you’re wearing a mask right now?”