"Daddy Cat! Where are you guys? I found a safe spot!" Dream Jia immediately shouted excitedly to her teammates upon seeing this area covered by a light curtain.
Fortunately, Daddy Cat and the other two assisting members ran into the alley not far from Dream Jia's location, so she didn't have to exert much effort to find them. She quickly guided them into the light curtain. After the four entered the light curtain, a semi-circular light shield formed immediately, blocking all the coins falling from the sky outside the light shield. Once the light shield began to protect them, the incessant downpour of coins quickly turned into a gentle rain and finally stopped after a strong wind blew through.
"Wow! The Challenger Team is so lucky! They actually stumbled upon the first safe spot! The Hunter Team better step up! If you keep winning these inconsequential victories, the Challenger Team might just breeze through this maze challenge with more thrills than dangers!" The Countess applauded the Challenger Team's luck while also expressing a somewhat disappointed tone towards a visibly frustrated Daddy Cat.
Upon hearing the Countess's words, the Challenger Team members couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief. Because the protection of this safe spot was only active for one minute after activation, the four of them dared not to sit idly. They sat on the ground, trying to relax their nerves, while standing in line, ready to dash towards the chosen path as soon as the protection of the safe spot expired.
After seeing Daddy Cat and Dream Jia safely enter the first safe spot, Arun finally breathed a sigh of relief. Although Daddy Cat's victory in the first round of chess battle had caused some trouble for the Challenger Team, Arun didn't expect them to enter the first safe spot so quickly. This result made Arun much calmer now and also gave him a bit more confidence that their side could smoothly complete the rest of the maze challenge.
After all, from the first round of chess battle, it appeared that the items obtained by Daddy Cat's victory were not as deadly as imagined. Thinking of this, Arun couldn't wait to start a new round of chess battle, because he wanted Daddy Cat and the others to be prepared for the next round of obstacles before the protection of the safe spot expired. The Countess readily agreed to Arun's request and allowed him to make the first move to start a new round of chess battle.
"The vines of the Challenger Team and the water of the Hunter Team! The vines can absorb all the water, so the winner of this round is the vines!" With the Countess loudly announcing the result of this round of battle, the chess piece depicting vines that Arun turned over immediately engulfed Daddy Cat's chess piece depicting water.
Following that, the situation in the vine maze suddenly changed. The vines weaving the maze seemed to be electrified, twitching and stretching wildly, and began to thrash or strike around indiscriminately. Many relatively slender vines were smashed or chopped into pieces by the sturdier vines, turning the entire vine maze into a terrifying hell dominated by devilish tentacles.
Due to the protection of the safe spot, the frenzied vine tentacles did not launch any attacks on the Challenger Team. However, after a dozen seconds, as the light curtain covering the safe spot disappeared, the vine tentacles wriggling around the safe spot immediately rushed towards its location as if they had discovered a new continent.
The Challenger Team members naturally wouldn't stand there waiting to be killed by the vine tentacles. As the protection of their light curtain disappeared, they dodged the vine attacks while heading towards the faintly visible path amidst the wriggling vine tentacles. They had observed that the vines in that path hadn't gone berserk but still maintained the form of vine walls. So, as long as they could run into that path, they would surely evade the vine tentacle attacks!
Unfortunately, the Challenger Team's idea wasn't wrong, but they clearly underestimated the aggressiveness of these vine tentacles. This led to them being entangled by dozens of thick vines that suddenly extended from both sides before they could get far. Then, the five members of the Challenger Team were either crushed into minced meat by the continuously tightening vines or beaten into a red and green mist by the vines slamming around them along with their bodies and the entwined vines.
Seeing their teammates mercilessly killed by the vines, Arun couldn't help but be shocked, and he also frowned, looking at the Countess with eyes full of doubt, questioning why his teammates were so tragically blocked by the vines despite him being the winner of this round of chess battle?
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Seeing this, the Countess hurriedly opened her mouth with a hastily painted smile, coughing as she explained, "Uh, when the maze challenge started, I didn't say that only the Hunter Team could flip chess pieces to block the Challenger Team's progress, did I? Um, that's right! This is actually the rule of the maze challenge! Both the Challenger Team and the Hunter Team can flip chess pieces that are either advantageous or detrimental to themselves! Yes! That's how it is! I designed the rules like this from the beginning! Cough, cough, cough!"
"Damn it! She obviously changed the rules last minute because of an unexpected incident! The Countess definitely didn't anticipate this happening!" Watching the Countess's guilty smile, Haoyun cursed through clenched teeth.
However, no matter how much Haoyun cursed, it was already too late because the Challenger Team had been completely wiped out. Since all five members had failed the challenge, the frenzy of the vines quickly subsided, and they reformed into vine walls. After a while, Daddy Cat and Dream Jia, along with three new assisting members, flashed back into the first safe spot.
Although the deaths occurring in the challenge were just extremely realistic death experiences rather than actual deaths, after experiencing the pain and horror of death multiple times, Dao Lao and Dream Jia could clearly feel that under the influence of multiple deaths, Daddy Cat and Dream Jia, who replaced them, had undergone significant fluctuations in their mentality. Therefore, Dao Lao and Dream Jia began to attack their own bodies from a conscious level, trying to regain control of their bodies while Daddy Cat and Dream Jia were emotionally unstable. Unfortunately, after several attempts, they didn't achieve any results.
"Don't be discouraged. Perhaps your idea is correct, but the timing isn't right yet. Anyway, you still need to keep an eye on their condition. If their spirits suddenly collapse, you might have a chance!" Haoyun encouraged Dao Lao and Dream Jia, while also worrying about Arun, who hadn't participated in the maze challenge and remained relatively stable emotionally. Because if Arun's state remained stable, it meant that Haoyun wouldn't even have a chance to try to regain control of his own body.
The one-minute protection time from the safe spot quickly passed again, and the Challenger Team once again plunged into the tense maze challenge task. While they were avoiding the occasional sniper attacks and searching for safe spots and exits in the maze as best as they could, the items appearing on the chessboard in the subsequent chess battles became increasingly absurd. Under the attacks of demon hunters, medieval knights, swarms of insects, celestial saints stepping on clouds, and even the starship squad's super-nanometer cannons, the Challenger Team's exploration of the maze became more and more difficult, and their return to the safe spot after being killed became more and more frequent.
Finally, the chess battle between Arun and the Temper finally ended with Arun's repeated defeats. Looking at the Temper being replaced by the Little Tiger, Arun finally breathed a sigh of relief. Although he didn't know how the battle with Little Tiger would turn out, at least after getting rid of the torment of the Temper, a veteran chess player, Arun could relax a bit in the chess battle.
As Arun hoped, the situation seemed to favor him after the battle with Little Tiger began. Due to Arun's consecutive draws of winning cards, not only did he take a commanding lead in the duel with Little Tiger, but his teammates in the maze challenge also encountered few obstacles in this round of battle, greatly improving their efficiency in exploring the maze.
With the number of chess pieces on the board gradually decreasing, there weren't many opportunities or time left for Little Tiger. If he didn't put more effort into defeating Arun, the Challenger Team might find the way out of the maze smoothly without any obstacles. Seeing Little Tiger becoming more anxious, Arun's mentality became even more relaxed. And after his mentality relaxed, his luck improved even more.
After taking a deep breath, with a momentum like a rainbow, Arun once again flipped a chess piece by intuition. It was a chess piece depicting a jumping clown. Upon seeing this chess piece, the Countess exclaimed dramatically, "Oh my god! How did your luck suddenly become so good?! You actually drew High Jump! I declare that Arun's High Jump can evade the Tire Breaker attack drawn by Little Tiger, and the winner of this battle is still the Challenger Team!"
After the Countess announced the result of the chess battle, the chess piece drawn by Arun turned into a strand of starlight and immediately flew towards the Challenger Team members in the maze. After these starlights entered the bodies of the Challenger Team members, they all felt a powerful force in their legs, causing them to have an impulse to take off in place.
"High Jump, as the name suggests, gives you powerful jumping ability. However, this ability may have a time limit, so I hope you can use it wisely! Cough, cough, cough!" The Countess briefly introduced the function of "High Jump" and then began the countdown with her fingers crossed.
Hearing the Countess's speech, two assisting members who had experienced life-threatening situations in the maze challenge immediately jumped into the air without hesitation. Obviously, due to the excessive psychological pressure brought by the maze challenge, they were eager to use this powerful jumping ability to escape from danger as soon as possible.
"Cough, cough, cough! Want to reach for the stars? You guys are too greedy! Misusing items will also be punished!" The Countess shook her head as she watched the two assisting members tragically die because they were eager to escape.