He called for his teammates to regroup with him…Then, he sat on top of Webor’s head and requested him to walk towards the the staircases.
“Landlord’s team is finally making their move?”
“They sure took their sweet time with finding the clues.”
“So dumb, no matter how many clues they find, it won’t be as beneficial as having an hour or two as a head start.”
The players started murmuring after spotting Felix’s movement.
Although they called him names, they still wanted to see which segment of the floor his key was going to unlock.
After all, they had been working pretty hard in the past hours, and they had collected a sizable number of clues.
Some of them had managed to get more clues of a single segment than the others, making it more desirable than the other segments.
While they were wishing for their ideal segment not to be picked, Felix and his teammates had stopped before the staircases and turned around.
“It looks like I already have everyone attention.” Felix smiled comfortably as he eyed the confused players.
“I will get straight to the point since time is precious at the moment.” Felix eyed them coldly and snapped his finger, displaying nine holographic colored keys.
Before the players could react, Felix continued on, “I already found all the remaining keys in the floor. If you want to get yours, simply accept my three conditions.”
“…”
“…”
“…”
For the first time in a while, the hall had returned to its peaceful silence…No one was speaking, running around, or trying to break things apart.
They merely kept eying the brilliant revolving keys while having Felix’s announcement echo over and over again in their minds.
Shock, disbelief, distrust, confusion, and lastly anger!…Their emotions were thrown into disarray at the thought that Felix might actually be speaking the truth.
If so, then all their efforts for the past hours were for naught!
Worst of all, they were making a fool of themselves before their own ancestral as they were searching for something that didn’t exist!
They didn’t want to believe that…They couldn’t.
“Stop spewing bullshit, we don’t have time for your crap.”
“Motherf*cker just had to rub it in before climbing the tower to mess with our mentality.”
“Humans are trul….”
Before the players could finish throwing their curses, Felix proclaimed indifferently, “I swear on my masters’ dignified names that I am speaking the truth.”
“…”
“…”
“…”
The players’ hearts sunk to the bottom of their stomach after hearing him swear on his masters.
They instantly believed in him, knowing that swearing on ancestors was taken even more seriously than a contract with the Queen’s supervision!
After all, the ancestors’ names were sacred and treated as gods by their descendants.
Who would dare to swear on his own god under his direct eyes and break it?
In turn, distrusting Felix even though he swore on his masters’ name was the most disrespectful thing they could do…Especially, when they were watching them live.
“If you don’t trust my words, trust that my masters will give you justice if I fooled you.” Felix said composedly.
Felix wasn’t bullshiting them…He knew that If he used his masters’ names in vain, he would not be treated kindly by his masters.
ᴘ ᴀɴ ᴅᴀ-ɴᴏᴠ ᴇʟ, ᴄᴏᴍ “What are your conditions?” The Timewatcher asked.
There were so many questions roaming the players’ minds…Such as, how did Felix find the keys so fast and why did he decide to hide them for so long?
But since time was tight, they kept them to themselves.
“First, you will hand over all the collected clues in your possession. You will swear on your ancestors that you have given me everything.” Felix informed with a devious glint.
Before the players’ hearts settled at such a damning condition, Felix carried on, “Secondly, you will support my team wholeheartedly if we met at one of the ancestral floors. Last but not least, you are nor allowed to trade keys or clues between each other.”
“Naturally, you will need to swear upon it too.”
“You have ten minutes to make a decision before I begin my climb.”
Most of the players’ expression turned ugly at the sound of those vicious conditions.
The fact that they required to swear upon their ancestors made it impossible for them to cheat Felix or pull a fast one!
‘This kid’s intelligence is truly on another level.’ Lady Yggdrasil chortled, ‘No wonder my daughter has fallen for him.’
She understood that the rules had banned using Queen Ai’s contracts in this game to force out infighting and betrayals.
Felix went around it by using the ancestors as his backers to keep the players in check!
It wasn’t like the other players couldn’t think of the same, it was simply too risky to use their ancestors’ names.
“What a cheeky cutie.” Kumiho giggled.
“Cheeky? He is just a disrespectful little shit that needs to be taught a lesson.” Saurous scoffed in irritation.
How could he not get annoyed when his team’s fate was under Felix’s hands?
“I won’t even retort.” Thor rolled his eyes at him and refocused on the newest development.
“Enlighten me.” Felix smiled kindly.
“We don’t need to accept your proposal.” The Magnifier disclosed, “You will be forced to leave the keys behind when you commence your tower climb.”
The moment they heard so, the players’ eyes brightened up in delight.
“He is right. That f*cker can’t take the keys with him!”
“We just need to wait until he loses his patience.”
“Haha! Even if he didn’t enter the tower, we will all be teleported automatically after a few hours.”
Although Siren’s team and Kumiho’s team would have placed a significant distance. Still, it was much better than accepting Felix’s conditions since they would be giving him too much of an advantage.
Unfortunately, their joy didn’t last for long…
“Are you guys taking me for an idiot?” Felix’s eyelids twitched in vexation, “You think I will make such a rookie mistake?”
“What do you mean?” The Magnifier frowned.
“I have hidden the keys around the floor again in the past hour when you guys were mindlessly searching anything you see.” Felix smirked widely, “Trust me, you won’t find those keys for at least an hour or two…You want me to swear on it?”
“…”
“…”
“…”
The players felt their mind shatter at the thought of going out again to search for the keys after already combing the entire floor twice!
They knew that it was impossible for them to have another ago when they were mentally exhausted.
Felix didn’t wait three whole hours before commencing his plan just to ensure that the highest number of clues get collected.
He did so to exhaust them mentally while also waiting for Siren’s team to leave the ground floor.
As long as they were watching, he couldn’t hide the keys again since they would easily find them.
With all variables being dealt?
The players were going to be left with no other option but to accept his conditions…Unless, they wanted to waste their time with another searching attempt while knowing that the other teams were climbing the tower.
“Landlord is really the devil. How can someone be so manipulative?” Micheal gave the players a sympathetic look.
“He is so bad.” Selphie giggled while covering her mouth.
Her kind personality would have found it hard to tolerate such behavior…But, when it came to Felix? She felt that everything he did was right.
“6 minutes left.” Felix stressed casually.
“I accept your conditions.” Timewatcher proclaimed instantly, not bothering to even discuss it with his teammates.
This didn’t sit well with them.
‘F*cking hell captain, we could have waited to see other teams’ decisions.’
‘Be quiet if you know nothing.’ Timewatcher eyed them coldly, ‘We can’t be wasting more time and effort in the ground floor. We need to be at our peak forms to deal with the next floors…Especially, the ancestral floor.’
‘But…’
Before they could retort, he added, ‘His deal isn’t that bad if you think about it. Our clues aren’t that precious to guard at all cost. As for the second condition? We just have to hope that we don’t end up meeting him in one of the ancestral floors.’
‘We have already wasted too much time to bother trading clues or keys.’
Although they weren’t entirely convinced, his teammates understood where he was coming from.
“Smart fella.” Felix praised as he gestured with his finger for Timewatcher to hand him the clues through Queen Ai.
Without hesitation, Timewatcher copied all the clues and sent them to Felix.
‘Good, good, good.’ Felix grin grew wider the more clues he read about the floors.
Although the clues might be vague and somewhat like riddles, each one was specified for a segment of the tower.
‘The lowest number of clues he has is for segment number seven.’ Felix smiled creepily, ‘Good luck dealing with it.’
‘Where is the key?’ Timewatcher frowned, having a bad feeling about Felix’s creepy smile.
‘Underneath the pile of books in front of the fifth bookshelf on the third row.’
‘Sneaky motherf*cker.’ Timewatcher cursed Felix and sprinted towards the location with his teammates.
Only after they heard the location did they understand that Felix truly meant it when he said that it would take them an hour at least to find the keys!
He hid them in a place that was already scourged through countless times by most teams!
Some teams chased after them in hopes of finding the key before them…Alas, the shadowborns weren’t that retarded to let others take advantage of their tradeoff.
After confusing the players with a few fake spots, they managed to find the key in that location.
‘It’s for segment number seven…Motherf*cker!’ Timewatcher cursed hatefully after realizing that the worst scenario had happened.
He already knew that Felix wouldn’t miss such an opportunity to make their climb a hellish experience…He would have done the same too.
Still, it didn’t feel good to be dancing on someone’s palms like this.
‘Let’s go!’ Irritated, Timewatcher went to the staircase with his teammates while glaring at Felix.
“Safe journey.” Felix wished them with a sincere smile.
“F*ck you!” Timewatcher and his teammates flipped him the middle finger angrily as they disappeared through the corridor.
“Who’s next?”
