326 Maze Run - Start

In the seating area.

"What the hell? I… I thought it was going to be a normal Maze run. Dear Lord, look at the size of it," Luo Mei exclaimed.

"It certainly is … unique. I hope little Ma and the rest, as well as Yu Ming, will be fine in this," Wen Cheng said. Even Du Yuhan at the side was a little surprised.

Fan Ruogang stood up from her seat. "Sect Leader, what the hell is that? That wasn't what it looked like last time. It was just a simple maze back then. What is going on?" she asked.

"I don't know, Fanfan. It seemed the boredom of last year's Maze run forced them to make this one more… interesting," Ma Rong said.

"Master, is Yu Ming going to be alright? That looks a little dangerous," Zhou Mei said to her masters.

The Third Elder pat her back and said, "I'm sure he will be okay. Look, the staff is already flying above the Maze. They are ready to save the participants when they need it," she said.

Ma Rong looked at the maze once more and got a little worried. This was not what she had expected when she sent him there.

*******

"Oh, This is interesting," Emperor Zexian said when he saw the Maze finally show itself from the barrier. "It wasn't like this last time, was it?" he asked.

"I don't think so. I remember being very bored last year during this maze run and couldn't help but want the battles to begin," the Empress said.

"It's actually all second brother's idea for them to change it. He remembered how boring it was too," the princess said.

"I did… but, not even I could've expected them to make this many changes," the second prince said.

"Oh look, the first batch of 10 went in. This is going to be a little more interesting for sure," The Empress said with a curious smile.

* * * * *

"30 seconds later. The next group will leave. Number 11 to 20, please come forward," Fu Zhen called the next group forward.

'30 seconds per 10 people. So me at 124… that's 6 minutes later. I will start 6 minutes later than the rest. I hope that doesn't make that much of a difference,' Alex thought.

More and more participants of the Maze run went in, and finally, after over 5 minutes, Alex walked forward when his name was called.

Fu Zhen waited for the 30 seconds to pass and said, "Go."

Alex immediately walked through the 4th of the 10 openings in the maze that belonged to him. He was now inside narrow walls of tall plants. He took the path straight ahead and walked.

At the same time, he started thinking.

'Remember what are the rules. What am I not allowed to do?' he thought.

'I can't attack another player. I can't touch the talisman of another player without this red talisman. I can't obstruct another player's path, and finally… I cannot stop moving,' Alex thought and kept on walking.

When he came upon a fork in the road, he had no idea where he was supposed to go. "Screw it," he thought and walked straight ahead.

After a minute or so, he came across a dead end. This was not the correct path.

"F*ck"

He turned around and walked back to the intersection once more. However, this time, there was a woman there contemplating where to move.

When she saw Alex walking towards him, she suddenly took out a bow and arrow and aimed at Alex. Alex could tell that the woman was at least in the Meridian tempering realm, thus he was not her match.

"You will get disqualified if you attack me. Why don't you choose a path a go first? I won't stop you," Alex said. He slowly started circling around the woman.

The woman was frightened even more as she couldn't see Alex's cultivation base and kept the bow and arrow at him at all times.

"You— You just want to get behind me and steal my talisman, don't you? You think I'm stupid. Why don't you go first?" she said.

"I'm afraid I can't do that. You will steal my talisman," Alex said. "I guess we are both in the same dilemma then."

Alex was desperately trying to come up with things to say. "First of all, please just put the bow down. You know obstructing me from leaving this place will get you disqualified, right?" he asked.

"I'm not obstructing you at all. You can leave if you want," the girls said. "Besides, you keep telling me to drop my bow, yet you still hold your sword. You're quite a hypocrite, aren't you?

Alex slowly looked at the sword on his right hand and sighed. "You are right," he said before throwing away his sword.  "Happy?" he asked.

The girl finally accepted that he wasn't after her and decided to lower the bow for now. Just then, Alex walked forward and grabbed his sword once again.

The girl immediately pulled her bow back and targeted him as she asked, "What are you doing?"

Alex simply looked at her and smiled, "Time's up."

"What?" the woman didn't understand what he meant when suddenly, she felt her body lift without her volition. She looked up to see that the staff was pulling her out of the maze field.

"You are disqualified for not moving for a minute."

Alex immediately started walking down the path once more. He didn't want to be the next one disqualified. He walked on and found another intersection.

This time, however, he seemed to have chosen the right path as he didn't encounter any dead ends.

However, he did encounter it next. Free, dead-end, dead-end, free.

After walking on for nearly 10 minutes, he finally came across a long stretch of thin walls that seemed to lead… outside.

"That can't be true. It's too soon," Alex thought.

Still, he had to try, so Alex took a step forward. Suddenly, something grabbed his foot.