"This is Captain Sabazushi. He is strictly responsible for all security matters both inside and outside the castle. I have already handed over the formal procedures to his team. After twenty-four hours have passed, their current employment agreement will be terminated. If you are willing, you can absolutely continue to renew the contract with them on your own terms. I highly recognize the ability of Captain Sabazushi. The hired mercenary team he leads is of truly excellent quality. Because of them, this castle has never once been invaded by outsiders in all these years..."
In the grand, dimly lit corridor of the old stone castle—a setting that perfectly captured the chilling atmosphere of a classic horror movie—Battera walked ahead to lead the way, formally introducing Liam and the others to their new surroundings.
Very strong. There is no doubt he is a Nen master. Walking near the back of the group, Tsezguerra only used his peripheral vision to carefully observe the short man. The captain wore a dark, tactical mercenary uniform, a neat mustache, and a tilted beret on his head.
The short man, in turn, was also quietly observing the eclectic group Battera had brought inside. He immediately recognized Tsezguerra as a famous, seasoned Bounty Hunter. He was indeed very skilled. However, the young man and the woman gave the captain an intensely dangerous feeling. His sharp eyes shifted to the massive, terrifying tiger named Lumos walking dutifully behind Liam, and then to Bisky, who was casually strolling next to him. However, this little girl—who looked completely ordinary in her frilly pink dress—had actually followed them deep into the restricted castle. Could she be a relative of Battera? Or perhaps the kid of the dangerous man and woman?
Soon, Battera led everyone down a winding stone staircase into the most secret, heavily fortified underground depths of the castle. They arrived at a spacious, cavernous cellar that had been simply but expensively modified.
The not-so-bright overhead lights flickered on with a quiet buzz. What came into view in the center of the cellar were three long, perfectly aligned rows of heavy tables. Resting on each long table were exactly thirty large, boxy monitors. Positioned neatly in front of each monitor was an ordinary-looking piece of hardware. It looked remarkably retro.
"This is the JoyStation console that I have been desperately searching for over the past several years..." Battera stood near the door, looking out over the silent room. He sighed, his tone heavy and complicated.
The revived girlfriend standing next to him reached out, holding his arm tightly for support. Battera smiled weakly, patting her hand gently before intertwining his fingers with hers.
Bisky leaned against the stone wall and smiled knowingly. "You spent so much immense effort and money gathering these, and it was not just to save the life of your girlfriend, right?"
Battera looked down, speaking frankly. "No, it was not. I originally started collecting copies of this extremely rare game because I heard a rumor. I heard there is a so-called item inside called the Breath of Archangel, a magical card that can flawlessly cure all diseases and pains. However, after I successfully obtained my first few game consoles, I hired a few people to test it. After going in and experiencing the reality of it myself, I learned that there is another magical medicine hidden inside that game—one that can completely restore a person's youth..."
At this point, the old billionaire shook his head with a bitter, self-deprecating wry smile. "I will not say any more on the subject. The latter was just my own foolish greed speaking." He turned to look at the young woman beside him, his eyes softening with profound tenderness. "As long as you can finally wake up and stand beside me, what else could possibly matter?"
The young woman was clearly very moved by his confession, her eyes shining with unshed tears.
But Shizuku completely ruined the romantic atmosphere, speaking up from the side in her usual flat, detached tone. "You will still die much earlier than her."
Looking at her blank expression, there was absolutely nothing intentionally sarcastic or cruel about her statement. She sounded exactly as if she was just kindly helping to clarify a basic mathematical fact. Or perhaps she just wanted to genuinely explore her own logical doubts: Battera clearly seems to know this fact. Does this woman know it?
The woman did, in fact, know this. Hearing the blunt statement, she smiled, a little bitterly at first, but mostly with a sense of profound relief. She reached up and gently stroked the wrinkled cheek of Battera.
"Battera has always deeply regretted the vast age gap between us. But why don't I? For a long time, I was also unwilling to accept the cruelty of it. I would ask myself: Why was I born so late? Why couldn't you wait for me? You are already old and fading before I have even lived. It really felt far too cruel," she murmured, her voice steady. "But since the day I finally decided to accept the pursuit of Battera, I stopped caring about the numbers anymore. A human life is not very long to begin with. How many perfect years do we really need to truly fall in love? As long as we have deeply loved each other, and as long as I have experienced this kind of true love, I will never feel truly lonely again."
Perhaps because she had just miraculously survived a catastrophic tragedy and come back to life, this young girl—whose name Liam still had not bothered to learn—seemed terrified that something completely unexpected would happen the very next second. She ignored everyone else in the room, passionately and directly confiding the absolute depths of her heart to Battera.
Poor Battera. He was already a fragile old man. Hearing such a pure, profound confession broke his heart completely. His eyes turned red, and fresh tears streamed freely down his weathered face. He held the hand of the woman tightly, pressing his lips to her knuckles, completely unable to say a single word through his choked sobs.
But Liam quickly shattered the moment, his voice loud and intentionally rude. "Do you finish? There will be plenty of time to sit around and talk about love later. Let's finish introducing these things first."
He raised his hand, pointing lazily at the massive pile of expensive game consoles sitting in the underground cellar in front of him.
Startled back to reality, Battera hurriedly wiped his tears with the sleeve of his suit. He steeled himself, clearing his throat before meticulously detailing everything he knew about the legendary game, Greed Island. This included all the highly relevant safety precautions and the complex mechanics for actually using the game console, and he shared it all without a single reservation.
After all, he had officially handed over the ownership of all thirty game consoles and this entire ancient castle to Liam. It was entirely up to Liam to decide whether he wanted to keep them for himself or sell them off for a staggering profit.
Liam listened closely, nodding along to the explanation.
The JoyStation console was split into two primary slots: Player 1 and Player 2. But instead of plugging in a standard controller, the user had to insert the specific game memory card. After the memory card was securely inserted, the user had to place both hands near the console and release their aura toward the machine. The sheer force of the Nen would trigger the system, and the user would be physically digitized and brought directly into the world of the game. It was the exact same mysterious island where Liam, Shizuku, Pariston, and Kortopi had drifted to all those years ago.
So, generally speaking, each individual Greed Island game machine could only be used by two players at a time. However, since the Player 1 and Player 2 slots could technically be connected to a specialized 4-slot splitter accessory, the theoretical maximum number of players per machine could actually be expanded up to eight.
Out of the thirty game consoles currently sitting in the cellar of Battera, exactly nine of them had their Player 1 and Player 2 slots occupied, and each only had a single memory card inserted directly into the console. This was the costly, foolish mistake Battera had made when he first started collecting the game consoles and acting as an amateur manager. He had wasted a staggering amount of money. He had not realized you could easily use a simple splitter to create extra entry slots out of thin air.
In other words, those nine highly valuable game consoles were currently occupied by eighteen players. And the strict rule of the game was absolute: before those specific players actively chose to exit the game, their memory cards absolutely could not be pulled out of the console. Let alone destroyed. If someone on the outside tried, they could only sit there and stare at the locked machine.
Battera explained that this happened simply because he did not know anything about the mechanics at the time. He had absolutely no idea how incredibly amateur the first batch of amateur Hunters he hired actually were. Those foolish people did not even think of using a cheap splitter for him to maximize his investment! How amateurish could they possibly be?
After those initial eighteen people entered the game, it was as if they had completely vanished off the face of the earth. They never came back out. But Battera knew they were definitely not dead. Because the absolute rule of the system dictated that if a player actually died inside the game, their physical body would be forcefully sent back to the real world, manifesting right in front of the console. This would conveniently free up a card slot and save the owner a lot of trouble.
Just die already, you bastards, Liam thought to himself, a dark idea forming in his mind.
There was absolutely no time limit for completing the game. Some weak players with no real combat or survival skills quickly realized they had absolutely no hope of ever completing the brutal challenges. Some of them even married the native NPCs, had children, and settled down inside the game. They were perfectly determined to hide away safely in the starting towns of Greed Island and simply live out the rest of their natural lives.
In addition to those heavily locked nine units, there were several other game consoles that had a memory card inserted directly on one side, and a splitter attached on the other. Several other game consoles used splitters on both sides, maximizing their capacity. In short, a massive chunk of the game consoles in the room were currently occupied by players. But because of the early mistakes, they did not reach their theoretical maximum utilization. Many valuable slots were completely wasted.
For the rest of the collection, there were exactly eight completely innocent, untouched game consoles remaining, simply because Battera had not managed to hire a suitable, highly skilled Hunter yet.
"If those players do not choose to quit voluntarily, or if they are not killed in the game, there is absolutely nothing anyone on the outside can do to free the consoles," Battera apologized to Liam, bowing his head slightly. "Of course, even if the JoyStation console is locked and occupied like this, if you put it up for public auction, you can still easily auction it off for an incredibly high price. If you do not mind the hassle and the trouble, I can gladly use my connections to help you sell these occupied game consoles..."
Liam rubbed his chin, thinking about it for a moment. "If they all suddenly decided to quit, the market price of an empty, fully usable game console would definitely be much higher, right?"
"Of course," Battera confirmed with a nod.
"That is good to hear. Then just keep them all here with me for now. When the time is right, I will ask you to help me sell them. How about that?"
"Yes, yes, of course, but..."
Liam smiled slightly, a glint in his eye. "Do not worry about it. They will all quit on their own soon enough."
Battera nodded slowly, deciding it was best to say no more on the subject.
Standing quietly near the back, Tsezguerra was visibly moved as he listened to the detailed explanation. He stepped forward and pointed eagerly at one of the occupied game consoles. "Do you need any help testing them?" he asked.
Liam curled his lips into a knowing smirk. "You just really want to go in and play it yourself, right?"
He waved his hand dismissively. It was already an occupied, locked machine anyway. "Whatever. If you are that willing to go in and have a look around, then please, be my guest."
Tsezguerra was not going to be polite about it. He immediately walked over to a storage cabinet and grabbed a blank game memory card. He quickly scanned the room and found a machine with Player 1 (1/1) and Player 2 (3/4) currently occupied. He carefully inserted his blank memory card into the empty slot on the splitter. Then, strictly following the instructions Battera had just provided, he raised both hands and gathered a dense layer of aura around his palms. He approached the dark screen of the game console.
The moment his aura made contact, his entire physical body immediately turned into a swirling ball of glowing aura and disappeared completely out of thin air.
"Squawk!"
Sitting comfortably on top of the massive head of the tiger, Jaku let out a startled cry, its feathers puffing up. What was that sudden movement? Where did that big, hairless bird just go?
Having overseen the process countless times, Battera was already completely used to the sight. Seeing that his business was concluded, he turned and was just about to leave when he was suddenly stopped by Liam.
"Can we find a more suitable, private place to talk?" Liam asked, pointing a thumb toward the heavy wooden door outside the cellar.
The mercenary captain, Sabazushi, was a very discerning and intelligent man. He immediately recognized the dismissal, offered a crisp salute, and quickly left the room.
The underground cellar became completely quiet. After the game of Greed Island was fully running, the console did not actually require a traditional electrical power source to maintain the connection. Naturally, there was no mechanical buzzing sound or fan noise. The room was perfectly, eerily clean and silent.
Is there a problem? Battera looked back at Liam, his wrinkled face filled with deep confusion.
Liam casually flicked his fingers. A tiny, concentrated wisp of aura flowed out smoothly from his fingertips. As it traveled through the air, it perfectly transformed into the shape of a shimmering, translucent bubble. A thick piece of glowing red liquid rapidly materialized inside the sphere. Before it even reached its target, the liquid twisted and formed on its own into the sharp shape of a five-pointed star.
The flying star bubble drew a smooth, flawless parabola through the cold air. It landed accurately and silently squarely on the forehead of the completely puzzled Battera, sinking into his skin and leaving behind a faint, rose-gold Star Mark.
Although Battera generally knew about the existence of Nen, he was ultimately a Muggle. He had no inner eyesight and could not perceive aura. Naturally, he had absolutely no idea what Liam was doing or what had just hit him.
But he realized it the very next second.
Liam snapped his fingers with a sharp crack. Battera suddenly felt as if his own eyes were aggressively transitioning like a scene cut from a movie. A short, disorienting black screen flashed across his vision.
When his vision cleared and he looked back at Liam, Shizuku, and Bisky, he gasped. He clearly saw that the three of them were all entirely shrouded in a thick, flowing, bubble-like white light. Even the massive tiger and the little gray bird perched on its head were glowing.
"It really is such a profound pity for such a beautiful, young girl to faithfully follow such a broken, old man like you!" Liam said, his voice dropping into a serious, intense register.
"Let me see the true purity of your so-called true love. If your deep, lingering obsession with youth, aging, and time is truly strong enough, you just might be able to develop some very interesting Nen abilities..."