Forty-nine rules of the end times

Does the Chapter 82 Challenge also have hidden rules?
After Guan Tong was sucked into the burning black hole, everything went black before his eyes, and his body seemed to be suspended in mid-air.

After seven or eight seconds, his vision returned. Guan Tong was surprised to find himself floating high in the sky, below which was a giant island that looked full of life.

At the same time, he also noticed that there were many other figures floating in the air like him, who were probably other contestants who had ascended to higher realms.

Looking around, everyone's body was shrouded in a layer of gray mist, making it impossible to see their faces or figures.

However, there were very few people standing alone like Guan Tong; most of the others were standing in groups of three or five, clearly teammates.

This is the venue for the first Ascended Challenge, the Holy Grail Island.

The voice of the fire-stealer then resounded in the minds of every contestant.

The challenge rules are as follows:

All Ascended will have their appearance blurred and will be randomly placed somewhere on the island to compete in battles as teams.

For each opponent defeated, the winner gains 1 point and takes all points already earned by the defeated opponent. Defeated Ascendants do not die, but are immediately eliminated.

During the competition, all participants will receive a [Temporary Backpack], which can be used to store randomly spawning items on the island. Using these items wisely will significantly increase your survival rate.

The competition lasts for 24 hours, during which the island's safe zone will shrink every 2 hours. Ascendants outside the safe zone will be eliminated.

24 hours later, all surviving teams will be ranked according to their total points. The team with the highest total score will receive first prize. The second and third ranked teams will receive second and third prizes, respectively. Teams ranked fourth through tenth will receive fourth prize. Teams outside the top ten will not receive any awards.

You now have five minutes to prepare. The random distribution will begin in five minutes.

After hearing the rules, Guan Tong immediately understood that this challenge was a pure team competition.

Eliminating a member of another team earns you 1 point, plus the opponent's accumulated points. After 24 hours, all surviving teams are ranked by their total points.

"From this perspective, my one-man team is at a disadvantage."

Since the final ranking is based on the team's total score, Guan Tong would need to achieve a higher ranking by earning more points on her own than all other teams with a full complement of five players.

This is undoubtedly very challenging.

As Guan Tong pondered, a thought suddenly struck her.

The Fire Stealer just explained the rules of the competition... I wonder if there are any hidden rules in this challenge?

He tried opening the terminal and selecting to view the challenge rules.

After staring intently for a moment, the rules actually changed!

Guan Tong's breathing quickened slightly as he carefully observed the newly revealed hidden rules.

[Hidden Rule: The Mystery of the Holy Grail]

[Hidden Rule: Legend has it that a Holy Grail is hidden within the Holy Grail Realm on Grail Island. The team that finds and obtains it will receive an extraordinary and generous reward.]

[Note: Once the Holy Grail is acquired by a team and held for 30 consecutive minutes, ownership of the Holy Grail will be fixed with the holding team, at which point the challenge will immediately end.]

Holy Grail!

After reading the hidden rules, Guan Tong's breathing became even more rapid.

Undoubtedly, the "extraordinarily generous reward" was extremely attractive to him.

Moreover, this hidden rule might be visible only to him, giving him a huge advantage over other teams.

We must find the Holy Grail!
Guan Tong made up his mind; this was an extremely rare opportunity for him, and he absolutely could not let it slip by.

[Time's up, launch begins]

The moment the Fire Thief's voice fell, countless figures plummeted from the sky!
Countless ascendants were randomly placed throughout the island, which was of unknown size and could accommodate contestants from all over the world.

After Guan Tong landed, five other people landed not far from him.

The two sides were less than ten meters apart when Guan Tong spotted them, and they spotted Guan Tong as well.

Because their features were blurred, it was impossible to tell what the other teams looked like. However, the joy displayed in their indistinct expressions was something they couldn't hide.

One of them exclaimed excitedly, "What great luck! We just landed and ran into a lone guy!"

Without saying a word, Guan Tong raised the Silver Hunter and fired a No. 3 high-explosive ricochet.

Since this is a competitive challenge, he naturally won't hesitate to show mercy.

"boom!"

[Points +5]

Guan Tong: "..."

He was momentarily stunned, never expecting that the entire five-man squad would be wiped out by his single No. 3 bullet.

"Looks like I'm the lucky one... I ran into a weak team right away."

That being said, Guan Tong also knew that there weren't many Ascended Beings who could withstand a single No. 3 bullet head-on at this stage. In fact, let alone the No. 3 bullet, even the No. 2 slug bullet and the No. 1 shotgun shell were not so easy to defend against.

After dealing with the five people, he immediately surveyed the surrounding environment.

He was randomly dropped onto a hillside with the sea behind him, which seemed to be on the edge of an island.

This means he needs to move inland as soon as possible, because the safe zone shrinks every two hours, and he doesn't want to be eliminated because of it.

However, the specific direction to go cannot be chosen arbitrarily.

"I need to determine the location of the Holy Grail first."

Searching for the Holy Grail on such a huge island without any clues is like looking for a needle in a haystack.

Guan Tong thought there might be a clue somewhere on the island, but after thinking about it, he first found a hidden spot to hide and then took out an item from the storage box.

It was the [Guiding Flashlight] that he found in the survival chest he received as a reward after the fourth rule.

"I don't know if it will work..."

Guan Tong selected to use the item, but the message indicated that the use had failed. She needed to mentally recall the target location first.

He vaguely remembered that the hidden rules seemed to mention location information. He opened the terminal to check again, and sure enough, the rules said that the Holy Grail was in the "Holy Grail Secret Realm" on the island.

"Lead the way to the 'Holy Grail Realm'," Guan Tong silently recited, attempting to use the item again. *Click!*
The flashlight shone, casting a dazzling yellow beam that spread across the ground like a road sign, guiding the way to the "Holy Grail Realm".

It worked!
Guan Tong was overjoyed. He had originally thought that "Holy Grail Secret Realm" might not be considered a place name and might be judged as a failure, but he did not expect it to be a success.

Looking at the bright yellow light on the ground, he immediately had a clear goal: as long as he followed it, he could find the location of the Holy Grail's secret realm and find the Holy Grail!

Guan Tong set off immediately.

If he could, he would love to run there in one go, or even use the grappling hook to speed up his movement—but doing so would undoubtedly be too dangerous.

The island is now teeming with Ascended Ones, who are enemies of one another. One must proceed with caution and be wary of traps.

Guan Tong took out the Corpse Whistle on a whistle, and after consuming 20 points of mental energy to blow it gently, three undead with faint red eyes immediately crawled out of the ground.

"You go in front, you go to the left, you go to the right."

Guan Tong ordered the three undead to spread out around him. This way, he would be in the middle and could have some buffer in case of a sudden crisis.

Upon receiving the order, the three undead immediately surrounded Guan Tong and moved forward with him.

Before they had gone far, Guan Tong noticed something amiss not far ahead. He immediately ordered the three undead to lie down and hide with him, observing from the shadows.

A wooden house stood not far away, and a group of more than a dozen Ascended Beings were engaged in a fierce battle around it!
"Team One, Team Two, Team Three..."

Based on their positioning, Guan Tong deduced that there were three teams in total. The fighting among these three teams was completely disorganized, a simple case of each team attacking its own area.

Soon, people began to be defeated and eliminated, with one team collapsing and being wiped out first.

Of the remaining two teams, one was mostly armed with melee weapons and fought fiercely. The other team was no match for them and was quickly reduced to only two men. Seeing that they were outmatched, the two men looked at each other and turned to flee at the same time. The team with melee weapons refused to let them go and gave chase.

The two teams quickly ran far away. Just as Guan Tong was about to come out, three people were a step ahead of him, sneaking out from the other side of the hillside and heading towards the wooden house.

It turns out I wasn't the only one secretly observing...

Guan Tong glanced at the three-person team, gave an order, and the three undead immediately went over.

The three men, thinking they were alone, lowered their guard. But just as they were about to enter the cabin, three figures pounced on them!

"careful!"

One person shouted a reminder, and a sandbag appeared out of thin air in his hand, which he hurled with force.

The sandbag seemed to be a tool of his mental power, enlarging in mid-air to the size of a basketball, and then slamming a living dead person to the ground with a "thud".

The other two also took out their items to fight back, but they were both taken aback when they saw the red light emanating from the attacker's eyes.

"Not Ascended Ones! These are... the living dead?"

"What the hell? Why are there living dead from the Fifth Rule on this island?!"

Just as the three were wondering what was going on, two gunshots rang out from behind them.

Before they could even turn around to check, they felt a sharp pain, then lost consciousness and were eliminated.

[Points +3]

Guan Tong lowered the muzzle of his silver shotgun and used two No. 1 shotgun shells to take down three people from behind.

"I didn't expect that using the undead as bait to attract the enemy's attention would be such a good tactic."

Guan Tong thought for a moment, then slipped into the wooden house.

The first floor of the house was empty. He went up the stairs to the second floor and found a gray box in the corner.

"This must be the item box that the Fire Stealers mentioned in the rules, which will randomly spawn on the island."

Guan Tong wasn't sure and was worried it might be a trap, so he asked one of the living dead to open the box, but they couldn't open it.

Guan Tong stepped forward and immediately saw a notification when her palm touched the box.

Opening a map supply crate requires either one key or one multi-functional lockpick.

"So that's what the multi-functional lock picks sold in stores are used for," Guan Tong thought to herself. "As for the keys, I guess we'll have to collect them on the island."

He doesn't have a key now, but there are 6 lockpicks in the storage box. He's not going to hesitate to use one to open the box and get the items inside.

[Jackal]: Interferes with enemy drone scanning for 3 minutes after use. One-time use item.

Guan Tong saw the prop's effect and felt it was pretty good, so she put it into her "temporary backpack" and then quickly left the cabin.

He figured it out: the probability of randomly spawning item boxes inside such buildings should be higher than in the wild, which is why the Ascended Fighters fight around them.

Two minutes after Guan Tong withdrew, the team that had previously pursued them returned. They were stunned when they entered the wooden house and saw the open boxes on the second floor.

"Holy crap, someone stole the props!"

"I'm so angry! We finally managed to wipe out two teams!"

"We've gotten so caught up in chasing them, someone should have come in first and opened the box!"

"Chase them!" one of them shouted angrily. "The chicken thieves can't have gone far. Catch them and kill them!"

"go!"

The group, filled with resentment, ran out and chased after the enemy towards the center of the island. However, Guan Tong was following the route indicated by the [Guiding Flashlight].

The route didn't go to the center of the island, but rather to the west of the center.

Guan Tong followed the guidance and walked for a while. He encountered Ascended beings in battle along the way, but unless they were right in front of him, he tried his best not to get involved.

For him, it was better to find the Holy Grail as soon as possible than to fight with other contestants for points; that was the real grand prize!
But he soon discovered that reaching the Holy Grail's secret realm was not so easy.

The route leads to a small town with rows of houses, and following the route means passing through it. Taking a detour would waste too much extra time.

"There must be many ascendants in a place like this. With more houses and props, the competition must be extremely fierce..."

Guan Tong checked the time; there were still about forty minutes until the safe zone shrank for the first time. Since she didn't know how much it would shrink at once, if she took a detour laterally, she might run out of time and get stuck outside the safe zone, ruining everything.

Therefore, he had no other choice but to pass through the town!

(End of this chapter)