Chapter 158: 80% Progress

Chapter 158: Chapter 158: 80% Progress

With Leon added, the speed of pathfinding and gathering fragments for Jeremy and Asaro was even faster than before.

By the seventeenth day, the three factions still hadn’t determined the ultimate victor.

With only three days left until the end, the total number of survivors was a mere fifteen.

Chaos Cats: nine people. Order Mice: six people.

Hidden among those two factions were three Star-Reversers whose identities hadn’t been exposed yet, still lurking.

Along with the map gradually closing and shrinking, the fifteen surviving individuals, whether they wanted to or not, were forced to converge on the final area — Star City.

The team of Jeremy, Asaro, and Leon had also gathered all ten elemental fragments over the past few days.

All clues regarding the location to activate the Wheel of Fortune pointed to Star City.

The final battle would definitely be fierce.

Cats would frantically hunt Mice.

The three Star-Reversers, if they didn’t want to be eliminated, had to take down one Cat or one Mouse every day.

Initially, Jeremy wanted to avoid all the survivors, prioritizing groping his way to the Wheel of Fortune’s location and activating it.

But reality wasn’t that smooth.

Spending two days scouting routes in Star City yielded no results.

The places the clues pointed to were all vague riddles, having no significant use.

The countdown clock only had ten hours left. Currently, there were six Cats and four Mice remaining. The Star-Reversers, counting those still hidden, were only two left.

If those two prevented the Mice from activating the Wheel of Fortune, then finished off the remaining living Cats or Mice, they would still win.

And the sole objective for the Cats right now was to clean out the Mice.

It could be said that in the current situation, the Mice were the most dangerous faction.

The giant clock hovering in the sky of Star City chimed a crisp bell sound again.

The Vice President’s voice rang out: [The Cat and Mouse match only has three hours left before ending. Please arrange your time reasonably, everyone~]

The announcement ending, the three dumped all their remaining points into the clue regarding the Wheel of Fortune. But ultimately, it only pointed out a rough area.

Exactly the most densely populated central area of this city.

If time runs out and the Wheel of Fortune hasn’t been activated, the Order Mouse faction loses.

If there are still surviving Mice, then the Star-Reversers and Chaos Cats will use the number of surviving individuals to determine victory.

Looking at the situation, no matter how you slice it, the loss rate for the Mice was higher than the other two factions.

After the last Mouse aside from the three of them was eliminated, the group decided to split up.

Leon volunteered to act as bait, drawing the attention of the remaining individuals elsewhere. Jeremy and Asaro continued scouring the central area.

Another hour passed. The notification of Leon’s elimination rang out.

Less than ten minutes later, the sound of footsteps echoed from afar, drawing closer by the second.

Currently, aside from Asaro and him, the Order Mouse faction had no one else left.

He originally thought he didn’t care much about winning or losing, but under the urgent notification sounds, Jeremy also felt tense.

"..."

"Is there no one guarding over there?"

"Let’s go take a look."

The conversation accompanied the footsteps, becoming clearer.

Just as Jeremy prepared to engage in battle, Asaro — who still hadn’t found a clue — returned.

Catching his movement, Asaro cast a glance at the three individuals approaching from behind. The scythe appeared in her hand:

"I’ll go handle them. You keep looking."

The sentence was decisive. Before the voice completely faded, the person had already vanished on the spot.

Asaro’s strength Jeremy knew perfectly well. Perhaps thanks to that trust, the desire for victory within him at this moment deepened a notch.

Seeing Asaro had intercepted the three cats, Jeremy didn’t linger, immediately spreading his wings and flying towards the final area to scout.

Only forty minutes left.

The Order Mouse faction only had Asaro and Jeremy left.

The Chaos Cat faction had four people left.

Neither Asaro nor Jeremy were Star-Reversers.

Meaning among the four surviving cats, there were still two Star-Reversers hiding.

Jeremy scoured while using magic to probe the surrounding situation.

One of those cats hadn’t revealed themselves. Among the three tangling with Asaro was an old acquaintance — Raphael, Intermediate Stage Five-Star. The remaining two were both Intermediate Stage Four-Star.

Even though Asaro was strong, fighting one-on-three made it hard to avoid being suppressed.

Losing was only a matter of time.

"..."

Jeremy took a deep breath, his gaze rapidly sweeping everywhere.

Finally... he locked onto the location with the highest probability of containing the Wheel of Fortune.

A very inconspicuous place: inside the dial of the giant magic clock that no one had bothered to pay attention to before.

The clock glowed all over, so massive that a third of its body was completely hidden in the clouds.

Looking very closely, one could see: every time the second hand rotated half a circle, the minute hand at the center would disappear for about a second.

And during that extremely short duration, on the clock face emerged magic patterns so faint that without using magic power, it was impossible to notice.

A few seconds later, those patterns transformed into ethereal water ripples. Right at this moment, light would pierce through the cloud layer, shining straight onto the gemstone at the core of the clock.

The brilliant gemstone inlaid at the center became ethereal in that instant, exactly like a mirage.

The shape of its inlay groove and the shape of the ten elemental fragments pieced together were almost no different.

Assuming every hand, every pattern, even this entire clock was the base plate of the Wheel of Fortune, then the thing that truly activated its core must be the multi-colored magic stone synthesized from the ten fragments.

Having caught that point, Jeremy instantly spread his wings and flew straight up.

Having been labeled with the word "giant", the clock’s self-proclaimed volume was not small.

Even bigger than three adult mammoths combined.

Standing in front of it, Jeremy was pitifully small.

Just upon getting close, he could feel the powerful magical fluctuation. The sound of the gears turning was also distinctly clear.

All those things, when standing on the ground, could not be perceived.

This further solidified Jeremy’s certainty: this magic clock was exactly the Wheel of Fortune in the rules.

Flying straight to the central core, he reached out, releasing threads of magic power to probe towards the gemstone.

His fingertips passed straight through it, touching the freezing cold clock face.

...It really was an illusion.

A violent gust of wind struck. Jeremy raised an arm to block.

Just as he was about to place the multi-colored magic stone into the core, a faint but unignorable scent suddenly drifted over.

"..."

A name surfaced in his head. But his hand didn’t stop. The stone was pressed perfectly into the groove.

A crisp "click" sounded. It fit.

Right at that exact moment, the previously unremarkable clock abruptly flared with a blinding light.

The dial tilted, crashing down exactly in Jeremy’s direction.

The speed was incredibly fast. Just as Jeremy was about to dodge, the sound of tearing wind rang out. A long chain, its sharp tip retracted and tightly wrapped in magic power, coiled around his waist.

Then it yanked backward forcefully, forcibly pulling him out of the crushing range of the collapsing clock mass.

The chain retracted. Jeremy looked up at the Chaos Cat in front of him.

...More accurately, Cat No. 9 — Lucius.

The moment he stepped close to the clock, Jeremy had read his intention. He slipped his body to block the way, the icy purple tip of the scythe pointed straight at the opponent.

"Although I’m very grateful, I can’t let you pass."