The Rise of the Winter Wolf - Book 3 - Chapter 58 - Quiz Time!

                                                                                      Wolf

‘This really is a cool looking door…’ I think as I trail the door’s frame with my fingers. The door has the usual line going across it, just like the other doors, but it also has several other details that aren’t on the others. Such as a black and red coloring to the door, a strange engraving of some sort of tower with a crescent symbol on it, and a much larger frame than the other doors.

This isn’t actually the first time I’ve seen a mini boss door for the floor, but it is the first time I’ve seen this one. And considering that my level is high enough that the mini boss shouldn’t be a problem for me, it’s a good enough time as any to challenge the mini boss.

The only reason I didn’t do so the last time I saw a door to one of their rooms was that it hadn’t been very long since I had entered the floor, so I wanted to see more of it before moving on. It wasn’t until afterwards that I found out that I can’t really backtrack on this theme. Not further than the last room that is.

Which kind of sucks. And leaves my dungeon and System maps null and void for this theme.

Putting all of that aside for the moment, I stop touching the door frame to instead reach out and touch the crescent moon symbol on the door.

As soon as my fingers make contact with it, the door immediately splits open, revealing a large – and rather unique looking – room on the other side. The room has some sort of endless void of darkness running through the majority of the room, with two long and seemingly electrified cables running from one side of it to the other. The two cables have little markers every few meters, with red electricity sparking at each marker, along with a small, three by three meter platform at the very start of the cables, near my current position.

Well, this is certainly a change of pace…

It’s not just the layout that’s interesting, but the strange panel stationed on the platform in the form of a podium with a screen, along with a green button with a circle, and a red button with an x taking up half of the screen each.

And that’s not even including the large… thing? The large thing at the end of the room, near a door that I’m assuming will lead to the exit.

Before I identify the thing, I walk up to the edge of the floor just so that I can peer down the edge of the pit. After a few seconds of looking, I raise my head again to look up at the cables, then at the other end of the room again.

I wonder if I can just…

Deciding to just go ahead and try it, I manipulate my ice element to leave my body and begin building a bridge. However, right as my ice element attempts to go over the pit, it stops as if it had hit a wall.

“The hell?” I mutter before reaching my arm over the pit. It isn’t until I do this that I feel some sort of energy flowing over my arm. What’s more is that the energy feels… strange. Almost sentient even.

It also feels dangerous, despite the fact that it isn’t doing anything to me, so I retract my arm as quickly as possible.

I raise my head again to look around the room, first at the blinking red lights throughout the long room, then at the thing at the end of it before identifying the thing.

                                              _-| Unnamed – LXRv01 Anchor – Level 566 |-_

Anchor? What sort of a name is that?

The creature is in the form of some sort of high-tech totem, with a bright red screen on the top of it, along with three small red circles around the screen.

What is even more confusing is how the creature isn’t doing anything at all. Outside of sitting there staring at me, that is.

Although I’m not even sure if it can move in the first place, considering how it looks like a structural part of the room itself…

I look around the room one last time before stepping up to the platform with the strange panel.

The instant my feet touch the platform, beeping and other sounds of the like begin running throughout the room, followed by the faint red lighting turning darker and darker until it suddenly turns off completely. After that, another light – a white one this time – replaces it. However, instead of filling the entire room, this light is only shining on the track made up of the two wires.

This room…

I suddenly jerk in surprise as a cold and mechanical voice begins speaking seemingly from out of nowhere.

“Welcome to the System Game Show. Here you will be asked questions about the System and its history.”

Uh, okay. That was probably something I should have expected, considering the panel in front of me, but still…

“Here is your first question.”

Wait, what? No time to get ready?

“How many years has the System been in existence? Select green if you believe it has been less than 5000 years, and red if it has been greater than 5000 years.”

I stare at the panel before looking up and squinting at the anchor creature seemingly staring at me from the opposite side of the track.

How the hell am I supposed to know-

“You have fifteen seconds to answer the question.”

Okay, what the fuck is with this game show? That’s not enough time for me to look it up on the forums!

Although I get the feeling that that’s the point of the time limit, but still!

I look between the green and red buttons as the robotic voice continues to count down before eventually just guessing and pressing the red button on the panel.

The System seems too sophisticated for it to be less-

My thoughts are interrupted as the lights within the room turn red and some sort of red energy begins to build at the top of the anchor. Soon after that, three beams of that red energy burst out of the top of the creature before shooting directly towards me.

“What the hell!!!” I shout whilst almost instinctively creating a wall of ice in front of me, still on the platform so as to not have it make contact with the energy floating around outside of the platform. The energy then strikes directly at my wall of ice, causing a powerful force to explode from both sides of the ice wall towards the room’s wall, followed by the beams themselves.

I openly gape at the beams until they finally end, leaving the air that they had previously passed through completely hazy, with little bits of smoke here and there.

After a few seconds of staring at the ice wall in front of me, I turn my attention towards the anchor at the other side of the room, only to see a green light replace the red one at the top of its body before the light returns to red again. At the same time, the platform I am standing on begins to slowly move towards the next mark on the cables.

Once the platform stops moving, the robotic voice returns.

“Answer was chosen by the Competitor. Competitor chose the incorrect answer. Punishment was dealt out to the Competitor. Moving on to the next question.”

Are you kidding me?

I’m not sure which I should focus on more. The fact that this quiz just said that the System was less than five thousand freaking years old, or that the anchor just shot a laser beam at me for choosing the wrong answer…

As if on cue, the robotic voice begins speaking again.

“How many galaxies are initialized into the System? Select the answer choice that matches the correct answer.”

Select the…

My thoughts trail off as the two buttons on the panel turn into eight, each with their own number on them.

Oh…

“You have fifteen seconds to answer the question.”

My eye twitches slightly at the robotic voice before I focus on the answer choices.

I don’t think I like this room all that much. Doesn’t matter that the anchor can’t actually seem to hurt me.

This robotic voice is getting on my nerves.

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