This Life, I Will Be the Protagonist

She hadn't thought to bring [Chavez's Time]—not that it mattered. The only skills visible to others were the ones she had officially unlocked. [One-Person Party] was undetectable, and the skills from [Midnight Exile] were long known anyway, so it didn't make much difference.

There were no weapons in this round either. Her [Betrayal] from the previous game had only been usable because she acquired it mid-game. Fortunately, she still had [1-Bamboo] and the key skill [Reselect], which would let her swap tile effects once she understood the rules of the game.

Once all her World Graveyard setup was finished, Rita found herself back in the now-familiar starting room. First thing, she synced with Bone Black Jade, confirming the connection remained unbroken. She could still share its vision and control it, so she relaxed a bit.

Next, she grabbed the [Plush Collar] and turned Nivalis—who was nearly filling the whole starting room—into a plush doll, freeing up space. Then she couldn't help but open the ladder rankings to equip her new title: [Proud Undying]. What a gloriously edgy name—so much better than her old one, [Heaven's Wrath].

She eagerly checked the title's effect:

Title Skill – [Stubborn Mule]: A mule never admits defeat. Hold your head, shake it, and say "No, I was right!" to undo one action you took in the last five minutes and erase all traces of it. Cooldown: 1 hour. Skill becomes active upon equipping the title.

Rita: "..."

She had every reason to suspect this ridiculous ability was just something Rabbit #3 made up on the spot.

She spent a full three seconds in awe at the sheer troll energy of this skill. Why did all her abilities insist she say something aloud? Still… she wore the title anyway.

When the active player count reached 100,000, a rules scroll appeared in the room.

Divine Game #24269: Blocks and Me

Game countdown: 00:29:59

Game Objective: Collect blocks. Final ranking will be based on block quantity and aesthetic score.

(Note: In this round, all bindings on equipment, weapons, accessories, items, relics, and toys will be temporarily disabled.)

Game Duration: 48 hours.

Game Difficulty: Torment.

Game Rule 1: No more than 20 blocks may be in contact with the ground at any one time.

Game Rule 2: …

Game Rule 6: -40Rn-TcUAmPm-Po-218-UThKPrBi

Game Rule 7: ◆□■▲□■■▲□

Game Rule 8: Red blocks may not connect with green blocks.

Game Rule 17: …

Game Rule 18: Your body cannot have an odd number of block colors. fɾeewebnoveℓ.co๓

Game Rule 27: ≌∝≈≡∝≡≈≡≌∝≈

Exclusive Rule 1: You may not use theft skills on players with lower combat tier than you.

Exclusive Rule 2: You may not kill Divine Game players ranked at "Fool" tier.

Exclusive Rule 3: You may not use repair skills on mechanical species.

Penalty: Any rule violation will result in a random stolen item from the past 3 stardays being returned to its rightful owner.

...

The countdown this time was longer than usual.

When Rita read the part about bindings being disabled, she had a sinking feeling in her gut.

She had brought half her entire arsenal into this game.

[Lonely Antenna Baby] and [Soul Catcher] were both perfect-tier relics.

Forcing herself to calm down, she began analyzing the rules.

Combat tier was, as expected, still Tier 9: Torment. There were 27 rules in total again.

She skimmed past the ones with gibberish symbols and radioactive isotopes. She could only understand three of them.

And it wasn't just her—B8017913, with its ability to parse over 5,000 languages, could also only understand three rules.

Was this targeted sabotage?

Before she could think further, her body began to transform.

Her view dropped. A crinkling, clacking sound echoed around her. Looking down, she saw her limbs and torso morphing—into blocks.

Her upper body was now made of red blocks, lower body white blocks. Her once black leather boots were now glossy black rectangular blocks.

She looked like a little block figure, no more than 25 centimeters tall. Only her wings had retained their original appearance—though scaled down—but at least she could still fly.

The blocks came in several shapes, most common being 2cm cubes. She quickly estimated her current size from the number of them used.

Worse still, all her relics and items previously stored in [Magician's Wisdom Tooth] were forcibly expelled—and transformed into blocks too.

A purple donut-like base with a silver metal strip… a black circular block… and an arm made of four white block segments.

Only the tooth itself remained in her mouth—also now blockified. She licked it. Yep, block.

She instantly understood the design: Everything—tools, weapons, relics—had become blocks.

And blocks couldn't be stored in any kind of spatial equipment.

Fortunately, each block had connectors—some protruding, some recessed. She began attaching a few items back onto herself.

The antenna was easy. She found a connector on the top of her head and snapped it into place.

The hand bone... now that was trickier. Its connector was at the base, and there was no good place to slot it.

Eventually, she stuck it to her chest, finger pointed forward—then curled the fingers into a "thumbs up."

If looks were part of the scoring criteria, she might as well get stylish with it.

She tested a few large motions. The joints held.

But this game was clearly rigged to be difficult. She doubted things would stay stable.

She picked up the [Plush Collar] and tried to use it on herself—nothing happened.

No transformation into plushie.

Likely another unlisted game rule: Block form cannot be altered.

She gave [Survive Until the End] a shot and transformed into a plate. That worked.

From beside her, Nivalis's voice chirped in the chat:

"You're now a block plate."

Well, at least transformation skills still worked.

When she changed back, she turned to see Nivalis had become a blocky little dragon—mostly white and blue, roughly her own size.

As for B8017913, it now looked like a ring of white blocks wrapped around her wrist.

Then she reread the game description—collect blocks.

Her stomach twisted.

Everything—items, relics, even herself—was now made of blocks. And binding was disabled.

Obviously, the intention was for players to start stealing from each other.

And it wouldn't stop there. If physical bodies were composed of blocks too, it was likely players could lose actual body parts.

Would block theft be done via combat? Mini-games? Could you just die and escape?

She'd never seen over 100,000 active players before.

Maybe they all believed that after the last hellish Divine Game, this one would be easier.

Clearly, they'd all guessed wrong.