Chapter 567: The Giants Are Cooking

Thalion was the only one who seemed bothered by the possibility that a giant had been waiting for someone to come down the chimney. Since the giants had arrived, an hour had passed, and more than one hundred trial takers were already dead. On the roof, however, the mood was surprisingly calm. Most simply listened to the loud shouts, high-pitched screams that were usually cut short, and the resonating gongs that announced another death.

So far, none of the giants had left the house, which was the only reason Thalion was still on the roof. At the moment, it seemed like the safest place to be as long as the giants remained inside.

What bothered him was that he had no idea what they were doing. Most of the trial takers had clearly escaped outside, with only a handful remaining inside the house. Thalion refused to believe the giants were simply wandering around searching for them. In his opinion, they couldn't be stupid, or they wouldn't have managed to kill this many people in such a short amount of time.

"Keep an eye on me," Thalion whispered to the ogre and the woman. Both nodded and stepped a little closer. Just to be safe, he also informed the bloodseed of what he was planning.

After sitting down, the Specter of the Eternal Dream emerged from his chest and silently drifted through the roof. Thalion himself couldn't see through solid objects, but the specter had no trouble gliding through them. It hovered just beneath the roof, above the staircase, allowing him to observe every giant moving between the rooms on the first floor.

The giants on this level were noticeably smaller than the one downstairs, and they were feasting on captured trial takers. That wasn't all they were doing. Using crude blades, they carved glowing runes into the door handles and across the wooden floorboards. It took Thalion only a few moments to understand what he was witnessing.

The giants are trapping the house.

The realization was horrifying.

Now, the only loud noises came from the bathroom and the cellar. At least one giant was still actively hunting there. Perhaps the giant that had grabbed the cyborg had been in the middle of trapping the chimney. That would explain why no giants had come onto the roof and made far more sense than one simply standing there waiting.

Slowly gliding through the walls, the specter continued its inspection of the first floor. The bedrooms looked as though a bomb had exploded inside them. Mattresses had been ripped apart, feathers drifted through the air, and bloodstains marked the places where trial takers had met their end. Using Blood Vision through the specter's perspective, Thalion confirmed that no one remained alive in either room.

The second bedroom was no different. That led him to believe the giants possessed multiple abilities for flushing trial takers out of their hiding spots. Otherwise, at least one or two survivors should still have been hiding there. It was possible they had some way to conceal themselves from Blood Vision, but Thalion considered that unlikely. Even if such a method existed, there certainly couldn't be many survivors left.

The rooms were also covered in runes, many of them partially hidden beneath feathers or smeared with blood. Returning to the house suddenly seemed like a terrible idea. At the very least, not without proper preparation.

Before deciding whether to go back inside, Thalion wanted to scout the rest of the building. It had been foolish not to use the Specter of the Eternal Dream for reconnaissance earlier.

The living room looked no better. A massive giant was methodically placing traps throughout the room, carefully leaving only a narrow path that the giants themselves could use without triggering them.

What baffled Thalion the most, however, was the kitchen.

One of the giants was calmly stirring a massive pot filled with bodies of dead trial takers. The stew had turned a dark crimson and looked so revolting that Thalion wouldn't have dared flush it down a toilet, let alone eat it.

Congratulations

One of you has uncovered one of the giants' secrets

The giants prepare a stew from the blood and bodies of their victims

If the stew is completed, a single spoonful is enough to empower a giant

For the next five minutes, the giant will gain vision of every trial taker and move at greatly increased speed

Reading the first two lines, Thalion felt a surge of pride. He had actually uncovered one of the giants' secrets. But as he continued reading, his heart sank.

This was bad.

If the stew was completed, they had no chance of surviving the first game. The house and garden simply didn't offer enough space to evade giants that could see every trial taker.

Thankfully, one thing gave him a glimmer of hope.

Beside the boiling pot lay a small, open book containing the recipe for the stew. Unfortunately, Thalion had no idea what most of the ingredients even were.

What am I supposed to do with "Add two spoons of Onizu"?

This page copied the chapter without the author's permission; the NovelPhoenix site is where the author publishes it.

According to the recipe, the giants still had two more hours of cooking ahead of them, which hopefully was enough time to make a plan.

Once the giants looked away, Thalion guided the Specter of the Eternal Dream downward through the floor and into the cellar.

Unlike the rest of the house, the cellar consisted of one enormous chamber. It resembled a gruesome butcher's workshop, with the corpses of gigantic beasts hanging upside down from iron hooks. There, he spotted one of the giants hunting the remaining trial takers.

At the moment, it was pursuing the water elemental Thalion had seen during the previous show. The elemental had already lost a significant portion of its body, its reserves clearly running dry as it desperately fled from the relentless giant. If Thalion didn't intervene, it would be dead within seconds.

Given the nature of the system event, helping another trial taker was probably a terrible idea. On the other hand, the elemental was currently occupying one of the giants. How much longer would the giants keep searching or trapping the house, if this one finished its hunt?

After a brief moment of hesitation, Thalion decided it was worth trying.

He drifted lower and conjured a concentrated jet of flames, blasting it directly into the giant's eyes. The attack wasn't meant to injure it—only to blind it long enough for the water elemental to escape.

The giant noticed the flames and let out a deafening roar.

The shockwave instantly annihilated both the flames and the Specter of the Eternal Dream.

Just before the connection was severed, Thalion caught one final glimpse of the giant's massive foot descending toward the fallen elemental.

The moment his consciousness returned to his real body, the familiar gong echoed across the trial grounds.

The water elemental had died.

The woman and the ogre, Purpuff, were already waiting for him.

"I take it you were the one who uncovered their secret," the woman guessed.

"We were about to wake you. The first giants are leaving the house. I think we should head back inside while it's still safer there."

"There's one problem," Thalion muttered. "The giants have trapped the entire house, and we only have two hours to do something about that stew."

The thunderous footsteps of the giants rushing outside made it difficult to think clearly. Everyone on the roof pressed themselves lower, desperately trying to stay out of sight so even the towering giants wouldn't spot them.

Thalion doubted the giants were unaware that trial takers were hiding on the roof.

Getting back inside would be difficult, but they had to stop that stew somehow. It was an almost hopeless situation, especially considering how deadly the giants were. The doors and windows had all been shut, making entry nearly impossible while the giants remained invulnerable.

"Traps. Good Lord, we have to destroy that potion or we won't stand a chance of surviving!" a man with the head of a white bird exclaimed far louder than he should have.

Several trial takers immediately shushed him, while someone smacked the back of his head.

"I should be able to secretly dispel the traps," Thalion whispered, "or deliberately trigger a false alarm to send the giants on a wild goose chase. For that, I'll need time. Also, while the giants themselves are invulnerable, the walls aren't. They're incredibly durable, but not indestructible. Can any of you create small passages through the walls into the house? We have two hours before the stew is finished, and once that happens, we're all dead."

The group quietly gathered around Thalion.

"I might be able to create a small tunnel, but it will take at least half an hour considering how sturdy these materials are," a woman with insectoid eyes and purple skin said.

Soon, several others stepped forward, claiming they could create openings as well.

"Hmm... the first giants are already in the garden, and that stupid cat-dog is another problem," the woman without eyes or a nose concluded. "The moment the giants discover a tunnel, it'll become useless."

"Creating holes in the doors could be just as valuable," Thalion added thoughtfully while keeping an eye on the few giants roaming the garden. "If the doors can't be sealed, the giants will have a harder time catching us."

So far, only three giants had ventured outside, meaning four still remained in the house, one of them busy brewing the stew. Three giants laying traps throughout the house wasn't ideal, but it would have to be good enough.

"This whole trial is completely unfair!" an arrogant red-haired human suddenly announced in a voice loud enough for everyone to hear. "What are we even supposed to do against those giants? The moment this game is over, I'm filing an official complaint."

His outburst visibly irritated the more competent trial takers gathered on the roof.

"Would you shut up?" a woman with snakes for hair hissed at him. "We're trying to stay alive."

"Oh no, I'm done keeping quiet," the man replied arrogantly. "I'm not playing this ridiculous game anymore. It's beneath someone like me. A chosen shouldn't have to lower himself to this."

Unfortunately, the man was powerful enough that no one dared silence him by force.

"Alright, everyone who actually wants to survive this system event, come here," Thalion whispered. "We'll split into three groups."

He quickly outlined the plan.

"Group One infiltrates the house with me. Our objective is to create as many hidden pathways between the rooms and the outside as possible. That'll make it much harder for the giants to corner us."

"Group Two stays outside. As soon as the giants are distracted, you begin creating holes through the exterior walls."

"Group Three spreads the word about our plan and creates as many distractions as possible so Groups One and Two can work. If everything doesn't go completely wrong, we should have a chance to deal with that stew."

It was little more than a hastily assembled plan, and Thalion doubted Group Three would accomplish much beyond drawing attention. Still, it was the best option they had, and there was no time to waste. His danger sense had been screaming at him for the past several minutes.

Thankfully, the others weren't fools. A number of them immediately stepped forward to help. It wasn't everyone, but hopefully enough.

The insect woman and another man volunteered to accompany him inside the house. Purpuff and the unsettling woman without eyes or a nose agreed to spread the plan and create distractions. At least that gave Thalion some hope that Group Three would actually contribute.

Unfortunately, most of the volunteers still drifted toward Group Three, while only a single person joined the effort to breach the outer walls.

"I'll need a few seconds to disarm the traps," Thalion said before sitting down once more. "Use that time to figure out how you're going to accomplish your objectives. Things are about to get a lot rougher."

"Good!" Purpuff boomed a little louder than necessary. "Let's do this and bring honor to our ancestors! With a team this large, we'll have those giants running in circles."

The others nodded and slowly began moving away from Thalion and his two companions.

Thalion couldn't shake the feeling that many of them had no real intention of distracting the giants. It seemed more like an excuse to stay as far away from the danger as possible. Mentioning it now wouldn't accomplish anything.

He needed to move.

His plan was to wait inside the children's room on the first floor while the giants searched the garden outside.