This Life, I Will Be the Protagonist

"She's a crew member!"

But Rita didn't care. She clamped the green block between her feet and darted across the deck toward the second dropped block, bouncing and flying as the pirate ship swung wildly. With the violent shaking, she couldn't afford to fly recklessly and got knocked into the ship's seats more than once.

This time it was a purple rectangular block.

She grabbed it with her hand and, on her way to the third block, quickly attached it sideways to the rear of her long block-shaped torso. Her chest was already adorned with the skeletal hand, and free-form assembly took three seconds—not worth it.

The third block was also purple, but this time a square. She stuck it to the outside of her arm.

All three blocks were picked up before the collection timer ran out.

But as soon as Rita started collecting blocks, she had been watching the pirate ship closely. She hadn't seen any other drops. Either the treasure chest only dropped three blocks, or the blocks disappeared once the timer expired.

Given the way that particular chest was practically falling apart, it was safe to rule out the first option.

By the time the first round hit 21 seconds, most of the crew had realized what was going on and stopped targeting Rita. They turned their focus to the other two chests—only a few stubborn fools were still hammering away at her.

Rita could've kept hammering the chest too, but now wasn't the time. She needed to prep for the next round.

Bouncing and flying was fine for rushing to loot, but not ideal for evasion. If she got marked as the next treasure chest, she'd be in trouble with her current bulky state.

She hopped into the last row of seats to get a clear view of the other two chests.

If they got attacked, she could dodge. If not, she wouldn't waste time.

She detached the green block from her foot, then used the square purple block on her arm to press against it and lock it into place. Then she disconnected the other foot.

Now, the block on her right arm was affixed to a green and purple block at a right angle.

Since blocks could only be gained through the game, this meant unless Rita was hit or voluntarily removed them, the awkward-looking appendages weren't going anywhere.

Just look at the treasure chests falling apart and still hopping around like nothing happened.

It seemed Rita was finally out of danger—for now.

Once she was reasonably safe, she began setting up her next round of tactics.

"If I'm the treasure chest next round, just stick with me. I'll toss the blocks I pick up to you. You'll follow behind and attach them. If I knock any blocks loose, and you can grab them, do it."

At the 30-second mark, the golden glow on her body vanished.

To her disappointment, she wasn't a chest this round either.

She took down the little barricade she'd built to protect Nivalis, let her out, and said, "I'm going after the chests. Come find me in 20 seconds," before leaping back into action.

With I'm Getting Serious, every magic arrow she fired would home in on its target—but even that didn't guarantee a hit.

Some treasure chests had abilities like phasing or blinking, and her arrows would vanish if they hit the ship instead of their mark. That was a known flaw of Betrayal. But compared to not needing to carry physical arrows, it was an acceptable trade-off.

And if a chest tried jumping to the other ship to avoid her?

Sure, it worked temporarily. But someone would always flush them back out.

In theory, with her tracking arrows and consistent aim, she should've landed at least 9 hits per round. But things weren't that easy.

Just like her, other players had stealth and evasion tricks—whether through skills, gear, or quirky relics.

Plain invisibility was useless here because the golden pillar marking the chests didn't disappear with it. Only phasing or similar effects would truly work.

Some chests could redirect incoming attacks. Some had aura effects that made enemies overlook them entirely. At one point, both ships had only two chests visible, and Rita suspected some had used baby antenna-style abilities.

One player even fused into the ship's surface. Rita couldn't aim or shoot them at all. Even though Target Locked came off cooldown, she didn't use it—what if the dropped block became unreachable?

Some players teamed up like she and Nivalis did. But as rounds went on, others caught on. If a player was clearly supporting a chest, people would swarm and tear them apart with brute force.

If Rita tried her first-round trick again, players would mob her, pin her arms down, and assign a squad to pry her fingers open.

One round, a chest had three bodyguards. The crew swarmed them, ripping and pulling as if the little block-men were in a cartoon brawl. Rita didn't have much else to do that round, so she joined in the block pile-on for fun.

Still, with I'm Getting Serious, by the time Round 17 started, Rita had collected 35 blocks. She'd used Target Locked once.

Every round, whether she succeeded or not, she always reserved 5–7 seconds to adjust her block configuration.

During those adjustments, she'd have Nivalis return to her side.

By now, Rita looked ridiculous—tiny block head perched atop a chunky mess of parts. Her shoulders were adorned with piles of tiny blocks like miniature garbage heaps. Her torso had two layers of blocks in a neat grid, her legs were lumped with block tumors, and even the back of her head had a small shield fragment stuck to it.

She didn't care about aesthetics. Speed was what mattered.

She'd accumulated 10 block colors so far, keeping herself safely even-numbered to avoid punishment. But through one of the divine penalties, she'd also learned another hidden rule:

Black blocks cannot connect to gray blocks.

Current time: 8 minutes and 27 seconds into the game.