THIS IS AN ABSOLUTE DEATH GAME
The Liar's Gambit
The lights came on like a slap — harsh, clinical, and absolute.
A hundred people squinted into the sudden white, blinking away the dark. Then the room revealed itself: a perfect grid of transparent cubicles, ten rows by ten columns, glass from floor to ceiling. One person per box.
Silent. Isolated. Watched.
Numbers were etched on each door: 1 through 100. The glass felt thick, soundproof. A hundred private cages.
Then, a voice: smooth, emotionless, everywhere at once.
"Welcome to Liar's Gambit. I will now explain the rules."
At the far end of the chamber, raised high on a podium of polished steel, stood a man in a black suit. Beside him: three masked referees, motionless. The man smiled, not with warmth, but with precision — like he was about to enjoy something.
"The first rule," he said, "is simple. If you exit your cubicle, you will be executed."
Silence. Then confusion. Then noise.
A few players pressed against the glass. One yelled, "Wait — what?!"
From Cubicle 1, a wiry man with restless energy slammed a fist against the wall. "This is a game show, right? The cash prize? That's real?"
The man on the podium didn't blink. "Correct. Twenty-two million dollars to the winner." He leaned closer to the mic, voice suddenly colder. "Survival, however, was never guaranteed."
The panic started like a spark. A breath held too long.
Then it snapped.
A chorus of outrage followed.
In cubicle #3, a man with a neck full of prison ink slammed his forehead against the glass, teeth bared. "You can't do this!"
Two cells down, a woman with silver braids and fire in her eyes punched the wall so hard her knuckles split. "We were promised a game, not a slaughterhouse."
A silent figure in #94 stood still as stone, then reached down and slipped off her shoes — delicate ballet flats. She placed them side by side, neatly, like she was stepping onto a stage.
In #90, a man with a jaw like a slab of concrete stared coldly at the podium. He didn't yell. He just cracked his neck, rolled his shoulders, and waited.
Another — a younger woman with nervous hands and a sudden, frantic laugh — muttered something under her breath, then stepped forward, eyes locked on the exit.
And from #1, the sarcastic guy with a half-smirk even now, flipped off the game master with both hands and grinned. "Twenty-two million better buy a damn army."
Six doors hissed open.
Six rebels.
A breath.
Crack. Crack. Crack.
The first body hit the floor before the others realized what happened.
Gunfire ripped the air in clean, clinical bursts. The referees fired with mechanical grace. The man in the jacket folded mid-stride. One bullet caught the grinning boy in the throat. The would-be soldier collapsed without a sound. The others dropped in ugly, final ways.
The game master didn't flinch.
"Eliminated," he said.
No more shouting. No more rebellion.
Only the stillness of ninety-four players — frozen behind glass — as the blood spread outward on the white floor like spilled ink.
Welcome to Liar's Gambit.
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