"How many others?" I said, after the silence had run its course.
"Total?" Jake picked up his mug again, both hands, the anchor grip. "Hard to say. I have seen maybe two dozen players since I arrived. Different levels, different life counts, different amounts of time in here." He drank. "Most do not make it past their third or fourth death. They get careless, or desperate, or both. Start taking risks the math does not support."
"And the ones who lasted longer?"
"Lasted longer," he said, with a particular flatness that made the phrase do more work than its two words should have carried. "The experienced players, the ones who knew games, who came in with skills and strategies and good instincts. They lasted longer. But this place is designed to break you eventually."
Designed to break you
