“Tsk, it’s been nearly twenty minutes, and you still haven’t found your Sentinel?” The short-haired girl showed pity in her eyes, “Even if you search through all of the rooms one by one, you should have found him by now, right?”
“Who is to blame?” Cen Zhen deliberately answered with these words towards the Guide with the ponytail. The latter wanted to laugh but didn’t dare to laugh too obviously, and said out of humanitarian concern: “I’m sorry, I won’t lie to you this time, okay? Well, we really met Sentinel from Team 10 just now, in this direction, about five rooms?”
The short-haired girl let out a sound of surprise, but after exchanging glances with the ponytail girl, she decisively agreed along, “Yes, yes, yes.”
Cen Zhen ignored them and walked to the next room. There was another team in the next room. It was team 8, a combination of female Sentinel and male Guide. The Sentinels had just finished grabbing the badge, and when they saw someone appear, they immediately put on a vigilant posture.
“Tsk.” Cen Zhen thought to himself that he really shouldn’t waste time talking to Team 2 just now. The Sentinel of Team 8 found that Cen Zhen was still in an unattackable state, and immediately relaxed her guard. She raised her eyebrows and played around with the badge in her hand provocatively. “I remember you are from the team with 60.19% compatibility, right? You haven’t reunited with your Sentinel after this long, you guys basically have no chance of winning.”
Cen Zhen learned his lesson, and without waiting for the Sentinel to finish speaking, he opened the door and entered the next room. As a result, several rooms were empty in a row. It must be that other teams have searched the surrounding area before him.
In order to find the Sentinel of the same team as soon as possible, the Guide will usually try to walk toward the center of the maze to have more direction choices. Cen Zhen understands that there is not much time left for him, so he immediately chooses a direction and chooses to open doors in a straight line. He wants to go to the border of the maze to see if there is a slip-through badge. However, when facing a certain door, Cen Zhen suddenly stopped, hesitantly put his hand on the door handle, and did not push it open.
Outside the maze, hundreds of spectators and other students who got summoned by friends came to watch the game online, held their breaths, and stared intently at Cen Zhen, expecting him to open the door and enter.
“Open the door!”
“Why are you so hesitant, Team 10 Guide?? Push the door open!”
“The Sentinel of Team 10 and the Sentinel of Team 6 are so freaking idle, plus the personal terminal signal is blocked in the maze, they can’t even play cards online to kill time.”
“Sentinel of Team 6 was liberated just five seconds ago. So this Sentinel of Team 10 is the only one left ok… Did he fall asleep? I think he has maintained this sitting position against the wall since the second minute of the game… …”
“He’s not asleep, his eyes are open, and didn’t even blink more than a few times.”
“Is it so difficult to open the door?”
“…He, he retreated?? Am I blind???”
“???”
“……”
“I got it, I got it!!! He must have done it on purpose, he just didn’t want to join up with the Sentinel, that’s right! There is no need for him to reunite at all! He can obtain the badges himself, and if they don’t join up, he can be protected from attack…How smart!!”
“WTF?? That’s right!”
……
The moment Cen Zhen’s fingers touched the door handle, an indescribable premonition rushed into his mind from his fingertips like an electric current. The numbing trembling stops him. Cen Zhen withdrew his trembling fingertips as if he can see through the wall into the room, a hazy and illusory figure appeared in front of his eyes, with long pale golden hair falling on the ground, he was obviously an adult Sentinel, but he is curled up, burying the head in the knees, hugging himself in a defensive posture like a child desperately trying to protect themself, although he is currently in an absolutely safe place.
Cen Zhen also felt the emotions of the man inside closely—pain…and fear.
Why is there fear? What is he afraid of? Cen Zhen couldn’t help being immersed in this emotion, wanting to grasp something illusory, but when he was about to sense it more carefully, the state of empathy immediately faded away like a tide, leaving him standing alone in the empty pure white room.
After three seconds of hesitation, Cen Zhen resolutely withdrew his hand, then turned around, walked quickly to another door, and left without looking back.
“……”
Where he couldn’t see, Lian Yu gritted his teeth bitterly towards the door that he thought would open. The moment Cen Zhen approached, he suddenly sat up straight from the position against the wall. Twenty minutes of waiting had approached his patient limit.
He was fully prepared with his fake smile, but…the other party for real left……
Left? ? ?
Lian Yu sat back in the corner again and snorted, “Won’t try to win anymore!”
Outside the maze, the live broadcast of Team 10 has been filled with messages on screens of “Poor Sentinel” by the audience watching on the terminal, followed by another wave of the message of “No, you’re definitely winning”.
At the 30th minute of the game, just over the halfway mark, all players heard a reminder from the host at the same time: “All the badges have been collected, and the team currently ranking first in points is…Team 10.”
The timing of this reminder was very unfortunate, it happened when Cen Zhen was in the same room as Team 3. The Sentinel rushed directly to Cen Zhen in a rage and tore off his number plate impulsively.
“You fucking cheated didn’t you!!! I’m reporting you for modifying the number plate without permission—”
Before his sentence could finish, the voice of the dean came from the number plate: “The Sentinel of Team 3 violated the rules of the game and were banned for ten minutes. The two badges owned by Team 3 were transferred to Team 10.”
Sentinel of Team 3: “……”
Sentinel of Team 3: “???”
The two looked at each other dazed, and Cen Zhen calmly took the two badges and his number plate from Team 3’s Guide, showing a little dislike in his eyes.
“How is this possible…” When Cen Zhen walked to the door, Team 3’s Sentinel suddenly muttered, “Did you bribe the referee…”
“A yellow card warning for Team 3. Please pay attention to your words and deeds.” The dean’s ruthless voice came again, and Team 3’s Guide hurriedly covered the mouth of the Sentinel, for fear that he would say anything more.
Cen Zhen pushed open the door and bumped into Team 1 head-on. The other party saw the white Team 10 number plate like a big bad wolf who saw his fat dinner flying away from their mouth and irrationally rushed forward with a yelp. The number plate Cen Zhen put back on for less than a second got brutally ripped off again.
“Sentinel of Team 1 violated the rules of the game and was banned for ten minutes. The three badges owned by Team 1 were transferred to Team 10.”
Not far away, the Guide and Sentinel of Team 3 both express pity towards them, as if they saw how foolishly they were just a minute ago.
It wasn’t until after the badges were handed over that the Guides of Team 1 belatedly realized, “You haven’t met with your Sentinel? Then how can Team 10 rank first in points? Did the system make an error?”
The three big question marks expressed the aspirations of the four people present, but unfortunately, Cen Zhen was not willing to answer them. He casually put the badge into the bulging pocket on the right side of his jacket, kept silent, and opened the door moving forward with a clear purpose in mind.
Due to the commotion here being so loud, and the Sentinels’ sense was one sharper than the other, the other teams soon gathered in a circle around Cen Zhen. They were vigilant against each other, but most of them stared more at Cen Zhen.
No clue who started it, but two of the Guides blocked Cen Zhen’s path, they didn’t attack nor move away, they just silently forced Cen Zhen to compromise with them, because in the previous maze competitions, each team’s score was close, so there was a lot of tension between the teams. Team 10’s points are very likely only one or two points higher than the second-placed team. If Cen Zhen stumbled here, they undoubtedly could overtake it soon.
Cen Zhen looked at them calmly, slowly stopped, and said: “It’s useless for you to block the way, I have 18 badges in my hand now, and I also have the initiative point for 13 badges. Even if I stand here and do nothing, it is a must-win situation.”
This data stunned everyone. 13×2=26 fixed points, plus 18×1, is 44 points. On top of that, Cen Zhen can’t be attacked at this moment. There are 25 badges in total. Even if the remaining points are all obtained by the same team, that’s only 12*2+7*1=31 points, which is far lower than the total score of Team 10. What he said is absolutely correct. The two members of Team 10 just need to find a different room to sleep in and wait until the time is up to claim their victory.
The rest of the team secretly observed each other’s expressions. It was terrible that none of them could be sure that Cen Zhen was lying. After all, they knew how many badges they had in their hands.
Just when the two Guides retreated slightly, Cen Zhen smiled faintly, this was his first smile today, and many people still don’t realize what this rare smile represents… For example, this ponytail girl Guide from Team 2 who has lied many times in front of Cen Zhen.
“But…wouldn’t this be too boring?”
The ponytail girl and her Sentinel stood by an inconspicuous wall, trying to reduce their sense of presence. They try to look extremely harmless as if they were here for sightseeing, but the desire to win in their eyes was still strong, obviously waiting for the right time. At this time, she suddenly noticed that the ‘main character’ in the center of the crowd looked over and walked straight towards them.
“Hi.” Ponytail girl greeted generously without any guilt, “I didn’t expect you to be so good. How did you do it……eh?”
Cen Zhen opened his jacket pocket, allowing the badges inside to fall to the ground one by one. The metal badges collided with each other, making a crisp and messy sound. Then, Cen Zhen took off the number plate on his chest, while the ponytail girl pretended to panic and shouted: “Woah, don’t come near me, you are trolling! Dean, come stop him!”, Cen Zhen pushed open the door behind her.
The red lettering on the white number plate instantly turned green, and Cen Zhen’s status changed from ‘unattackable’ to activate. Cen Zhen took advantage of the ponytail girl’s stupefaction and pressed the number plate against her. His voice was soft and deep, like a devil’s whisper: “Enjoy the game.”
After he finished speaking, Cen Zhen turned around to enter the room, and closed the door. At the last moment when there was only a small gap between the door and the wall, the voice of the dean also came from the number plate: “Team 2 obtained Team 10 Guide’s number plate, Eighteen badges held by Team 10 are transferred to Team 2.”
“……”
There was a long silence outside the maze, and it was the same inside, but Cen Zhen knew that soon, fierce conflicts would erupt from both sides. After all, the team with the advantage had changed from Team 10 to Team 2. He doesn’t care how they would fight outside, but inside… Cen Zhen raised his head and directly looked into Lian Yu’s gaze.
To his surprise, Lian Yu’s eyes looked very quiet, and it stayed quiet…… The expected madness and affectation did not appear, whether it was throwing himself over him and talking nonsense, or soft-spoken whining ‘How can you come so late, I hate you~~’, Cen Zhen is immune to, and is ready to ignore him completely.
However, Lian Yu just looked at him calmly, neither sad nor happy, this made Cen Zhen feel strange in his heart as if he had really done something terrible just now, which caused Lian Yu to be sooooo sad that his grief turned into indignation.
Original Author’s Note:
Lian Yu: Puppy eye attack
Cen Zhen: … (conscience condemned)
Lian Yu: You have a conscience?
Cen Zhen: That’s right, I don’t have any conscience!
