Chapter 14
Back in the game, while waiting in line for the five-player dungeon, Cheng Jiacheng noticed the subtle atmosphere between the four of them, and wanted to ease it but didn't know where to start.
An Jing chewed bubble gum and glanced at Zhan Mu from time to time, as if paying attention to his movements and expressions. It was very strange. They didn't know each other at all and were not even familiar with each other, but it was Zhan Mu's indifferent attitude that made him pay attention to him again and again.
Over here, Zhan Mu was privately messaging Lu Chao, asking, "I understand this feeling. It's the kind of mutual admiration between competitors. It seems this An Jing thinks highly of me."
"That's strange, why isn't his imaginary enemy me?" Lu Chao said with a smile.
"Maybe they guessed that you're AI." Zhan Mu curled his lips, "So they ignored you and thought more highly of me instead?"
"There is another possibility. He really wants to seduce you." Lu Chao said this, and then threw a coquettish glance at Zhan Mu from a distance, which was very teasing and funny.
Zhan Mu couldn't smile anymore, and his expression of facing a great enemy returned. What a cold person! He seemed easy to get along with, but in fact, the line in his heart was obvious to everyone. He was usually cheerful with everyone, but in fact, no one had entered his heart.
Hot on the outside, but cold on the inside.
Lu Chao observed him for several months and came to this conclusion.
Zhan Mu, the word "Mu" in his name means old age, which makes him look old. He is easy to get along with and talk to, but it seems that no one can get into his heart. Being kind and approachable is a courtesy, but in fact he is not easy to get along with.
A person with a terrifying sense of boundaries.
But Lu Chao, despite being raised in an elite family, is truly lively and friendly. Just for fun, Zhan Mu would definitely not be happy about wearing women's clothing, but Lu Chao didn't mind. Zhan Mu was someone who really needed to be respectable.
"Are you making a fuss about not getting what you want, Mr. An?" Bian Lu noticed An Jing's repeated attention to outsiders and sent him a message.
"No, I really think Zhan Mu is different from the people I've met. He's a bit like you, but his energy is stronger." An Jing was typing with Bian Lu.
"What was I like back then?" Bian Lu asked.
"It's that arrogant attitude of looking down on everyone." An Jing smiled and found it amusing. At the same time, he looked at Zhan Mu, who was avoiding his gaze and his eyes contained impatience and disgust.
Sure enough, Zhan Mu hated An Jing.
"Loading, hahaha." An Jing continued to scold Bian Lu.
"..." Bian Lu chuckled dryly and sent two emojis. To be honest, he quite liked Zhan Mu. It might just be that they had a sense of identity because of the similar class difference.
This kind of good feeling that is hard to describe in words is called resonance.
Yes, even if a poor guy becomes rich, even if his inferiority complex is tempered into courage, he will never forget the bowl of warmest porridge when he was down and out.
So much so that later, when sitting in a luxury car or villa, I would recall the taste of that day, even though that bowl of porridge was not delicious and was simple and unpretentious.
"It's time to enter the dungeon," Cheng Jiacheng reminded them.
"What does Sister Chengcheng do for a living? Is she married?" Zhan Mu asked.
"Oh, don't ask. When I'm at school, he asks about my grades. When I'm at work, he asks about my work. It's so annoying." Cheng Jiacheng changed the subject, but he knew very well that he was just taking the opportunity to test his social strength.
"Okay." Zhan Mu suddenly felt that he was not good at speaking, so he remained silent.
Zhan Mu was in a daze when he suddenly saw Lu Chao send a message: "It's okay, just playing games. Don't worry about offending people. You probably won't have the chance to meet them again in the future."
The copy was opened, and this time they went directly to the Heavenly Stems Yin and Yang Bureau, which was still the opening of Jia and Yi Wood from last time.
"Do you remember your positions?" Zhan Mu ordered, "Bian Lu Yang Wood, An Jing Yang Fire, Cheng Cheng Gold, Lu Chao Shui. I'm looking for the last one, Shengmen Tu."
The four nodded and did not move when the wood of the grassland turned over. Then, the disk moved by itself, and then it was the wood of the forest, which was the Yang wood. According to the rules, everything was normal, and the Azure Dragon in the Jia and Yi pattern did not move either, but the disk moved again.
"Very good, it seems we are right." Zhan Mu said happily.
The four people stood there separately until the round was over. At dusk, he was thinking that he still had to look for a way out, when all five of them saw at the same time that a gray-green stone base rose in the middle of the pan.
The system voice also appeared at the same time: Congratulations to team 12306 for passing the second level of the Chaos Battle Royale, the Heavenly Stems Yin and Yang Bureau, and entering the third level, the Earthly Branches Zodiac Bureau.
"The twelve Earthly Branches and the twelve Chinese zodiac animals?" Cheng Jiacheng murmured.
The five people entered the new copy and saw a huge square stone slab in front of them. It looked very similar to the first level, but there were no mythical beasts on the four sides. Instead, there were 24 squares in a 4x6 grid.
"What does this mean..." Bian Lu yawned.
"Does it look like Blindspot Candy Crush? What do you think?" An Jing smiled and jumped over. Suddenly, glowing words appeared on the stone slab under his feet. It was: Mao.
"Is that so? That's pretty simple," Bian Lu replied. "The character 'mao' corresponds to 'rabbit,' so why don't we just step on it and find which stone slab represents the rabbit?"
Zhan Mu squatted down, "Is it really that simple?"
He touched the stone slab closest to him, and sure enough, it worked. The word "rat" appeared on it, which should correspond to "Zi" in the twelve Earthly Branches.
But An Jing is in Mao, which does not match, so it is wrong.
It was visibly that An Jing's health bar dropped rapidly. He was a little panicked and wanted to leave the stone slab immediately. However, the moment Zhan Mu's hand left the stone slab, his health was emptied and he was eliminated.
"So difficult?! How do we play this?!" As An Jing left, Lu Chao let out a painful wail.
"Then we'll probably have to die a few more times," Bian Lu said solemnly, "but this dungeon only has five chances, and we've already used them twice..."
"I recommend a method, and I need your cooperation." Zhan Mu suddenly said. He squinted his eyes and looked at the 24 squares, grinning wickedly: "Why don't one of you run in order, remember to step on every stone slab, and I'll keep track."
"Aren't you asking us to die?" Cheng Jiacheng frowned.
"This is just a game. If everyone wants to win, sacrifice is necessary." Zhan Mu smiled meaningfully and said, "Otherwise, I can also take part. However, if you take notes, I'm afraid you won't be able to remember them as quickly and accurately as I do."
"Oh, you're so confident, bro?" Bian Lu folded his hands, curious. He asked provocatively, "Well, since you say you have the best memory, then if you repeat the string of numbers I tell you verbatim, we'll believe you."
"Okay, I want to try." Zhan Mu raised his eyebrows.
"2454876464876649." Bian Lu randomly typed this number into his game interface memo and read it out loud. He pondered it and said, "Wait, I'll count down for another 10 seconds. In 10 seconds, repeat it and answer me."
"Can you do it?" Lu Chao sent a private message to Zhan Mu.
Here, Bian Lu began to count down, ten, nine, eight... seven... Zhan Mu also secretly gave Lu Chao an OK gesture.
"One." Bian Lu narrowed his eyes and smiled, "Please repeat your answer to me."
"24548764648766...5, oh no, 49." Zhan Mu was neither humble nor arrogant, and his momentum was not weak at all.
All correct, I actually remembered them.
Bian Lu expressed his admiration, clapped his hands and smiled.
"I agree with your tactics." Lu Chao said solemnly.
Zhan Mu raised his chin and nodded. Lu Chao smiled and said, "Okay, I'll go up then. Watch carefully." Then he stepped on the stone slab and used an S-shaped route to light up the words on almost half of the stone slab.
He ran until his health was completely depleted, and just before leaving, Lu Chao made a lively "yeah" gesture.
"Have you remembered?" Cheng Jiacheng was also very curious and amused, and even snapped his fingers in front of Zhan Mu as a reminder.
Zhan Mu nodded and replied, "Starting from the bottom left, the order is: Wu, Xu, Snake, Chou, Ox, Shen, Rat, Sheep, Wei, Horse, Mao, Monkey, Rooster... That's it. Don't talk to me, or my mind will get confused and I won't be able to remember. Keep going."
This memory is amazing!
Bian Lu was completely convinced. After hearing this, he rolled up his sleeves and said, "I can run faster, so I'll do it. Don't bother Zhan Mu. The two of you should be able to pass it directly."
As he spoke, he walked to the first stone in the lower right corner, almost in one go, allowing Zhan Mu to see the rest of the layout.
Bian Lu was eliminated, and now only Zhan Mu and Cheng Jiacheng are left.
Zhan Mu frowned and said, "Next you must act strictly according to my ideas." As he said that, he jumped up and stepped on the character "horse". To be honest, the design of this game is really reasonable. The whole board is not big, and you can jump directly to the middle of the board from the outside.
"Horse, horse corresponds to noon, noon horse." Cheng Jiacheng asked: "Where is the word noon?"
"One horizontally and six vertically. Do you understand?" Zhan Mu replied, then pointed to the first stone slab in the lower left corner.
"I understand. Just say it according to your idea." Cheng Jiacheng replied, and at the same time, the look in his eyes became complicated, and turned into unspeakable admiration.
Zhan Mu continued to think carefully. Next, he jumped to Rabbit, looked at Rabbit and said, "Two horizontal and five vertical, Rabbit."
"Two horizontally, five vertically..." Cheng Jiacheng tried hard to identify it, pointed to the stone slab and confirmed with Zhan Mu again and again before jumping over.
That’s right, Rabbit is paired with Mao.
Next comes the boring elimination game: Dog versus Dog, Rat versus Rat...
Even under such guidance, Cheng Jiacheng discovered an even more difficult point, which was that there were not enough people. Their movements were restricted, and they had to consider the distance every time they jumped to the next grid. This was also a step that Zhan Mu had to think about.
But fortunately, both of them are good at sports, and they have practiced standing long jump very well, and they did not make any mistakes such as slipping when landing.
Chen pairs with dragon, tiger pairs with yin, pig pairs with hai, monkey pairs with shen, chou pairs with ox, wei pairs with sheep...
In the last square, Rooster faces Rooster, and they sadly find that their position is too far away from the remaining two squares.
"This way, you and I will jump over at the same time, making sure that both feet only step once, and press down both the Chicken and You stone slabs at the same time." Zhan Mu said, and pulled up his trousers, ready to go.
"It's really a bit far. I'm afraid I won't be able to step on the right spot." Cheng Jiacheng was a little nervous, mainly because he was afraid that making a mistake would waste his memory. Thinking of this, he felt even more stressed.
"Don't be afraid, try it, it's just a game." Zhan Mu patted her shoulder. At this moment, one of them was Wei and the other was Yang, and the two stone slabs were very close to each other, so they stood together.
"I'll count to three, two, one." Zhan Mu said with a firm voice, "When you say one, we'll jump. Three, two, one!"
As they talked, they both prepared to jump together, and stepped on the two characters "Ji You" with their left feet at the same time, very accurately, and then landed outside the plate - success!
They turned around and saw the plate full of glowing words, which were very bright. Both of them had smiles of accomplishment on their faces.
At the same time, the other three teammates revived, and the system voice sounded again: Congratulations to Team 12306 for passing the third level of the Chaos Instance Battle Royale, the Earthly Branch Zodiac Bureau, and entering the fourth level...
"That's awesome, buddy." An Jing looked at Zhan Mu and saw that he was smiling evilly.
"Awesome." Bian Lu also shook his head in admiration and was very happy.
Only Lu Chao, not knowing what he was thinking, said, "I've made up my mind to follow you, Captain Zhan."
Zhan Mu smiled and said, "Go on and see what the next level is." - In fact, he felt very happy!
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