Chapter 14
Before Lei Shen could even recover from his dizziness, enthusiastic viewers had already calculated his score in the live chat.
[Two yellow playmats, three other colors...wow, only a 7 out of 10?]
[How can there be so few? I remember Lei Shen always came in first or second in these hidden object games last season! Did you miscount?]
[Don't let your fan bias get too strong. He only had five photos in total, and the camera was pointed directly at him. How could he possibly miscount?]
Lei Shen's fans found the result unbelievable and speculated whether something unexpected had happened during the mini-game.
The other fans who watched the whole thing didn't dare say a word.
Because it really is just a dish!
Lei Shen first wasted a lot of time at the village entrance, even though five yellow crawling mats were actually buried under his feet.
After that, he still insisted on finding Leng Zhi's yellow crawling mat, hoping to widen the gap with the other guests by having a three-fold difference in scores.
So he searched everywhere outside the swimming pool—considering he hadn't encountered Leng Zhi at the pool that morning, he naturally ignored that spot.
Unfortunately, most of the remaining playmats were hidden in the swimming pool and wisteria trellis.
Fans watching the live stream were getting increasingly anxious, watching Lei Shen miss the correct answers step by step, and were so frustrated they wanted to breathe oxygen.
Lei Shen's live stream saw a sharp drop in viewership, while casual viewers flocked to Leng Zhi's live stream sub-venue.
Lei Shen listened to Li Chi's settlement figures with a chill running down his spine, and could only silently console himself:
There are still six days left, there's still... there's still a chance to turn things around.
Li Chi announced the game results:
"We have now tallied the scores for all the guests. First place goes to Leng Zhi and Jiang Mingzhe! They achieved an excellent score of 52 points! Let's congratulate them on earning five stars!"
The star badges were placed inside soft red silk and presented to the guests on a silver platter.
Leng Zhi took the badges, gently squatted down, and tied all five badges to Jiang Mingzhe's chest.
Jiang Mingzhe, who had just had his remaining badges taken, exclaimed, "Ah!"
Leng Zhi gently ruffled the boy's hair: "What's there to call him? He won the star for you anyway."
Jiang Mingzhe suddenly became the kid with the most stars on his chest, and instantly felt that his bad dad wasn't so bad anymore. A strange sense of honor welled up inside him: "I will definitely protect the stars!"
Leng Zhi glanced at him sideways but didn't say anything.
What an easy kid to fool—to him, it doesn't matter where the stars are placed, since Jiang Mingzhe won't have a chance to secretly spend them anyway.
Li Chi continued to announce the game results:
"Since Yun Jingcheng and Le Xinzhou both scored 20 points, their two groups are tied for second place! Congratulations to each group for receiving three stars!"
"Shaoqi and Youyou have a total of 18 points. Fourth place gets a star. Congratulations!"
He paused, then said regretfully, "The Lei Shen team's performance was somewhat disappointing. It's a pity that fifth place doesn't come with a prize."
Le Xinzhou neatly pinned the newly acquired badges to Duoduo's painter's hat, and looking at the four sparkling star badges, he proudly nudged Lei Shen with his elbow.
"Old Lei, you're completely broke now? Want me to lend you a couple? We can't let the kids suffer, no matter how tough things are. We can't let Xixi sleep on the steps with you, can we?"
Lei Shen's lips twitched. Although he was very unhappy, Le Xinzhou's words, though rough, made sense. He really needed to borrow two pills for eating and sleeping.
Before he could reply, Shao Qi said lightly, "Come on, you're even helping him out. Don't forget you still owe Yun Jingcheng a star and two gold coins! Jingcheng is a young man who's easily embarrassed, so don't shamelessly drag this out."
Le Xinzhou chuckled: "I remember, Sister Shaoqi. I was just joking with Lao Lei. Now that I've paid back the money, it's not enough to lend him any more."
“Old Lei, you’ll have to find another creditor.” He patted Lei Shen on the shoulder, then grasped Yun Jingcheng’s hand. “Jingcheng, thank you for your generous help yesterday. I’ll exchange the gold coins for you at the restaurant later.”
Yun Jingcheng blushed slightly and pursed his lips, saying, "No need to give me any more gold coins, Brother Xinzhou is too kind."
Le Xinzhou exclaimed, "How could I! I have to pay. If you borrow and repay, it's easy to borrow again. If you don't pay interest, that's just bullying a newbie."
Lei Shen: "...?"
Shut up, you living dad.
Le Xinzhou was practically putting Lei Shen on the spot. According to his logic, no matter who Lei Shen borrowed two stars from, he would have to pay four more gold coins afterward to make things look good.
Four gold coins! That's almost half a star!
Such a lucrative business opportunity was certainly not to be missed by Leng Zhi, who had the most stars in the entire venue.
A clear, deep voice came from behind Lei Shen:
"Leng's Bank is honest and trustworthy, Brother Lei, would you like to consider it?"
Lei Shen smiled and looked at Li Chi: "Dear host, is this kind of lending behavior permitted by the program team?"
Li Chi: "We will not prevent guests from trading stars, after all, this is a free and open variety show."
"How about it, Brother Lei?" Leng Zhi said with a smile, "Two stars. Tomorrow you only need to pay me three more gold coins, which is much more cost-effective than Le Xinzhou's rate."
Lei Shen took a deep breath, silently repeated "mind your image" three times in his mind, and gritted his teeth to agree: "Okay, I will definitely pay back the principal and interest tomorrow."
He emphasized the words "principal and interest" heavily, his heart bleeding.
We absolutely have to get first place tomorrow.
Leng Zhi readily took two badges from Jiang Mingzhe's chest and handed them to Lei Xixi: "Deal!"
Next came dinner time. With today's experience, all the guests began to save their money, only buying the 3-gold-coin children's meal and ignoring the other menu items.
As everyone was preparing to choose their rooms for the night, Li Chi mysteriously raised his finger, making a shushing gesture.
"There are special rules for the rooms tonight. The good news is that no one needs to use up their stars."
[Hahaha, Lei Shen just borrowed those stars, now he doesn't need them anymore.]
[I paid such high interest for nothing]
[Let's order something nice, two stars can last until tomorrow night!]
Judging from Lei Shen's expression, this is probably not good news.
Lei Shen, who was so angry that he wanted to tear a single gold coin in half, laughed in exasperation.
You should have said so earlier! Borrowing just one star would have saved you interest!
Li Chi continued reading the rules: "Tonight we will all sleep on a large communal bed! The crawling mats we found during the day are the space each guest can have. Considering the distinction between male and female guests, we will use a screen in the middle to separate them."
Shaoqi was puzzled: "A dormitory-style room?"
Le Xinzhou explained, "It means everyone sleeps in one room. Many agritainment venues offer this kind of experience, where everyone sleeps in a row and chats together until they all fall asleep."
Yun Jingcheng, who came from a talent show, once participated in such team-building activities with his teammates and recalled the experience: "Yes, I once slept in a dormitory with my teammates, which was quite fun!"
Li Chi also breathed a sigh of relief—the guests were used to being pampered, and he was initially worried that some of them would not cooperate with the program's arrangement, but fortunately, the guests seemed to be very interested in it.
He continued, "While everyone is having dinner, the staff has thoroughly disinfected the play mats and set up the rooms for everyone. Please follow me!"
After saying that, he took out a small, colorful flag from his pocket, held it high, and walked out, looking just like a tour guide.
-
The dormitory-style room was converted from a small auditorium. Fifty-four playmats were arranged in the order the guests received them, and mattresses and pillows were placed according to the number of playmats each person had.
Le Duoduo exclaimed, "Wow! This...this is way too big!"
The entire sleeping area was visibly divided into two sections—the one for the Cold Treatment team and the one for those who weren't Cold Treatment.
This was not unexpected. Leng Zhi found twenty-eight crawling mats on his own, which was almost the total number of everyone else combined. According to the rules announced by Li Chi, he would have half of the area on the large communal bed.
"My goodness, you could practically have Xiao Mingzhe rolling around on it like that," Le Xinzhou murmured.
He only had space for eight playmats, but fortunately the playmats were large enough to fit him and Duoduo's two blankets, one big and one small.
The children were fascinated by the experience of staying together, and before the adults could even finish lamenting the unequal distribution of space, they had already jumped onto the mats and started running around like crazy.
Jiang Mingzhe adopted the air of a mountain king: "This is my father's territory, you all have to listen to me!"
Unfortunately, his voice was quickly drowned out by the cheers of the other kids during their pillow fight.
The next second, he had to forget his mountain king persona and was forced to join everyone's pillow fight.
The kids quickly ended their fight—they were held down one by one by their parents.
After all, they had just eaten dinner. If we let them move around freely, it would be troublesome if something happened to them.
Yun Jingcheng held Xiaoyu's hand and said gently, "You're the big brother, so let's play some gentle games together, okay?"
The obedient Xiaoyu nodded vigorously: "Okay~"
He raised his hand, gesturing to the other kids: "Shall we play a game together?"
Seeing that none of the kids objected, Xiaoyu tilted his head and started thinking about what they could play: "Hmm, we can play word chain! We can also play fruit squat! What do you want to play?"
Jiang Mingzhe blinked, a brilliant idea flashing in his mind. He held up his little genius watch: "Let's have a competition of the games inside the watch!"
The games on the watch are a hot topic among kindergarten kids these days, and the other five- or six-year-olds immediately became interested and started discussing them excitedly.
"I'm really good! If it weren't for the watch limiting me to two games a day, I would definitely be number one in my class."
"Let's compare scores, who's higher?"
"Tch, let's compete then!"
It wasn't until Shao Youyou took out a phone from her pocket and waved it in front of the kids that they finally quieted down.
A mobile phone!
If there were a hierarchy of games for kids, mobile games would definitely be at the top, because parents generally don't allow their children to become addicted to mobile games.
This scarcity elevates the status of mobile games.
Shao Youyou whetted everyone's appetite before slowly saying, "What's a watch? I have my own cell phone."
She opened her phone's home screen, tapped a flashy app icon, and, accompanied by the game's launch sound effects, exclaimed loudly, "You guys have definitely never played this before! This is the most popular game among elementary school students—"
Leng Zhi listened silently to the game's sound effects and felt they sounded somewhat familiar.
I think I just heard that yesterday.
Then, he heard Shao Youyou pronounce the game's name:
"DiYao Mobile Version!"
Leng Zhi: "...?"
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