Chapter 123
Because they had something on their minds, everyone woke up early the next day. The first thing they did was to run out to see what was happening. Although the dust had not dissipated, visibility was already very high. Everyone shouted excitedly. Even Liman, who had been targeting Chu Huaiqin and the others, almost ran over to hug Chu Huaiqin, but was glared back by Xia En.
Visibility improved, and although there were still some obstacles to departure, it was no longer a problem.
Chu Huaiqin and his team cooked the last bit of cactus, leaving behind a half-shell of rabbit meat for lunch. Lin Zhinan took over the cooking while Chu Huaiqin and Xia Entang studied the map. The dust had almost completely dissipated, and it might disappear with the sun.
With this mentality, the crowd did not move even after breakfast, and sat there waiting. They waited and waited until seven o'clock, but the dust still did not disperse, the sky was gloomy, and everyone was in panic. Will the sandstorm come again?
But there was no other way now. If they waited any longer, they would not be able to reach the next food point and would go hungry again.
A dozen or so teams discussed their plans and set off one after another.
The dust was blinding, and maps were useless. The only tool anyone had for determining direction was a compass. Starting at seven in the morning, they followed the compass's direction. At noon, everyone stopped to rest.
Some ate food prepared in the morning, while others cooked it fresh. There wasn't much food left, and this meal had taken up almost everything they had. However, as they were getting closer to the food point on the map, the group wasn't too worried.
"It looks like we can reach the next food point before two o'clock in the afternoon." Will Smith was in a good mood. Now that Liman was no longer causing trouble, he was still quite relieved.
"If we weren't walking so slowly, we would have arrived at noon." Phil curled his lips, lay on the ground looking at the gray sky, and snorted in annoyance.
"Be patient!" Will Smith advised.
He now only hoped that the dust would disappear tomorrow so that he could continue walking. After all, there was not enough food or water now.
"Brother, are they all cooked?" Lin Zhinan took out the remaining half-shell rabbit meat, which was smoked black. Because it was smoked for a short time, the meat could not be kept for long.
"Cook it all, but eat half and leave the other half." Chu Huaiqin was a cautious person. Now that Fu Chen hadn't left, he had to prepare for the worst.
"Okay." Lin Zhinan nodded and ran to pull up two onions to eat with the rabbit meat. Now they have a lot of water equipment, so they are not stingy with water.
Forty minutes later, the aroma of stewed rabbit meat came out again. The other teams drooled at the smell and cursed Chu Huaiqin in their hearts again.
After the five of them finished eating, some of the other teams had already set off. Chu Huaiqin and his team were at the end, a long way behind. Chu Huaiqin didn't intend to catch up, but followed slowly.
Above the vast dust, the drone was still flying. The audience in the live broadcast room was looking down from a high altitude. Seeing a group of small people walking forward slowly, their hearts were slightly touched.
At this moment, they clearly realized that human beings are so insignificant in the face of nature.
Everyone worked hard and by two o'clock in the afternoon, they should have reached the food point on the map. However, when someone compared the map, they found it was different.
For a moment, panic surged in everyone's heart, and they asked others what was going on, but in fact there was no need to ask, they were lost.
"We shouldn't have set out on such a dusty day." Someone growled.
"Yes, who was it, who suggested it?" When people are afraid, they want to find an outlet. This question is obviously meant to cause trouble.
But it’s hard to say who made the decision to set off. Come to think of it, it seemed as if we all left without any prior agreement.
"Brother, what should I do?" Lin Zhinan looked at the compass needle, which should have pointed southwest but was now pointing west, and she felt like crying. She had clearly checked the needle from time to time, so how could the direction suddenly be wrong?
"Xia Entang, map." Chu Huaiqin glanced at the compass, took the map Xia Entang handed over, and his eyes wandered over it. "We should be off track for no more than half an hour, but we don't recommend going any further now."
Chu Huaiqin placed his hopes on tomorrow.
"You're not leaving? Are you staying here to die?" Daley, the star of the Auntie team, looked at Chu Huaiqin in disbelief, thinking that this guy was simply stupid. "We must have strayed a lot from our original route. It's only two o'clock in the afternoon. I suggest you go back."
"We also suggest turning back," the sheep team said. They were running out of food and needed to restock. Having lived in the desert since childhood, they were more acclimated to the weather than anyone else, so they still had plenty of stamina and could easily walk for a few more hours.
"I," the Double Eagles looked at Chu Huaiqin and the others, "we decided to stay and see."
"Let's go."
"We'll stay."
Slowly, the team split into two factions. The ones left were Chu Huaiqin's team, the Double Eagle team, and the Maozi team. The others all agreed to go back half an hour, return to the place where they had not gone astray, and change direction.
"Safe." The people from the sheep team and the camel team bumped fists with Chu Huaiqin, waved their hands, and left with their backpacks.
"It's good that you stayed. You might go hungry." Chu Huaiqin looked at the people from the Double Eagles team.
"Well," the captain of the Double Eagles touched his nose embarrassedly, "they all think you're pretty lucky."
Chu Huaiqin: ...
Live broadcast room: ...
"Pfft, dear brother, are you being treated as a mascot?"
"Is it good to stay? If the dust doesn't clear by tomorrow, and I don't hurry back now while I still remember the way I came, I might not be able to find my way tomorrow."
"It's okay. Look, my brother is drawing arrows on the ground."
It was only two o'clock in the afternoon. They didn't want to go back, nor did they dare to walk around. So they simply set up camp on the spot and took a nap.
Live broadcast room: So calm.
The people returning gradually disappeared in the gray dust. They walked according to the direction they remembered and the compass, but after half an hour, an hour, when the compass still pointed to the west, everyone panicked. What should they do?
Chu Huaiqin slept until almost six o'clock, as if he had made up for all the sleep he had gotten during this period. His body felt so relaxed that he seemed like he could jump into the sky.
However, the mind is never very clear when taking a nap in the afternoon, and the same goes for Chu Huaiqin. When he came out with squinting eyes and yawning, Lin Zhinan was cooking and Xia En was studying a map.
Chu Huaiqin walked over to him and sat down, then asked, "Do you feel that the dust has faded a little?"
"Well, they should be able to disperse tomorrow." Xia Entang put the map away and stuffed it into his pocket unnaturally. He opened his mouth and muttered, "It's getting dark."
Chu Huaiqin: "What?"
Xia Entang turned his head away and said, "Nothing."
"Brother, it's time to eat." Lin Zhinan shouted.
Actually, all the food tonight was left over from the afternoon. There wasn't much to share between the five of us, but it was enough to fill our stomachs. The Twin Eagles and the Maozi team also left something, but that was their last meal. The livestream was filled with heartache and worry, and one fan after another rushed to the forums outside to post messages, praying for good weather tomorrow.
Fans of "Star Wars": God, please keep it cloudy and have sandstorms tomorrow, and get them out. God, none of the people here are suitable for filming "Star Wars".
Phil fans: Nonsense, our Phil can film the second-generation president, Caesar, who is known as the guardian of the empire.
Daley fans: Our Daley can play Ace, the man who narrowly escaped the presidency of the founding fathers. That presidency should have been his.
Shane fans: Ahhhh, our Shane can play the commander-in-chief.
"Star Wars" fans: Get out of here!
Chu Huaiqin fans: Fortunately we remained silent.
The group of people had eaten and drunk their fill and had slept for a while in the afternoon. Now they couldn't fall asleep at all, so they simply lay in the tent, stuck their heads outside, pulled down the chain and fastened it around their necks, wearing masks and looking at the sky while chatting.
The three teams were not far from each other. After introducing themselves, they began chatting. The Maozi team had three celebrities and two twins who were amateurs. The Twin Eagles team had four celebrities and one amateur. It seemed that compared to the American team, they were more reliable. At least they were really participating in the show, not for other purposes.
"Chu, your kung fu is very good. Have you been practicing since you were a child?" asked Andre, the captain of the Russian team. He is also a star, but the entertainment industry in the Russian team's country is not very developed, so there are not many fans.
"Yes, I've been practicing since I was a kid," Chu Huaiqin replied. Because of his unique physique, he originally practiced to strengthen himself, but he never expected it to become a money-making tool. If his grandfather knew about this, he would definitely chase him down with a cane.
"That's amazing! Most people practice martial arts to keep fit, but you look more like a professional martial artist." The people from the Maozi team exclaimed in amazement. They also watched the battle where Chu Huaiqin taught Ford a lesson. It was really awesome.
"Well, I also did it for fitness." Chu Huaiqin said with a smile.
He was born in poor health, and grew up to be sick frequently. So his grandfather found a martial arts master to teach him martial arts. When he first started learning martial arts, the master said that he had a talent for martial arts, but his attacks were too brutal, and he only wanted to practice ruthless moves. This made the master very worried. If Chu Huaiqin had bad intentions in the future, he would be a disaster. The master was reluctant to continue teaching, but it was only after Chu Huaiqin's grandfather interceded that he reluctantly agreed to continue teaching.
However, his master said that one should practice Zen first before practicing martial arts, and he could continue to do so while Chu Huaiqin studied Buddhism. Therefore, Chu Huaiqin's calm temperament now was also largely due to the fact that he had copied a lot of Buddhist teachings.
"You're amazing to be able to reach this level of fitness. Your parents must have good genes." The people from the Maozi team praised.
Chu Huaiqin: ...
"Okay, let's stop chatting. Aren't you tired of chatting through a mask?"
Xia Entang interrupted the conversation, unwilling to let the topic continue. As the only person who had entered Chu Huaiqin's inner world when he was a child, Xia Entang knew Chu Huaiqin's past very well.
His mother came from an aristocratic family, her grandfather a prominent figure in the Chinese art world. Chu Huaiqin's mother, nurtured by culture from a young age, was a well-behaved girl with a good family background. She knew what man she could find? Perhaps because her life had been too easy for her for the past twenty years, she took a Phoenix Man as her true love and vowed to marry into the Chen family, leaping headfirst into the fire pit that Chen had lured her into. The subsequent plot is both comical and realistic: the Phoenix Man has a true love, and Chu Huaiqin's mother, despite being the principal wife, is reviled as a mistress.
Chu Huaiqin was brought up in his maternal grandfather's home due to his poor health. When his grandfather died, he had aged considerably due to his daughter's affairs. He was unable to care for his daughter, but couldn't let go of his nephew. Remembering what Chu Huaiqin's master had said, he was afraid the ten-year-old boy would go astray. Before his death, he made Chu Huaiqin swear not to hurt anyone with force, and Chu Huaiqin agreed.
Later, Chu Huaiqin used the boxing skills he had learned to enter the ring. This could be said to be his regret, or even guilt.
Now the Russian team not only talks about martial arts, but also about genes. This is just opening up the wound!
"My genes are indeed good. I came from the Chu family." Chu Huaiqin smiled. Seeing Xia En's angry look, he remembered that the child had clenched his fists like this and said he would help him get revenge.
Chu Huaiqin's words made Xia En stunned, and he couldn't help but look at him.
"Okay, let's stop talking," Chu Huaiqin sighed, turning his gaze to the sky, "I can see the stars now."
"Really, it's stars." Lin Zhinan also saw it and said excitedly: "Brother, we will definitely find the way tomorrow."
"Well, go to bed early!" Chu Huaiqin yawned and shrank his masked head into the tent.
When Xia En saw Chu Huaiqin go in, he also retracted his head and wanted to talk to him, but he saw Chu Huaiqin took off his mask and turned to sleep with his back to him.
This was the first time the two of them had been in the same tent. For a moment, Xia En felt a little uncomfortable: Qingqing must be thinking of his grandfather.
After hesitating for a while, Xia En couldn't help but move closer and reached out to hug the curled-up person.
I secretly said in my heart: Don’t be sad, I am here.
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