CH 24.3

Chapter 24 Part 3 - Weibo (3/6)

Hence, for this entire morning, Qi Xingchen was contracted to the children. It was only when Director Zhao came over to announce the mission, the children who had surrounded him in a circle finally dispersed.

“Whose turn is it?” Qi Xingchen wiped his sweat.

“It’s my turn, Teacher Xingxing,” A girl raised her hand while blushing, “there are still 8 more after me.”

“Okay, I got it. I need to go do my own job now, you all can find me again tomorrow morning. Would it be in time?”

The girl hesitated for a moment: “We have an exam at 9 am tomorrow.”

“Then we’ll have it earlier bah, find me at 5.”

Qi Xingchen set a timing, sent the children away, then assembled with the rest of the guests to listen to the instructions.

Director Zhao first teased him with a few “Teacher Xingxing”s, then raised his loudspeaker: “Everyone knows that our programme team ran into some small issues yesterday; our guest count has been adjusted back to 6 now. Hope that everyone would not be affected by this, not make any direct responses on social platforms, and continue to work as one to finish the mission every day. Next, I will announce today’s mission.”

“Today, we will be undergoing a survival challenge in the wild, all tools needed for the mission will be provided by the programme team. The requirement is—”

Director Zhao turned around, pointing behind him: “Do you see those two mountain peaks? The one on the left is called Panlong1 Mountain, while the one on the right is called Jufeng2 Mountain; you all need to find a key to clear this stage in each mountain, only then would it be considered mission accomplished.”

“The mission time limit is 24 hours, if the mission is completed before the sun sets today, it will activate the hidden reward. Information about the reward will be announced after the mission.”

Hearing the three words “mission time limit”, everyone could feel that the difficulty level of the mission this time was different from before, as there was no time limit in the past.

“A key to clear this stage?” Liu Ziyu asked, “Are they ordinary keys?”

“This will be up to you guys to discover for yourselves,” Director Zhao smiled, “In any case, it is distinctive from the items that grow on the mountains. Alright, put down your personal belongings and set off with me.”

Everyone looked at each other in dismay, then helplessly threw their backpacks into their rooms.

Panlong Mountain and Jufeng Mountain were half an hour away from Yangshan Village; to save their physical energy, Tao Tao took out 200 from their travel funds and rented two rickshaws from the villagers.

As they got closer to Panlong Mountain, everyone realised why the programme team wanted to restrict the time to 24 hours.

From a distance, these two mountains were the flattest and shortest of the nearby mountain ranges. Once they got to a closer distance and saw them in their entirety, did they realise that even if they were the shortest, they were still considerably taller than some explored mountain peaks!

Qi Xingchen glanced at Luo Qiuman from the corner of his eyes and realising that she looked slightly troubled, he asked Director Zhao, “Can I give the PASS card to other guests to use?”

Director Zhao: “Can’t do that, I had reminded you all yesterday that it must be allocated then.”

Qi Xingchen: “But……”

“It’s alright,” Luo Qiuman spoke up, “You wanted to give it to me to use, right Xingxing? Normally, I would work out often, I should be able to hang in there.”

Since Luo Qiuman had said so, everyone could only bite the bullet and head over to the production assistant to collect their tools.

The tools were in two large bags, which Zhang Yunfei opened one by one and reported: “Two tents, six trekking poles, six sun hats, one washbasin, six rice bowls, twelve chopsticks, one lighter, a switchblade, and some seasonings.”

Seeing that he had gone silent, Liu Ziyu urged, “Don’t stop, continue ah.”

“…… Nothing else,” Zhang Yunfei said, “that’s all.”

That’s all?

“That shouldn’t be bah,” Tao Tao was flabbergasted, “What about food? It’s now just ten in the morning, no matter how we climb two mountains before going back to the village, it would take almost a day, and that is if we find the keys without a hitch. If we can’t find them, we would need to spend the night on the mountain. Not eating anything for more than 10 hours is……”

Not eating anything for more than ten hours; this would be acceptable if there was no exercise done. But it goes without saying that mountain climbing was very physically demanding, wouldn’t not eating be equivalent to wanting their lives?!

Zhang Yunfei also felt that something wasn’t right: “The production assistant might have overlooked some things during preparation. I’ll go and ask.”

Five minutes later, Zhang Yunfei returned with a wooden face.

“What did he say?” Qi Xingchen asked.

Zhang Yunfei said: “Director Zhao’s exact words were: this episode is testing on wilderness survival; if even the food is provided to you all, would it be even considered a survival?”

The group of guests: “……”

Want to curse at somebody.jpg.

Zhang Yunfei could understand everyone’s feelings, so after comforting them, he said, “Why not let’s go first? After all, it’ll be useless to stay here, maybe we would even find the keys to clearing this stage a short while after we get up there.”

“Sure,” Qi Xingchen said cooperatively, “Making the next step according to the situation, when we reach the mountain there’ll definitely be salvation.” 3

Cameraman: “……How did you even come up with a complete jingle?!”

The guests were put in a better mood: “HAHAHAHA……”

Accompanied with that resounding jingle, everyone began to climb slowly up the mountain, while keeping an eye out for any objects that looked like a key in their surroundings.

Unfortunately, even until noon, there was still no sign of it.

“Yunfei-ge, is it time to take a break?” Tao Tao wiped her sweat, “We’ve been walking for three hours already.”

Luo Qiuman was also a bit out of breath, so Zhang Yunfei checked the time, “Okay, we’ll rest for an hour before we set off again. I’ll see if I can find some fruits and such to fill our stomachs.”

“Then you go find the fruit. I hear sounds of water nearby, I’ll go get some water,” Qi Xingchen said.

They let the three females wait in the shade. As Qi Xingchen took out the water basin, Bo Ye said, “I’ll go with you. The water is clear in the mountains; there might be fish.”

Qi Xingchen: “……You’re planning to catch fish? The fish in the mountains are even smarter than people; without a fishing net, it might be a bit difficult to catch them with your bare hands.”

“Why would we need to use our bare hands?” Bo Ye pulled out the switchblade from the backpack, “We can sharpen the branches and spear the fish with them.”

Qi Xingchen: “……”

Are you4 being serious? Qi Xingchen was completely speechless.

How many years had this young master Bo been brainwashed by wuxia 5 movies, to actually think that it was easier to spear a fish with a branch than to catch it with bare hands? The real idol could never be this sweet and naive6, Qi Xingchen thought silently.

But he could not bear to smash the fake idol’s wuxia dreams, and still brought Bo Ye to go with him.

On the way, when the fake idol picked up a branch as thick as his finger and sharpened it here and there like sharpening a pencil with the blade, he also did not say anything, pretending not to see it.

After walking for about twenty meters, sure enough, they did see a small stream. Not sure if they were considered lucky or not, but the stream was cut off by a fallen tree trunk, creating a shallow pond.

In the pond, there were actually large schools of carp swimming about lazily, all plump and strong, which whetted the appetite of anyone who saw them.

Bo Ye raised the branch, standing at the water’s edge to observe for a moment, then lifted his leg to step into the water.