Chapter 66 Live-Fed Park - The Third Game

Late at night, the moonlight shone on the rippling water outside the window. Water droplets, stirred up by the heavy rain, occasionally danced gracefully in the moonlight. If she hadn't known it was standing water, Bai Xiao would have truly felt that this scenery possessed a unique kind of beauty.

“Welcome to Hunting Ground No. 95. Player qualification verification in progress. Game ID 526. Qualification confirmed. Game loading. Players, please prepare. Countdown ten seconds: 9, 8, 7... 3, 2, 1.”

Ding—

Before the game sound rang out, she was still clearly counting down in her mind.

The familiar darkness didn't come?

What did that sentence mean? Why would she think that? She looked up at the ceiling; the lights were very bright. Where was it dark?

For some reason, her mind felt muddled, and some strange sounds lingered in her head. It seemed a segment of memory was gradually being sealed away, while another was being forcefully loaded.

Bang, bang, bang. The sound of knocking on an iron door came, and a person in a dark blue uniform and a mask roared unhappily at them through a crack in the iron door.

“Numbers 526, 735, 1107, 21533, why haven't you finished the milk on the table? What are you waiting for!”

It was the voice of a strict woman.

Bai Xiao, or rather, she only knew herself as Number 526 now. She reflexively raised her cup and quickly drank the last gulp of milk.

“Very good, well done. Lights out soon, hurry to bed.” The woman watched with satisfaction as the four of them drank every last drop of milk. She pointed to the beds, signaling them to quickly go to sleep.

Bai Xiao returned to her bed. How strange, she actually knew which of the four beds was hers. Even stranger, she wondered why she felt strange about knowing which bed was hers.

She got into bed, pulled up the covers. The lights hadn't been turned off yet. She stared blankly at the room, which felt both familiar and strange.

The room's furnishings were very simple: four beds, two against each wall, and a long table in the middle of the four beds. There was a long bench on each side of the table, and only four empty milk cups on the table.

No need to wash up before bed? What did “wash up” mean? Another new term.

With such strange and unfamiliar thoughts, her vision slowly plunged into darkness.

Cold!

Who was spraying water on her?

Pain!

Who was hitting and poking her?

She really wanted to open her eyes, but her eyelids seemed glued shut.

Ring, ring, ring—

“Wake up, wake up! Class at eight o'clock, don't be late.”

It was still a woman's voice. She shouted down the corridor. As she walked, she tapped on her tablet as she passed each room, and the corresponding room door would open.

She didn't know what she had done last night, but her body still felt cold, and her arms were a little numb. Bai Xiao followed her three roommates out the door, skillfully lining up one by one next to the door.

The long corridor had so many rooms that the end was out of sight. The number of people standing outside each room varied: some had two, some four, some six, and some eight.

Besides the different number of people per room, the biggest difference was their clothes. Those in two- and four-person rooms wore uniform light gray athletic suits, while those in six- and eight-person rooms wore dark gray athletic suits.

Soon, a loud, clear whistle sounded. Her body moved at the sound of the whistle, turning right without any conscious thought. Everyone else, like her, uniformly turned right or left, slowly forming two long lines, one going upstairs and one going downstairs.

Bai Xiao observed that the line going downstairs had many people; they were all from six- and eight-person rooms. Her own line had fewer people; they were all from two- and four-person rooms.

Everyone seemed to know which room they should go to upstairs and that this was music class.

Once they were seated, class began. There was no teacher, only a person dressed similarly to the dormitory Administrator playing music. The music was soothing and pleasant.

No one spoke; they just listened to the music. Several beautiful pieces of different styles played on a loop, making Bai Xiao feel drowsy.

Slap!

A ruler mercilessly struck her back. She instantly woke up, her body immediately sitting upright.

It was the person playing the music who had just hit her. After hitting her, that person didn't pay any more attention. He didn't care that he had hit someone, continuing to patrol up and down the rows of desks. He hit anyone he saw dozing off with the ruler, without holding back at all.

She should feel angry, she thought to herself. Her hands had also twitched when she was hit just now; an intense urge to strike back almost broke through her brain's control.

She truly felt that with her abilities, beating up the person with the ruler wouldn't be a problem. Why had she felt an involuntary fear just now? Why did she shrink back? It felt as if she had been hit by a ruler many times, from a long time ago.

Ring, ring, ring—

The long music class finally ended. There was no break; they were led downstairs by these dark blue uniformed Administrators.

During the break, Bai Xiao felt truly amazing. Since last night, how had she suddenly come up with so many interesting words to describe certain things or events?

This class was physical education. Only after coming downstairs did she realize that this building had a total of five floors. The top floor's purpose was unknown, the fourth floor was where the previous class was held, the Third Floor was for accommodation, the second floor was probably where the six- and eight-person rooms had their classes, and the First Floor was unknown, but there was a faint smell of food, so it was likely the cafeteria.

Downstairs was a super large lawn. The outermost part of the lawn was a running track, and beyond that was a tall wall. There was a thick iron gate in the middle of the wall.

The wall was so high that she couldn't see the outside world at all from within. She really wanted to go see it.

Ah, darn it, how could she be curious about the world outside the wall?

Two voices fought in her mind.

“Gather! Still divide into two teams, two- and four-person rooms, and six- and eight-person rooms, and stand in formation!”

Before she could sort out why there were two completely different voices in her mind, another group of blue-clad Administrators appeared. They forcibly divided the crowd into two teams: one team began jogging around the track, while the other team lay down on the lawn in order, sometimes on their fronts, sometimes on their backs, like pancakes, needing to be sunned on both sides.

If they couldn't run, they would be hit with a ruler. As for the force of the blows, Bai Xiao felt it was stronger than during music class, as these fierce Administrators were swinging their arms fully when they struck.

She found it very strange. It was just a steady half-hour run, why couldn't so many people do it? Running was such a simple thing. Let alone half an hour, she felt like she could run for two hours without a problem.

For some, half an hour passed quickly; for others, it felt like a year per second.

Soon the two teams switched. The sun was very glaring today. She hadn't felt very hot while running, but she didn't know why, when lying still, she felt like her face was going to dry out from the sun.

Why was time passing so slowly? Hurry up and sun my back; I'd rather be running...

Bai Xiao thought painfully.

Thus, one team ran for half an hour, and the other team sunned for half an hour. This was repeated twice, and finally, class was over.

Ding-a-ling, ding-a-ling, ding-a-ling—

This was the dinner bell. For everyone, this sound was simply heavenly.