Chapter 142: College Entrance Examination
Following the same flow of people, Zhang You slowly emerged from the examination room.
She placed a hand casually on her earlobe, appearing calm, her lips moving gently as she whispered, "It's me."
Beside her ear, a tiny, intermittent voice spoke, barely concealing its excitement:
"You jie! You finally contacted me! Wow, you have no idea how horrible things have happened to me..."
Zhang You's brows furrowed beneath her black-framed glasses. "What's wrong?"
"Ugh, that math test just now was so hard! So outrageous!"
Zhang You: "..."
"Oh, by the way, let's not talk about that. How are the others?" Guo Guo, on the other end of the line, suddenly sniffed and asked softly, remembering something important.
"I haven't contacted them yet."
Zhang You paused, and the crowd behind her jostled her. She didn't like being so close to strangers. However, just as her pace quickened, the flow of people around her also quickened.
They were practically sweeping her away, pushing her towards the door.
Time was limited, so Zhang You could only quickly say, "I can't leave here right now. As soon as I leave the school gate, I'll be automatically teleported to the exam room for the next subject. Luckily, the store wasn't lying; these glasses really work inside the dungeon."
Guo Guo immediately replied, "Yes, yes, yes, it's the same here. That's why I'm holding onto a pole, otherwise I'll get squeezed... Hey, hey, hey, don't squeeze me..."
Zhang You continued, "But the signal shielding inside the exam room is extremely strong, and the glasses will be ineffective. We can only contact each other from a distance after we get out, and we can't contact everyone at once; only those who are online can contact each other."
"So, if we want to contact each other, we must exit the exam at the same time and approach the gate. If not everyone is online, for example, Wanqing isn't here, it means she was either taking an exam or had some other accident."
Guo Guo was in a state of chaos. After a moment of confusion, she caught up with Zhang You's train of thought. "But our exams are scheduled at the same time. Logically, they should start and end at the same time. Oh, no, I don't know if Xinjue is awake yet. If she doesn't wake up, will her exam progress be different from ours?"
"That's what I want to tell you."
Zhang You adjusted her glasses. "I suspect our time flows differently, or perhaps our exam progress is different."
Guo Guo was stunned. Her first thought was, "If one of us finishes a section first, can we spoil the spoilers for the next person?"
"No, that's unlikely." Zhang You shook her head. "The game indicates this is a dungeon, and the setting is the college entrance examination. Don't forget, cheating is not allowed in the college entrance examination."
Besides, she didn't believe this dungeon consisted of just the college entrance examination. How could a dungeon be that simple?
Guo Guo slumped for a second before quickly rallying her spirit: "It's okay, at least there are four of us! Wanqing and Jue Shen are both top students. I'm sure they'll be fine even if they take the college entrance exam again!"
Zhang You: "...I hope so."
Then she heard Guo Guo's panicked voice: "Oh no, You jie, I'm about to be squeezed out the gate. Please contact the others first. We'll only see each other next time. Best of luck on the comprehensive exam."
Zhang You nodded silently. Just as she was about to offer a few more words, her eyes suddenly fixed, and she raised her hand to touch her glasses.
From the outside, she appeared to be wearing only a pair of unremarkable black-framed glasses. Only Zhang You could see the few lines of small characters on the glasses, the most prominent of which were the four square names.
In that instant, a name, once dull and silent in gray, flickered for a moment, then lit up.
—Tang Xinjue
Zhang You blurted out, "Xinjue is awake!"
Guo Guo: "Huh? What Jue?... Wait, Jue Shen is awake???"
Guo Guo was suddenly overcome with emotion and wanted to speak again, but all she could hear was a fragmented, clamorous sound that quickly faded away.
Zhang You looked up. The school gate was only a few steps away. She immediately tapped her lens twice, racing against time to initiate the next call.
Just one second, just enough for the other party to receive. Tang Xinjue would surely understand her.
Of course, if this didn't work, there would be another chance. As long as she was certain that Tang Xinjue was awake, a huge weight would have fallen from her heart.
She was confident that Tang Xinjue would find new clues there.
Knock, knock, knock!
Another loud knock echoed from the restroom door, accompanied by an increasing number of hurried footsteps, indicating that the number of people outside was rapidly increasing.
Tang Xinjue withdrew her gaze from her surroundings. There were still no clues here, not even on the way here, nor in the corridor.
Generally speaking, she was now in an extremely strange, yet seemingly flawless, place—in short, it looked like the dungeon was really trying to get her to take the college entrance exam.
She opened the door and walked out. Outside the restroom, the original two supervisors had swelled to over a dozen in just a few minutes, crowding the narrow room. Each one had a blank expression, as if copied and pasted, their sole purpose being to urge Tang Xinjue back to answer questions.
Tang Xinjue walked past them without noticing, washed her hands calmly, and then headed back.
This time, as if to guard against her, every classroom door in the corridor was firmly closed. A teacher stood outside, silently watching her as she passed.
Besides the clatter of footsteps, the corridor was completely silent. As she reached the door of classroom 307, Tang Xinjue suddenly smiled at the invigilator. "Teacher, is the exam discipline on this floor so good?"
No one asked questions, no one went to the restroom, no one showed any emotion other than answering questions, not even a cough.
Here, it seemed not just the invigilators were uniform and even identical.
The teacher studied her for two seconds, not seeing what she was about to do, and said coldly, "This is the college entrance examination."
Tang Xinjue shrugged and returned to her seat. She waited until the bell rang, signaling the end of the math exam, before she slowly stood up and followed the crowd out of the classroom.
If she was right, what was waiting for her at the school gate this time might be the transmission for the next English exam.
"Excuse me, classmate."
At the corner of the corridor, where it met the stairs, she suddenly reached out and put her arm around the shoulder of a passing girl, slowing her pace while talking to her.
"What's up?" The girl who was stopped had short, dyed hair. From her hairstyle to her tone, she exuded an air of flamboyance, in some ways standing out even more than Tang Xinjue in the crowd.
Tang Xinjue smiled. "Excuse me, would you like to discuss the answer to the second-to-last question?"
The girl's face dropped. "??? I don't know the answer!"
Tang Xinjue changed the subject. "I'm just kidding. Your hair looks great. I'd like to know where you dyed it. Was it the West City Barber Shop?"
The girl's expression softened slightly, but she still shook her head and mumbled, "I can't remember." Then she turned and disappeared into the crowd.
Tang Xinjue didn't even blink, naturally withdrawing her hand and continuing to survey her surroundings. A few seconds later, she stopped another person, this time a boy who looked timid and hunched.
This time, she said, "Classmate, you dropped something behind you. Is it your admission ticket?"
The boy shrank even more, trembling and waving his hands. Without even turning his head, he scurried into the crowd like a shrimp, quickly disappearing from Tang Xinjue's sight.
"...Is that so?" Tang Xinjue's eyes flickered slightly, and she continued searching for her next target.
Next, she stopped more than ten students dressed in various styles.
But no matter what topic they chose, whether they were alone or in groups, even the most talkative students would never communicate for more than two sentences before disappearing faster than bubbles on the surface of water.
"Fifteenth."
Approaching the school gate, Tang Xinjue finally withdrew and smiled at the security guard who was watching closely at the gate.
At the end of her sight, countless heads of people rushed out of the gate, becoming blurred dots against the background. But when she turned and looked back at them, rows of blank expressions resembled crude reproductions, indistinguishable from enlarged backgrounds.
As she left the exam room for the first time, she noticed that a few students still retained their individual characteristics, looking more like "people" than the NPCs. Despite their sparse and scattered numbers, they looked like the result of random beautification by a program for the sake of rationality.
When the dungeon environment, rules, and settings offer no clues, the vast and most easily overlooked NPCs may hold the most interesting secrets.
In repeated conversations, seeing these students only offer basic responses consistent with their appearance, each time being "forced offline" faster and faster, Tang Xinjue smiled.
Found it.
"Exam Room 37, 3rd Floor, turn right, classroom 307."
The middle-aged female teacher glanced at the admission ticket and gave Tang Xinjue directions.
After being forcibly transported back here for the second time, they met for the third time in the exact same place. The female teacher, however, acted as if she had never seen Tang Xinjue before and asked kindly, "Is there anything else I can help you with?"
Tang Xinjue was also very polite: "No, thank you."
"If everything’s okay, go take the exam."
The middle-aged female teacher also smiled, and an atmosphere of harmony filled the room and the outside world.
It wasn't until Tang Xinjue stepped onto the stairs that the harmonious atmosphere suddenly froze, and the temperature plummeted. "Student, your exam room is on the 3rd floor."
Tang Xinjue, already on the 2nd floor corridor, turned back nonchalantly: "Isn't this the 3rd floor? Oh, sorry, I went the wrong way."
Twenty seconds later, Tang Xinjue turned back again: "Huh? This is the 4th floor? Sorry, I was too nervous and didn't look carefully."
Before she finished her words, she calmly turned to leave, only to be stopped by a shrill voice: "The direction is up the stairs!"
Tang Xinjue shook her head: "Maybe I've studied too much. I was in room 30…?"
"—Ding-ling-ling—"
As the bell rang, signaling the start of the exam, the invigilator's face turned darker than charcoal: "307, don't go the wrong way again!"
Several supervisors had already emerged from the stairs. If this girl went the wrong way again, they would "escort" her to the exam room.
Tang Xinjue followed her steps down the stairs with complete compliance. Just as she reached the fourth floor, a faint sound glimmered at the edge of her hearing. It was the sound of something heavy falling, coming from far above and diagonally above. Almost inaudible, it was muffled by the air and the floor, yet it made Tang Xinjue look up instantly, her eyes sharp and bright.
"Teacher," she said softly, gazing at the floor above. "How many floors does our building have?"
The author has something to say: Zhang You: As long as I call Xinjue and hang up, she'll definitely understand what I mean.
Tang Xinjue: ??? Hello?
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