Chapter 31: Message

Chapter 31: Message

Mr. Deng still wanted to ask Xing Ye where the video came from, how they suddenly got another teammate, and whether or not she could be trusted.

But before he had the chance, Xing Ye had clicked through the memory card to find a hidden file and played it. Mr. Deng could only close his mouth and patiently watch through the whole video to ask afterwards.

The video swayed for a few seconds before the male teacher in Room 404’s face popped up. He adjusted the camera before leaving with a mischievous laugh.

After he left, the three could see the scene the male teacher had blocked earlier. It was a dressing room.

“It’s the girls’ dressing room.” Mr. Deng said, “Gym’s divided between separate genders. Before the girls attend class, they would go here to change into gym clothes. That male teacher’s the current grade head of the third years, yet he’s actually secretly recording the girls’ dressing room. Seriously, how disgusting.”

“Yeah, if only everybody thought like you.” Xing Ye said in agreement.

Cao Qian glanced at Xing Ye, but as usual, showed no interest and focused on watching the video.

Right now, there was nobody in the dressing room. Xing Ye changed the video speed to 16x and after an hour passed in the video, a girl finally appeared.

She was dressed in sportswear and had gloves on. She used a key to open the locker, taking out a watch and putting it into another locker without a lock before tightly locking it back up. She put the key beside the watch and silently left the dressing room.

Five minutes later, a group of girls walked in, chattering. They were just about to change when a clearly rich-born girl piped up, her voice confused. “Where did my key go?”

“We’re just changing clothes, what would you need a key for?” Her classmate said.

“My dad gave me a Patek Philippe watch worth millions for my birthday yesterday and I accidentally brought it to school, so I locked it in my locker before I changed.” The gaudy looking girl said.

Even if she was rich, losing the watch before she could show it off sucked.

“Maybe you accidentally dropped it during gym? Let’s stop changing and go find it.” Her classmate said.

While they were clamouring around, another beautiful but rather unconfident looking girl opened her own locker. In there, sat the watch and key.

The glamorous looking girl snatched back the watch and ruthlessly gave the pretty girl a slap, “How dare you steal my things? Let’s see how long you end up in prison when I sue you for this!”

“I-I didn’t…” The beautiful girl’s face was flustered. Her pair of large eyes seemed to be able to speak, starting to overflow with tears.

Strictly speaking, her beauty was just about equal to the glamorous looking girl. However, superficial men would often prefer a delicate, soft little rabbit-like beauty like her over the arrogant and headstrong girl.

They fought for a while longer until the teacher finally called everybody to go, retrieving the video camera while he was at it.

Girl A snuck into the locker room while nobody was there and used the key she got from who knows where to take Girl B’s watch and put it in Girl C’s locker. It was obvious what she was doing, framing Girl C while she herself just watched from the sidelines.

The Fly, the male teacher, knew the truth and could clearly say it, but didn’t want to be blamed for setting up a spy cam in the girls’ locker room. Thus, he could only keep silent.

“Have you memorized the three’s appearances?” Xing Ye asked.

“They’re all very pretty so it’s easy to remember.” Cao Qian nodded.

Mr. Deng also nodded.

“Girls B and C are probably already dead while A’s still alive.”

They might already be in Year 3 Class 3, about to take the college exam and graduate.

“I can check the office where the student profiles are. I’m a teacher, so I have more access than students.” Mr. Deng said.

Xing Ye glanced at him before swiftly finding a part in the video with all three girls’ faces, taking a screenshot and logging on to Wechat on the computer. He sent the photo to the group chat and typed: I want to know everything about these three girls within the hour. I’ll give whoever provides the information 10,000. If somebody knows them but doesn't dare to say, bring them to me. If anyone has their specific address or other information where I can contact her from, I’ll award an extra 5k.

Mr. Deng: “...”

“Now we can just wait, it probably won't even be half an hour before somebody contacts me with information. Oh but first, I have to buy a new phone. The computer’s too inconvenient.”

Cao Qian: “...”

“What happened to your phone?” Mr. Deng asked.

“Accidentally dropped it.” Xing Ye pointed down for Mr. Deng to see.

Mr. Deng’s legs immediately went soft, cold sweat beading on his forehead as he waved his hands, “No, no, no, I’m really too scared of heights, I can’t look down. You’re too careless, with how important your phone is, dropping it would be really inconvenient.”

“It’s fine, I’ll just buy a new one.” Xing Ye said casually, “Even if the school doesn’t sell them, I can just buy one from a classmate. I’m sure there’s plenty willing to sell to me.”

Mr. Deng thought of the text Xing Ye sent out earlier and wiped the sweat off his forehead, nodding, “True. If I didn’t need my phone, I would also want to sell you it.”

From that, XIng Ye could tell that Mr. Deng knew it didn’t matter if his phone was broken. “Mr. Deng, let’s trade information while there’s nobody else on the rooftops. That way, it’ll be more convenient to work together and fight.

“I’m sorry. Yesterday, I was on my guard against you and deceived you by putting up a strong front. In fact, I’m not a high level player, but a novice player. Cao Qian and I both just finished the novice world and we’re from the opposing fate camp.”

“Huh?” Mr. Deng was dumbstruck, “Then will we be fine as all new players?”

“The remaining four players all seem to be veteran players. Yesterday, we fought and killed one of them. It took the only two special QR codes I had as well as all of Cao Qian’s special ability to beat her. She was our class’s Ms. Li. She had over 30,000 points and was also very strong, but not undefeatable. As long as we’re prepared, there’s hope.” Xing Ye said, “So, I want to see your QR codes and draw up a plan to defeat the remaining three players.”

"Ms. Li?" Mr. Deng thought for a moment, "Oh, the year two English teacher. I heard she resigned yesterday and your grade’s still looking for a new homeroom teacher now. For now, the math teacher’s going to substitute for her. So she was actually a player and the reason for her sudden resignation was because you two killed her…”

It seems that the system would automatically remedy the aftermaths after players fight. That’s why no police came after Ms. Li’s death and why Cao Qian didn’t seem the slightest bit worried.

But it’d be a completely different matter if ordinary people were killed.

“To make sure we can all trust one another, I want each of us to share our basic information. Cao Qian, you go first.” Xing Ye signalled Cao Qian with his eyes.

Cao Qian still remembered what Xing Ye said yesterday about not trusting Mr. Deng, who would give over a QR code so easily. How come now...

She thought back to Xing Ye’s words and tried to think for herself, but even after a while, she still couldn’t understand. However, she still listened to him and showed the information on her phone screen.

“Cao Qian, opposing fate camp. I have 1100 points, soon to become 1000 because 100 needs to be consumed to sustain my initial skills, superhuman strength and agility. I have no special QR codes and just have a prop-type Hundred Shot Gun. There’s ten bullets with a guaranteed accuracy of 100%, 4 of which I’ve already used. The rest have a hit rate of 20-50%, and I don’t think that it’ll be able to hit with my luck, so they’re basically useless. I was the one who killed Li Hong and this is her death information.”

Cao Qian was an honest person. Since Xing Ye told her to say it, she wouldn’t hold anything back. Her phone screen proved everything she said was true. When Mr. Deng saw how penniless Cao Qian was, his face distorted.

Xing Ye then introduced himself. “Xing Ye, with 200 points. I’ve never used my starting skills before. They’re just growing abnormally long legs and large lungs, so it looks like they let me jump higher and hold my breath for longer. It’s not very useful. I only had the QR code you gave me earlier, which is already used.”

He lied without even blinking as he frantically tapped around his wristband’s interface to no avail. “How do you show your profile to others with this?”

“You can’t when it’s a wristband. It’ll only work when it’s on your phone, so you’d better buy a new one quickly.” Cao Qian said.

Xing Ye spoke to Mr. Deng. “Mr. Deng, we’ve already proved our sincerity. If you want to cooperate with us, let us see your profile. If you’re not willing, our cooperation will end here. Cao Qian and I will just think of ways to find QR codes around the campus. There’s still a day left, so we should… be able to at least find one, right? It’s not like we’ll never be able to find one.”

“We definitely won’t be able to find one,” Cao Qian said coldly. “You really overestimate your own luck. Do you think it’s that easy to find a carefully hidden, concealed sheet with a QR code in this big-ass campus?”

Mr. Deng’s expression was very, very unsightly. Before, he was willing to work with Xing Ye’s group because he appeared very strong, but now that he knew Xing Ye had nothing, anybody in his place would be unhappy.

“If you’re willing to join us, I guarantee I’ll use my life to protect you.” Xing Ye said, “Although our luck is a little lacking, you saw our strength. We could kill a high level player like Li Hong, so as long as we have special QR codes, we’re good! Right now, Di Kuang’s side seems to have gotten a lot of clues, but that’s alright, we also have plenty. Di Kuang has three and we also has three, so as long as we can catch one of them alone, we’ll be able to win.”

Combined with Xing Ye’s current sixteen year old face, his words sounded especially stupid and hot-blooded.

Mr. Deng was so furious that his whole body trembled as he pointed at Xing Ye, “I’d be crazy to team up with two trash teammates like you! And here I was, thinking you really were a high level player and even wasted a QR code to befriend you! Who do you think you are, using those bits of information to try and trick me into revealing my personal abilities, points, and QR codes? You must be dreaming!”

With that, he left, stomping down the stairs as if he would be stopped if he was a moment slower.

He flipped his face so fast that Cao Qian was still dazed with shock.

Xing Ye didn’t chase after Mr. Deng, instead going to post something on Wechat: I need a new phone, just deliver it to me at the rooftops. I don’t care how much it is as long as it’s mostly new. I’ll buy it for 10,000, paid to whoever sends it to me first.

Cao Qian was speechless.

“Do you understand now?” Xing Ye asked.

Cao Qian pondered and said, “My data’s obvious, so even if I didn’t say it, an attentive person would be able to see through them instantly. It doesn’t matter if he knows and by doing this, we can test the character of our potential teammate to make sure he can be trusted."

Xing Ye was satisfied. “What you said was all correct, but there’s still two points. First, I told him the other group’s leader is Di Kuang, especially stressing how he was much stronger than us and had a lot of clues. Since Mr. Deng knows the three girls’ faces, he can use that along with our data and profile to get Di Kuang’s help, similar to how he tried to get my goodwill with the QR code earlier. Second, I didn’t give him my real initial skills. That way, he would confuse Di Kuang and let him relax his guard against me.

“Although he refused to be our teammate, he’s still helping us sabotage them. Providing the enemy with wrong intel is a great merit.”

Xing Ye certainly was testing Mr. Deng out earlier, but if Mr. Deng chose to overlook their situation and join hands with them anyways, Xing Ye would’ve directly revealed the truth. If he really was a man of honor, Xing Ye wouldn’t mind revealing his weaknesses to him.

Unfortunately, he wasn’t.

Xing Ye sighed, “I really hope he’s somebody who would act as they say. I know my ways are despicable, but in this sort of game, I can’t risk letting a hypocrite be part of our team.”

Cao Qian seemed to want to say something as she opened her mouth, pausing for a while before finally asking. “Are your initial skills strong enough to help us beat Di Kuang?”

“If I’m not misunderstanding my skill’s true use, it is.” Xing Ye admitted.

Kiki: Eyy, anyone expect that? Let's hear your thoughts!