Chapter 43: The Ghost King and the Poor Student 08

After three days and two nights of hard work, by the third night, Tang Bin and Cheng Hongyi didn’t stay up too late and went to sleep at ten o’clock.

They had worked as much as they could, and according to Cheng Hongyi, they were likely to face a tough battle tomorrow. The past two days of early mornings and late nights working as carpenters had really worn them out, so that night, Tang Bin slept deeply.

He slept soundly until he was awakened by a piercing scream.

He was no stranger to this scream, and there was no doubt that Lao Diao and the others were up to something.

Tang Bin opened his eyes and saw that the fire in the fireplace had gone out, and the surroundings were still a little dark.

It wasn’t a pitch-black darkness where one couldn’t see their hand in front of their face, but rather a faint light coming through the window of the small cabin, as if the sky outside was beginning to brighten.

Cheng Hongyi also sat up.

The two of them exchanged a glance. Cheng Hongyi glanced at his watch, and Tang Bin leaned over to take a look. The time was 5:35 in the morning.

And the screaming continued.

The person screaming this time was a male. Tang Bin noticed that some of Lao Diao’s group had also been awakened, still in a dazed state, but Lao Diao and Zhao Xiaoguang were nowhere to be seen on their “beds.”

The voice was coming from the backyard. After exchanging another glance, Tang Bin and Cheng Hongyi got up and walked toward the backyard. As they arrived, they saw Lao Diao, Zhao Xiaoguang, and Huang Xiaomeng standing in the yard, their eyes filled with terror, but the three of them were unharmed, obviously not attacked or anything of the sort.

“What’s going on?” Tang Bin rubbed his eyes and asked.

Upon noticing their arrival, Lao Diao and the others immediately showed an unnatural expression, but this time Zhao Xiaoguang reacted more quickly. He pointed to the surroundings and said, “Didn’t you notice? All the wood we’ve been working on the past couple of days is gone! What the hell is going on?”

The disappearance of the wood not only meant that the past three days of work had been for nothing, but it also meant that their chance of escaping was likely gone!

No wonder they were screaming like that.

“Oh.” Tang Bin responded calmly, without any other reaction.

He had already discussed this issue with Cheng Hongyi before. He believed what Cheng Hongyi said was true—the wood must have been taken by the system after being counted. As for how his personal space worked, he still didn’t know.

Tang Bin showed no reaction, and Cheng Hongyi, who was usually emotionally neutral, became even more expressionless.

But their lack of reaction clearly caught the attention of the others.

Lao Diao suddenly frowned and picked up an axe from the ground, pointing it at Tang Bin and Cheng Hongyi. “Did you two secretly move the wood in the middle of the night? Speak up!”

Huang Xiaomeng quickly caught on and said, “Yeah! I remember clearly, last night we—”

She was suddenly silenced by Zhao Xiaoguang’s hand over her mouth. She didn’t finish her sentence.

However, Cheng Hongyi sneered. “So you moved the wood we processed to your side, didn’t you?”

Although Tang Bin had been asleep last night and didn’t know anything, Cheng Hongyi, for various reasons, hadn’t fallen asleep so quickly.

He hadn’t slept and hadn’t moved, and since Lao Diao and his group deliberately didn’t put too much firewood in the fireplace last night, the flames went out relatively early.

Once the fire had gone out, and Lao Diao and the others got up to do their thing, Cheng Hongyi knew exactly what had happened.

They probably thought the task settlement would end at six o’clock this morning today, and that the appearance of the so-called personal space would also occur at that time. So, they decided to get up in the middle of the night and move all the wood near them.

They didn’t even spare the properly sized, unused firewood near the fireplace.

To prevent Tang Bin and Cheng Hongyi from noticing anything while getting up in the night, Lao Diao had also organized a night watch rotation.

So, Tang Bin’s concerns the previous night were not wrong at all.

Lao Diao, Zhao Xiaoguang, and the others didn’t want them dead. It was just that the thirty pieces of properly sized wood were too tempting. If they could monopolize them, they certainly wanted to control the situation.

What no one expected was that the last shift would fall on Zhao Xiaoguang. After a brief dozing off, he turned his head, only to find the wood was gone!

When Cheng Hongyi exposed the truth, it was clear that Lao Diao and Zhao Xiaoguang were not as experienced in such tricks. Getting caught in the act of stealing made them feel embarrassed and ashamed. Lao Diao, Zhao Xiaoguang, and Huang Xiaomeng all couldn’t help but blush.

But what made them even more embarrassed came later.

Cheng Hongyi’s calm, almost monotone voice said, “You all know we have personal spaces, right? The stakes next to the fireplace that you secretly moved last night are still there, but the wood we personally worked on is missing. This means those have been counted and moved into the system’s space.”

“……”

Cheng Hongyi probably didn’t do it on purpose, but in situations like this, the more indifferent he sounded, the more his condescending attitude became apparent.

As a result, Lao Diao and the others were rendered speechless with embarrassment.

They had been caught red-handed, made a fuss without even understanding the situation, and ended up unintentionally embarrassing themselves. The three of them present, one after another, were all “team idiots.”

This was like a public execution of their intelligence.

—

“Ha!” Seeing their expressions, Tang Bin couldn’t help but laugh out loud.

Of course, he wasn’t doing it on purpose.

It was just that he had been so afraid of human society in the past, and apart from the male lead, he had never really paid attention to the people around him. Now that he wasn’t afraid anymore, watching these people relax made it actually quite interesting.

What was that saying again…? Maybe they were just there to be the comic relief.

After laughing, Tang Bin grabbed Cheng Hongyi’s wrist, wanting to check the time again.

Of the two phones they had found earlier, one was in Lao Diao’s hand, and the other had been taken by Cheng Hongyi, as he was the first to grab it, so naturally it was his. Although the phones were old and had no apps or functions, they could still be used as watches once the time was calibrated. Tang Bin had been using that phone to check the time, as well as setting a six-hour alarm for sleep.

However, they didn’t have a charger. His phone had already been turned off the night before due to the battery being low. So now, he could only rely on Cheng Hongyi’s watch.

He wanted to see how much time was left. When they passed by the kitchen on their way to the yard earlier, he noticed the bread basket hadn’t been replenished, and he wanted to know whether the system would provide them with food after the activity ended at six o’clock.

But before he could raise Cheng Hongyi’s wrist to check the time, that familiar scream came again from the cabin.

At this point, the sky was already beginning to lighten.

Tang Bin glanced at the sky one last time, feeling like something was dripping onto his face.

It was light, not heavy, but very cool.

Before he could think much about it, Cheng Hongyi grabbed his hand again and pulled him towards the house.

Lao Diao, who had been embarrassed and angry, wanting to teach the two of them a lesson, heard the noise and ran into the house as well, with Zhao Xiaoguang and Huang Xiaomeng following right behind.

The activity time was about to end, and no one knew what would happen next. The past three days had felt like the calm before a storm, and everyone had a vague sense that the real action would happen after the third day ended.

So, everyone was a little nervous.

However, once they rushed into the house, Lao Diao only saw his little brothers crouching by the window, jumping up and down, and he couldn’t help but shout angrily, “What the hell! Are you trying to die?!”

“Boss… boss…” One of the little brothers turned around and, without forgetting to point outside, made Lao Diao walk over to see for himself.

What he saw was exactly what his little brother had described — a world covered in silver, with snowflakes falling all around. The once green trees were no longer visible, buried under a thick layer of snow, and the world seemed to be a vast, desolate white.

The scariest part was that the snow was still falling, almost as if it were covering the entire cabin, blocking their view.

“What’s going on?!” Lao Diao asked in shock.

He had just been outside in the yard, which was open-air, and he hadn’t felt a single bit of cold or seen snowflakes!

“I don’t know…” One of the younger brothers, who had noticed the change outside first, stammered, “I swear, when I woke up, it wasn’t snowing. I just blinked…”

At this moment, everyone instinctively looked toward Cheng Hongyi, who seemed to be the one who understood the situation best.

Cheng Hongyi glanced at his watch, and his indifferent voice rang out: “It’s six o’clock.”

It’s six o’clock.

Time was up.

Almost everyone simultaneously remembered the “story” the phone had told them last time they were in the room — that winter was coming, and they had to leave immediately…

“We’ll leave now,” Cheng Hongyi was the quickest to react. As he spoke, he was already pulling Tang Bin towards the cabin’s door.

“Wait!”

Tang Bin gently pulled his wrist free from Cheng Hongyi’s grip and ran back to grab the school jackets they had taken off before going to sleep. The snow outside was cold, and although he wasn’t sure if the two fall school uniforms would be enough to protect them from the harsh cold, he figured it was better than nothing.

But Cheng Hongyi wasn’t slow either. In the brief moment, he had already opened the cabin’s wooden door, and a gust of cold wind, carrying snowflakes, blew into the room. The remaining people inside shivered and hurriedly packed their things.

Although they didn’t have much gear, Lao Diao’s little brothers didn’t know that the wood had already been automatically collected by the system, so they were still somewhat confused. Meanwhile, Lao Diao and Zhao Xiaoguang, wanting to grab axes for protection, had delayed their departure a little.

By the time they rushed out of the cabin, Tang Bin and Cheng Hongyi were nowhere to be seen.

“Damn, they run faster than rabbits,” Zhao Xiaoguang cursed as he watched the snowflakes swirl in the air.

“…Which way should we go?” One of Lao Diao’s little brothers asked, lost and helpless.

“They went that way! Let’s hurry and catch up!” Yang Yi, who had been watching Cheng Hongyi, urged anxiously.

“We’ll go that way, towards the mountain base! To the riverbank!” Lao Diao shouted, leading the way. This time, his intelligence finally kicked in, remembering the message from the phone, and realizing the ultimate goal was to cross the river.

Only then did everyone scramble to push their way out of the cabin.

Up until this point, their fear was still rooted in losing Cheng Hongyi, who had been guiding them. They hadn’t yet realized how terrifying the snowstorm and being trapped in the mountains could be, as mentioned by the phone.

But while they hadn’t realized it yet, Tang Bin already had.

After he and Cheng Hongyi put on their jackets, they were dragged along in a rush. The snow was falling heavily, and it was hard to walk, with deep and shallow patches—more difficult than the grassy fields below. But for some reason, Cheng Hongyi seemed especially anxious, more so than ever before, as though every second mattered.

The snow was so heavy, each flake was about the size of a fingernail, and they hit his face as they flew by, making it impossible for Tang Bin to even open his eyes properly.

Fortunately, Cheng Hongyi was running ahead of him, so he didn’t need to worry about finding the way. But still, it was painful for Tang Bin.

The only relief was that they kept running, and though his skin felt numb from the cold, he didn’t actually feel too cold.

At least, if they kept running, they wouldn’t freeze to death on the mountain…

Tang Bin thought.

He didn’t know how long they had been running, but his lungs felt like they were about to burst. When he lifted his head again, he suddenly realized his vision had cleared.

—Somehow, the snow didn’t seem as heavy anymore.

It had shifted from large flakes to smaller snow pellets, and the intensity of the snowfall had noticeably decreased. Even the wind wasn’t as strong anymore.

“We’re almost at the base of the mountain,” he heard Cheng Hongyi say.

The wind had been so loud earlier that even though they were running into it and Cheng Hongyi was ahead of him, Tang Bin couldn’t hear what he was saying.

Now that his vision had cleared, the urgent feeling was gone, and Cheng Hongyi’s pace gradually slowed down.

But he didn’t stop. Despite sounding out of breath, which indicated he was tired, he kept going.

Tang Bin was curious but couldn’t ask anything at the moment.

—He was panting like crazy, unable to speak.

However, Cheng Hongyi managed to speak. “Looks like we’ve run through the blizzard.”

Tang Bin: “???”

Cheng Hongyi paused for a moment, and then the two of them kept moving quickly through the mountain forest. The intensity was much lower than before. After a while, they both began to recover, and Cheng Hongyi finally explained:

“According to what that student said earlier, the blizzard appeared in an instant, and the snow was very deep. This clearly defies natural laws. Considering that our roles are those of hunters trying to escape the snow, I suspect the blizzard started at the mountain top. If we hadn’t run out in time, we could have frozen to death up there.”

Tang Bin glanced at his thin clothes and felt that Cheng Hongyi’s explanation made sense.

But having experienced more worlds, his perspective on the setting was a bit different from Cheng Hongyi’s. “But what if this is part of the setup? What I mean is, maybe once it’s six o’clock, the scene will automatically switch…”

Tang Bin wasn’t trying to argue, he was genuinely asking Cheng Hongyi this question with a curious mindset.

After all, being in this “mission within a mission” had piqued his interest in the system itself, and he couldn’t help but want to explore the meaning of the world and the task they were in, which made him ask more questions.

“You might be right,” Cheng Hongyi said, giving him a brief but approving glance. It was a quick look, but Tang Bin saw it.

He inexplicably felt a sense of validation, and it made him quite excited. Just then, Cheng Hongyi said, “In a situation where both possibilities exist, the only way to determine which one is correct is to keep running down the mountain. The most important thing is, if your scenario is true, then by running down the mountain, we’ll just be a bit tired, but there won’t be much of a loss. But if it’s the first scenario, we’ll…”

“We’ll be trapped on the mountain. The snow will just keep getting worse…” Tang Bin murmured, and then fell silent.

He had only thought of the first scenario, but from Cheng Hongyi’s tone, it was clear that the moment he saw the snow, he had already thought of both possibilities! And he had even come up with the best solution!

Tang Bin was so shocked that for several seconds, his mouth was stuck in the shape of an “O,” and he couldn’t close it.

As a result, he accidentally inhaled a gust of cold wind. “Cough, cough, cough!”

There was no denying it, even Cheng Hongyi was amused by him.

Or rather, no one could resist the pure admiration in his gaze.

So, when Tang Bin coughed, Cheng Hongyi didn’t have time to check, and he didn’t realize that, in that instant, his favorability score had almost shot up from 10 to over 90, nearly reaching 100.

Although it was only a brief moment, by the time Tang Bin looked up again, the favorability had returned to its original value.

Cheng Hongyi’s smile had faded.

He had been walking while talking to Tang Bin and had naturally noticed that the cold wind mixed with heavy snowflakes was rapidly approaching from behind them.

Cheng Hongyi furrowed his brow. He knew that the only way to escape this damn snowstorm was to keep running—straight to the riverbank.