Chapter 54: Jumping into the Sea Here, Qin Jiu calls him “Top Student,” and the system calls him “Examinee You Huo.” Yet, in this video from many years ago, he was “Examiner A.”

The moment the video flickered to life.

Qin Jiu’s first instinct was actually to check whether the charger’s plug was securely connected, lest the power cut off again halfway through.

It wasn’t until he pinched the data cable and firmly pressed it in that he suddenly paused, then let out a soft, self-deprecating chuckle.

How to put it…

If he were merely an observer right now, seeing 922 or 154 act this way, he would have definitely thought they were nervous.

In his thirty years of life, at least within the existing memories he held, this was Qin Jiu’s first experience of something like this.

And this kind of emotion came without any rhyme or reason, utterly inexplicable.

It’s just someone he rarely thinks of, who never showed his face in his memories, yet somehow…

It was as if he had been waiting a long time just to see this glimpse.

……

The video begins with quickly passing scenery, moving from an empty street to an ordinary apartment complex, then to a commercial district, and finally settling on the face of a young man.

The young man looks haggard, with heavy dark circles under his eyes, but his gaze is still bright and full of spirit.

This is Zhao Wentu, before he turned into a villager.

It wasn’t until he saw this video that Qin Jiu suddenly realized that the person who kept calling him “Brother Qin” in the diary day in and day out was a college boy who hadn’t even graduated yet.

He turned on the sound on his phone.

Zhao Wentu’s voice came through: “—I just left the apartment and came out for a walk to help digest my meal. This is the street today. I couldn’t hit a single person even if I swung a stick, not even a bird.”

The camera returns to that empty street corner.

Zhao Wentu explains, “See that? If you keep walking all the way to the end, there’s white mist. When we came out of the exam, we walked through there—through the mist and into this rest area. I’ve been wondering these past couple of days, if I walk there now and pass through the white mist again, what would I see? Would there be monsters in the mist? Or would I go back to the last round of the exam? Or maybe end up somewhere else entirely?”

The camera shakes slightly as he walks.

As he says this, the young man actually starts heading toward the direction of the white mist.

“Forget it, forget it, I’m a bit too chicken. I’ll just follow along—Huh?” Zhao Wentu, while speaking, suddenly paused in his tracks.

The camera started to shake.

“Holy crap, you scared me! Why would someone just pop out from there…” he mumbled.

Startled, he seemed to turn around and run a couple of steps.

But soon he stopped again.

“Wait, wait… that seems to be my Brother Qin!”

Zhao Wentu’s tone was somewhat cheerful.

The camera shook again, accompanied by crackling noises.

But he quickly steadied himself again.

Judging from the fleeting glimpse of branches, it seemed he had moved to the side of the road and was standing near a wall.

Zhao Wentu’s voice suddenly became clear, as if he had leaned close to the microphone and was whispering.

“Examiner A! That Examiner A is here too, standing with Qin-ge. I don’t know what they’re talking about. The apartment service desk said invigilators usually don’t come to the rest areas. This is probably the only chance I’ll have to film an invigilator… rounding it off, it’s like capturing the system itself. I hope that when I survive and pass the exam, this video won’t just turn into desert sand and swirling snowflakes.”

“Come… behold the god of plague…”

With Zhao Wentu’s words, the camera refocused on that street corner once again.

……

The originally empty spot suddenly came to life.

A car was parked by the roadside, a low-key black model that gradually aligned with the fragmented images in Qin Jiu’s memory.

Two tall men stood by the car, making the dusty newsstand not far away seem somewhat small in comparison.

However, the one on the left was a few centimeters taller, just a little bit more.

With his jacket draped over his elbow, he spoke a few words before leaning casually against the car door behind him. The top button of his shirt was undone, leaving it casually open. The sleeves rolled up his arms traced the contours of his sinews and muscles.

That was Qin Jiu from years ago—his past self.

The features of his face were unchanged, except his hair was slightly shorter, his expression more arrogant, and that lazy, arrogant aura was even more evident.

As for the person beside him…

Even from a distance through the lens, it was clear that he was an exceptionally handsome young man, with skin so pale it still dazzled the eyes even under the setting western sun.

He wore the simplest plain shirt, army-green trousers, his calves wrapped in standard-issue leather boots, long and straight. When listening to someone speak, he would always lower his eyes, cold and seemingly somewhat weary.

Like a narrow blade sheathed in a long scabbard.

This set of clothing occasionally appeared in the data left behind by the system—it was the uniform of the earliest batch of invigilators. But in those leftover images, no one had ever worn it so perfectly.

……

The phone screen flickered again, displaying a brief two-second static pattern.

Yet Qin Jiu seemed to notice nothing, his gaze nailed to it, motionless.

……

When the blurry screen dissipated, the scene within the lens gradually expanded.

Midway through filming, Zhao Wentu felt that the distance was too far to capture every detail of the two men, so he switched from a wide shot to a close-up.

The young man’s face clearly appeared at the center of the lens…

Those familiar eyes and brows, that familiar curve of the mouth—even the impatience that occasionally seeped through when he frowned and the way he reached for his earlobe…it was all too familiar.

The only difference was that his earlobe was clean, without that dazzling earring.

……

Less than two hours ago, he had stood in this confinement room, right beside Qin Jiu.

They had known each other for less than a month.

Here, Qin Jiu calls him “Top Student,” while the system refers to him as “Examinee You Huo.”

And in this video from years ago, he was “Examiner A.”

……

Qin Jiu sees his younger self step aside from the car, straighten up, and say something.

Due to the angle, he couldn’t read the words from the lip movements.

The examiner A walked straight past him, went around to the driver’s seat, and pulled open the car door.

Leaning against the car roof, he spoke a sentence that was neither warm nor cold.

This time, Qin Jiu could see very clearly.

He said, “I’ll take your good words, and I hope we never meet again.”

With his back to the camera, Qin Jiu raised a hand to touch his temple, then tapped his ear, seeming to casually indicate that he had heard and would not meet again.

The street corner in the frame must have been in late autumn, with even the setting sun carrying a faint chill.

Withered leaves from the wall fell to the ground, then swirled in a whirl of wind.

Examiner A slipped into the driver’s seat.

Before long, the car turned around, gradually picking up speed along the street. In the blink of an eye, it disappeared into the white fog, vanishing without a trace.

……

This time, it should have been 078’s turn to lift the lockdown.

This brave soul sat in the lounge for an hour before having an epiphany, realizing that he had previously brought up matters he shouldn’t have—or at least, matters that weren’t exactly pleasant—and had displeased the one referred to as 001.

After much deliberation, he decided not to go add to the trouble and switched shifts with 922 at the last minute.

922 was still haunted by the earlier rocket launcher incident, fearing that he’d run into a warhead as soon as he opened the door, so he knocked before unlocking it.

But no one answered…

The soundproofing in the confinement room was quite good, and from outside the door, everything seemed quiet.

922 knocked on the door again, but there was still no response.

With a strange expression on his face, he thought for a moment and then decided to unlock the door himself.

“Boss, your solitary confinement is over.”

As he said this, he slipped through the door and froze in place the moment he turned around.

Qin Jiu was not absent.

He stood right there, close to the door of the detention room. In his hand, he held an old mobile phone from which a faint, rustling static noise emerged.

Unaware of what was playing, he remained fixedly staring at the screen, completely oblivious to anyone entering the room.

“Boss?”

“……”

922 was baffled and walked over to Qin Jiu’s side.

When he looked at the phone, the video was playing the latter half.

After watching for just a few seconds, he also froze in place.

That early invigilator uniform, 922 recognized it.

That face of You Huo, 922 also recognized it.

But when these two were put together… he suddenly didn’t recognize them anymore.

It wasn’t until the video started playing again in a loop that 922 abruptly came back to his senses.

There was a knocking sound outside, and 154’s voice came through faintly.

“922? Where is he? Did you get the boss and then get lost on the way back?”

922 was startled, and when he turned his head again, Qin Jiu had also lifted his gaze.

“Boss…” 922 pointed at the screen, then gestured toward the direction outside the door: “How could he be in there? Isn’t that the earliest batch of invigilators’ uniforms? Why would he be wearing that?”

“Who… is this a picture of?”

The sound of unlocking came from outside the door.

As the door to the confinement room swung open, Qin Jiu squinted in the sudden influx of light.

Unaware of how long they had been delayed there, several people were already waiting in the ship’s corridor.

The moment he saw them, 154 sighed in relief and said irritably, “You gave me a fright. I thought something was wrong again. Today’s round of confinement was really…”

021 added beside him, “Physically and mentally exhausting.”

154 instinctively nodded but, after glancing at Qin Jiu, immediately shook his head and said, “It was alright.”

Beside them, You Huo leaned lazily against the porthole, waiting, his fingers unconsciously fiddling with his earring. He lifted his eyelids slightly, his light brown eyes transparent under the lamplight, and looked toward Qin Jiu.

In that moment, his expression and demeanor gradually overlapped with that of Examiner A in the video.

As if, throughout all these years, he had never changed.

……

Qin Jiu’s lips moved slightly.

As if possessed by some inexplicable impulse, he turned off his phone screen, tucked it into his coat pocket, cast one last deep glance at You Huo, and said to 922, “No one.”

922: “…”

Am I blind………………

……

The atmosphere on the entire ship was unusually eerie on the journey back.

Even someone as resilient as 154 was starting to feel a bit unable to hold it together. But for a while, he couldn’t put his finger on exactly what was off.

It wasn’t until the small white boat docked, and he watched those two disappear into the cave entrance against the sea breeze, that it suddenly hit him…

Did the two plague gods not rush to have 922 make midnight snacks?

“Did something happen in the isolation room? Why do I feel that the boss is in a bad mood? And you too—ever since you came out, you’ve been wandering around like a lost soul. What’s on your mind?” He nudged the absent-minded 922.

922 tilted his head and stared at him intently.

Everything in the video began to spin rapidly…

It is known that only the earliest batch of invigilators wore that uniform; later, it was no longer strictly enforced.

Furthermore, Invigilator 922 has basically met all the earliest batch of invigilators, or at least seen their photos and files.

Except for one person…

Invigilator A…

922 grabbed 154 and let out a shocked “Holy shit!”

He was just about to speak when his foot stepped into empty air.

With two loud splashes, 154 was dragged straight into the sea by his unlucky colleague.