Rubik’s Cube

Chapter 62

From the time Tang Qi and Li Chun fell in through the hole until the time Ji Yushi reopened it, it had taken a dozen of seconds at most.

It was impossible for them to reopen a door and leave in such a short period of time, let alone leave Ji Yushi behind. But where did they go?

Ji Yushi thought of the mission mode —– Rubik’s Cube.

He scanned through the room below and saw that there was also a small ball floating in that room. It was the same colour as the one in his current room; red. In addition to that, a silver-white ladder had also appeared under the opened hole to help people go to the room below. Tang Qi and Li Chun had directly fallen through because they hadn’t had the chance to react.

To go or not to go?

After some thought, Ji Yushi bit off the zipper handle from his clothes with his teeth.

He had nothing on him, let alone a pen. This was the only method for him to leave a mark behind. Holding onto the small zipper handle, he forcefully carved a ‘7’ onto the ground.

In the unlikely event that his other teammates would come to this room after he left, they could at least know that they were here before and wouldn’t waste time here.

After he was done, Ji Yushi stored the zipper handle back in his pocket and then climbed down the ladder into the new room.

As soon as he stepped onto the ground, he heard a ‘beep—-‘.

Immediately afterwards, a circular hole and a ladder appeared on the wall to his left. A new entrance had opened in this room.

Someone was coming.

Could it be Tang Qi and Li Chun?!

Ji Yushi’s pupils constricted.

The first person to appear was a woman.

Caucasian, blond hair, blue eyes. Her hair was cut very short, and she wore black and gold tight fitting clothes. She climbed down from the ladder and very soon reached the ground. Her height was actually a little taller than Ji Yushi. Her entire being looked very cool and handsome — That is, if she wasn’t pointing her gun at Ji Yushi.

Ji Yushi took a step back and raised both his hands.

A man appeared behind the woman.

This was a black-haired young man with oriental features. He wore a uniform similar to theirs, but the style was different. The young man’s face and hair was stained with blood that was now almost dry.

The black-haired young man was startled the moment he saw Ji Yushi. He didn’t seem to expect seeing another person here.

“Search him.” The woman spoke. The language used was English.

“Okay.” The black-haired young man said.

The two wore different uniforms. They didn’t seem to be teammates. The black-haired young man didn’t have any weapons. One could tell from his tone that he had no choice but to listen to the woman’s instructions.

The black-haired young man first apologised before searching Ji Yushi from head to toe. All that could be found was a box of medicine and a game console. That was all.

“Check complete. Safe.” The black-haired young man said.

The woman stored away the gun and began to check the room. She seemed to be looking for something.

Ji Yushi lowered his hands, “Can you return the things to me?”

“Huh?” The black-haired young man raised his head, his eyes meeting with Ji Yushi’s.

It was a pair of very beautiful and clear eyes with long eyelashes half obscuring the emotions in the eyes. Paired with a particularly outstanding face, it was something that should have left the black-haired young man in awe but somehow, he also felt a chill through him.

“My things.” Ji Yushi repeated himself, “Could you return it to me?”

“Ohhhh!” The black-haired young man quickly returned the items in his hands back to Ji Yushi and apologised again, “Sorry. Really sorry about that!”

Ji Yushi stored away the medicine box and his black and white game console. He placed them back in their original positions like someone with an obsessive-compulsive disorder.

“No mark.” The woman said as she stood not far away, “We haven’t been here before.”

After saying this, she took out a small dagger from the strap on her leg and carved a mark onto the ground.

From where Ji Yushi stood, he saw that she had carved the number 8.

Because of the identical room structures, it was difficult for one to tell where they were inside the Rubik’s Cube. Let alone ordinary people like them, even Ji Yushi couldn’t distinguish between the rooms relying solely on his memory. Humans tend to share the same thoughts. Ji Yushi was able to quickly think of leaving markers behind for his teammates so others naturally would have thought of doing the same to at least leave a reminder for themselves.

The black-haired young man said, “I saw your game console. I’ve seen it on the internet, but it is something difficult for anyone to buy in reality. What era did you come from? Could time travel have been invented that early on?”

Ji Yushi who had his belongings returned was no longer as cold.

He answered the black-haired young man’s question, “When asking where others are from, you should introduce yourself first.”

The black-haired young man let out an ‘ah’. Knowing that he was in the wrong because of the body search, he repeatedly apologised, “Sorry, my mistake! My name is Morita Yu, from 2140 AD. I joined Tianqiong this year and have been working as a Guardian for three months!”

After saying that, he took out a necklace to prove his identity, “Nice to meet you!”

A simple pattern was engraved onto the necklace. It was the symbol of Tianqiong.

Morita Yu?

Ji Yushi spoke in Japanese, “My name is Ji Yushi, from Star Era 1456.”

To reciprocate, he also pointed to the sign on his chest.

Under certain special lighting, the ‘7’ on the black combat uniforms would show marks to indicate their guardian identity.

Both parties had confirmed each other’s identity.

Morita Yu repeated, “Star Era 1456?”

After saying that, he belatedly reacted to something else that surprised him, “Senior, you can speak Japanese?!”

“Yes.” Ji Yushi had worked in Tianqiong for three years so he could be regarded as a senior.

But 2140 AD? That era was completely different from their world. It meant that this Morita Yu in front of him came from a completely different time and space.

However, Morita Yu’s focus was on the game console. “Senior, what kind of game consoles do you have in your era?”

Even after mastering time travel, he was still playing a game console like this. Morita Yu cared very much about this disparity in technological development.

Before Ji Yushi could answer, the woman interrupted them, “Speak English.”

She scrutinised them and took an issue at them communicating in a language she couldn’t understand, “Since you can all speak English, use it here. It’s fairer communicating in English.”

She seemed to have forgotten about the fact that she had pointed her gun at Ji Yushi earlier and was now brazenly demanding fairness.

Morita Yu hurriedly explained to her, “Zoe, this traverser is from Star Era 1456. The era sounds the same as yours. Could you two have come from the same time and space?”

“1456?” The woman looked at Ji Yushi. She was shocked, “A traverser from seventy years ago?”

In her shock, she raised her sleeve.

On her skin was a glowing symbol of Tianqiong.

Ji Yushi frowned.

He now understood. This tall female traverser called Zoe had come from Star Era 1526. It was the same time and space as his but seventy years later.

*

As expected, the so-called recruitment referred to by the ‘Tianqiong of all eras’ was really just a case of hijacking.

It had gathered together Guardian squads from different times and spaces and had stuffed them all into this mission. Without regard for their own opinions, they were forced to continue until someone completes it.

Casting the net widely to catch more fish in hope to reel in the best.

It was a very typical, machine-like thought process. Icy cold and indifferent.

What Ji Yushi couldn’t comprehend right now was that he had originally thought that since there is a competitive relationship between the squads in this mission, all squads would start at the same time, but at this moment, the three people in the room were all from different squads.

“From the moment I was hijacked, I have been here for four or five hours and have enter four rooms.” Morita Yu was very amusing. He spoke in English, but he used Japanese when referring to Ji Yushi, “Senior, you?”

Ji Yushi said, “One hour and twenty-three minutes.”

Zoe with the handsome short haircut said, “About a day.”

Zoe had been here the longest.

According to her, since arriving here she had entered twelve rooms including this one. As for the number 8 she had just carved onto the floor, it was the eighth room she had been to after running into Morita Yu and started leaving marks.

After being here for a day, she only went to twelve rooms?

It looks like Zoe has had her fair share of experience here.

Ji Yushi asked Morita Yu, “Why are there so much blood on your face? Are you hurt?”

Having mentioned this, Morita Yu’s face suddenly paled considerably, “I-is there a lot?! God, I thought I cleaned it all up.”

Zoe’s original stiff expression had turned even more ugly.

Morita Yu spoke as he wiped his face, “It’s not my blood, it’s someone else’s.”

He talked about what happened just now.

It turned out that there was a reason why they pointed their guns at Ji Yushi as soon as they arrived. After Morita Yu separated from his teammates, he wasn’t the only one to run into Zoe. At that time, there was another teammate called Chuck with Zoe. The three travelled together and, after entering a room, they met another traverser.

That traverser had been here for two days and looked very tired.

In the new room and faced with six options, that traverser suggested that they choose the wall in front of them as that was where his teammates had gone through earlier and he wanted to catch up to them.

Chuck climbed up the ladder first with Morita Yu behind him but when Chuck leaned into the room, a tragedy occurred: His upper body was crushed on the spot and his blood and flesh splattered onto Morita Yu’s head and face. Morita Yu was so scared by this, he almost cried out.

Zoe jumped off the ladder and saw that the other traverser had quickly gone through another door — It was clear that he knew about some pattern of some sort but was unable to choose between two doors, so he had waited for their arrival and used them to test it out. In the end, Chuck became a sacrificial victim.

Bloody and tragic scenes like this was something Ji Yushi had seen plenty of but even he couldn’t help but be shocked when he heard this.

He tried to push aside those scenes from his mind. Sensing that Zoe’s mood seemed to have improved slightly, he asked, “So, what was different in that room?”

“The ball in that room was yellow.” Morita Yu said, “We followed that murderer into the other room and saw that the ball in that room was red. Coincidentally, all the rooms we had gone through before that were also red. My guess is that rooms of same colour are safe? But there are still four rooms in that room where the tragedy occurred that needed to be verified. The bad news however is that even if I want to go back, I won’t necessarily return to the original room.”

Because of this, they started to leave marks.

“If it was something like this……” Ji Yushi thought about it and said, “Like the six colours on a Rubik’s Cube, there are rooms with balls of six different colours. Suppose a person goes to a room with the same colour and a room with a different colour. Nothing happened in the first scenario, but something happened in the second case. This however wasn’t enough for one to form the guess that ‘rooms of the same colour are safe’ because the sample size was too small and there are six different colours. For one to have that thought, they would need to repeat that situation at least once more. My guess is that he may have been to at least four rooms before this guess of his formed and he was waiting for you to help him verify it.”

The two looked over at Ji Yushi. They seemed to be surprised by his meticulous and fast thinking abilities.

Ji Yushi belatedly fell silent.

This analysis of his wasn’t enough to help the other party obtain the information required to complete the mission. In fact, he also had no clue, so he wasn’t afraid of the others being one step ahead of him.

He was only surprised about the fact that he was no longer as closed off as he was at first.

He continued to ask, “How many teammates does your squad have?”

Morita Yu, “Four.”

Zoe wiped her face, “Including Chuck, six.”

Ji Yushi, “Did you run into other squads along the way?”

Both said they didn’t.

“Our squad consists of seven members.” Ji Yushi said, “Estimating conservatively, assuming that that traverser was from a five-person squad and assuming that they’re all alive, there may be twenty-one traversers here in this place at this very moment. According to the number of rooms experienced by the three of us and the traverser, let’s assume that we already know about twenty-one of the rooms. Now using the simplest calculation and assuming that the twenty-one rooms are arranged in a parallel line and by calculating the six faces…….Excluding the connected sides, there are eighty-six. But we came to this room from different directions and haven’t seen our teammates again after separating. The rooms seem to be moving. I think the number of rooms here may be a lot more than that.”

Here in this place, how likely was it for one to meet their teammate again?

Ji Yushi didn’t know.

Morita Yu was left speechless by Ji Yushi.

Knowing multiple languages and those analytical skills. Such a clever and extraordinary person must not have an ordinary background.

“That.” Morita Yu spoke up, “Senior. With you being so strong, you must be the captain, right?

Ji Yushi looked over. His eyes were calm and quiet. He just replied faintly, “No, our captain…..is someone much more capable than me.”