Rubik’s Cube

Chapter 72

After they left the room, Song Qinglan really went back?

What did Song Qinglan hear?

Would he ask about it? Or would there be more misunderstandings like the misunderstanding with the three boyfriends?

His eyelids still twitching, Ji Yushi’s heart raced chaotically.

The fingers hanging by his side quietly curled up, but his expression was the same as usual. He responded calmly, “Oh.”

“Thanks to the recording function, I managed to learn that you decided to continue towards the centre block. We would’ve wasted a lot of time otherwise.” Song Qinglan quickly continued, “Got separated from Lin Xinlan?”

Ji Yushi: “…….”

He and Lin Xinlan had waited for Song Qinglan in that room for at least twenty minutes. It was only when more and more traversers were moving around them did they decide to leave.

It turned out that the situation in the room Song Qinglan saw was just before he and Lin Xinlan left, not when they first entered the room.

The curled fingers slowly relaxed.

Ji Yushi was relieved inside but there was also a faint sense of disappointment.

Fortunately, he was someone who knew what he could and couldn’t do. He replied as usual, “Yes. We encountered a time difference and got separated.”

Song Qinglan declined to comment on this. Lin Xinlan getting separated from them didn’t affect their mission.

“These recordings can help us distinguish the time sequences. Coupled with the rules behind the movement of the rooms, we can go to each room with different time differences and leave traces behind. It shouldn’t be too difficult putting them together.” Song Qinglan said, “We should be able to get out of this mission soon.”

Ji Yushi: “Yes.”

Song Qinglan raised his lips and smiled handsomely, “Looks like Tianqiong was right about us having the highest chance in succeeding.”

After saying that, he glanced at Ji Yushi again. His eyes were deep, “Because we have Advisor Ji.”

Ji Yushi turned away and caught up with the two people gossiping ahead.

Compared to chatting with a steel straight man, he would rather listen to gossip.

The lights shone brightly in the dark. The cubes of different time and space fragments merged and recombined with the movement of countless traversers, changing nonstop.

Everyone walked towards a large purple cube. Duan Wen reached over.

The walls seem to have no physical body. Duan Wen’s hand didn’t touch anything.

Following that, Duan Wen lifted his leg and stepped in through the wall just like how he did when he first came out of his capsule.

The others also followed after him one after another. It was as if a game was slowly loading characters on a screen.

The surroundings became bright again. Everything was pure white except for the purple ball floating in the centre of the room. They retrieved the purple ball and opened the hole on the wall they had just entered from.

What they saw on the other end was no longer the darkness from earlier. It had instead changed back to the normal centre block with a black ball suspended in the air.

This mission was too abstract. Everyone who had gone through several fantastical journeys still couldn’t help but express their surprise and awe.

“Someone has been in this room.” Ji Yushi saw the strange marks on the floor, “It is already an integrated room.”

Duan Wen bent down and counted, “Nine. Does it mean that at least nine rooms have been joined?”

Ji Yushi: “Something like that.”

“Haa, the people crossing through the rooms have just been busy doing nothing. They probably would have never imagined that it was referring to joining like this.” Zhou Mingxuan sighed, “We must have also unknowingly joined quite a few rooms ourselves.”

Everyone nodded in agreement.

“The people who completes this mission may not be us but someone else.” Song Qinglan was thinking in a different direction, “With the colours joining, the rooms are becoming fewer and fewer, and the overlapping marks are increasing more and more. They will discover this sooner or later and the competition towards the end will be rather fierce.”

As the captain and as someone who often competed with others, Song Qinglan was very competitive.

He was able to keenly identify the current issue. Towards the end, the mission would be mainly about the confrontation between the traversers instead.

Duan Wen slapped his thigh, “Cap Song is right!”

Zhou Mingxuan, “Then should we do it or not?! The more rooms we join, the greater the chance of them noticing something, but if we don’t do it, we would be wasting a lot of time!”

Even Ji Yushi couldn’t help but frown.

Song Qinglan said, “Do it. Since we’re already here, why would we be afraid of making the first move?”

Song Qinglan stood on the side of the room, but he was the focus of everyone’s attention.

His eyes narrowed slightly, and his body gave off a fierce and domineering aura. It was clear that he had no intentions to lose.

He didn’t shrink back, nor did he hesitate when facing the challenges that were thrown at him.

“Starting from this purple room, we must win.”

“Beep—–”

A hole appeared on the wall in front of everyone.

*

“Yellow!”

“Red!”

“Grey! Blue!”

“Green!”

The four people in the seventh squad worked separately.

Every time they arrived at a new room, Duan Wen, Zhou Mingxuan and Song Qinglan was responsible for checking the colours of the surrounding rooms while Ji Yushi was responsible for the calculations.

“There’s also a grey here!”

Zhou Mingxuan jumped off the ladder.

“Yellow, red, grey, blue, green, grey…..” Ji Yushi figured out the direction they were going using his holographic projection, “The right side of the previous room was purple. We’re moving forward. Forward and then down. It is currently to our bottom right. We will need to circle back and then take the right. Forward and then right. The right is green which we can cross through and then we go back and then up before continuing down to enter a new purple.” (KKnotes: ????)

Everyone’s eyes spun.

Duan Wen, “Huh?”

Zhou Mingxuan, “Old Duan, don’t worry about it too much. Just do as he says.”

This was the fourth purple room they entered. After some comparisons, there was a time difference between two of the purple rooms. The earlier purple room was in the correct order and adjacent to the one at the beginning. If it doesn’t get moved, they should be able to join it together without much trouble.

Even if it was moved by the others, it didn’t matter. They could just choose another colour at random and start over — Sooner or later, these colours would all need to be joined together to form a continuous timeline.

Unlike earlier when they were going around blindly, this time they walked through the different coloured rooms with a purpose. They were the first among the countless traversers to figure out the situation.

Purple, yellow and then blue.

The target changed several times as they moved on, but Ji Yushi was still able to clearly figure out that they should do next.

In these intricate fragments of time and space, Ji Yushi was like a bright guiding light.

Song Qinglan was the helmsman in charge of the ship. Following Ji Yushi’s instructions, he lead the group forward.

A room with slower time and a room with faster time could be joined together. A room two seconds behind and a room two seconds ahead could be joined together.

Two hours, two seconds, no difference….Careful analysis and testing was required every time in order to allow them to figure out the exact time difference.

In order to test out the time sequence, the four of them separated several times.

In rooms with different time differences, they once just went in and then went out. To successfully join the rooms, they were at times separated for up to two days.

For a while, they seemed to back in the Ouroboros cycle. They had to go around and around and find the one path that would lead them to success in the constantly changing environment. “Rubik’s Cube” really deserved its reputation as a Super S-level mission.

As they went around, they left behind marks.

As the numbers increased, they encountered several groups of traversers along the way. The number of traversers they met had grown to more than a hundred. They had also ran into themselves several times. These rooms had recorded their journey through the rooms, so they were able to clearly figure out the time difference between rooms of the same colour by taking advantage of it.

The rooms were constantly decreasing.

Mental stress also continued to build up in Ji Yushi.

*

“Beep—–”

They reached a new room.

As soon as Ji Yushi stepped down from the ladder, Song Qinglan grabbed his wrist and stopped him from opening his holographic projection, “Ji Yushi.”

“Cap Song.”

Ji Yushi’s face was a little pale, and there was a thin layer of sweat across his forehead. Although he still looked spirited, it was purely from stubbornness.

The behaviour of the two attracted the attention of their other teammates.

Duan Wen and Zhou Mingxuan stopped and looked back at them.

“Rest in this room for a while first.” Song Qinglan said firmly, “We will continue after a break.”

“Successfully joined 37 blue, 23 purple, 16 green, 5 red, 2 grey and 15 yellow.” Ji Yushi objected, “The success rate is only half. We still don’t know how many are left for us to join.”

Song Qinglan said, “Those are just what we have done. There are still many others done by the other traversers. Having done so much already, there is no need to rush.”

Ji Yushi looked straight into his eyes. His gaze was very calm, “I just want to quickly go home.”

Quickly go home.

Hearing those words, Song Qinglan seemed to have thought of something. His grip around Ji Yushi’s wrist loosened.

“We all want to quickly go home.” Song Qinglan stepped back a little, “No, you must rest. Give your mind a break first before we set off again.”

“No need.” Ji Yushi, “You don’t have to worry about me.”

Song Qinglan laughed in anger when he heard this, “I don’t know if there is anyone at home who worries about you but here, I am the captain. If I don’t care about you, who will?”

This wasn’t Song Qinglan’s first time asking him to rest but this time he seemed to be extremely determined.

Knowing that there was no room for negotiation this time, Ji Yushi lowered his eyes to express acquiescence.

It couldn’t be considered a quarrel nor a confrontation but for some reason the atmosphere was a little tense.

“After walking through more than two hundred rooms, even I am a little tired.” Zhou Mingxuan added in due course, “It should be time to rest.”

“Let me take a look at the surrounding situation first.” Duan Wen said.

Ji Yushi found a place and sat down.

He then pulled out his black and white game console.

His way of resting was still the same. He didn’t sleep nor did he need it. Playing Tetris was the best way for him to relax.

Duan Wen and Zhou Mingxuan checked the colours of the surrounding rooms while Song Qinglan stood in place, watching Ji Yushi. The other party’s beautiful profile and quiet temperament was no different from the past, but Song Qinglan could sense his impatience.

After completing the missions set by Tianqiong, they would be able to go home and also get their reward.

And it wasn’t any reward.

He knew exactly what Ji Yushi wanted.

Song Qinglan hesitated. For the first time, he felt that he couldn’t control himself.

He circled twice and then finally gritted his teeth and walked over. But before he could speak, Ji Yushi stopped playing his game and spoke, “Why do you care so much about me?”

Song Qinglan was stunned.

Ji Yushi’s voice wasn’t loud, and the other teammates were still talking so they probably didn’t hear him.

“From the moment we departed till now, you have been expressing more and more concern towards me.” Ji Yushi’s eyes were clear, “It’s easy to misunderstand.”

Ji Yushi always spoke very bluntly. Every time, Song Qinglan would be caught off guard.

He was different from the other members of the seventh squad. He had not yet officially joined the seventh squad and his sexual orientation was different. He was also different from everyone else in other aspects; he was frank and open, never ashamed to say that he liked men. This was the one and only Ji Yushi.

And it was also the Ji Yushi who was not single.

This time, Song Qinglan couldn’t even say the words ‘I am the captain’.

Unabashedly reminded by Ji Yushi, he found that he couldn’t answer, as if his throat was blocked.

Ji Yushi lowered his head back down after saying that and restarted the game, “I will also misunderstand.”

Song Qinglan’s expression changed a little. His mood was in turmoil.

Some words seemed to be hanging from his lips.

At this moment, “beep——–“.

A hole opened.

Everyone looked up at the same time.

Someone looked down from the ladder and shouted, “Blue! There are people inside!”

Another person’s voice sounded, “Then go down!”

The familiar Chinese made them almost think that they had met their other teammates or perhaps the members of the ninth squad.

Slowly climbing down the ladder was a chubby middle-aged man. He looked like an otaku. The one who came down behind him was a younger man. He wore a pair of silver-rimmed glasses and a white shirt. Without even needing to speak, he gave off an intellectual air.

They didn’t look like traversers.

Unnoticed by the others, Ji Yushi’s entire body stiffened up. He was frozen in place.