SSSG Chapter 66: The Path to Fame and Glory (5)

Newcomers, Fight!

You should read this chapter over at Travis Translations – It’s free and the ad revenue is much better for me!

There’s no time left.

“Let’s hurry,” Du Yixin grabs Ying Sheng’s hand and runs forward.

Ying Sheng is blanking out a little. Any normal person daring to grab his hand would receive nothing short of a brutal beating, but he does nothing of the sort. There seems to be something deeper to Ying Sheng’s facial expression, looking rather serious.

The crowd moving about is quite chaotic. Though when Du Yixin and Ying Sheng arrives at the rally point for Group Four, he realise his training did have some effect. His running speed had noticeably increased.

And in fact, in the scuffle with the burly redhead before the Instance, it wasn’t as difficult to yank something from his hands as he thought it would be. He almost thought the guy had realised his worries and only put up a fight in name, but perhaps it might be that his physical capabilities have been strengthened greatly.

Other group members also begin to arrive. There’s two girls, one older and one younger, that look rather similar in appearance. Probably sisters. Then there’s a man and a woman together, the former rather plump and looking to be in his 30s, and the latter thin and even cosmetics couldn’t conceal the fact she should be in her late 50s.

Despite their presumably dissimilar backgrounds, they seem equally frightened to see the guy that chopped the monster up just now.

Of course, there’s groups listed on the big screen up there, but nobody can read such a thing when there’s so many of them here. They didn’t know any names either. They’d only know when they arrive.

Compared to other groups, the atmosphere in Group Four is clearly rather tense.

Ying Sheng couldn’t care less, though. Even the clear display of fear from the members only draw idle yawns from him.

Someone is approaching again. Du Yixin turns to look to find the last member of their group coming here. It’s a rather handsome young man, dressed in the latest men’s fashion, and he looks like he’d much more belong on a real celebrity’s stage than in this farce of a talent show.

Even though he presumably knows what penalty being late would carry, he arrives only in the very nick of time, as the moment he stops next to them the doll in a dress speaks up above them, “time. All confirmed arrived.”

The young man’s breathing is slightly uneven, and forces a chuckle as he says, “I was too far away. Phew,” though his light tone and smile immediately freezes in place when he sees Ying Sheng’s face here.

“Group Four will now choose a Group Captain. You have five minutes.”

Other groups would presumably enter a discussion at this point to choose the one with the best luck as Captain, because only the first arrivals to the goal counts as successfully debuting. If they end up with the unluckiest of the unluckiest who would throw a 1 each and every single time they’d just fail badly.

Not here, though. No one speaks up, and there are many nonobvious, shifty gazes staying about Ying Sheng.

This wouldn’t do. Du Yixin speaks up, “the countdown has already started. We should decide on a Captain.”

And the first one to step up obviously ends up the straw everyone prys their hands at.

“I think you should be the Captain then.”

“We don’t know anything. So we’ll be leaving it to you.”

It seems everyone fears the position of ‘Captain’ excessively, or rather, they fear what other trouble might befall them other than throwing the die in the future.

Du Yixin himself doesn’t exactly care about being the Captain or not, though. He just thought they should talk over it first, like finding out and handing the position to someone who’s lucky.

These attitudes seem to imply a ‘no way’ attitude though. He can only rub his nose and agree, “ok.”

“Group Four has selected a Captain,” although the dolls all have the exact same face, there’s clear differences in personality. This short-haired doll in a dress is clearly much less of a drama queen than xiao-Mei and xiao-Gang, not speaking anything beyond what the rules demanded.

“The Captain will throw the die once Groups One through to Three have moved.”

Du Yixin then takes a look at the big screen where the number under Groups One and Two have become ‘5’ and ‘4’ respectively; both groups have already disappeared from the white space.

It seems this number represents progress. Group One is at square 5, and Group Two at square 4.

In the meantime, Group Three is also throwing their die, and the result is, unfortunately, 1.

Group Three seems to be in an uproar, and the members all seem to be giving harsh glares to the Captain, but then they all immediately disappear before they begin to disparage their Captain.

Now, only three Groups remained.

“It’s your turn,” the porcelain doll says, “the Captain should throw the die.”

Although this is just the first round, but Group Three is already quite a little bit behind the other groups. Unless they manage to complete their missions quickly or just end up throwing a few 6s in a row, they’ll have a hard time chasing after the number one group.

Speaking of which, the mascots all keep talking about the goal but how many squares is that, really?

Du Yixin voices his question before throwing the die.

It seems this is not something they cannot learn about. The doll answers, “20.”

Twenty squares isn’t exactly far, but it’s also not too short, as it would take at least 3 missions even if one keeps throwing 6s.

And the missions… will likely not be anything simple, if simply going by the fact that three of them just ended up dead for trivial reasons already before they even began.

He shouldn’t overthink things now, though. It’s time to go.

He throws his die, and it lands on——Three.

The moment the result appears, they end up teleported into somewhere ‘outside.’

The Group is on top of a roof several hundred metres above the ground with no fencing. It almost feels as if the building is swaying in the strong night breeze. Meanwhile, there’s a helicopter flying about the building, making a lot of noise.

The younger of the sisters hugs her older sister for safety, “it’s really high. Jiejie, I’m scared.”

The older sister herself looks barely 20. Her clothing suggests she’s a student. Her face is all pale, but she still wraps her hand around her younger sister’s shoulders, “just don’t look. It’ll be ok.”

Suddenly, something shouts from midair, “here, here! Our newcomers are here!”

There’s a mini-porcelain doll (TL: Given the normal dolls are several metres doll, I imagine this one is just human-sized) in the helicopter, yelling excitedly with a megaphone in its hand, “welcome to the challenge, ‘Newcomers, Fight’! I will now introduce the rules!”

“We have set up three levels for you. Complete the previous one to unlock the next one! Any one of you completing all three levels will count as successfully completing your mission.”

“The ‘Newcomers, Fight’ of love and of bravery. Both me and our audience are barely able to contain our excitement!”

The extremely clichéd name reminds Du Yixin of the Wipeout-style of shows on TV. Usually they screen normal people who apply and set up challenges for them. Those who win receive monetary rewards.

“Now, let’s quickly introduce our first level. Everyone, look this way please.”

Opposite the roof they’re standing on is another building that is slightly lower in height. The two buildings are about 50 metres apart horizontally. There’s a metal pole connecting the two roofs. It’s barely wide enough to fit a pair of feet.

“Level one is extremely simple. You just have to reach the building over there! Without even a time limit! I can’t believe that such a simple challenge even exists, my oh my,” the host’s tone sounds like he would much better belong to the TV shopping channel next door.

Reach the next building? In the dark, several hundred metres above the ground, on top of this narrow metal pole?

You don’t even have to be afraid of heights to feel dazed already.

“Then let’s quickly decide on the first member to start the challenge!”

Who would go? Falling off is out of the question. Even just holding onto the pole would be squeezing the breath out of them. Obviously no one would be interested in this mad game.

The members then, as if by tacit accordance, land their gaze on Du Yixin. The thin, old lady speaks up, “you’re the Captain, aren’t you? You should go first.”

“That’s right,” the big plump man, her companion, immediately concurs, “we let you be the Captain, so you should take responsibility when it comes down to this.”

Let him be the Captain? Du Yixin’d think it must be his phys. ed. teacher who taught him his Chinese.

The sisters do not speak, but they wouldn’t make any eye contact either. The flashy man apologises, “I’m scared of heights. You can see my legs are giving out just standing here.”

Meanwhile, Du Yixin walks towards the edge. Actually feeling this nerve-racking height firsthand makes his heartbeat and blood pressure increase.

People always wished to soar high in the sky, but they also instinctively fear the heights when they’re in the sky.

He then turns to the host to ask, “we just have to reach the other building in any way possible?”

“Yeah, of course. I wouldn’t say anything even if you did just sprout wings on the spot and flew there,” the doll says, making a roarous laughter.

Well, he doesn’t know how to fly, that’s for sure, but instead of walking over the pole, it seems much easier to just grab the pole and slide over with the help of gravity. Maybe he can even make a makeshift hook so he doesn’t have to use his hands. He’ll climb up when he’s at the other side.

It seems doable, but he’s not sure whether his two months’ training will hold up, especially when he still has to lift himself up in the end.

“You’re the first challenger then, is that correct?” The host asks to confirm.

Outside of Ying Sheng, it would appear all present are normal people. And even if that’s not the case, just considering their physique, he is the most likely to succeed.

Du Yixin is about to agree when someone yanks him back by the collar.

“He isn’t;” Ying Sheng speaks up, then turns to the thin woman, “you just said he should go first?”

The woman is a bit scared of Ying Sheng, but her long-term habits die hard, and she spouts before she could react, “yeah. He agreed to be Captain, so he should lead by example!”

“By example?” Ying Sheng smiles and says, “sure.”

The woman can’t help but be spooked by that rather unsettling smile.

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TL’s notes: You know, I’d actually be interested in reading an extra where Ying Sheng just murders his way ignoring the perpetrator’s offer of peace. Feels like it would be nice and dramatic.