IJRELD: Hide and Seek 1

MAY 17, 2023 ~ KIWII

kiwii AKA xinji: warning in advance that I’m not a native of China hence I’ve zero knowledge of Chinese so the tlations might feel dud. My apologies!
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The sky was cloudy and it was raining heavily, and it was blown by the wind and crackled on the windows.

A flash of lightning pierced through the dark clouds and instantly formed a dense glowing spider web. A sound of thunder followed by lightning exploded in people’s ears.

In the bright office, a man was awakened by the explosion of thunder, and he sat up from the large black leather sofa, panting heavily. Like being frightened by thunder or having a nightmare, his face was bloodless, as pale as a dead person. He raised his hand to wipe the sweat off his forehead, but found that he was still wearing a gaming helmet on his head.

The man took off the helmet for a moment, and a strange smile appeared on his face. He stared at the game helmet in his hand, with a trace of greed in his eyes, as if it was not a game helmet, but the business empire he was about to acquire……

It has been raining outside the window for a few days. Since the beginning of summer, it has been raining heavily. After heavy rain, there is a tendency of light rain lingering until autumn.

Song Qingshu frowned slightly listening to the sound of rain hitting the window. He hadn’t seen the sun for a long time, if this continues, there will be a tendency to mold.

Even if his heart was irritable, the hand did not stop for a moment. The cold, white, slender and bony hands were flying rapidly over the keyboard, and the lines of codes on the computer screen in front of him moved up quickly.

Several mobile phones in the office vibrate twice at the same time. You don’t need to look to know that it must be the boss of their company in the WeChat group again.

Song Qingshu glanced at the phone, ignored him, and continued to code.

Sang Yu glanced at the news on his mobile phone, got up from his work station, walked to Song Qingshu, patted his arm excitedly, and said: “Qingshu, don’t code. The boss said that the money for the big order has arrived, and the employees will be rewarded. We will have a collective holiday for a day next Saturday for team building.”

When Song Qingshu heard about the holiday, he picked up his phone, and the message displayed on the screen was sent by the boss three minutes ago, and the content was similar to what Sang Yu said.

Their boss rented hundreds of holographic game helmets from his friends, and the team building on Saturday is carried out in the form of playing games.

The event also set up prizes. The first prize is 10,000 yuan, the second prize is 5,000 yuan, the third prize is 3,000 yuan, and the participation prize is 1,000 yuan.

Song Qingshu looked at the final award setting and said with a smile: “Did the boss drink fake wine? Or did he drink without eating peanuts? The last order earned so much? Why is it so generous?”

Sang Yu leaned closer to Song Qingshu slightly, and whispered, “Who knows what he thinks, I think he might have been abused in the game, let’s go in and find a place for him.” The fact that their boss likes to play games is known throughout the company, although this kind of team building activity is exaggerated, it is also in line with the personality of their boss.

“It’s noon, let’s go downstairs for a meal.” Sang Yu called several other colleagues and went to the cafeteria downstairs for lunch.

【Enter the game on time at 9 o’clock on Saturday morning, perform well, and see who can win the grand prize of 10,000 yuan.】

Near 9 o’clock, Song Qingshu found a comfortable angle on his sofa, adjusted the parameters of the game helmet according to the instructions, and put on the helmet.

When Song Qingshu opened his eyes, a game panel appeared in front of him. On the panel were three rectangular boxes, which were nickname, real name and ID number. There were two lines of small characters below: Nickname cannot be changed after being taken, and minors are not allowed to enter.

Song Qingshu thought about it and filled in the nickname: 米阳光 (mi sunshine).

kiwii: 米(mǐ): rice; meter (classifier) OR
Mǐ: surname Mi
阳光(yáng guāng): sunshine; transparent (open to public scrutiny)

The panel directly popped up with a big red X: the nickname is already taken.

Song Qingshu: ……

He filled in again: give me the sun.

A big red X popped up on the panel again: the nickname is already taken.

Song Qingshu: ……Is it so difficult for me to see the sun?

Looking at the (2/3) behind the nickname, Song Qingshu pondered for a while, and pressed the dice next to the nickname, thinking that the game should not choose used nicknames.

The dice spun a few times, then stopped, and five words were displayed in the nickname box: 小兔子乖乖 (Little Rabbit, be good).

A big √ popped up on the panel this time—passed.

Song Qingshu looked at his nickname and the check mark passed by the system, and ten thousand muddy horses galloped past in his heart.

After filling in the real name and ID number and verifying that the player has reached the age of eighteen, a game pass card with Song Qingshu’s profile picture was directly generated.

Clearance Certificate

Nickname: Little Rabbit, be good

Game ID: 2333333

Level Points: 0

Cumulative Points: 0


Instructions were written on the back of the card:

Notes: 1. Each person only has one customs clearance certificate. Only after finding the customs clearance certificate in the game level can the next level be carried out. Please keep it safe. Any loss will be at your own risk.

2. This game adopts the point system, and the accumulated points can be exchanged for the Dream come true card prepared by the game company for players.

Note: Dream come true card: Everyone has daydreams, this card can make daydreams come true, this card can only be used once, and will be automatically destroyed after use.

Song Qingshu carefully read instructions twice. He always felt that something was wrong, but he couldn’t think of anything. After clicking to enter the game, the panel in front of him gradually disappeared, and a white mist appeared in front of his eyes, and the white mist gradually dissipated, and he saw himself standing in front of a school.

The sky was still full of dark clouds, and the cold wind was blowing, as if it would rain heavily at any time.

Song Qingshu only wore a pair of jeans and a white tee when he entered the game, and felt a little cold when the wind blew.

The sign above the school gate was hung with six big characters written on it: Linchuan Private Middle School.

There were dozens of people standing scattered in front of the gate. Song Qingshu counted, and there were a total of 48 players including himself.

“I’m here!” Sang Yu thought Song Qingshu didn’t see him through the crowd, so he waved to him.

Song Qingshu stood still in front of Sang Yu, and asked him with a puzzled face: “Have you seen the boss?”

“Boss? I didn’t see him when I came in.” Sang Yu replied bluntly, not only the boss, but also other colleagues were not here, “Maybe he hasn’t come in yet, wait a little longer.”

Song Qingshu nodded, but did not speak. When his eyes swept over the other players standing around, his gaze suddenly stopped somewhere, and his eyes lit up instantly.

A man appeared in his sight.

The man was wearing a well-fitting casual outfit, which well outlined his tall, thin figure.

Wide shoulders, narrow waist, long and slender legs, the body proportions are perfect, it can be said that he looks exactly according to Song Qingshu’s taste.

Song Qingshu couldn’t help but take a second look.

The man was lowering his head and talking to the girl in front of him. He felt that someone was watching him all the time, and when he raised his head, he met a pair of dark and bright eyes.

The man was stunned for a moment, then smiled at him as a greeting, then lowered his head slightly, and said something to the girl with a serious face.

Song Qingshu felt a little embarrassed when he was caught peeping, his face turned red slightly.

Sang Yu followed Song Qingshu’s line of sight and found a beautiful girl standing at the end of his line of sight, who was talking to another man.

He stretched out his hand and waved in front of Song Qingshu’s eyes, “Hey! Get back to your senses! I said brother, even if the girls are good-looking, you can’t keep staring at them like this. You can easily be regarded as a pervert like this.”

Song Qingshu’s face turned even redder, how could he tell Sang Yu that the person he just saw was not that girl?

He thought about it carefully, or forget it, if you misunderstand, just misunderstand.

Sang Yu directly reached out and touched his forehead, and then touched his own forehead, “You don’t have a fever, why is your face so red? Is it possible that you are a big man but feel shy when you look at other little girls?”

Song Qingshu: ……

Song Qingshu was about to explain to Sang Yu: I don’t, I don’t, don’t talk nonsense. Before the words were spoken, a game panel appeared in front of him.

【Game rules:

1. Everyone in this game has only one life, if you die here, you will die in reality, so please cherish life.
2. Game clearance standard: find your own customs clearance certificate.
3. The situation in the game cannot be explained to the players in reality, otherwise the consequences will be at your own risk.
4. After clearing the level, you can invite colleagues and friends around you to come in and play together. If you invite enough people, you can skip a certain level, and the accumulated points will also increase. 】

After the rules of the game disappeared on the panel, many newspapers appeared on the panel, all of which reported news about the dead.

There are all kinds of deaths in the news, those who jumped to death from a building, those who jumped into a river and drowned, those who were hit by a car, and those who were cut off by a kite string while riding a bicycle……The game not only frantically put pictures next to the relevant news, but also did not blur them.

After reading it, Sang Yu scolded the unscrupulous boss: “Fuck, isn’t this harmful? Sure enough, the capitalists are all scammers. Other bosses let employees 996, and the old bald guy actually takes our lives as points. This is if you get that card, not how much money you want, I said why he is so generous all of a sudden.”

kiwii: The 996 working hour system (Chinese: 996工作制) is a work schedule practiced by some companies in the People’s Republic of China. It derives its name from its requirement that employees work from 9:00 am to 9:00 pm, 6 days per week; i.e. 72 hours per week.

But this game is crazy enough to scare players in this way.

Song Qingshu raised his head and looked around after reading the news. Everyone’s faces were not very good.

A few little girls who didn’t look too old looked like they were about to cry, probably because they were frightened; there were also a few who couldn’t bear it well, and squatted in a place with few people nearby to vomit after seeing those bloody photos. The man and woman standing in the corner didn’t react, they were still calm.

Song Qingshu usually likes to watch horror movies. There are many bloody and scary scenes in horror movies, but these are acceptable. If he’s feeling a little uncomfortable right now, it may be because he knows that the horror movies are all fake, and the reports are all real people.

The game did not give them a long time to alleviate the adverse reactions. After about five minutes, the panel was replaced with four bright red characters: The Game Starts (游戏开始).

The school gate slowly opened to both sides……