Chapter 158: [Passing the Imperial Examination] Mock Exam
Bai Cha woke up earlier than Mother Han—mainly because she hadn’t slept at all.
She put on a jacket to cover the bruised injury on her wrist, then heated up two bottles of milk and boiled two eggs.
Leaving half of it behind for Mother Han, she had Han Yingying write a note in her own handwriting:
“I’m heading out for the exam first. Mom, remember to eat.”
With that, Bai Cha stepped out the door.
As for Han Yingying, after a moment’s hesitation, she entered Mother Han’s room first.
She began by deleting the call log from yesterday on her mother’s phone.
Then, just as Mother Han’s alarm went off, she pressed her face close to her mother’s, startling her awake.
Feeling guilty and flustered, Han Yingying bolted out of the room to catch up with Bai Cha.
She wasn’t entirely clear on why Bai Cha insisted she do this—actually… it wasn’t that she didn’t understand, but rather that she didn’t want to think about it.
In any case, following instructions was all that mattered.
After she departed, Mother Han remained in bed for a very long time.
Clutching her chest, she felt a pain so intense she could barely catch her breath.
She had endured a night full of nightmares, dreaming that her daughter had leaped from the roof of a soaring building.
From such a high building, falling straight down into the void.
She had sprinted with all her might to catch her, again and again, missing by a fraction every single time!
Just a tiny fraction! She almost caught her!
Mother Han switched off the alarm in a state of near-total breakdown.
She comforted herself, telling herself that it was merely a bad dream.
Getting up, she prepared to place the milk and eggs into the pot for her daughter as usual.
However, upon walking into the living room, she discovered a glass of warm milk and a boiled egg already set out on the table.
Along with a slip of paper.
Staring at the words written on the paper, Mother Han’s hands trembled uncontrollably as tears streamed down her face in an endless river.
The suffocating pain in her heart grew increasingly intense.
Unable to hold herself up, she collapsed onto the floor, buried her face against the sofa, and sobbed uncontrollably.
Having left the house early today, Bai Cha didn’t need to sprint all the way to school.
She was actually quite curious whether the school would undergo any noticeable changes following a teacher’s death yesterday.
Unsurprisingly, there were none.
The bloodstains at the spot where the teacher died had already been scrubbed completely clean.
It was as if no such event had ever occurred.
The teacher tasked with guarding the stairwell at the entrance still stood in his usual spot, urging every student to hurry up.
The exam was scheduled to begin officially at eight o’clock, meaning morning self-study was still required prior to that.
When Wang Jiapeng and his group arrived in the classroom, they discovered Bai Cha was already seated.
The group felt somewhat anxious, eager to chat with Bai Cha about what had transpired last night.
Regarding that so-called Wenchang Pagoda, each of them had studied it after returning home, and it appeared to be nothing more than a scam.
At least, no anomalies could be detected so far.
And that thing cost eighty thousand yuan apiece.
Looked at this way, that master seemed like a fraud out to scam money.
Then again, it was hard to say for sure.
Unfortunately, they hadn’t run into Bai Cha this morning.
Fortunately, everyone was assigned to the exact same exam room—or rather, all the players were grouped together in one place.
Examinees entered the room at 7:30. On the way to the exam room, Wang Jiapeng approached with visible urgency.
“We went to that group owner’s place last night, and he gave each of us a necklace.”
Bai Cha knew, of course.
“I know. I trailed behind you. Don’t worry, take the exam first.”
Wang Jiapeng blinked.
Ah… right. He had almost forgotten that besides their identity as students, they were also players.
It was hardly surprising that she could find a way to follow them and keep tabs on things.
But what about the exam?
The players gathered inside the exam room and sat down.
Everyone exchanged quiet, wary glances.
Judging by the injuries or bandaged conditions across their bodies, it was easy to tell that almost everyone here was a player.
They had been in this instance for three days now, enduring relentless torture every single day.
“Fuck,” a player cursed under his breath.
He had originally hoped that if he were seated between ordinary NPCs, he could use a X-ray vision item to copy their answers. Now, his plans were completely ruined.
Everyone around him shared the exact same academic level as himself.
Many players who had prepared cheating methods overnight held the exact same thoughts.
Everyone knew full well that if they failed this mock exam, the consequences awaiting them would inevitably be far more brutal than being unable to answer a routine classroom question.
Yet the game was truly ruthless, gathering all the players into one place.
Some had already fallen into silent resignation, deciding to draw lots for the multiple-choice questions, leaving the fill-in-the-blank and comprehensive problems to pure luck.
Bai Cha sat in the very first row.
Specifically, right in front of the teacher’s podium, directly under the invigilator’s nose. Fortunately, she had no need to copy anyone.
Because the exam duration was condensed, the entire testing process felt extraordinarily tense.
There were two invigilators, one of whom happened to be their homeroom teacher.
The two paced back and forth continuously across the room. Coupled with the array of surveillance cameras overhead, this setup was clearly designed to crush anyone’s hopes of cheating.
Wearing a foul expression, the homeroom teacher hovered beside each student for a long time, glaring at them as they wrote their papers.
The first subject was Chinese Literature, which was manageable—one could always squeeze out a few words regardless.
The second subject, Mathematics, was a completely different story.
Setting aside the multiple-choice section, even if players wanted to guess on the calculation problems, they didn’t even know how to write down fake steps.
Under such crushing pressure, the players’ mental states were gradually unraveling.
When the homeroom teacher paused beside a player once again, watching him struggle for a long time without producing a single word, a look of contempt and disgust crossed the teacher’s face. Suddenly, his expression shifted drastically, his fingers jabbing toward his own eyes uncontrollably.
A blood-curdling shriek instantly echoed through the exam room.
Everyone turned to look.
They watched in horror as the homeroom teacher gouged out his own eyeball.
The expressions across the room remained largely cold and detached, particularly the player sitting right beside him.
That player’s fingers were twitching subtly, as if controlling something unseen.
The other invigilator froze briefly before snapping back to his senses, hastily rushing forward to support his colleague.
Before he could reach him, however, he too lost control of his body, dropping straight to his knees and slamming his head violently against the floor in a frantic, self-mutilating kowtow, blood spurting everywhere.
Bai Cha knitted her brows slightly.
Truth be told, tormenting these teachers served little purpose.
Unless these teachers were also involved in something deeper.
Based on what had been revealed so far, however, they merely functioned as game mechanics designed to inflict pressure and escalate difficulty.
Still, that player… could he manipulate people?
Withdrawing her gaze, she resumed writing her paper.
Regardless, Mother Han needed her daughter’s test scores, which would allow her to proceed with the next step of her plan.
This chaotic scene quickly alerted the teachers outside. The two invigilators were helped away, replaced by a new invigilator.
“Focus on your exams, everyone! No whispering or exchanging glances!”
Honestly… to insist on continuing the exam even after an incident like this occurred proved that, at least within this game-generated school, test scores and the college entrance exam held far greater value than human life.
And it wasn’t just the school—nearly everyone held this view.
Including the students themselves.
Three subjects were scheduled for the morning, making the timeline for the mock exam exceptionally tight.
By the time lunch arrived, Bai Cha let out a heavy sigh of relief, too drained to even bother going for food.
After several days of high-pressure environments, even with her enhanced physical stamina inside the game, a profound wave of exhaustion washed over her.
She wondered how Han Yingying was progressing on her end.
Bai Cha stood up, pretending to head to the restroom—it was lunchtime anyway, so there weren’t many people around.
“Yingying?” she called softly.
Han Yingying materialized swiftly.
The surrounding atmosphere turned noticeably gloomy.
“Sister, you called for me?”
“Did you talk to them?”
Han Yingying nodded.
“I did. I called them over to the sports field to talk… After learning the truth, they were just as furious as I was. One of them ran off to settle scores right on the spot.”
