Chapter 28: Unable to Withstand My Imagination

The one with his throat gripped wasn’t just Yao Dexian.

All the teachers standing outside the Chrono Seed’s time-space bubble stared fixedly at Ye Chao, faces filled with incredulity. It was as if, in a hundred-meter dash, someone had forgotten to start the stopwatch for the time-space bubble challenge—no one remembered. By the time Guan Junyuan snapped awake and hastily pressed the timer, the clock froze at three minutes and five seconds, at least ten seconds late. In other words, Ye Chao had cleared the trial in less than three minutes.

How could this be possible?

How could it be so quick?

Not only did the opposition, led by Yao Dexian, stiffen in respect, even Hailey—the most ardent supporter—felt her knees weaken.

Everyone present knew that, once activated, this Chrono Seed constructed a time-space bubble called “Going Home.” This bubble integrated real-world terrain, the evolution of space-time, the challenger’s memories, and other factors such as weather and temperature, generating random trials. Yet the theme remained singular: returning home.

The difficulty wasn’t high; compared to the carefully arranged trials from the underground cave to Jiang City in reality, it was even simpler.

But—

Difficulty wasn’t the point; the key was the number of participants. Ordinary p2p challenges were nowhere near as thrilling as P vs NP or the infamous twenty-stage card bend—everyone knew that. In reality, if the journey home was tackled in groups of five or ten, the difficulty was just right, allowing for a proper assessment of each person’s abilities. If, as today, nearly two hundred people faced a challenge designed for five or ten, they’d steamroll through without needing to use their abilities.

Yet the “Going Home” time-space bubble was single-player only. The difficulty wasn’t high, but for each challenger, it was a nightmare—especially since it tested comprehensive abilities.

This was precisely why the teachers deployed the Chrono Seed. Increasing difficulty in reality would only give Ye Chao more chances to shine; his talent for connecting and communicating within a team meant the more people, the more impressive his performance. With Xu Tiange shadowing him every step, the teachers couldn’t forcibly abduct anyone. This extra trial was meant to erase Ye Chao’s advantage, and it looked perfectly fair—no one could object.

No one expected that Ye Chao would be the first to clear it, in only three minutes!

How could this be?

In reality, the distance from here to the city wasn’t far—one or two kilometers. In the time-space bubble, it would surely be several times further; after all, this was a university-level challenge. Not to mention the bubble—even in reality, one or two thousand meters would require three or four minutes for students without enhanced physical abilities, and that’s on a flat sports field free of hills, trees, vines, and grass.

In real mountain forests, half an hour is considered brief, an hour not long.

Three minutes? Neither Guan Junyuan nor Yao Dexian could confidently manage that.

“Why are they all staring at me?” Ye Chao wondered. After teleporting, facing world destruction, then suddenly being surrounded by hawk-eyed teachers, he feared the sudden silence most of all.

Feeling hollowed out, Ye Chao nearly collapsed. He realized, upon a fleeting thought, that he had already fallen to his knees...

He was fairly certain he’d encountered a time-space bubble, but the departure was so bizarre that even his certainty wavered.

“If you ask me, who am I supposed to ask?” Alpha Princess replied irritably, tossing Ye Chao a llama.

Having glimpsed “home” just moments ago, only for it to vanish into smoke and ash, no one could muster any joy.

“Could the seed be broken?” In the crowd, Li Jiujie—his chest wrapped like a mummy—boldly speculated.

“Shut that crow’s mouth!” Guan Junyuan slapped him across the face, inadvertently smacking Yao Dexian’s “anti-bleeding and bruising” cigar into his mouth. The burning tip made Li Jiujie cry out, aggravating his chest injury, prompting a fit of coughing and smoke rings from nose, mouth, and ears.

He’d finally mastered a skill he’d long struggled with.

But no one cared.

Broken? It was a possibility, yet no one dared imagine it...

The consequences would be too dire: nearly three hundred high school students simultaneously lost in a time-space bubble, affecting evaluations and future prospects.

“It’s not broken—he really cleared it! Look, he’s got the reward!” Hailey suddenly pointed at Ye Chao and shouted.

The dazed crowd followed her finger and saw, indeed, Ye Chao holding a shining silver device in his hand... a laptop? Like a freshly cooked meal in a chef’s show, it radiated light that gradually faded.

This was the “Hometown” trial reward, condensed by the Chrono Seed based on the challenger’s performance and the bubble’s characteristics.

Regular time-space bubbles offered similar rewards, but challengers had to find them themselves.

But the Chrono Seed trial was different; it was an artificial fantasy world—not a deadly one, and yielded no other products than the final reward.

Teachers?

Ye Chao’s eyes were dazzled by the building’s lights, and he struggled to adjust to the dim surroundings. He saw a circle of people quietly watching, felt their murderous gazes, and naturally jumped in fright.

As his vision adjusted and the voices grew familiar, he breathed a long sigh of relief.

They were teachers!

That meant he was safe?

But... what on earth had happened in that time-space bubble?

“F91 prototype personal workstation? How—how—how did you get that? Ugh...” Hailey’s words reminded Alpha Princess, who stared wide-eyed at the silver laptop in Ye Chao’s hand, then gagged...

Soon her body was emptied out, then she self-rescued; emptied again, rescued again...

She stammered on, unable to stop.

“Ye Chao, did you really clear the time-space bubble? How did you do it?” Still fixated on the silver laptop, Yao Dexian asked, cautious.

If Ye Chao had lucked through the first half, and coasted on others’ ratings in the latter half—yet still performed so outstandingly in the final bonus round—it could only mean one thing: he’d been playing the fool all along.

Cleared? Time-space bubble?

Yao Dexian’s words were few, but Ye Chao instantly caught the key phrases.

He glanced at the teachers’ shocked faces and strange appearances, and quickly understood—

That had been a time-space bubble, but not a natural one—an artificial test, the third exam.

There were several ways to create artificial time-space bubbles, but in Jiang City, given the capabilities of high school teachers, only one method was feasible...

So, that had been the Chrono Seed assessment venue?

Rumor had it, after modification, the assessment venue could tailor trials to participants’ memories, probe their weaknesses, and seek out flaws in their abilities and character...

Yet for some reason, the Chrono Seed had read Alpha Princess’s memories.

…

That so-called most advanced third-generation bio-neural network supercomputer’s... emotional intelligence assistance program—Ye Chao didn’t understand its details, but it was clearly powerful enough to break the Chrono Seed’s assessment venue.

“Teachers, if I told you I did nothing, would you believe me?

“Really—the test just couldn’t handle my imagination...”