Wake Up, This is Not a Dating Show! Chapter 13

Chapter 13 Hunting Time (Part 4) Grabbed by the wrist, stopping the movement…

Actually, prior to this, Ye Nai genuinely hadn’t suspected Yi Xingzhi much. After all, from the beginning until now, he seemed to have been putting in effort the entire time. It was really hard to associate him with an undercover agent.

If all of this was action taken to deceive and gain trust, wouldn’t the price paid be too high?

If Yi Xingzhi had deliberately interfered, they might not necessarily have won the basketball game, and thus wouldn’t have obtained the hint that there was an undercover agent. This was undoubtedly the easiest method.

Why would he choose such an arduous and risky approach?

“So you’re convinced the undercover agent is me?” Yi Xingzhi’s expression remained indifferent, displaying neither the annoyance of being falsely accused nor the panic of being exposed.

“No.” Ye Nai looked him in the eye and spoke bluntly, “But highly suspicious.”

Yi Xingzhi met his gaze calmly but said nothing more. It was unclear if he intended to prove himself through actions or if he had already given up defending himself.

Once all the dishes were pretty much served, the host began explaining the rules for this round’s game, “Don’t Do It Challenge: Dining Edition”.

“Each person will have a card tied to their head. You cannot look at the content of your own card. You must guide others into performing the action written on their card. Once they do it, they fail and must remove the card. Guessing the content of the card allows you to swap it for a new one. Everyone gets three cards, and the last person standing wins.”

Even though they were required to play a game while eating, with such restrictions, everyone was afraid to act rashly, fearing a random movement would trigger the words on the card. Therefore, they all ate with exceptional caution.

Finding it annoying not even being able to eat in peace, Ye Nai decided to end the battle quickly.

He glanced at the Blue Team’s three cards, picked up a piece of food in front of him, and said as if inadvertently, “This pork belly is pretty good.”

Yi Xingzhi immediately spun the Lazy Susan, moving that dish toward the Blue Team.

“This is honey-glazed BBQ pork,” Yin Tianhan, who was familiar with the local cuisine, said.

Yuan Lei also took a bite. “I think it’s a bit sweet.”

“Alright, you two can take your cards off,” Ye Nai announced expressionlessly.

The two were stunned. They didn’t expect the killing spree to start so soon. Dumbfounded, they took off the cards on their heads. Yin Tianhan’s read “Say the dish name”, and Yuan Lei’s read “Evaluate the dish”.

“Awesome, a double kill right off the bat?” Pei Ze was stunned.

“You take yours off too,” Fu Tingyuan told him.

“What did I do?” Pei Ze took the card off in confusion, only to see “Say an animal name” written on it.

When did he say an animal… Wait, did that count too?!

“You’re pretty awesome yourself,” Ye Nai drawled lazily. “Self-destructing right off the bat.”

Yin Tianhan picked up his cup and stood up. “Let’s not have such killer intent. It’s fate that we brothers are gathered together. Come on, let’s call a truce for a few seconds, cheers first.”

Hearing his sincere words, everyone didn’t suspect much and stood up to clink glasses. However, right after they drank and sat down, the host announced, “Ye Nai, Yi Xingzhi, and Fu Tingyuan remove your cards.”

Upon removing them, Ye Nai’s card read “Stand up”, Yi Xingzhi’s was “Cheers”, and Fu Tingyuan’s was “Drink water”.

“You’re truly sinister. You live up to your surname,” Ye Nai couldn’t help but open fire.

“So this is how the game is played? Understood.” Yi Xingzhi had an epiphany.

Before Fu Tingyuan could speak, Yin Tianhan clinked glasses with him again, looking apologetic. “Sorry about that, friendly fire.”

“It’s fine, it’s an individual battle after all,” Fu Tingyuan expressed understanding.

In the blink of an eye, everyone had lost a card, and they became even more vigilant and defensive toward each other.

Pei Ze reached out his right hand to pick up some food, while Yi Xingzhi happened to reach for a tissue with his left hand, and their arms bumped. Seizing the opportunity, Pei Ze shifted his chair to the left, moving closer to Fu Tingyuan, who was sitting on his left.

Seeing the other party remain motionless, he rolled his shoulders and pretended to say naturally, “It’s a bit cramped.”

“I’m not cramped,” Fu Tingyuan didn’t even lift his eyes.

The two were already very close, their elbows touching. Bracing himself, Pei Ze continued to shift to the left. Before he could even think of his next line, Fu Tingyuan turned his head, pointed at his own card, and asked, “Is mine ‘Move the chair’?”

Pei Ze was just moving towards him and didn’t expect him to turn around suddenly. Their noses almost touched, and he hurriedly leaned back to create distance.

“Was it that obvious… Ouch!” Because of his drastic movement, he tilted the chair backwards and lost his balance, falling backwards.

Fu Tingyuan deftly helped him press the chair back into place. “It’s okay, not that obvious.”

Pei Ze: “…”

Thank you, I feel completely uncomforted.

After Fu Tingyuan changed his card, Yuan Lei scooped himself a bowl of rice and asked, “Does anyone else want rice? I’ll get it for you.”

No one responded. Only Pei Ze was about to hand his bowl over, but suddenly grew cautious. He withdrew his hand and said, “Never mind, I’ll get it myself.”

“Okay.” Yuan Lei turned to Ye Nai again. “Does Nyle want some?”

“No,” Ye Nai replied without any hesitation.

Such an obvious trap, did he think he couldn’t see through it?

Yuan Lei handed the rice pot to Pei Ze and flashed a victor’s smile. “OK, you two take yours off.”

Ye Nai’s eyes instantly widened, thinking he had misheard. He reached up to take his card, which read “Reject someone”.

“…”

That counts?!

And Pei Ze’s card read “Receive something”.

With only their last cards remaining, Ye Nai looked displeased, while Pei Ze wore a tragic expression.

After a while, Ye Nai suddenly said to Yuan Lei, “Alright, you can take yours off too.”

“I just took two bites of rice!” Yuan Lei looked up innocently.

“Mhm, at least you admit it,” Yi Xingzhi nodded.

Yuan Lei looked at his card; it actually read “Eat rice”. Speechless, he tossed the card onto the table.

There were quite a few of these self-destructing cards. Before long, Yin Tianhan got hit by “Lean back in chair”, and Fu Tingyuan got hit by “Pick up a spoon”.

Yi Xingzhi was the only one left on the field with two cards, immediately making him the prime target.

“To be reasonable, shouldn’t Brother Yi have removed this card a long time ago?” Yuan Lei said. “It’s just that no one was keeping time.”

“Ah, I didn’t even notice,” Pei Ze regretted not keeping an eye on him. “If it were anyone else on the field holding this card, they wouldn’t have completed it so easily.”

Ye Nai had actually thought of this issue early on, but it was highly likely Yi Xingzhi was the undercover agent. It was safest to win this individual battle himself.

With everyone’s unanimous agreement, Yi Xingzhi took down his card, which read “Remain silent for ten seconds”.

Everyone returned to the starting line again, and the game officially entered the final stage. In this round, no one even dared to eat, terrified that a random movement would cause them to self-destruct, so they devoted their full attention to the battle.

“I’m a bit thirsty, has anyone seen the water?” Yuan Lei asked, holding up his empty cup.

Ye Nai saw the lemon water sitting right in front of his eyes. Just as he was about to hand it to him, he suspected his phrase was “Pass something”. Pointing to the pitcher, he said, “It’s right here, get it yourself, or wait until this round is over and I’ll get it for you.” After a pause, he added, “Do you like drinking this?”

“It’s okay,” Yuan Lei failed to trick him and answered casually.

Ye Nai looked at the host. “Does that count?”

The host nodded. “It counts.”

Yuan Lei took his card down in confusion, only to see “Chat about food preferences” written on it. Scratching his head, he said, “Alright, I’ll just eat in peace.”

“Show-off, what a counter-kill,” Pei Ze praised.

As soon as he finished speaking, there was a bang, and Yin Tianhan’s cup suddenly tipped over, spilling water everywhere.

“Are there any tissues?” He started searching the table.

The tissue box was placed right in front of Ye Nai, but he was sitting quite far from Yin Tianhan, making it hard to hand it to him. He planned to spin the table to get it over there.

Before he could move, Yi Xingzhi beat him to it, picking up the whole box of tissues and handing it over directly. Yin Tianhan pulled out several tissues consecutively to soak up the water, taking quite a while to clean up the table.

“Do you still need this?” Yi Xingzhi also handed him the lemon water.

“Thank you.” Yin Tianhan took it and poured himself another cup.

“Brother Tianhan, take it off,” Pei Ze said, trying to hold back his laughter. “This is what they call shooting yourself in the foot.”

Yin Tianhan’s card was “Pour water”.

He shook his head and sighed, “Wow, that didn’t fool you guys. You’re so hard to kill!”

Only then did Ye Nai realize that the water was deliberately spilled. He really went all out acting so realistically.

The Blue Team was left with only Fu Tingyuan. Facing the Red Team’s predatory glares, he remained composed and seemingly unpressured. He called out to Ye Nai, pointing at his chin. “There’s a bit of oil here.”

“Oh, I’ll wipe it later,” Ye Nai guessed this was another trap and brushed him off casually.

Yi Xingzhi turned his head to look and confirmed, “There really is.”

It was real? Ye Nai was a bit surprised. Seeing that the tissue box had been placed over by Yin Tianhan, he prepared to spin it back. But just as he stretched out his left hand, the person beside him grabbed his wrist, stopping his movement.

Yi Xingzhi didn’t speak. He simply raised his hand, spun the Lazy Susan to bring the tissues over, and pulled one out.

Watching his well-defined hand getting closer and closer, Ye Nai quickly snatched the tissue. “I can do it myself.”

As soon as he spoke, he saw the other party’s hand had already stopped steadily, clearly just intending to hand the tissue to him.

Ye Nai: “…”

Why did he think Yi Xingzhi was going to wipe it for him? It was probably mostly because of that helmet incident earlier!

Ye Nai felt a wave of embarrassment and wiped his face haphazardly, still completely confused. He didn’t understand why Yi Xingzhi had helped him get the tissue. When he looked up, he saw that his card read “Pull a tissue”, and he was eliminated just like that.

Yuan Lei gave Fu Tingyuan a thumbs-up. “Impressive, almost a double kill.”

Yin Tianhan: “I concede to this prediction.”

Listening to their discussion, Ye Nai roughly guessed the situation. Pointing at his own card, he asked, “Is mine ‘Spin the Lazy Susan’?”

“If you guessed it, you guessed it, why say it out loud?” Pei Ze complained. “If you had just laid low and done nothing, you would’ve won the whole thing!”

“Cheating is boring.” Ye Nai pointed at Fu Tingyuan. “Didn’t he just say it too?”

Ye Nai swapped for a new card. Seeing that the word on Fu Tingyuan’s card was somewhat difficult, he was calculating what to do when he suddenly saw Pei Ze stretching his chopsticks, struggling to reach the vegetables placed further inside.

Fu Tingyuan naturally pushed the outer dishes aside, clearing a space, and moved the dish Pei Ze wanted outward.

“Thanks.” Pei Ze moved the vegetables to his bowl and buried his head in eating.

Everyone present looked at the cards on their heads and fell into silence…

“Pei Ze, were you really not doing that on purpose?” Ye Nai asked.

“What?” Pei Ze just swallowed his bite. Following his gaze, he turned to look at Fu Tingyuan’s card and laughed loudly. “Ah, you’re dead! I didn’t even see, yours is ‘Move a dish’ hahahaha!”

Fu Tingyuan was momentarily stunned, but then he also smiled. He raised his hand to take down Pei Ze’s card and showed it to him. “Not a loss, an extreme one-for-one trade.”

It read “Say ‘Thank you'”.

Pei Ze’s smile instantly froze.

The live set and the bullet screen erupted in laughter.

[Smiles don’t disappear, they just transfer to my face!]

[I thought dying for love was just an ancient myth… Ting has Yuan-Ze scoring like crazy!]

[LMAO Ye Nai basically won by doing nothing at the end!]

[Well, didn’t he rely on Brother E to help him? Who understands the gold value of that wrist grab!]

[Is Yi Xingzhi really the undercover agent? Which side is he undercover for, LMAO!]

[Can you guess why their CP name is called Yi-Ye Obscures the Eyes?]

When the host announced that Ye Nai was the winner of this round, he was still a bit dazed.

First, those two mutually destructing at the end was too sudden. Second, he realized that winning this round was largely thanks to Yi Xingzhi stopping him from spinning the Lazy Susan.

He had clearly intended to help Yi Xingzhi win a round to return the favor for misunderstanding him. Why was he owing him more and more instead? As for whether he was the undercover agent or not, it had become even more confusing.

The spot where his wrist was grabbed seemed to still be emitting a faint heat. Feeling awkward, Ye Nai tucked his left hand under the dining table, as if he wouldn’t feel that strange warmth as long as he couldn’t see it.

“Am I crowding you?” Yi Xingzhi noticed his action of withdrawing his hand and moved his chair slightly to the side. “This game has given you PTSD, feels like you’re trying to bait me into moving seats.”

His brows and eyes were usually cold, but looking over right now, they carried a hint of a smile, softening his features significantly. The light fell into his eyes like the moon reflected in a lake.

Ye Nai stared at that moonlight for a moment before looking away to speak: “Then why did you still move?”

Yi Xingzhi seemed to think seriously for a moment before finally saying, “I don’t know, maybe I felt you wouldn’t harm me?”

The hand Ye Nai used to hold his chopsticks unconsciously tightened, and it took him a long while to reply, “That depends on whether you lied to me or not.”

Translator’s Note:

• “Yin” (陰) used as an adjective usually means sinister, tricky, or underhanded. Ye Nai says Yin Tianhan lives up to his surname “Yin”.
• “Ting has Yuan-Ze” (廷有淵澤) is a pun and shipping name combining Fu Tingyuan and Pei Ze’s names.