Chapter 11

Chapter 11

Tina blinked at her. “Miss Xiang Meiling, would you like to initiate a vote now?”

Only then did Chen Nuo learn the mother’s name.

“Don’t waste a chance. The odds are far too low,” he said.

“I know. I’m only asking how we would initiate one if we wanted to,” Xiang Meiling replied.

“Let’s wait until someone actually decides to initiate a vote. I’ll explain the specific rules then,” Tina said. “I’ve told you a lot, and you all need time to absorb it. Contestant 1 also needs to think about tomorrow’s event.”

Xiang Meiling said nothing more. The group dispersed. No one was in the mood to eat, drink, or enjoy the hotel now. Most returned to their rooms.

Once inside his own room, Chen Nuo closed the door, took a deep breath, and sat in the armchair. He rested his head against its soft back.

The chair was comfortable, but there was no chance of relaxing now.

Just as Tina had said, he needed time to process everything.

They had been kidnapped by the mysterious K Organization. A microbomb had been implanted in every person’s body. After four years in induced hibernation, they had awakened in 2023…

Things that should have existed only in novels and movies had actually happened to him.

Four years. How were his parents now? If there truly had been a worldwide pandemic, were they still alive?

Chen Nuo had never missed his parents so much, even though he had silently said goodbye to them the moment he boarded the plane.

He had planned to kill himself in a foreign country on the final day of the trip. But now, his circumstances seemed to have taken a new turn.

For everyone else in the tour group, this situation was a catastrophe. For Chen Nuo, it might be the turning point of his life.

If he could win this game, he could leave with the prize money.

He did not doubt Tina’s claim that the K Organization honored its promises. The dark-web audience around the world was watching this live stream. If the organization broke its word, those spectators would likely lose faith in it.

So Chen Nuo believed that if he survived, he really could take an enormous prize home and return to his parents.

He would not have to die after all.

Chen Nuo had decided to kill himself because a medical examination one month earlier had revealed that he had lung cancer.

Advanced-stage.

His doctor had told him it could not be cured. Surgery, chemotherapy, radiation therapy, and targeted drugs might extend his life, but they would cost an enormous amount of money. The first operation, together with chemotherapy and medication, would cost around 150,000 yuan. Even then, the five-year survival rate was only about five percent. In all likelihood, his family would lose everything and he would still die.

The brutal truth had dealt Chen Nuo a fatal blow, hurling him into despair.

At the time, he had a little over five thousand yuan in his bank account. He had assumed he was young and healthy, so he had never enrolled in the public health insurance program, much less bought private coverage. If he sought treatment, he would have to pay for everything himself. He could never afford that. Borrowing money or taking out loans was impossible. The only people he could turn to were his parents, who lived in his hometown, a small county seat.

But Chen Nuo knew their financial situation. His mother had been laid off twenty years ago and scraped together a living by cleaning other people’s homes. His father was a truck driver. Though already in his fifties, he still drove a heavy truck between their county and cities throughout the region every day. Driving through the night was routine for him.

Every yuan they earned came from bitter labor. They lived frugally, and their total savings could not amount to more than a few tens of thousands, the product of an entire lifetime’s work. But Chen Nuo knew how much they loved him. If they learned that their only son was terminally ill, they would sacrifice everything to pay for his treatment, even if they had to sell every possession they owned.

That was why Chen Nuo had not dared to tell them about the cancer. He loved his parents and refused to become their burden. After a week of thought, he made his decision: he would use his remaining savings to travel abroad, enjoy the final days of his life, and then kill himself there.

His parents might believe it had been an accident. They would be devastated, but perhaps that was still better than spending everything, sinking deep into debt, and losing their son anyway. That would not merely break their hearts. It would destroy their lives, leave them without a home, and condemn them to a bleak old age. Chen Nuo would rather die than see that happen.

But now, everything was different.

Even if twenty people split ten million dollars, each would receive about three and a half million yuan. And that was the minimum.

For Chen Nuo, it would be enough. He could use the money for treatment, prolong his life, and perhaps even be cured. Hadn’t Tina said it was four years later? If she was telling the truth, his body’s functions would have slowed to their lowest possible levels during those four years of induced hibernation. His cancer cells should not have spread or developed either. Science and medicine advanced every day. Perhaps by 2023, cancer could already be cured.

He was only twenty-five, still in the prime of his youth. Love, family, a career: he had not begun any of them. If not for his disease, who would choose suicide at such a young age?

Although he would face the threat of death every day from now on, excitement made Chen Nuo’s blood run hot.

Reason told him he should not feel this way. Everything the organization had done was criminal. Yet he could not suppress the impulse inside him. He was almost eager for the game to begin.

He knew there was one thing he excelled at. Most likely, he was the only one among the twenty-one contestants who was good at it.

Then again, perhaps not…

The first contest would take place tomorrow. What kind of event would Lv Chao choose?