The Genius Game - Chapter 2

At that moment, the clown spoke: “Welcome to the Genius Game. The rules will be announced in thirty minutes.”

Jian Tanxi asked, “What is the Genius Game? Did you bring me here? Where are the others? Where have my parents gone?”

However, the clown did not answer these questions and drifted far away instead.

Jian Tanxi could only look around helplessly.

She noticed that, aside from herself, there were indeed other people here. They were all lying on the ground, still unconscious.

A white mist shrouded their bodies, making it difficult for Jian Tanxi to see their appearances clearly.

But it wasn’t completely impossible to see.

Not far from her, there was a hospital bed.

On the bed lay an elderly man with graying hair, unconscious, with an IV drip attached to his hand.

Because he was lying on the hospital bed, which was elevated, the white mist only obscured the lower part of the bed, leaving the old man’s body visible.

Jian Tanxi walked over, intending to wake him up.

But after calling out a few times, the old man did not respond.

Jian Tanxi had no choice but to give up and conserve her energy.

She had no idea how to pass this so-called Genius Game. She needed to save her strength to deal with whatever challenges lay ahead.

She glanced a few more times at the old man on the hospital bed and noticed that he had a refined, scholarly appearance. However, she didn’t recognize him.

After a while, the others lying on the ground began to wake up one by one. The clown drifted over, spoke to them, and then drifted away again.

They stood up, their faces filled with confusion.

Jian Tanxi counted and realized that, including herself and the old man on the hospital bed, there were seven people in total.

Closest to Jian Tanxi was a middle-aged woman in her thirties, holding the hand of a young boy, likely her son.

The woman was about 155 cm tall, slightly plump, with a slight hunch in her back. Her face looked weary, and she had some gray hairs.

But the child she was holding was only five or six years old, so the mother shouldn’t be very old and shouldn’t have so many gray hairs.

Jian Tanxi found it a bit strange and decided to ask about it later.

Next to the mother and son stood a middle-aged man in his forties. He had an honest face, dark skin, and messy hair, suggesting he might do manual labor.

Beside the middle-aged man stood a girl about 160 cm tall, slender, wearing a white dress.

The girl wore glasses and looked very young, with a small frame as if she hadn’t fully developed yet, so she was probably only in her teens. However, she didn’t seem childish; her expression carried a calm intelligence that didn’t match her age.

She was extremely thin, Jian Tanxi wondered if she even weighed 80 pounds, or perhaps less.

The person farthest away was a young man in his twenties. He wore a plaid shirt, was very thin, stood with a straight posture, and had a pair of gold-rimmed glasses. He was handsome, but his eyes held a faint trace of impatience.

At first glance, Jian Tanxi thought of a phrase, a refined scoundrel.

But then she scolded herself inwardly: How could she form such a negative impression of a stranger so quickly?

Everyone exchanged glances, but no one spoke first.

They all waited, hoping the old man on the hospital bed would wake up, while also checking to see if there were any others on the ground who hadn’t yet stirred.

Not far away, a clock ticked steadily, allowing everyone to estimate how much time had passed.

After waiting ten minutes, the elderly man on the hospital bed still hadn’t woken up, and no one else in the room had stood up either.

It seemed all the living people were here.

At that moment, the young girl in the white dress spoke up, “How… how did all of you end up here?”

Jian Tanxi hesitated, unsure whether she should share her own experience.

She didn’t know anyone here and didn’t dare trust a single person.

The others also seemed hesitant, and no one answered.

Finally, the middle-aged man in his forties, with a simple and honest face, spoke first, “I don’t know what happened either. I was repairing a car in the shop today, and when I looked up, all my colleagues and customers were gone. I searched everywhere for them, but there was no one. I ran out into the street, but there was no one there either. Many cars were just parked, still running.

It was as if… as if one second someone was driving, and the next, the drivers had all vanished. I went to the police station to report it, but there was no one there either.

I got a little scared and tried calling my family, but the call wouldn’t go through… Then I tried sending messages to my family and colleagues, but the messages wouldn’t send either.

So, I went back to the shop. But then, some of the papers on the desk suddenly came to life, growing arms and legs, and started walking toward me. They kept spinning around, and I got so dizzy I passed out. When I woke up, I was here.

Just as I opened my eyes, a huge clown-shaped paper appeared in front of me. It said, ‘Welcome to the Genius Game. The rules will be announced in thirty minutes.'”

This middle-aged man’s experience was quite similar to Jian Tanxi’s.

The girl in the white dress who had asked the question earlier also spoke, “Uncle, my experience is similar to yours… I was reading in the library today, and in the blink of an eye, everyone else in the library disappeared. There were some blank papers scattered on the front desk, and those papers came to life and started walking toward me. I was so scared I fainted.

After I woke up, my experience was the same as yours.”

Hearing two people in a row share similar stories, the others were visibly surprised.

The remaining people no longer held back and briefly recounted how they had ended up here. Jian Tanxi also shared her story.

Everyone’s experiences were quite similar.

The handsome man in the plaid shirt said, “It seems we’ve all been through something similar… Wait, there’s still one person who hasn’t spoken.”

The handsome man looked toward the elderly man on the hospital bed.

The old man still had his eyes closed, not yet awake.

The handsome man frowned and said, “Old man, stop pretending to sleep. We’re all awake now. Get up so we can discuss how to escape together.”

However, the elderly man on the bed seemed not to hear him, his eyes still tightly shut, breathing slowly.

The handsome man was about to reach out and shake the old man awake but was stopped by the honest middle-aged man.

The middle-aged man said, “If he could wake up, he would have by now. I think he might be a comatose patient, not like us. Look, he’s still hooked up to an IV.”

The handsome man replied, “We were all unconscious earlier too, but we woke up. There’s no reason this old man shouldn’t wake up.”

Jian Tanxi also said, “We were all healthy before, but this elderly gentleman might have been a critically ill patient who has been in a coma for a long time. Even if he’s here now, he might not wake up. Otherwise, why were we all lying on the ground earlier, while he was lying on a hospital bed?”

The handsome man didn’t believe it: “The situation is very dangerous now. Many people have disappeared, and we’ve been transported here with no idea how to get out. Perhaps this is a conspiracy targeting all of humanity. And this old man might be deliberately hiding among us. He could be observing us secretly, waiting for a chance to strike. He might be on the side of the antagonists.”

The middle-aged mother in her thirties had a different theory: “If this elderly man is truly pretending to be unconscious, it’s likely he just doesn’t want to contribute. He might be waiting for us to find a way out before waking up, so he can pass through unscathed. He probably isn’t an antagonist, just someone unwilling to take risks.

If there really is an antagonist, or a group of antagonists, behind today’s events, and they have the power to make people disappear, they could just as easily make us vanish. Dealing with us would be effortless for them; there’s no need for such roundabout tactics like planting a mole.”

The middle-aged mother spoke logically, and the others nodded in agreement. Even the handsome man couldn’t come up with a rebuttal.

Jian Tanxi had initially thought this middle-aged mother was just an ordinary parent, but she turned out to be intelligent, calm, and rational, quite different from her appearance.

Suddenly, a thought struck Jian Tanxi: Could this so-called “genius game” be a game only geniuses could participate in?

But although Jian Tanxi considered herself smart, she wasn’t arrogant enough to think of herself as a genius.

The young, handsome man seemed highly intelligent; the elderly man lying in bed appeared to be a highly educated professor or someone of that caliber, both of them could be considered geniuses.

However, the middle-aged laborer, who did physical work, probably didn’t qualify as a genius. And the five- or six-year-old boy, who hadn’t spoken a word and just timidly held his mother’s hand, couldn’t be called a genius either…

So, did this “genius game” have another meaning?

Moreover, even if it truly were a game only for geniuses, surely there couldn’t be only seven geniuses in the entire world, right?

That made no sense.

They could only wait and see what the clown had to say.

Although everyone had various speculations about the elderly man, his expression remained completely unchanged. It was impossible to tell whether he was unconscious and couldn’t hear them or whether he had exceptional mental fortitude and was skilled at deception.

Just then, the teenage girl in the white dress looked at the elderly man on the hospital bed and suddenly exclaimed, “Isn’t this Professor Pan Xian from the Chinese Academy of Sciences?”

Jian Tanxi asked in surprise, “Professor Pan Xian? You know him?”

The girl in the white dress nodded: “Yes, even though I’m just a high school student, my dream is to work at the Chinese Academy of Sciences someday. So, I’ve learned about the staff there. This is Professor Pan Xian, he specializes in biology and is also the vice president of the Academy.”

A few days ago, I saw a news report stating that Professor Pan Xian had fallen into a coma due to a sudden heart attack and was rushed to Huaguo Third Hospital for emergency treatment. No wonder he appeared lying on a hospital bed, he must indeed still be unconscious.

So, the earlier speculation was wrong. He is neither a member of the antagonist’s side nor feigning unconsciousness to avoid contributing, but is genuinely comatose. It’s not that he doesn’t want to wake up; he simply can’t.

After the girl in the white dress explained, everyone suddenly understood.

It seemed their earlier worries were unnecessary.

Most people in Huaguo know of Professor Pan Xian. He has made outstanding contributions in the field of biology and has received numerous awards both domestically and internationally. The Chinese Academy of Sciences is the nation’s top research institution, and only the best can work there.

However, while most have heard of him, few know what he looks like.

Fortunately, the girl in the white dress was there; otherwise, everyone would still be unclear about the old man’s identity.

At that moment, the handsome middle-aged man spoke again, looking at the girl in the white dress and saying, “Wait, just because you say he’s Professor Pan Xian, he is? What evidence do you have?”