"Hey…. Are you okay?" he asked in concern, shaking Yumiko's shoulder gently. "Water...." he thought as he then splashed some water from his bottle onto her face.
After a spark, the water on her face revealed her horrifying reality. She gasped, clutching his hand tightly, her eyes wide with fear as she watched the players, her body trembling in panic. "I don't want to continue this game anymore!!!" she repeated the sentence, her voice raw with fear and appalling.
"It's okay.... It's okay. We also didn't expect this," the glass-wearing man assured, his voice calm and confident, holding her hand to give some comfort.
At the same time, a sharp, grating sound echoed, getting everyone's attention as the land shifted, causing their footing to tremble violently as one section ground against another. Their feet could feel the tremor, a deep thrumming pain. "What the hell is happening here?" Dean shouted, his eyes wide in clear shock as he watched the ground churn.
"It's unbelievable...." a glass-wearing man murmured, watching the dust mixed air and land shifting in disbelief.
Danny's eyes widened in shock as he spun, noticing the land shifting on every side.
"It's rotating like a roulette," a girl wondered, as her hand automatically held Dean's hand tightly.
Dean was watching his hand, playfully looking at her face, and he winked his one eye at her in a flirtatious way.
A girl pulled her hand in annoyance and look away towards the timer, "Asshole." She whispered.
Now, their gaze shifted to Timer. "44:50"
"We're all going to die!!!!!!!" a black woman screamed, her voice made everyone panic and break their tiny faith, and tears welled up in her eyes.
"But I have responsibility.... I need to watch my disabled parents," another man cried, thinking of his parents. "Mom..... dad...." he screamed in pain, thinking of his parents.
"Just stop it, guys.... We are trapped… Even if it's a game, everything has a pattern and a way. We have to figure out soon to get out of here…."Danny inquired and motivated them with examples of real incidents, watching others.
"But, how?" the old man raised a question.
Danny's gaze shifted to his half-drunk water bottle. An idea struck his mind, and he executed as per his inner feelings. Weight can determine everything in this game. If it's pulling from inside, even a water bottle can be pulled in, which means I can identify the wrong one he thought of. Without delay, a single second, he ran over a nearby empty water bottle, collected righted it and opened the cap, and refilled it with heated sand. After filling two bottles, He glanced at the others, then took a deep breath, stepping into the square where Yumiko was already standing.
"What the hell is he trying to do?" Dane whispered as his gaze fixed on Danny's action.
"He's playing with sand…." Clara fretted, her tone was exasperated.
"He must be crazy...." Dean disparaged his action to the other girls.
Danny disregarded Dean's bad mouth: he confidently threw the sand-filled bottle into the square next to him. It landed perfectly without pulling into the sand.
"It's worked…" the braided girl screamed, watching everyone happily and hugging the nearby girl excitedly.
"Maybe his luck...." Dean again teased him out of envy.
Then, Danny took that bottle and threw it next to him. It's also remained due to his luck. He jumped in relief and excitement, "I think we can reach one by one following this trick…" He said, while standing there, watching the next square.
Everyone encouraged Danny happily, clapping each other, their faces filled with hope of winning this game. "You are great, my dear boy," the old lady with the red hat murmured, her voice thick with emotional support.
"Thank you, Ma'am…. "Danny bowed to show respect for her age, a happy, proud smile on his face. He turned and threw his bottle towards the front, but this time the bottle was instantly pulled into the sand, disappearing.
.
"Oh!!!!!" everyone shouted in shock with disappointment sigh.
"Shit! I thought this was correct. " Danny whispered to himself, hiding his disappointed face, he turned towards the crowd, raising his hand, "I need another bottle…" He shouted, raising his hands and waving them a signal.
The man with glasses, his gaze shifted to Timer, "With only 37 minutes remaining, " he murmured, A disdainful smirk replaced on his lips. "We can't reach the endpoint if we go this speed," he shouted, looking directly at Danny.
Danny turned, his gaze fixed on the man with glasses. "What?" he asked in confusion. "What do you mean?"
"What?" The players raised the same question in the confusion.
"Do you have a better idea?" Dean scoffingly, grabbing his shirt off to make an unnecessary scene in front of the group.
"I do…" he declared, removing Dean's hand from his shirt. "You need a lesson, how to behave with an elder," he warned him, tapping his shoulder gently. Then he took a pen from his pocket and closed its cap precisely.
Everyone looked at Specs' man's every move and action. "I am Xavier Canny, I am a Mathematician's professor, I have 10 years of experience…" Xavier introduced himself simply, his voice calm and measured.
Before he could continue, Dean interrupted, despising his explanation. "We are not here for an interview…. Just tell your fucking idea!" he roared, his hands running over his hair, frustration boiling over.
"He's just an annoying jerk," Xavier realized that Dean was unworthy to argue at this time, and he smiled back at him. His gaze shifted to the crowd as he cleared his throat before he spoke and folded his sleeves. "Total distance of this round is 2 km, which means we are in the center of the circle, so the radius of the circle is 1 we have to travel 1 km."
Others exchange glances with each other as they nod in agreement and concentrate on his explanation carefully.
Xavier kept speaking calmly, "Listen..." as he placed his foot on the box, carefully measuring each step of the square vertically and noting. Then, returning to the center of the circle, he explained, "It looks like each square is about 0.75 meters on a side. So, for a 1-kilometer distance, which is 1000 meters, we'd have roughly 1333 squares."
"What 1333?" Danny was surprised as his gaze shifted to the vast desert.
"If we identify each correct and wrong square checking step. For every row, there are two possibilities, so it is multiplied by two, making the 2666 checking square step possible to reach the end." Xavier explained his perspective and his calculation.
"Wait…. This is insane… "Danny was stunned by Xavier's explanation.
"Then, how can we reach the end?" The braided girl pushed, biting her nail in curiosity, her eyes still it's remained on Xavier's calculation drawn in the sand.
"Do you have a solution?" a young boy hesitated and asked in a low, trembling voice.
Xavier nodded in answer, "Yes.... I do. If we go straight by Dean's method, by checking 1333 steps." He noticed everyone's shocked reaction in disbelief and continued, " If a person took 30 seconds for each step to guess the square, whether correct or wrong? 30 x 1333 is equal to 11 hrs. 11 minutes to reach the end point. Thus, we are already dead by this time.
"Shit! 11 hours…. It's crazy." Danny worried, his mind still figuring out the possibilities.
Clara eyes moving randomly watching and noticed everyone's discouraged expression on their face as she interrupted, "What? You should have told us this before! Now… Now time is 33:55, we left half an hour…. We all going to die… there is no fucking change escapes here…." she roared her leg shaking in fear of death.
"I know, it was late, but we left half an hour ago. I have found out the riddle, how it works. Without knowing, entering into the field, we are done....." Xavier explained his reason. "We just ran as much as we could. Is that the only way to reach the endpoint? "Xavier conceded with confidence and motivated them by raising his hand. "We can do it!"
"Yeah... We can! "Everyone screamed louder in agreement by raising their hands.
"How can we proceed without knowing if the square is the right choice?" the braided girl asked, a note of hesitation in her voice. "What if your idea fails?" She waved her hand through the heat waves, her eyes revealing doubt about his plan.