Chapter 42

The sunlight was just right, the sky was clear and bright, warming the ground to a pleasant temperature, neither too hot nor too cold. A breeze swept through, carrying away the mild warmth of autumn.

It was a lovely autumn day, perfect for traveling.

At the parkour district, three people stood on the same platform.

The Crow tilted its head.

Lollipop tilted his head too.

Chu Tingwu raised her hand to cover the Crow's eyes, then said, "It's looking at your shoulder strap."

It was a metal chain that gleamed brightly in the sunlight.

Lollipop clapped his hands. "Oh~"

He crunched the lollipop in his mouth, took off his shoulder strap, and dangled it in front of Crow.

Even with Chu Tingwu's hand covering its eyes and moving around, the Crow's head kept shifting, trying to peek around her palm to see the "bird-tempting" object behind it.

Lollipop kept making "oho" sounds, while the Crow responded with "caw caw" noises.

Chu Tingwu: "..."

You two are so noisy.

The Redhead girl crossed her arms, looking exasperated.

The two of them occasionally used professional terms when talking, and with Chu Tingwu's current foreign language level, she couldn't understand much, especially when they spoke too fast... after all, she was only a first-year high school student. But the system would translate for her, displaying real-time subtitles next to their heads, which looked quite amusing.

Crow's "rehabilitation" was progressing slowly. Chu Tingwu tried to train it not to pick up everything it saw. But preventing it from picking things up entirely would go against the bird's nature, so she attempted to teach the Crow to retrieve only specific items she requested.

When throwing cotton candy far away and having Crow fetch it back, Chu Tingwu felt something was off. After unwrapping the cotton candy and feeding torn pieces to Crow, the dog-training vibe reached its peak.

Chu Tingwu: "=="

Since the venue was still being set up, the three of them took the opportunity to make brief self-introductions.

However, to others watching, they appeared to be chatting on the rooftop, walking and talking, then suddenly jumping to the third-floor terrace across the way, where they sat in a row along the edge—mind you, their sitting spot was nearly ten meters above the ground; one slip forward, and they could bid farewell to walking forever.

Lollipop: "You absolutely must try high-altitude parkour, Wu! I've seen your videos, you're as agile as a real cat. Have you seen the movie 'Catwoman'? I think you should have been the lead actress!"

Lollipop was quite the flatterer and... well, quite the rambler.

Redhead girl: "Where I live, there are lots of crows, and I always found them quite annoying. They even steal corn from my house, yet you can actually make a crow obey—"

The Redhead girl seemed somewhat afraid of small animals.

She kept thinking the Crow would drop cotton candy on her.

Lollipop reached out excitedly: "Over here, over here."

Crow retrieved a small bag of cotton candy from Chu Tingwu's pocket, flew up, showed off with a loop in the air, and dropped it.

Lollipop jumped up to catch the cotton candy and asked Chu Tingwu, "Can I eat it?"

Chu Tingwu: "...Sure."

How did you all start playing around like this!

Lollipop wanted Crow to stand on his shoulder, but when he reached out, Crow pushed his hand away with its claw—only after Chu Tingwu spoke did Crow finally agree to change positions. Lollipop stood still, held his breath, and made a gesture of stroking bird feathers, trying to look cool:

"Quick! Take a photo!"

His excited voice wasn't cool at all!

Chu Tingwu and the Redhead girl took several photos for him from the side, and then they took some group photos, which Lollipop posted on his own page. He said, "Wu, the comments are saying you're like a shrine maiden who travels with crows and cats."

That sounded so cool! Even her name was "Wu."

However, some fans were commenting in Chinese about "self-improvement through labor reform," whatever that meant—was it some kind of proverb?

The event organizers had provided translators for the two foreign friends, but since the translators couldn't climb onto rooftops like them, and Chu Tingwu didn't seem to need translation anyway, the translator could only wait below, until a staff member notified her, and she called out:

"Teachers, the venue is ready, you can come down now!"

The production team had set up many fixed cameras in the area, and to get more shooting angles, there were also camera operators with their equipment filming today's rehearsal footage.

The translator explained to them: "We'll have each teacher run three routes, and during tomorrow's competition, we'll select several routes from the total nine to use as the final competition routes. Please don't reveal the routes you've run to anyone!"

Choosing five points from nine points meant there were numerous possible routes, and revealing the routes would affect the competition's fairness.

Lollipop raised his hand in an "OK" gesture.

Not just them, but all staff members had signed confidentiality agreements.

—Of course, they wouldn't run these routes just once. During and after the competition, the judges would need to "commentate." So they had to run multiple times, achieving their theoretical best speeds, to later evaluate contestants' movements and route choices.

Large buttons were installed at each checkpoint, which contestants had to press with any part of their body. When pressed, the buttons would light up, along with the sign above them.

Lollipop went first.

After warming up, he stood at the starting point, cheerfully waving both hands. A three-second countdown appeared on the screen at the starting point, then 3, 2, 1—

[Timer Start!]

Lollipop's demeanor changed in that instant; Chu Tingwu felt he seemed even "happier."

As he lowered his hands, he performed a front flip right there, landing precisely on the steps, then bounced onto the railing, swinging smoothly using a tree trunk.

Redhead girl: "Monkey."

Chu Tingwu: "Hm?"

Redhead girl: "That's his nickname. Have you noticed? His arms are naturally longer than others'."

Yes, that was true... but thinking back to their earlier interactions, Chu Tingwu realized Lollipop had been constantly moving, very active, his wrists and arms always nimble. He'd never let his arms hang straight down, so the proportion difference wasn't noticeable.

He had turned what could have been a strange, potentially discriminated-against physical trait into his greatest advantage.

Parkour involves many movements that mimic animals, and animals are natural parkour experts—cats are, and so are monkeys. Chu Tingwu could see that Lollipop ran with great joy.

The Redhead girl patted her and took the initiative to follow.

Chu Tingwu decisively took a step forward as well.

The staff members were surprised but didn't stop them—after all, this was just rehearsal.

They watched as all three teachers entered the course, though only Arthur at the front was running according to plan, hitting the five points in sequence, while Teacher Maggie and Little Teacher Chu seemed to just want a closer look—

Maggie patted Chu's shoulder and pointed at the wall ahead, saying something.

The next second, the staff members' eyes widened:

The two women jumped forward in unison, left and right, wall-running, cat-hanging, completing beautiful platform turns, standing up, and continuing forward.

Maggie let out a joyful laugh.

Chu Tingwu's Crow circled above their heads, then descended, flapping its wings and following behind, meowing loudly like a cat, almost convincingly real.

After getting familiar with the venue, they all shortened their times on their second run.

The other two parkour practitioners might have been doing parkour for longer than Chu Tingwu had been alive, and although she showed "exceptional talent," after seeing her parkour style, they helped her modify several transitional movements.

Maggie shrugged: "At first I thought you were just good at imitating cats, but after seeing you run, I realized your jumping ability is extraordinary. With your jumping skills and amazing balance, you can completely ignore those necessary connecting techniques—so you can use techniques as a means of acceleration, like here, Wu, you can slide directly down the railing, kick off the wall to change direction, and here..."

However, while they could point out flaws in Chu Tingwu's performance, she couldn't offer much feedback, as she was still relatively new to the theoretical aspects.

...Besides, she wasn't quite sure how high humans could jump, and did parkour athletes even count as normal humans?

When the two started arguing, she simply stuffed a marshmallow into each of their mouths to quiet them down.

Arthur rummaged through his pocket but couldn't find a lollipop, and suggested disappointedly: "Wu, how about this—I'll run, and you chase me, with your goal being to give me the marshmallow—I think this kind of 'chase' will definitely inspire more creative movement designs!"

Chu Tingwu: But that's such a bizarre reason to chase you!

Arthur shrugged and started crafting a story: "It's simple, let's say I'm actually an alien from the Lollipop Planet who can't tolerate marshmallows—I'll die if I eat them, and you're an assassin from the Marshmallow Planet... Hey, wait, don't leave! Is this story too childish? I can think of another one—"

The three practiced until noon, with Chu Tingwu being the last one—once she finished running, they could go eat their boxed lunches.

Before she ran, the staff cleaned up the course one more time.

—Before each run, the staff would re-inspect the course to ensure its safety.

After all, this area used to be a residential zone, and no one knew if a wind-blown can might suddenly appear around a corner, causing another judge to go offline.

Chu Tingwu waited at the starting point, gazing across the street, her eyes flickering slightly, but her posture remained unchanged, appearing lost in thought just like before.

But when the screen displayed the large text [TIMING START!], her entire body explosively transformed from stillness to motion, the crow on her shoulder taking flight as the girl below seemed to sprout wings herself, her initial leap resembling "takeoff."

A pair of eyes watched quietly.

Chu Tingwu reached the first checkpoint, and the moment she pressed it, the light panel lit up.

Arthur whistled.

But since they were all tired and familiar enough with the route, they didn't follow this time. Nine checkpoints were arranged in a semicircle, with a huge screen at the concave middle point that would display the parkour footage both now and during the competition.

Chu Tingwu quickly reached the third checkpoint, hitting it with her hand as the light panel illuminated.

Her expression remained unchanged on the screen, her bangs floating up then falling back, the crow following behind, its black wing edges briefly covering half the camera before only Chu Tingwu's back remained in view.

But before reaching the fourth checkpoint, though her speed appeared unchanged on the surface, her brows slightly furrowed—

When she did parkour, the system would usually just shower her with praise, saying things like "my little one is so amazing" or "look how much faster you are than them (though the routes weren't actually the same)," and wouldn't interfere with her decision-making.

But as she was about to reach the fourth checkpoint, a familiar semi-transparent blue marker appeared before her eyes.

This marker showed hand and foot prints, and originally Chu Tingwu was supposed to hit the button with her hand, as she had always done before. But following the marker's suggestion, she would need to kick over and press the button with her foot.

Although the staff had said the buttons wouldn't break easily from stepping on them, none of the three had ever done this before.

Chu Tingwu didn't slow down or stop, so her mental deliberation lasted only an instant:

She braced against the ground, raised her leg, and swept her pointed toe over the button, causing the light panel to flash on instantly. Then Chu Tingwu maintained her speed, even accelerating as she landed, sliding down the stairs and rushing toward the fifth checkpoint.

The marker before her eyes disappeared.

After lighting up the fifth checkpoint, she reached the finish line and high-fived Arthur and Maggie in turn.

Arthur gestured: "Seriously, that move where you supported yourself with both hands and pressed the button with your leg was really cool, like a kind of... um, street dance? I want to try it this afternoon too!"

Chu Tingwu smiled: "Just a spur-of-the-moment thing."

Maggie: "...You Chinese people are really scary."

Chu Tingwu: "?"

Maggie: Chinese people can actually casually use idioms in daily life!

The staff called them to go eat, but Chu Tingwu waved her hand: "I just had some inspiration, can I stay a bit longer?"

This wasn't a problem.

But after everyone left and the staff went to eat, Chu Tingwu walked back to the fourth checkpoint.

Crow circled once overhead before landing on the roof behind the button, looking at the tiles as if wanting to peck at them, then secretly glancing at Chu Tingwu, then looking down again, and...

Chu Tingwu: "No."

Crow: "Caw caw!"

When it got angry, it stopped speaking cat language! It was clever, knowing that Chu Tingwu could understand cat swear words!

Chu Tingwu went over and crouched down, clearly seeing what was under that tile: several pieces of broken glass, ground into sharp points, glinting with a faint light that could attract crows from this angle, and up close there was a slight smell of blood and glue.

There were also traces of dried glue on the button itself.

Obviously, the glass had been stuck to the button, and if Chu Tingwu hadn't noticed while rushing through her parkour and had forcefully slapped it, she would have immediately cut her hand.

Chu Tingwu was certain that during previous runs, this button didn't have this piece of glass: this meant it was installed just before her run, during that staff inspection, and most likely, it was done by that staff member.

Chu Tingwu: "System, is it as I suspected?"

[Yes.]

Although the staff member could avoid the cameras near this checkpoint, with the system present, the target could still be quickly identified through other nearby surveillance.

Chu Tingwu: "So that's why you warned me? Thanks."

The system didn't respond.

Chu Tingwu: "Are you angry?"

[...]

She stood on the roof with her hands in her pockets, and though the system hadn't said anything, Chu Tingwu could guess its meaning: of course it was angry, but not at its little one—it was angry at itself! It had only detected the danger nearby just before she was about to get hurt, it had failed terribly at being a system!

Chu Tingwu: "Actually, I made a mistake too."

System (shocked): "How is that possible?"

Chu Tingwu: "I had noticed earlier that one of the staff members didn't seem to like me much, I felt their gaze, but I didn't take it seriously."

After her perception skill improved, she became very sensitive to others' emotions and attitudes. It was normal for some people not to like her, like how older people might think her making videos and promotional clips and learning parkour at such a young age was "attention-seeking," or how strangers her age might think she was too flashy, bringing a cat to school every day—even gold has its critics... it just happened that this time the person who disliked her was a staff member.

But if they hadn't taken any action, just thinking something wasn't illegal—

Now they had acted.

System: "How can you talk about victim-blaming like this! A crime is a crime, it has nothing to do with whether the victim was careful enough or not, it's entirely their fault!"

Chu Tingwu: "Mm."

System: "...Mm QAQ"

Chu Tingwu had the system record and archive the footage, then got a plastic bag and had Crow fetch metal tongs to collect the glass—after all, having brought a bird out, she carried these cleaning supplies with her.

Chu Tingwu said softly: "I'm angry too, so let's confront them directly."

She wasn't angry about potentially getting hurt, nor did she want to make a big deal that would affect the parkour competition—this was definitely an individual's action, so she decided to contact the police after the perpetrator left the venue. Fortunately, she had connections with both people and cats in the police system.

But she noticed the System was feeling down... so she wasn't happy either.

Chu Tingwu called the event staff, telling them she needed to go home to feed her cat and would return in the afternoon, then jumped directly from the roof to the temporary curtain top surrounding the street block.

She crouched steadily above, calmly watching the crowd outside, then silently leaped to the third floor of a beef noodle restaurant... At that moment, someone getting into a car happened to look up, glancing around vigilantly.

The System let Chu Tingwu take action—

Although even if the kitten didn't pursue, it could handle the criminal perfectly well. But now, this... this criminal was like a mouse it had prepared for its kitten. It could monitor all of Chu Tingwu's physical data, so it knew what her current hormone secretion represented: she was angry.

Might as well let the little one vent.

The System watched Chu Tingwu lovingly. Meanwhile, countless surveillance cameras on the street and all networked systems along the way formed what seemed like a real, invisible web, manipulated by a non-existent hand, trapping the little bug in the middle.

The little bug remained completely unaware.

He was a young man in his early twenties, with an unexercised, chubby face, but well-groomed, seemingly wearing makeup before going out.

He was driving an expensive car, now impatiently stepping on the gas pedal twice—

He hit another red light.

Why were there so many red lights, and why did they always happen just as he approached! Earlier, he was just a second away from making it through, but after seeing the traffic police, he didn't dare run it.

[Did it work?]

His phone vibrated.

The man bit his fingers, staring at his phone, looked at the red light again, then cursed under his breath and parked at the mall before getting out with his phone.

"Work my ass, the luck's terrible. You come in the afternoon, I'm not going to be a staff member anymore!"

He'd rather be at a bar than being a staff member, which was both tiring and hot.

[Come to the bar.]

The man rolled his eyes, crouching at the intersection.

Why did he feel so uneasy... but it couldn't be, nothing was accomplished, just a piece of glass, who knows where it ended up...

In the alley behind him, a passing stray cat softly meowed, and Chu Tingwu, crouching on the rooftop, peeked out and waved hello to the cat.

The man before her didn't know that the moment he was "observed," his entire life was like a thin sheet of paper, all data spread out before Chu Tingwu's eyes. When he contacted others, the ringtone vibrated, and the other person's personal data also transformed into a new document file, while on the other side, a three-dimensional map of the bar appeared before Chu Tingwu.

This was... yes, she hadn't expected it, this was a drug trafficking downstream organization.

To be precise, it was a fence operation, and the man was a regular at the bar, an addict. During the recent police operation, this bar was well-hidden enough to avoid being exposed, and the man had learned that the dragon cub had contributed significantly—because they needed to apply for official status for the dragon cub, and the man's family had some money and influence.

The dragon cub's background was recorded online, and without Chu Tingwu, the dragon cub probably couldn't have been employed. Chu Tingwu's schedule was semi-public, and it only took some connections to infiltrate the parkour competition venue.

The System played some content about the individuals to Chu Tingwu, but parts of both parties' experiences were censored, with the reason being: "These kittens cannot see."

Chu Tingwu: "=="

The man walked forward below, while Chu Tingwu easily followed above. The man glared at a passing stray cat, neurotically biting his fingers again.

Meanwhile, Chu Tingwu had already dialed Lin Undercover.

Lin Undercover, hearing her content on the other end, lowered his voice and said, "You're not going to chase after them, are you? With your cat? I know Three-Five-Five has a good sense of smell too, and you can let her track, but you're still just a kid, don't be rash—"

Chu Tingwu: "I'm almost at the bar."

There was a commotion on the other end, and Lin Undercover urgently said, "Find a place nearby to hide, the police will be there soon."

The police action was very quick. Lin Undercover hadn't hung up on Chu Tingwu, and noticed she seemed to stay in a relatively quiet place, which relieved him... Their entire operation this time was also very quick, and though they expected trouble, the criminals seemed to be waiting to be caught:

The bar lost power, someone got electrocuted while fixing the electrical box, someone fainted from their phone exploding, someone chose the wrong drink, and some were struggling with drugs... Only the man who had just entered the bar was still somewhat clear-headed, but before he could understand what was happening, he was taken down by the incoming police.

Lin Undercover sighed in relief: "Little Chu, where are you?"

Just as he asked, someone jumped down in front of him.

Lin Undercover: "..."

He almost couldn't catch his breath.

While they were making arrests, Chu Tingwu had been crouching on the second-floor roof, quietly observing—forget about whether it was dangerous or not, are you a cat? If so, at least meow!

Lin Undercover: "...stay by my side, don't wander off."

According to Chu Tingwu's report, she first discovered someone placing dangerous items along her parkour route, then found the person suspicious when trying to confront them, followed them to the bar, noticed addicts leaving the bar and collapsing in the back alley were in questionable states, and that's when she called the police.

There was nothing wrong with this explanation. Lin Undercover was about to warn the youngster again when he saw Chu Tingwu slightly turn, raise her foot towards the palm of the man's hand beside her, and step down hard.

The man: "Ahhh!!"

Chu Tingwu withdrew her foot, her expression unchanged, looking innocent.

Lin Undercover: "...feeling better?"

Chu Tingwu: "Huh, better about what?"

Lin Undercover: Just keep pretending!

...Are all cats this vindictive? Following you across half the city just to step on your foot?

Everyone around pretended not to see or couldn't stop it in time, some waving it off saying "minor... ah, minor..." Chu Tingwu stood with her hands in her pockets, listening to Lin Undercover continue to lecture her, responding obediently. Lin Undercover continued:

"This time it was indeed our fault. Give me the evidence to take away, and we'll notify the event organizers. Be careful these next few days, I'll arrange for a female officer to stay with you at a hotel."

It was indeed because of their information leak that Chu Tingwu became a target for retaliation. Chu Tingwu didn't want to miss tomorrow's event, so the police needed to protect her for a few days.

Chu Tingwu: "Okay =="

Lin Undercover: His hand was itching to flick the kid's forehead.

After sending Chu Tingwu away, Lin Undercover's expression changed slightly as he looked at his gloves—

Before coming, hearing there was blood on the broken glass, he had a bad feeling.

Sure enough, the results came back that evening.

That man had AIDS, and he had smeared his own blood on the glass, fresh blood at that.

Lin Undercover, listening to the interrogation, cursed.

The dragon cub beside him "meowed," looking at him with a shocked expression.

Lin Undercover: "...This kitten shouldn't hear such language."

System: This kitten doesn't need to know either.

It transformed into a stream of data, silently wandering in the cold data world, its "gaze" at all humans showing no difference, like looking at passing birds, cats on the ground, and insects underground.

When seeing its sleeping young one at home, the System casually pulled some nearby data and wove a small flower—

As the flower shattered, the man in the interrogation room suddenly convulsed.

System: No, not appropriate here... the young one might discover it.

So it temporarily skipped over this human and reopened the "criminal files" that it had shown to the young one before. These virtual files were clearer than what the police had obtained, recording everything about a person's life that could be presented on the network.

Names of "associated persons" slowly emerged, most of whom were currently sitting in prison cells and would be executed together after some time.

System: "Humans are strange."

Before killing their own kind, they would fulfill their kind's final wishes and use more painless methods - cruelty intertwined with mercy... but the data didn't want to understand their mercy.

It just let the names on the files... quietly dim.

Some turned directly gray and shattered—

Their "fate" was accidental death, before tonight.

Some didn't die directly but were marked, observed—

Their "fate" was to die in an inconspicuous way within the next ten days to a month.

Then, the system seemed to feel this wasn't quite "fair."

-

Drug dealer "Zhang Yuejin" lit a cigar and suddenly felt a bit cold.

"Zhang Yuejin" was his sixth alias. He usually stayed near the border and was considered a veteran in this business, but he rarely brought in new people or opened new routes... Perhaps contentment and caution were why he had managed to stay alive for so long.

Earlier, a route in Ji Province had been busted, so he decided to take a break, assess the current situation, before arranging the next shipment.

He bit the cigar, hands relaxed on the steering wheel, but that uneasy feeling still hadn't disappeared.

The cigar's ember flickered like a bomb's countdown.

"Damn!" Zhang Yuejin stubbed out the cigar, "This is weird."

Better change locations, he felt like someone was watching him, but there wasn't even a bird around, let alone people—

He started the car.

The moment the ignition caught, "BOOM," the car exploded.

-

Lin Undercover dozed off at his desk and was awakened by loud table-banging at three in the morning.

Rubbing his head, he found it was the chief captain banging the table while arguing with someone on the phone.

He tilted his head to ask his colleague—

"Dead?"

"Not just that, how did these ones die too!"

When prisoners die, the prison guards would certainly face consequences, but that wasn't the point—because it wasn't just the criminals who died. News just came that there had been an extremely violent conflict among drug organizations in Myanmar, but somehow all their undercover agents happened to be away from the scene for various reasons.

Lin Undercover shuddered: Was this incredibly good luck, or had their undercover list been exposed? If it was the latter, that would be a huge problem!

The current casualties were still being counted. As the conflict drew multiple parties' attention, Lin Undercover stroked the dragon cub's head while listening to the data reported from the prison, feeling both pleased and uneasy: "...troubled times indeed."

The criminal they arrested yesterday had already been transferred to the detention center due to the simple nature of the case. Lin Undercover shook his head, unaware that:

The criminals in the detention center had also entered a countdown to death.

Meanwhile, Chu Tingwu rolled over, continuing to sleep hazily.

Mmm, dreaming about cake...

Wanting to eat cake, the kind of small cakes that Teacher Wang used to buy.

-

Chu Tingwu went to the competition venue accompanied by a female undercover officer, carrying a bag of small cakes.

As she munched on the cake, the system reported to her the follow-up on the criminals' arrests:

"All the drug dealers from previous transactions have been arrested." Well, it had killed half of them, and would kill the other half after some time.

"Those people from yesterday won't be coming out again, not anytime soon." And they would soon be dead too.

"I've checked the identities of everyone present today, there won't be any more problems." It wouldn't wait until the young one was about to encounter danger before scanning for problems anymore.

As for some processing details and crime details, there was no need to tell the young one about those.

Even the name of that little bug would be deleted from the data after cleanup... Was that even something important?

On the other side of the planet, countries were thrown into huge turmoil due to what happened in just a few short hours last night. Chu Tingwu responded with an "mm," patted Three Five Five's chin, and raised her hand to wave at the Constant twins in the audience.

As she waved, the contestants entering the venue also saw her in the walkway.

The contestants were indeed familiar faces - Ris'er and Little Lu, Eagle and Shark had all made it to the finals.

This final was for the speed race, divided into two sessions for the contestants - first half with four people running route A, second half with four people running route B - after all, having eight people take turns running once would make it hard to maintain audience excitement, and the process would be too short and boring.

So in the first half, four people would determine first place based on speed, same for the second half, then the winners from both halves would compete once more to determine first and second place, while the other six would be ranked directly based on their original times.

This "compete again" method would add new suspense to the competition, and they would run route C during the finals.

According to the pre-set procedure:

After the first round, Arthur, aka "Lollipop," would run once as mentor and judge. After the second round, the redhead girl Maggie would run once. The judges could "lead by example" to offer suggestions and evaluations, so there was actually no need for speed competition... they could stop at any point while talking.

Chu Tingwu was responsible for the final route. But in reality, after the finals were run and results announced, only the award ceremony would remain. Chu Tingwu's run would be relatively "casual" then, with few people paying attention to her or caring about her data. It wouldn't affect the fairness of the outcome, as if the event organizers were specifically accommodating her.

At this moment, some people were indeed watching her—

Hang Ling: "Go Chu Chu!"

You Zhenzhen: "Chu Chu—you're the best!"

Ris'er, influenced by the cheerleading squad: "Ah, so is Chu also competing? But don't we already have eight people here?"

He had drawn the first half A route.

Little Lu smiled and greeted everyone around, then whispered in his ear: "Don't know, is she on the judges' side? Could she be staff? Should we go get photos with Arthur and Maggie after we finish running?"

He had drawn the second half B route.

Since it was an outdoor competition, the audience seats were set quite far from the field. After the undercover officer finished discussing with the event organizers and completed inspections, she signaled that Chu Tingwu could take her seat.

The host was cheerfully telling jokes, then seeing the prompt, began introducing the judges on stage:

Although parkour was a niche sport, and Arthur and Maggie weren't very famous domestically, with many in the audience just following the trend or coming as tourists, the audience still politely applauded during their introductions—

The screen would also show videos of the two athletes doing parkour at appropriate times, drawing gasps from the crowd.

"Last but most special guest, she's a local from Fallen Phoenix City, our own little judge... You might not know her name, but you've certainly seen her—"

The screen showed the city promotional video that Chu Tingwu had filmed.

The audience was silent for a second, then erupted in intense cheers.

Chu Tingwu had walked to the front of the judges' table. She jumped directly over the judges' table, stepped onto the back of the chair behind it, and stood on one foot on the chair back, waving to the audience.

The audience was... super supportive with loud applause, with some explaining to out-of-town tourists: "This kid is from our city, she's been on TV, called..." what was it again?

Host: "Chu Tingwu, Little Teacher Chu! Let's thank Little Teacher Chu, she'll be responsible for evaluating route three, which is the final competition route today!"

After the host's explanation, the audience who had been somewhat concerned about "why they only invited foreigners" felt this arrangement was acceptable now.

Only the contestants' area was silent.

The contestants' area was tonight's Bridge of Sighs.

The contestants exchanged glances, transmitting brain waves through their eyes:

Do you think you can get first place?

"First of all, I might not even be able to outrun Arthur and Maggie!"

"What about the finals then? If I get first place but lose to that little girl, does that really count as first place?"

"Why are you so convinced you'll lose?"

"Well, even if I win against her, it's nothing to be proud of!"

"She's probably just here as a mascot, just running around casually..."

"Hmm, your mascot can do parkour? Why don't you just say she's a cat passing by?"

The enthusiastic parents, not caring what others might think, were busy cheering for their children:

"Go, baby, go! You can beat them all!"

Chu Tingwu: "...I'm really not a contestant."

Just sit down already!

The electronic screen displayed a countdown. As it slowly reached zero, the first round's contestants took their positions. Virtual fireworks burst in the air, the screen changed—

The competition had begun!