Chapter 196: Continuing to Love Is What Matters Most
The puzzle was not meant to be assembled on a standard table. Instead, the organizers had set up a massive vertical board against a wall, stretching nearly two meters high. Each individual puzzle piece was constructed from thick, durable foam board, scattered in a chaotic pile on the floor.
"Even without a reference image, this will not stump Bronya." She immediately stepped forward and dumped the remaining pieces out of their containers, letting them clatter against the ground.
Generally, a normal person would choose to assemble the straight edges first, slowly restoring the middle bit by bit through trial and error.
But that conventional method was far too slow for Bronya. Her gray eyes darted across the scattered foam shapes. She engaged her hyper-processing capabilities, running rapid calculations to piece together the geometry and color gradients in her mind. Within seconds, she figured out the general appearance of the original image.
Then, a distinct shadow fell over her delicate features. The completed image was a photograph of Rovel holding her in his arms from just a few moments ago. The event organizers had sneakily taken a candid shot and rushed it into a custom puzzle.
'Dark history plus one,' Bronya thought, her lips pressing into a thin line.
"Divide the wall into ten rows and ten columns," Bronya instructed, deciding she could not be bothered to dwell on the embarrassing image right now. She turned her gaze directly to Rovel. "I will call out the coordinates, and you will place them."
"No problem," Rovel replied, stepping up to the wall.
"Row seven, column three."
"Row eight, column eight."
"Row one, column ten."
Bronya operated like a flawless precision instrument. She rapidly numbered each foam piece in her mind and called out the exact locations, while Rovel followed her instructions with perfect synchronization, snapping each piece into its correct position on the vertical board.
In a mere three minutes, while the other competing couples were still frantically sorting pieces by color or struggling with the border edges, Rovel and Bronya had already completed thirty percent of the board, triggering the first stage task.
"Excuse me, you two," the host interrupted, walking over with a microphone and looking directly at Bronya. "What does the other person care about most regarding you?"
It was somewhat similar to the previous question they had faced, except the last one had been specifically about flaws. This one was much broader; it could be a strength, a weakness, or a general trait.
"...Emotions?" Bronya tentatively offered an answer, tilting her head slightly.
Her lack of emotional expression was both a unique charm point and a lingering regret, so it seemed like a logical deduction.
"Sorry, incorrect answer," the host chimed cheerfully. "You need to pause in place for one minute."
Bronya did not react outwardly, having fully expected a potential failure on the first attempt. In her analytical view, there were only a few possible answers Rovel could have written down. They were leading the competition by a massive margin anyway; getting it wrong once or twice did not matter much in the grand scheme of things.
She needed to secure full marks for this round to guarantee the best possible chance of winning the championship, so giving up on answering was completely out of the question.
Soon, the sixty-second timer ticked down to zero, and Bronya delivered her second calculated guess. "Figure?"
The buzzer sounded again. The answer was still wrong. Rovel stood off to the side, a somewhat inexplicable, amused smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. Seeing that expression made Bronya's fists clench slightly, a rare spark of irritation flaring in her chest.
After another full minute of silent deliberation, Bronya stared flatly at the host and answered, "Appearance."
"Correct answer!" The host looked at the whiteboard where Rovel had written the word 'looks' and nodded enthusiastically. "Please continue completing the puzzle."
"Tsk," Bronya clicked her tongue in sheer annoyance, glaring at Rovel. This damn superficiality.
They resumed their rapid-fire assembly. Soon, another two minutes passed, and the duo successfully reached the second stage task.
'I hope I draw something normal...' Bronya prayed silently as she reached toward the randomization button on the digital screen.
However, when the screen flashed and began playing a video demonstration of a passionate French kiss, her eyes widened fractionally. She felt as though her scalp was about to explode from pure shock.
There was absolutely no way she was going to do something like that with Rovel in front of a massive crowd.
The penalty for failing the second stage was noticeably more severe than the first. The drawn action had to be completed within one minute. Failing to do so required staying frozen in place for an additional minute, resulting in a total two-minute time loss.
"It seems the two of you haven't been dating for long, so you don't dare to express your love so boldly in public," the host said into the microphone, trying to smooth things over and keep the atmosphere lively.
The audience below immediately erupted into loud cheers and whistles, rooting for them to take the plunge. Bronya kept her head down, saying absolutely nothing, her face completely hidden as she silently calculated the penalty time in her head.
But this quiet, avoidant behavior was completely mistaken by the onlookers for pure maidenly shyness. The crowd only grew louder, shouting words of encouragement from below the stage.
Two agonizing minutes finally passed, and the randomization roulette started spinning once more.
However, the god of romantic comedies seemed to be actively toying with them today. The digital wheel slowed to a halt, and they actually drew the exact same kissing video again.
"Uh... we prepared a hundred different videos for this stage. I really didn't expect you to draw the same one twice," the host remarked, a distinct hint of amusement dancing in his eyes as he gestured toward the screen. "How about you two give it a try this time?"
"..." Bronya stared blankly at the screen, coming to the firm conclusion that today was definitely not a good day to go out.
So, they stood in silence for another long two minutes. Having wasted a total of four minutes on penalties, a few of the other couples had already started to catch up to their puzzle progress.
Finally, the roulette spun for the third time. The video drawn was no longer the same as before, offering a glimmer of hope.
But as the clip played, the female lead on screen gently kissed the male lead's cheek, then intimately nuzzled his neck before lightly biting down on his earlobe.
"..." Bronya fell into a heavy, suffocating silence once again.
"Do you still want to wait?" Rovel asked, his voice calm and completely unbothered by the ticking clock.
"Wait a bit longer. We still have time," Bronya muttered. Her face was already so gloomy it looked as though it could drip water at any second.
Another two minutes vanished.
When the roulette spun for the fourth time and landed on the exact same ear-biting video as just now, Bronya felt a dangerous urge to summon Project Bunny, press a heavy cannon barrel directly against the organizers'foreheads, and ask if they were intentionally messing with her.'It is just a kiss on the cheek, it is nothing... it is nothing...' Bronya kept repeating the mantra in her head, desperately trying to comfort herself.
She reached out and tugged on Rovel's sleeve, signaling for him to bend down to her height.
Seeing the stoic silver-haired girl finally making a active move, the audience below could not hold back their excited cheers.
Bronya leaned in, her lips briefly brushing against Rovel's cheek. She then stiffly leaned her face against his neck, opened her mouth, and gave his earlobe a quick, mechanical bite.
'This should be enough,' she thought, having already thrown all her caution and dignity to the wind.
"Regrettably, the audience indicates your performance was far too stiff! Please wait in place for one minute," the host announced apologetically after looking at the live voting results on his tablet.
Standing so close to her, Rovel could clearly feel Bronya's body temperature rising rapidly. In all probability, the heat radiating from her small frame was not born from embarrassment, but from sheer, unadulterated anger.
Thankfully, the fifth video draw turned out to be a simple princess carry followed by spinning in circles. Rovel scooped her up effortlessly, completing the motion with ease, and the two of them finally passed the dreaded second stage.
They had been stuck at that single checkpoint for nearly ten minutes.
However, since their puzzle-solving speed was still incredibly fast, completing the entire board within the thirty-minute time limit would not be a problem at all.
"Stage three," the host announced. "Randomly select five puzzle pieces and hang them up at the very top of the board. You can choose from the provided tools to reach the required height."
"Tools aren't really necessary," Rovel said. He crouched down smoothly, allowing Bronya to climb up and sit securely on his shoulders.
He stood up tall, elevating her perfectly. Bronya reached out, grabbing the designated foam pieces and snapping them easily into the highest empty slots on the board.
Soon, the two of them snapped the final piece into place, completing the entire puzzle at the twenty-seven-minute mark and earning a perfect score of thirty points.
As for the pair who had previously been in first place, they seemed to have gotten into a heated argument during the assembly process; their puzzle was only sixty percent complete.
"We've got it!" Bronya breathed a long, heavy sigh of relief, sliding down from Rovel's shoulders. Today, for the sake of this limited-edition Homu doll set, she had truly sacrificed far too much of her pride.
Soon, the final whistle blew, and the results were officially tallied. Rovel and Bronya had secured the absolute victory.
The previous first-place pair had only managed to complete ninety percent of their puzzle when the time ran out.
The host took center stage, holding his microphone high as he addressed the cheering crowd. "This story tells us that falling in love is important, but it is only a beginning. Loving someone means having the courage to overcome embarrassment and the strength to shield them from all storms. But what I want to tell everyone here today is... continuing to love is the most remarkable thing of all. It determines whether you can reach the distant shore called love and truly find your own lasting happiness."
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