Chapter 486: Chapter 486: Only Heartless Towards You
"How did this happen?" Li Juezhou unbuckled his seatbelt and leaned over from the passenger seat to check the dashboard, but saw no warning signs of any faults.
Sang Ning unbuckled her seatbelt and jumped out of the car. Li Juezhou followed suit, getting out as well. The two circled around the vehicle for inspection but couldn’t find any issues. Finally, Li Juezhou opened the hood, checked the engine, then shook his head at Sang Ning: "Looks like there’s a problem with the engine. The car just slowed down instead of overturning—we’re lucky."
Sang Ning raised a hand to shield her face from the sun and looked into the distance. She could see the other three groups’ cars had already reached the finish line. She sighed but sounded somewhat relieved: "See? I told you the production crew was unreliable. It’s fortunate we were the ones driving this car. Imagine if it had been another group—they wouldn’t know what hit them."
Li Juezhou’s expression turned grim. The production team’s negligence was borderline fatal. What if a small mistake cost lives?
The coincidence of it all made him uneasy. He planned to demand a proper investigation and explanation from the production team.
Just then, a dune buggy appeared behind them. It came speeding down a sandy slope and finally came to a stop. A PD (production director) and a young man with skin darkened by the sun jumped out of the vehicle. Due to the soft sand and their hurried pace, they stumbled, almost tumbling head over heels as they awkwardly approached.
Sang Ning turned to look. As the PD got within a few steps of them, he suddenly tripped and went straight down on his knees, as though bowing deeply to them. The young man walked faster at first but ultimately also knelt when he reached her and Li Juezhou. The moment he opened his mouth, he exclaimed, "Sorry!"
The PD struggled to get up and followed suit, bowing repeatedly in apology. His face was filled with fear: "Teacher Sang Ning, we are deeply sorry. Our crew didn’t pay enough attention and accidentally put this nearly-scrapped vehicle into circulation along with the others. Thankfully, you’re okay. Otherwise, every single person on this production team would owe you their lives."
"Teacher Sang Ning, I am so sorry—it was my mistake. But this car’s issue was only with its power; it slows down gradually at high speeds and doesn’t pose much of a serious danger." The young man spoke with a dizzy, dazed tone, almost as if he couldn’t comprehend how he’d made such a rookie error. But the mistake was already done, and all he could do was apologize sincerely. "It’s my fault—however you decide to punish me, I’ll accept it."
"How about we deduct your salary for this month?" Sang Ning chimed in.
The young man raised his head, the despair in his eyes instantly replaced with hope. He had already braced himself for losing his job—or worse, for Sang Ning taking legal action against him. He hadn’t expected her to let him off so easily. He nodded repeatedly in agreement: "Absolutely! Not even a problem—take off half a year of my salary if you want, I’ll accept that too!"
It was just a minor hiccup with minimal impact. Sang Ning didn’t want to make a big deal of it and risk souring everyone’s mood during filming. She simply let it go. When the other three groups of guests arrived at the finish line and asked what happened, Sang Ning brushed it off with a casual remark about the car’s power issue.
Filming resumed, but Li Juezhou couldn’t quite let the matter rest. Taking advantage of a moment when no one else was around, he leaned close to Sang Ning and whispered, "Sangsang, don’t you think the punishment you gave him was too lenient? I respect your decision, but if it were me handling this, I wouldn’t have let it go so easily."
Sang Ning replied calmly, "Humans aren’t machines—we’re bound to make careless mistakes sometimes. Since no irreversible consequences occurred, and his attitude in admitting fault was sincere, a small lesson is enough to ensure he doesn’t repeat the same mistake. There’s no need to push someone to the brink."
Li Juezhou chuckled: "You’re odd. Sometimes I find you completely heartless, other times you’re overly softhearted."
Sang Ning reached out and gave him a hard pinch, her eyes curving into a smile: "The only person I’m heartless toward is you."
After the desert surfing challenge, the guests returned to the camp for a meal. They rested for nearly an hour before the PD finally arrived, holding the next mission briefing: "Partners, up next is the most thrilling segment of our entire filming schedule. Welcome to the off-road survival challenge!"
Someone asked, "What kind of survival challenge?"
The PD turned on the projector in the main hall and explained the upcoming task with a slideshow of images flashing on the screen: "We’ll continue using the same groups from the desert surfing challenge and assign everyone a professional off-road vehicle. The cars’ trunks will be packed with essential supplies and rescue gear. Your job is to successfully navigate through a deserted section of the desert."
Jiang Xiaoti, who was naturally timid and prone to worry, immediately raised a question: "Isn’t the desert’s isolated area really dangerous? We’re supposed to be filming a show, not signing away our lives. What if someone dies there—who’s accountable?"
The other guests shared similar concerns, prompting the PD to quickly clarify: "This survival challenge is named after remote wilderness areas, but the route you’ll be traversing isn’t an actual deserted zone. It’s a special tourist path created for people who want the thrill of crossing the desert. There are plenty of supply points along the way. The safety is completely guaranteed, you can even verify online right now."
Jiang Xiaoti immediately pulled out her phone to check. After reading the description, she finally exhaled in relief: "Oh, so it’s just a tourist experience thing—why did you guys make it sound so terrifying? You had me scared silly."
With safety reassured, nobody objected. After all, the activity promised a novel and exciting experience. The rules were simple too: just like the desert surfing competition, whoever crosses the isolated area and reaches the finish line first wins.
Having already encountered trouble once, Sang Ning and Li Juezhou were particularly cautious this time. Before heading out, they insisted on thoroughly checking the off-road vehicles—breaking down halfway due to low power and needing rescue was not something they wanted to repeat.
Even the PD was shaken by the previous mishap and readily agreed to their request. He even had the director bring in specialized mechanics to assist with vehicle inspections.
Sang Ning didn’t stop at just inspecting her and Li Juezhou’s car. She also checked the vehicles of the other three groups. After all, any group encountering an issue would ultimately be problematic for everyone.
Once all four off-road vehicles were confirmed trouble-free, Sang Ning meticulously inspected the supplies in the trunks one by one to ensure nothing was missing. Despite the fact that the tourist path was set up for safety, it still lay in the heart of the sparsely populated desert. There was no harm in being extra careful.
Sang Ning’s diligent attention to detail earned unanimous praise from both the production crew and the other guests. But Lu Yujing found this irritating.
When Sang Ning got around to inspecting the trunk of her and Song Shiye’s vehicle, Lu Yujing stepped forward to block her: "Ours doesn’t need checking. Why are you being so fussy, acting like someone’s out to kill you or something? What a fuss for nothing."
"Sister Jing, what kind of attitude is that? Sister Sangsang was just trying to be helpful," Song Shiye interjected, unhappy with Lu Yujing’s tone as he opened the trunk himself for inspection.
Qin Feng chimed in to mediate: "Peace and goodwill, people, peace and goodwill. We’re all friends here—it’s perfectly normal to look out for each other. We’ll handle checking our own trunk."
Qin Feng didn’t skimp out either; he gave the supplies a proper inspection to ensure everything was accounted for. While Lu Yujing’s "someone’s out to get us" remarks were clearly unfounded, having all necessary items prepared was only commonsense.
After completing all the preparation, the guests began driving their respective off-road vehicles. To maintain a more authentic first-person perspective, no cameramen joined the vehicles this time. Instead, each car was outfitted with mounted cameras, while every group was also given a handheld camera to use.
