The last two players were caught unexpectedly in their desperate attempt to rescue their team.
Sam was captured by Toping, while Shon was ambushed by none other than July Boy, who had been lying in wait at CAMP2 to intercept anyone sneaking toward the boulder.
July Boy's stealth was flawless. Not only did he catch Shon, but he had also managed to capture Roslin, Pre-Guy, and two other members from Shon's class during an earlier attempt.
With all the players caught, Sam and Shon seemingly was the last ones remaining. Confident in their perfect victory, July Boy and Toping escorted them back to the base.
However, as they arrived, Sam and Shon were stunned—just as Jangla and Chingla had been earlier. The base was empty. There were no frozen players.
Sam furrowed his brows. "What's going on? Where is everyone? Wasn't this your base?"
Toping answered coolly, "We never said this was our base."
Shon, still confused, added, "But Hori was always standing here, seemingly guarding the frozen players… or at least, that's what it looked like."
Toping smirked. "I had Hori stand here so you'd think this was our base. In reality, this was never our base. This boulder was just a decoy."
He paused, letting the realization sink in before continuing. "You thought this boulder was our base, and you believed that if you crawled up from CAMP2, you'd have an opportunity to ambush us."
Shon's eyes widened. "But in reality, even if we had successfully climbed up from CAMP2, we still would've lost?"
Toping nodded. "Exactly. That's why I never bothered to let July boy chase after you, even thought he can't with his lasy attitude. I knew you'd eventually come to him at CAMP2 when the game was nearing its end."
Still processing the revelation. "Then… where was your real base?"
Toping, Hori, and July Boy exchanged glances before Toping smirked. "Our real base is at CAMP1."
Sam and Shon were speechless. They had been there at the very beginning.
The ICE team then escorted them through a hidden path behind the boulder—an entrance that was completely concealed from outside view. The secret passage formed a full circle, leading down the slope and emerging at CAMP1.
Sam, still trying to make sense of it all, asked, "Wait. If July boy was waiting at CAMP1, and Hori was pretending to guard the fake base while you and Tsunami were chasing us… that means no one was actually guarding the real base?"
Toping chuckled. "Actually, Tsunami and I were both the spear and the shield."
Shon narrowed her eyes. "What do you mean?"
"We couldn't rely on Hori or July Boy for defense if the real base was ever discovered. So instead, Tsunami and I took turns swapping roles—one of us would defend, while the other hunted down the WATERs."
Shon's breath hitched as the truth hit her. She had been observing from her safe spot and had always assumed Toping and Tsunami were hunting together. But in reality, they had been alternating between offense and defense the entire time.
As they were walking towards the CAMP1, towards their real base, Toping smirked and saying what kind of embarrassing thing they should let them do.
Maybe dance to Shakira song wearing leaves around the waist, yeah that sounds good, all 21 of you dancing will be so much fun to watch.
Soon, they all reached CAMP1 where all the frozen players was held, the allies watched them being escorted back knowing that they lost the game, but did they actually?
Toping acted to throw the two remaining prisoners and started celebrating laughing like an evil menace, but then choked in his own saliva.
Tsunami looked at the time and it was 4:59, she said we captured every last one of the WATERs before the game ends.
Toping laughs once again saying, yeah with my brilliant I managed not only to win but get a perfect victory.