Chapter 140: Chapter 136: The Game Needs to Close the Loop
The train had been running smoothly for another half an hour when it arrived at the station.
Luo Kai's cigarette fell from his mouth as he listened to the broadcast, and then he looked at the station sign outside; indeed, they had reached the final destination, Xiangcheng.
The carriage had already become lively as people started preparing to disembark, bustling around and picking up their luggage. Xu Shuo and his companion, who were standing by the door, were directly squeezed out of the way by the passengers.
As soon as the conductor opened the door, those who had already grown weary of the train trip swarmed out in a rush.
In the carriage, the row of people that Luo Kai had been especially attentive to alighted one by one, orderly. They seemed to show no abnormalities, even the salesman who carried a gun remained calm.
The little girl waved goodbye affectionately as she passed by Xu Shuo.
"So, are we getting off?" Xu Shuo looked at the person next to him, who was in a daze. He was the director; his word was final.
"Ah, this..." Luo Kai snapped back to reality and again looked toward the empty carriage littered with garbage.
He still felt a very dangerous sensation there.
After some thought, Luo Kai, suppressing his sense of crisis, walked back into the carriage, looked up at the luggage rack, and then down at the floor where the backpack had been before.
No matter what, this carriage was the site of the story's unfolding.
Yet, Xu Shuo followed the flow of people and got off the train. The style of the platform also dated back to more than a decade ago, so bare-bones it had a sense of bygone days.
The platform was bustling, with some children behaving like wild horses freed from their reins upon alighting from the train, mixing their laughter with the scolding of parents.
The surrounding crowd was hustling and bustling; no one wanted to linger on the platform.
The person with the black suitcase had also blended into the hurried crowd, the sunlight casting on the backs of the many departing passengers, rendering them somewhat unreal and dim.
— That person had run away.
It was as if a creepy voice came from the void, sinister, deep, and hoarse.
Xu Shuo turned to look at the train, the dark green-skin train had weathered many storms, showing signs of wear on its body, yet remained sturdy.
— Hehe, another little pathetic one is going to suffer.
Childish jeers seemed to come from all directions, as the sunshine gradually turned chilly.
The sky appeared to have spilled a bottle of thick ink, as countless oppressive and suffocating darkness swept over, instantly devouring the remaining light!
— Then come and join me~
…
Boom—
A sudden thunderous noise exploded in Xu Shuo's mind, and his vision blurred.
When he came back to his senses, he was standing in the moving train carriage again, beside a stunned Luo Kai.
Luo Kai, holding his cigarette and breathing rapidly, suddenly stared intently at Xu Shuo, "Brother, do you know what I just saw?"
"You saw a ghost," Xu Shuo said calmly.
...
He had indeed seen a ghost and realized the scene had changed the moment after seeing the ghost.
The same train that had arrived at the station was now once again on the move, with passengers still sitting in their seats chatting with each other, the carriage smelling foul as if nothing had happened.
The view outside the window was of a winding river shimmering under the sunlight.
In the distance was a red high bridge.
Luo Kai's face turned ugly, "This time, it might be for real."
No sooner had the words left his mouth than the train entered the high bridge, with the view outside the window suddenly opening up to a beautiful vista of blue sky, white clouds, and river.
However, the next moment the train violently jolted with a thunderous roar, tossing everyone, whether standing or sitting, to the ground unawares.
Xu Shuo, steadying himself with the restroom's doorknob, looked inside the carriage. The little girl, with a look of panic and sorrow on her face, suddenly turned to look at him.
After that, the little girl disappeared.
Darkness spread across the top of the carriage, and fresh red blood seeped out from the cracks, an eerie and cold aura took over the place, and the entire train began to tip over to the left.
The passengers' cries of terror rose and fell in succession, and the train, while hurtling at high speed, derailed and flung into the air in an instant!
The long locomotive plummeted towards the underpass, dragging the carriages behind it into a tilt—screams and cries of pain were unceasing, and everyone was engulfed by immense fear!
"Heeheehee~"
Sinister laughter rang out from nowhere, and Carriage Number Thirteen was emanating a heavy stench of decay; outside was still bathed in brilliant sunshine, but inside, the carriage was engulfed in oppressive darkness.
A sensation of weightlessness began to assail everyone, as everything inside the carriage started to fall apart.
And all this seemed to slow down as well.
Xu Shuo looked up at the walls of the carriage, and in the darkness, he saw a strange figure crawling out; its appearance was indescribable, its contorted body moving over the flowing blood, thick and writhing like a blob of ink.
"Hey!"
In the chaotic carriage, Luo Kai steadied himself in a corner, turned his head, and shouted toward Xu Shuo, "Actually, there's something—I've never extracted the Mutant Script in this world!"
The train was plummeting through the air, suitcases on the racks kept falling down, and some passengers had already been seriously injured midway.
One of the black suitcases collided back and forth within the carriage, and finally opened with a bang, flinging out a dismembered child's body, chopped into pieces.
Xu Shuo glanced at the strange figure crawling over the side of the carriage, then looked back at Luo Kai and replied, "I know."
Only fourth-level players can change their professions, and Luo Kai, who could already be considered a veteran player, seemed so unfamiliar with it, even asking for his help; there was only one possibility—
He had never encountered such a thing before!
He needed someone to share the risk!
Luo Kai dodged a flying body, steadied himself, and continued, "The scripts I've extracted before were always just the normal scripts; I even started to believe that there were no Mutant Scripts in this world!"
"Now it's right before your eyes," Xu Shuo said indifferently.
"Brother, are you so calm because you already have a solution?" Luo Kai looked at him, somewhat amused and helpless. "This carriage is still falling, you could at least show some urgency."
"Where are you with the extraction progress?" Xu Shuo asked.
"Halfway through!"
"Then now I'll analyze the other half for you."
Leaning back against the wall of the carriage, Xu Shuo adopted a reclined position, folded his arms, and said earnestly, "The little girl we saw was already dead and she wasn't really the woman's daughter, which you might infer from the woman's indifferent attitude towards her and the little boy's rejection of her.
"The murderer dismembered the little girl and hid her in the suitcase.
"The police were indeed on the murderer's trail and followed them here, but during the chase, the train derailed.
"We started as spectators on the train for the first cycle until just before disembarking, and the pursuing officer still hadn't revealed the murderer.
"Now is the second cycle."
Xu Shuo finished speaking with a calm expression, completely ignoring the darkness and blood that were spreading behind him.
Listening, Luo Kai paused for a moment before continuing, "So what you're saying is that the script requires the players to expose the murderer before the train arrives at the station, or else it will trigger a derailment, resulting in total annihilation?"
After he finished speaking, he saw the system progress bar hit eight out of ten.
Just a little bit more!
He's the director, not only has he to recreate the story, but he also has to extract it into a complete game that players can clear!
"Wait a minute, if you put it that way..."
Luo Kai suddenly thought of something and widened his eyes, "What we are seeing now, are these scenes from the past?!"
Isn't this supposed to be a purely material world?!