Lonelytree

  Millman97

  “Boss Chen, I don’t think I’ll be able to stay in this house any longer. I’ll wait for you downstairs,” Fan Dade stammered. The footprints in the staircase made him panicked, and the man’s flight of footsteps could be heard through the phone.

  “Don’t panic, he might be hiding under the staircase. Tell me the size and shape of the footprint……” Before Chen Ge could finish, the call was cut off. “When one is caught in panic, they will do things that are illogical, but I can’t tell for sure if Fan Dade was someone who would react in this way.”


  Putting phone away, Chen Ge picked up the backpack from the ground, with his eyes zeroed in on the road ahead. “The next stop is Li Wan City. I’m here, but where are you?”


  Darkness and rain blotted out everything. No one could tell that countless monsters who lived in the shadows were all heading toward a small city at the fringe of the metropolis. Li Wan City was right ahead!

  The driver, Tang Jun, slammed on the gas pedal. The old bus rushed through the rain, continuing its acceleration. The rain pelted the windows, and the bus was shaking so badly that it felt like the whole vehicle might collapse on the spot. However, none of the passengers on the bus seemed to mind.

  When the blurry shapes appeared, everyone held their breath. Lighting flashed across the sky, and that brief moment of brightness lit up the many shadows that were shuffling through the darkness, and in return, the shadows also spotted the bus on Route 104, which was trundling through the rain.

  “We’re almost there.” The doctor was the first to stand up from his seat. He could perceive the changes in the atmosphere of the hearse and how it differed from normal. He refused to spend yet another second on the bus.

  “Hey, the three of us should leave together,” the doctor whispered to Chen Ge and the man who referred to himself as Scissors. “There is a passenger in front who is very dangerous. Once the three of us are off, we will split up and run in different directions. Whoever he ends up chasing, that will be the luck of the draw.”


  These passengers who had managed to survive after taking a ride on the hearse could not be underestimated, so the doctor did not hide his plan and shared it with others openly.

  Neither Chen Ge nor Scissors spoke. Scissors was suspicious that this was a plot by the doctor—the doctor was trying to get him isolated so that he would become an easier target. However, Chen Ge had his own plan. He planned to drive the bus directly to Fan Chong’s residential area and grab the red high heels and smiling man to force their way through the trap laid down by the shadow, rescuing Fan Chong who possessed crucial information.

  It was easy to get onto Chen Ge’s bus, but it was very difficult to leave. From a different perspective, one could say that this bus had gotten a lot more dangerous compared to when it was in the service of the shadow.

  Walking to the exit, the doctor grabbed the rail. He had heard stories about the smiling man before, and his plan was to find a safe refuge to hide after getting off the bus. The bus had already driven into Li Wan City, and they neared the small town’s bus stop. The doctor’s heart pounded, and his muscles in his arms and legs were tense. He was prepared to jump out once the door opened.

  That was the plan, but reality had other plans in mind. The bus did not stop when it passed the final stop; it did not even decelerate and rushed past.

  “It’s not stopping?” A bad omen rose in the doctor’s heart—he knew something bad was about to happen that night. The bus did not stop at the station that it usually stopped at.

  Other than Chen Ge, all the passengers turned to look at the driver. Tang Jun was under great pressure, and his body was shaking. He also had no idea what was waiting for them ahead—he was merely following the direction given by his boss.

  “Hey, why aren’t you stopping? Hey!” From the family of three, the middle-aged man stood up from his seat, and his expression was drawn. The boy who sat next to him also poked his head up to surreptitiously look around. He did not quite understand the world of the adults; everything was always too complicated for him to grasp.

  “Stop the bus! Stop the f*cking bus now!” The middle-aged man stomped toward the driver’s seat. Seeing this, Chen Ge grabbed his backpack and walked over. He kept his head lowered, and everyone thought that he was also going toward the driver with a complaint. Seeing Chen Ge step forward, the doctor decided to follow behind the man—he wanted to find out what was happening.

  “Can you hear me?” No matter what the middle-aged man was yelling, the driver’s lips were shut, and if his face was any whiter, it would have appeared like he was wearing powder on his face. “I’m f*cking telling you again! Turn the bus around! Don’t drive ahead any further!”


  Tang Jun ignored the middle-aged man and focused fully on driving.

  “Don’t drag us with you even if you want to die! We cannot drive ahead anymore!” This probably was not the middle-aged man’s first visit to Li Wan City. He knew more than he showed. He raised his leg and tried to kick Tang Jun’s feet again to step on the brake.

  “Friend, what you’re doing is illegal.” A powerful man reached out to grab the middle-aged man. Chen Ge dragged him back and placed him next to the smiling man.

  “Let me go! You have no idea what awaits us! Quickly, let me go!” The middle-aged man screamed as he struggled. “Stop the bus! Do not go further ahead! That is not a place where we are supposed to go!”


  “Looks like you know some things, why don’t you come and share them with us?”


  “Fog, blood red fog, we won’t be able to leave once we enter it! Quickly stop him!” The man’s face was twisted in fear. He hollered as he charged toward the driver’s seat, but he was once again held back by Chen Ge.

  “What kind of fog? You have to explain clearer than that.” Chen Ge was hell bent on getting the answer out of the middle-aged man when he noticed that the bus had slowed down. The doctor tapped him lightly on his shoulder, and he raised his head to look in the direction that the doctor was pointing at.

  A strange scene greeted him. Half of the city was shrouded by heavy rain, and all lights were swallowed up by darkness and despair. While the other half was completely dry. Instead of rain, a thick blood fog roamed the streets, pulsing with various types of negative emotions.

  Chen Ge had plenty of experience when it came to visiting the world behind the door, but this was the first time that he had seen the world behind the door in the real world and a blood fog of this scale.

  The shock in Chen Ge’s heart could not be put into words. Li Wan City was practically torn in two, one half covered by heavy rain, and the other swallowed by blood fog. It was amazing how clear the distinction was between the two worlds.

  On that rainy night after midnight, Li Wan City revealed its real appearance. During Chen Ge’s previous three-star missions, the world behind the door had often been a building shrouded in blood fog, but before Chen Ge’s eyes was half a city that was swirling with blood fog!

  “Do not continue any further!” Even though the middle-aged man’s voice was hoarse from shouting, the bus did not stop.

  Tang Jun glanced at Chen Ge through the rear-view mirror. The extremely courageous Chen Ge gave him the signal to keep driving while facing away from the other passengers. After receiving the order, Tang Jun stopped hesitating and stepped on the gas pedal.

  His new boss appeared kind and gentle on the surface, but in reality, he was a mad person who was even crazier than the shadow. Compared to the blood fog, Tang Jun was more afraid of his boss.

  The bus sped up without any warning.

  The sound of high heels clicking echoed in the bus, and the smiling face sprung up from his seat with a frozen smile plastered on his face, but both of them were too late.

  The last bus on Route 104 plunged headfirst into the blood fog and raced down the street that was dyed red!