Chapter 91

Chapter 91

The entire banquet hall was filled with chaotic screams.

This was not normal. Before attending the banquet, Xu Yang had confirmed the cruise ship’s itinerary with the secretarial department.

The ship was supposed to circle around the harbor. It would never head out to the middle of the sea. And the weather had been fine these past few days, with no strong winds or high waves. There was absolutely no way the vessel could be rocking this violently because of the waves.

Fear rose in his chest. He suspected the cruise ship had run into far more serious trouble.

He heard someone shouting at the top of their lungs, demanding to know what was going on, what had happened.

Xu Yang had no time to figure out the situation before he was slammed away again. Fortunately, President Nan grabbed him in time, stopping him from being knocked down and used as a human cushion beneath the crowd.

But Xu Yang quickly realized how serious his boss’s wound was.

In that split second, Xu Yang ran through several escape plans as fast as he could and chose the best one just as quickly.

While the cruise ship temporarily steadied, he and Nan Mu clung to the window drapes and climbed toward the exit above. Staying along the side near the wall, Xu Yang used the wall as leverage and shielded Nan Mu from the impacts of people crashing into them in the chaos.

Once they reached higher ground, Nan Mu was able to take in the entire chaotic banquet hall at a glance. He heard the ship’s broadcast come on, reminding everyone to head upward. The crew had already lowered the lifeboats at the bow.

“Please remain calm and avoid any stampedes!”

“All passengers, please proceed to the bow in an orderly manner. Under the crew’s guidance, put on your life jackets and board the lifeboats!”

“Please do not panic. Rescue personnel from the harbor are already on their way!”

With their own lives at stake, no matter how many times the broadcast reminded everyone to stay calm, the scene remained a mess. Everyone was surging toward the exits all at once.

Nan Mu and Xu Yang were swept along by the crowd and soon reached the bow. Looking down from there, they could see more than a dozen lifeboats floating on the surface of the sea.

Xu Yang had intended to get Nan Mu onto a boat first, but Nan Mu’s steps paused. He gripped the railing beside him. “Xu Yang, go find Panpan first!”

Xu Yang lowered his gaze to the clothes at Nan Mu’s waist. His white shirt had been stained red by the blood from the wound on his abdomen. Xu Yang hesitated. “Then you get on the boat first. I’ll go look for her.”

Nan Mu shook his head, his gaze sweeping over the body of the cruise ship. “No. I’ll wait for you here.”

“But your wound…”

Nan Mu pushed Xu Yang with the back of his hand and ordered in a deep voice, “Go to the room and look for her! If Panpan isn’t anywhere else, she must be in the room. If the room is empty, then she must have followed the others up to the deck. Put your phone on vibrate! If I see her, I’ll call you. Go and come back quickly!”

Accustomed to following Nan Mu’s arrangements, Xu Yang turned and ran back into the cabin.

In his heart, his boss would never make a meaningless decision. If Nan Mu wanted to stay on the deck, he had to have his own reason-for instance, searching for Panpan.

That was what Xu Yang told himself, but when he actually tried to force his way against the flow of people and squeeze into the cabin, it was anything but easy. He clearly wanted to go inside, yet the crowd kept pushing him toward the boarding point.

Instinctively, he glanced at the situation there and discovered that the boats floating on the sea were nowhere near enough to evacuate everyone. Judging from how severely the ship was listing now, it might not last until everyone had safely gotten off.

The crew on the cruise ship had clearly realized this as well. During the evacuation, all the company big shots were being prioritized, while the service staff and waiters on the ship were being left behind.

Xu Yang felt the blood in his veins freeze in an instant, as if someone had clenched his heart, leaving him unable to breathe.

He finally understood why his boss was unwilling to board a lifeboat and wait for them there.

So even survival was divided by status and rank. There were only so many lifeboats on the ship, and racing against time to evacuate had become a means of staying alive. The style of brooch pinned to one’s chest upon boarding had become the ticket that determined who was qualified to escape.

If Nan Mu were not with them… neither he nor Panpan would be able to get on a lifeboat.

Time suddenly became urgent. He fought his way desperately against the crowd and squeezed inside.

===

Nan Mu pressed a hand over the wound on his abdomen, calmly searching the panicked crowd for Panpan’s figure.
He was the one who had brought her onto the ship. Now that danger had struck, it was only natural that he had to get her off it.

But the situation on board was utter chaos. Everyone was mixed together like headless flies, making it almost impossible to tell anyone apart.

Nan Mu remembered that when he boarded, he had clearly seen the crew carefully inspecting the cruise ship’s condition… How could a cruise ship like this suddenly spring a leak?

It was simply unbelievable.

He was still searching the crowd for Panpan when a figure moving against the tide suddenly caught his eye.

The person was wearing a blue-and-white hoodie. Amid a ship full of people in haute couture gowns and suits, she looked completely out of place. She pushed through the crowd, trying to get into the cabin, but the people around her jostled her until she stumbled again and again.

She grabbed the door handle, and as the current of people swept her body ninety degrees around, Nan Mu caught a clear look at her profile.

Against the dark, misty night over the pitch-black sea, beneath the dim yellow glow of the colored deck lights, it was Wen Miao-with long, wavy black hair and skin as white as snow.

Wen Miao? How was that possible?

Nan Mu fixed his gaze on her, but the woman in the blue-and-white hoodie had already squeezed through the doorway and disappeared completely from his sight.

Impossible. It couldn’t be Wen Miao.

Even as Nan Mu told himself that, his feet moved of their own accord, forcing their way toward the cabin.

On the crowded deck, everyone was shoving and pushing, trying to break through the crowd and get out first. Nan Mu, moving against the flow, had his abdominal wound pressed into by several people. The pain was so intense that cold sweat poured down his back. Even so, it did not stop him from moving forward.

Until a hand grabbed his arm.

“President Nan!”

Nan Mu looked up and saw Xu Yang, his face full of anxiety, and Panpan behind him with her hair in disarray.

“President Nan, why did you come over here?”

It was too crowded here, bodies pressed tightly against bodies. Even when Xu Yang lowered his head, he couldn’t see anything below their necks. All he could do was spread his arms as much as possible and push away the people around Nan Mu.

Panpan glanced at Nan Mu’s face. Seeing how deathly pale he was, his lips almost bloodless, she knew he was barely holding on. At a time like this, there was no room to worry about propriety. She lifted Nan Mu’s left arm and draped it around her neck, then pushed through the crowd in front of them and headed outward.

Xu Yang had already witnessed Panpan’s strength. Although she was a woman, in terms of raw power, she was no weaker than the vast majority of men. Reassured, he took a step back and protected Nan Mu’s right rear side.

The three of them finally managed to squeeze to the boarding point, only to find that there was just one spot left on the lifeboat.

“One of you get on first. The other two wait for the next one… That lifeboat is already being lowered.”

The three turned back and indeed saw a new lifeboat being lowered from the bow.

Panpan instinctively pushed Nan Mu forward, wanting to get the injured man on first, but Nan Mu caught her wrist with his other hand.

In a low voice, Nan Mu said, “You go first.”

Panpan froze. “But your wound…”

“Ladies first. You go.”

Nan Mu did not explain, but Xu Yang knew what he was worried about-and his concern was not without reason.

“Hurry up and get on. President Nan and I will wait for the next one.” Worried the spot would be taken, Xu Yang gave Panpan a push from behind. “Go, go. President Nan and I need to put on life jackets.”

Panpan stumbled from Xu Yang’s shove, then was pulled by a crew member on the lifeboat, becoming the last person to board.

The lifeboat soon sped away in the opposite direction of the cruise ship.

Before leaving, Panpan saw Xu Yang put on a life jacket, then put the one in his hands onto Nan Mu. As the boat sailed farther and farther away, the two tall figures in her vision gradually shrank into a single black dot, vanishing into the vast, dark sea.

“The ship-the ship is sinking!”

No one knew who shouted it, but everyone on the lifeboat turned to look back. They saw the massive thing floating on the sea suddenly tilt even more sharply, the entire ship sinking beneath the surface at a speed visible to the naked eye.

Across the silent sea came the cries of the dying.