chapter 49
The three chatted for a while before the Train slowly pulled into Qing City station.
Train Rules, Rule One:
[This Train departs from Hui City and heads to Fenling. It will not stop at any station along the way. If needed, please open the window and jump off.]
“Sister Jiang, you keep the Spare Phone as a memento.”
Xia Xiaoqiang and Liang Jie walked to the window, then turned to wave at Jiang Li.
Jiang Li nodded, accepting it. “Thanks.”
Xia Xiaoqiang grinned generously, then joined Liang Jie in struggling to open the tightly locked window in the Dining Car.
They used their backpacks as padding, to soften the landing.
When the Train had slowed to a speed they thought was manageable, they jumped out of the window one after the other.
Now, the two of them were gone.
Throughout the entire Train, Jiang Li could no longer see a single living person.
It felt just like when she first boarded this Train.
Back then, everyone was alive, but in Jiang Li’s eyes, they were all invisible.
Now, however, everyone was dead.
On the tracks, the Train still rattled and clanked along.
But inside, aside from Jiang Li, there were only corpses…
Jiang Li, with Red Infant in tow, walked through the entire Train, scavenging for supplies.
This time, the main purpose was to stock up on food for Red Infant.
Jiang Li searched the bloody Train thoroughly.
She went everywhere she could, stocking up a large quantity of Heart.
There was only one place she hadn’t entered:
The Hidden Door in the Kitchen of the Dining Car.
When Jiang Li entered the Kitchen, she stared at the Hidden Door for a long time.
It was metal, rust covering the surface.
There was a clear, fan-shaped scuff on the floor from the door opening, but the handle was coated in thick dust.
It looked like… it was used often, yet disguised to look unused for ages.
Jiang Li withdrew her gaze and did not investigate further.
If she could clear this instance smoothly, it was best not to create extra trouble.
Jiang Li finished searching every part of the Train.
Finally, she returned to the relatively tidy Dining Car, sat down at a table, and closed her eyes to rest.
It wasn’t until a small, icy hand touched her fingertip that Jiang Li finally opened her eyes.
A bloody, skinless face drew close to Jiang Li’s face.
“Ha!”
The Little Boy bared his teeth in mischief, stretching out his small claws to scare her.
Jiang Li glanced at him, expression calm. “You’re here.”
Seeing Jiang Li’s indifferent reaction, the Little Boy was rather deflated.
His facial skin regrew itself.
Then he slumped down on the Seat opposite Jiang Li, looking discouraged.
“You guessed I’d come find you?” The Little Boy widened his eyes and asked.
Jiang Li nodded:
“Yesterday, the Administrator said there would be a new round of games after dawn. But now that everyone’s gone, doesn’t that just leave the two of us to play?”
“Then… aren’t you scared of me?” The Little Boy bared his teeth again. “I’m a bad kid!”
Jiang Li stared at the Little Boy for a few seconds, then said quietly, “I’m not exactly a good person either.”
“So, last round, what are we playing?” Jiang Li asked him.
“Rock-Paper-Skin.” The Little Boy grinned mischievously.
Jiang Li thought for a moment. “That’s fine, but I have one condition.”
“What condition?”
“Betting our lives,” Jiang Li said, smiling.
The Little Boy agreed without hesitation.
He sat on his Seat, swinging his legs, and dealt three Skull Cards to Jiang Li.
They were: Rock, Scissors, and Paper.
The Little Boy also kept three cards in his hand.
“I’m telling you, big sis, I’m playing Scissors!” The Little Boy pulled out a card and slapped it face-down on the table.
Jiang Li glanced at him and smirked. “Really? Then I’ll play ‘Rock’.”
Jiang Li tapped the table twice with her index finger.
Going by the logic of the Train games set up by the Little Boy, the wicked tend to be the ones who survive to the end.
So, in this round, the Little Boy would definitely lie!
The card he’d played now had to be “Paper.”
If Jiang Li fell for his “Scissors” bluff, she would die for sure.
So, for this round, she just had to do the opposite and play “Scissors,” and she would easily win.
What’s more, she could finish off the Little Boy and eliminate the Pollution Source.
Jiang Li’s fingertip gently picked up the “Scissors” and drew it from her three cards.
But just as she was about to put down her card, her Spare Phone on the table suddenly vibrated.
A text message popped up on the screen.
Jiang Li saw the message, her pupils shrinking in shock-
Her fingers tightened sharply around the card!
How could it be…
How could this happen?!
If this message was true, didn’t it mean she had been wrong from the very start…
Jiang Li’s heart began to pound in panic.
She lifted her eyelids, her gaze complicated as she looked at the Little Boy.
In an instant, all the details flashed through her mind-
The Migrant Worker who gave up his seat, the missing doctors and nurses, the Hidden Door in the Kitchen, the Smart Door Lock’s password, and Wang Qiang’s Immortality…
Everything was connected!
Jiang Li withdrew her previous card and quickly switched to another, placing it face down on the table.
Her fingertips trembled slightly, her hand pressing down on the card, refusing to let go.
A heaviness began to settle in Jiang Li’s chest.
“Are you ready?” The Little Boy smiled innocently.
His cool little fingers pried Jiang Li’s hand away from the card.
Jiang Li’s eyelashes quivered.
Outside the window, came the sound of the Train derailing.
There was almost no time left.
She had no other choice…
“Ready.”
Jiang Li released her grip.
The Little Boy reached out and flipped over both cards.
He hadn’t lied; he had indeed played “Scissors.”
And Jiang Li had played “Rock.”
“Wow! Big Sister, you won~ So amazing!”
Jiang Li tugged at the corner of her lips, but she couldn’t feel any joy.
It was just like before…
Last time she played a game with the Little Boy, it was the same-the winner wasn’t really happy at all.
Outside the Train window, the azure sky suddenly tilted.
The entire Train rumbled, beginning to plummet downward.
Jiang Li’s body lost control, weightless.
On the Qinghai Cross-Sea Bridge, the derailed Train was dragging carriage after carriage down into the abyss.
The other two cards in the Little Boy’s hand also fell before Jiang Li.
All three of his cards were “Scissors.”
Jiang Li felt a heavy weight in her heart.
Suddenly, a splash of blood-red appeared before her eyes.
It was the Little Boy, honoring the wager, killing himself.
The satisfied smile on the Little Boy’s face, having fulfilled his wish, was the last look Jiang Li saw of him.
In that final glance, the Little Boy smiled and said:
“Thank you for believing in me. I really am not a bad child.”
Then, Jiang Li fell into the void, exiting the Instance.
She… survived?
Now, Jiang Li sat stunned in the emptiness.
In her hand, she still held the Little Boy’s Peace Amulet Lock.
But her thoughts lingered on that text message, unable to recover for a long time…
[Congratulations, Chosen One, for successfully eliminating the Pollution Source.]
[Your clearance rank is SSS Rank. Your clearance reward is now being issued.]
[……]
In this Ghost Train Instance, Jiang Li had always thought the Little Boy was trying to prove to his mother:
Only evil people can survive to the end.
Kindness is useless.
But it wasn’t until the very last moment that Jiang Li realized… she was completely wrong!
On the surface, every round of rules seemed to cause the kind-hearted to die and the selfish to survive.
But in reality, those who survived by selfishness would face the final judgment at the end of the Train-a fate of endless torment.
The Train’s destination was not “Fenling,” but the sea.
Train Z114’s tracks would break off at the Qinghai Cross-Sea Bridge.
That was why Jiang Li felt herself falling, weightless.
And Wang Qiang, who killed his family, betrayed his companions, and slaughtered passersby, was the so-called “winner” of the Train’s game, representing the ultimate “Devil.”
He would be locked in the Iron Cage, sinking with the Train to the bottom of the sea.
The “Immortality” skill he won would accompany him, causing him to drown, revive, drown again, and revive again in the deep sea…
An eternal, endless torment.
This was true hell!
And those who were tricked early into the Dining Car, whom Jiang Li thought had been slaughtered,
In fact, they were sent through the Hidden Door in the Kitchen to Huaguo, twenty years in the future.
The message Xia Xiaoqiang sent Jiang Li was to tell her that after getting off the Train, she appeared in a tunnel.
Inside the tunnel were the Migrant Worker, many doctors and nurses, brave young men, those unwilling to kill their families, and so on.
In this Instance, the kind-hearted survived, the indifferent died, and the evil fell into hell.
Jiang Li had always thought the Little Boy was malicious.
She thought he was harming the kind-hearted, protecting the selfish, and promoting selfish values.
But only at the end did she understand-the Little Boy was using his own way to protest the injustice of his mother’s death.
He was using his own methods to punish those he considered “bad people.”
At the end of the Instance, Wang Qiang would forever keep his Eyes open, witnessing himself drowning again and again at the bottom of the sea.
Despair, without end.
Wang Qiang could escape.
He only needed to speak the Smart Door Lock’s password-“I’m sorry”-to escape the Iron Cage.
But surrounded by seawater, every time Wang Qiang opened his mouth, it began another round of drowning.
Endless cycles, Immortality without end.
Even if he wanted to speak and atone, he would never have the chance…