Chapter 168
Chapter 168
Yun Youyou furiously argued with the navigation system.
“Do you not understand human speech? This isn’t my destination at all! Hospital. Do you understand hospital?”
The navigation system stood firm.
In a prim, mechanical female voice, it answered, “This is the destination.”
Yun Youyou was almost laughing from sheer anger. Where had this artificially stupid intelligence come from?
“Come on, then. Tell me what kind of destination this is.”
The navigation system said, “The final destination of life.”
Yun Youyou: “…”
Goddamn it!
Was this navigation or a guided missile?
It was no good at directions, but apparently an expert at mowing down ghosts.
Yun Youyou felt as if the navigation system was about to run her over and kill her all over again.
Watching the showdown between ghost and navigation from the back seat, Ji Lin suspected that if he did not intervene, there would be an unexplained navigation-system death tonight.
Just then, Wang Yuanyou called.
Ji Lin answered.
“Hello? How are things over there? Did you reach the hospital?”
Wang Yuanyou had been thoroughly scolded and beaten by his mother after returning home, but he still worried about his good friend.
Ji Lin glanced up at the word CREMATORIUM outside the window. It was difficult to say everything had gone smoothly.
Wang Yuanyou seemed to notice his hesitation.
“What happened? Was there an accident? Don’t tell me you crashed.”
In his anxiety, Wang Yuanyou began speaking much faster.
Ji Lin leaned against the seat and looked at the ghost still confronting the navigation system in front, his head aching.
“There was a small accident, but no danger outside the car.”
Wang Yuanyou relaxed. “If there’s no danger outside, is there danger inside the car?”
Ji Lin said mildly, “Mm. A little gas cylinder is about to explode.”
The little gas cylinder in front turned and gave him a death stare.
Wang Yuanyou froze.
“A gas cylinder? What gas cylinder?”
In a flash of inspiration, he suddenly realized who Ji Lin meant.
Amused, he ordered Ji Lin to put the call on speaker.
“Hurry and turn on speaker. I want to say a few words to the adorable little gas cylinder before she really explodes.”
Ji Lin put the call on speaker and placed the phone between them.
Wang Yuanyou’s voice instantly filled the quiet car.
“What happened? Who made our Youyou unhappy?”
Yun Youyou supplied a name Wang Yuanyou could never have guessed in a million years.
“The car’s navigation system.”
Wang Yuanyou immediately fell silent.
What kind of ghost could get into a fight with a navigation system?
Puzzled, he asked, “What did the navigation do?”
Yun Youyou denounced it furiously. “It’s supposed to navigate, yet all it does is talk slick and refuse to show me the right direction!”
Wang Yuanyou deeply sympathized.
“Some navigation systems really do have problems. Sometimes they take you into a dead end and keep demanding that you drive forward. Who knows which idiot designed such an idiotic system?”
He babbled on for ages before belatedly asking, “So where are you now?”
Yun Youyou said, “The crematorium.”
The air went silent.
Both the car and the other end of the call fell completely quiet.
After a long silence, Wang Yuanyou finally spoke.
He said earnestly, “I know you’re short-staffed, so they sent you up here to recruit ghosts. But you can’t drag living people straight to a crematorium and kill them!”
“Other people use Boss Direct Hire. You went and created Crematorium Direct Hire. Recruitment solved at the source, employees manufactured on an assembly line. Even the Boss would applaud you.”
Wang Yuanyou was terrified Ji Lin would become a ghost by the time he saw him again tomorrow.
Yun Youyou declared righteously, “How could that be possible? Am I that kind of person?”
Wang Yuanyou countered gloomily.
“You’re not that kind of person, because you’re a ghost.”
At the crucial moment, the navigation system called out again.
“You have arrived at your destination.”
Yun Youyou wanted to rip the lousy thing apart with her bare hands.
“See? I’m not the one trying to send your good friend to the crematorium. His own navigation system wants him there.”
Then she turned to Ji Lin.
“What kind of grudge do you have against this navigation system? Why is it so determined to send you to a crematorium?”
Ji Lin said nothing. He glanced at Yun Youyou, then got out of the car.
Yun Youyou: ?
The next second, the front passenger door opened.
Ji Lin sat down beside her.
The seat had seemed spacious before, but the moment Ji Lin occupied it, an oppressive presence filled the space. Yun Youyou instinctively edged away.
Ji Lin leaned slightly forward and tapped the screen several times.
“The system probably malfunctioned and loaded the wrong voice pack. We only need to replace it.”
Ji Lin was about to press the button.
“Please don’t replace me!”
The sudden voice startled everyone in the car.
Yun Youyou thought the car was haunted before belatedly realizing the voice had come from the navigation system.
Ji Lin’s hand paused.
Yun Youyou had already started chatting with it.
Hands on her hips, she laughed three times like a petty villain intoxicated by sudden power.
“Weren’t you awfully smug just now?”
The navigation system said, “Sometimes life brings triumph, and sometimes defeat. Alas… I was too careless.”
Yun Youyou found the system rather amusing.
She had not sensed any intelligence from it, but the stupidity was undeniably real.
Yun Youyou continued teasing her. “Are you actually a navigation system? Why can’t you even navigate?”
The navigation system said, “Because I navigate the road of life.”
Yun Youyou thought the system had extraordinarily thick skin.
“Then what did you mean by bringing us to a crematorium?”
The navigation system said, “So you can transform yourselves and begin anew.”
Yun Youyou said, “…Are you sure you mean transform, not reduce us to ashes?”
Begin anew?
Were two urns supposed to drive out of the crematorium afterward?
The image was too beautiful. Yun Youyou did not dare imagine it.
That would be even more frightening than a hearse.
“Turn this idiot off. She’s getting scary.”
For a moment, Ji Lin could not decide which was more frightening: a ghost driving a car, or an intellectually challenged navigation system.
The fact that the two could hold an entire back-and-forth conversation probably meant…
Ji Lin did not dare say the rest aloud.
If he did, Yun Youyou might shove him directly into the crematorium to be burned.
At some point, Wang Yuanyou had ended the call.
Crematoriums were built in remote places. For miles around, there was nothing but trees and wasteland.
When the wind blew, tree shadows swayed like countless ghosts hidden among them.
Never mind humans. Even Yun Youyou, an actual ghost, was afraid.
Watching Yun Youyou hurriedly turn the car around without daring to glance to either side, Ji Lin found her rather funny.
“Didn’t you come to recruit ghosts? Why are you so scared?”
“Good people can still be afraid of bad people. Of course a good ghost like me is afraid of bad ghosts.”
Yun Youyou carefully drove back the way they had come, her tense little expression inherently amusing.
Still, what she said made a certain amount of sense and followed a certain logic.