Chapter 195
Chapter 195
Drip, drip.
Water, or something else, seeped from the tunnel ceiling and splashed onto the railway tracks.
Qin Ying pursed her lips, turned sideways, and handed the lamp to Zhao Jixian. “You two jump down first. I’ll bring up the rear and deal with that monster.”
Perhaps her face and eyes simply looked too earnest and trustworthy, because neither Zhao Jixian nor Feng Meiyu hesitated in the slightest.
Zhao Jixian climbed down from the train first, and Feng Meiyu jumped down after him.
Only then did Qin Ying follow them.
With rails beneath their feet, it should theoretically have been impossible for them to lose their way.
All they had to do was follow the tracks back toward the exit.
Yet the farther Zhao Jixian walked with the lamp, the more uneasy he became.
Suddenly, he stopped and called out in a trembling voice, “G-Great Detective, could I trouble you to take a look? Something up ahead seems a little off.”
Qin Ying had been following cautiously behind them, every nerve stretched taut.
She was afraid something might ambush them from behind, but she was equally afraid the two in front of her might suddenly twist their heads around a full one hundred and eighty degrees and cackle at her.
Her heart jolted twice when Zhao Jixian called out, and it took her a few moments to realize that “Great Detective” meant her.
The corners of her mouth twitched several times, but she forcibly kept quiet.
She had assumed that, at worst, the trouble ahead would be something like a rockfall blocking their path.
But when she reached the front, she too froze in place.
“You call this a little off?”
Just a little?
Qin Ying’s voice echoed through the hollow tunnel, growing louder as it reverberated.
Thunderbird beat its wings and flew higher.
At Qin Ying’s feet, four sets of rails extended in the four cardinal directions.
Within the kerosene lamp’s pinprick of light, the three people standing at the junction resembled tiny ants.
“Can railway tracks even form a crossroads?” Qin Ying asked expressionlessly.
Zhao Jixian said tearfully, “I don’t know! Theoretically, no.”
Feng Meiyu sucked in a sharp breath. “Ghost Hitting the Wall!”
As things stood, Feng Meiyu’s guess was honestly the most plausible explanation.
Qin Ying took a deep breath, drawing the damp, moss-tinged air into her lungs, and forced herself to calm down.
She stepped into the center of the crossroads and pressed a finger against one of the rails.
She had Di Shang give it a light taste, hoping it could distinguish real metal from false and determine whether any of the paths before them were merely illusions.
If two were real and two were fake, then this was nothing more than an illusion. They would only need to take one of the real paths.
Reality promptly slapped that theory in the face. According to Di Shang’s feedback, all four sets of rails were completely genuine.
Qin Ying crouched beside the tracks, frantically racking her brain.
Behind her, Feng Meiyu clutched her little bamboo basket in fear. “What is Big Sister doing?”
Zhao Jixian hurriedly shushed her. “Don’t talk. The Great Detective must be pressing her fingers against the rail to sense its vibrations, then using their direction to locate the exit.”
The moment he finished speaking, Qin Ying let out an exclamation of realization.
Metal conducted vibrations extremely well. Mineral prospecting and similar techniques took advantage of that very property.
That made sense! She would do exactly that!
A thin layer of metal spread over the fingers of her right hand, and she pressed her index and middle fingers against the rail to carefully sense its vibrations.
She concentrated as Di Shang lay motionless over her skin.
Just as she thought it had failed, the silver membrane formed by Di Shang suddenly trembled, bristling as faint ripples spread across its surface.
Someone was running along the tracks to the right.
Qin Ying sprang to her feet excitedly, pointed to the right, and whistled to Thunderbird.
The fist-sized Thunderbird glided lightly through the air and flew off along the right-hand tracks.
Before long, Thunderbird’s clear cry rang out from the darkness.
Delighted, Qin Ying beckoned to Zhao Jixian and Feng Meiyu. “Let’s go!”
She stepped over the railway ties and set off along the right-hand tracks.
After they had run a short distance, all manner of wailing and howling drifted toward them from up ahead.
Soon, the vague silhouettes of a group appeared, coming toward them.
When they drew close enough to see each other, Zhao Jixian stared in astonishment. “Black Seven? Why is it you lot?”
The newcomers were none other than the gang of street toughs who had been chasing Feng Meiyu and Qin Ying, with Black Seven at their head.
The hoodlums had been running along the tracks when Thunderbird’s cry nearly scared their souls out of their bodies.
Qin Ying was also taken aback when she saw who they were. She could not help looking back over her shoulder.
Qin Ying and the other two had climbed down from the rear of Carriage No. 1, then retreated toward the tunnel exit.
Why had they run into the gang from Carriage No. 9, which was up toward the front of the train?
Was space getting scrambled again?
Before Qin Ying could give it much thought, the black-jacketed Fatty called Black Seven came running up, reeking of hot sweat from head to toe.
He brandished a black object in his hand. The moment he spotted Qin Ying and the others, he shakily aimed it at them.
“Are you human or ghosts? Speak up! The thing in your grandpa’s hand doesn’t know friend from foe!”
Once Qin Ying saw that it was a homemade, single-shot gun, she frowned slightly.
Locally, this sort of gun was known as a break-barrel.
It might not even be lethal, but this was Qin Ying’s first time having one pointed directly at her, so she was still somewhat wary.
Fortunately, Zhao Jixian was with them. Qin Ying glanced back and gave him a meaningful look.
Zhao Jixian knew exactly what that gun was capable of, so he wasn’t afraid of a rusty lump that couldn’t even bring down a bird. Whatever he thought Qin Ying’s look meant, he stepped forward and said, “Black Seven, it’s us!”
The kerosene lamp was in his hand. He raised it higher, illuminating his face.
Black Seven and the others had been fleeing along the tracks in a blind panic. At the sight of a familiar face, relief washed over them.
Black Seven hurried up and reached for Zhao Jixian’s hand. “Mr. Zhao!”
Zhao Jixian was just as relieved to see him. He stepped closer and extended his hand, only to be struck by a pungent stench before they even shook.
The short Black Fatty clearly hadn’t bathed in years. The smell of stale sweat, mixed with another indescribable odor, hit Zhao Jixian full in the face.
Zhao Jixian froze. A pair of clammy hands had already clasped his own.
He lowered his gaze. Black Seven apparently had sweaty palms, because a pool of hot sweat had gathered in each one.
And it wasn’t just sweat. There was also some kind of slime smeared across his hands.
Zhao Jixian wasn’t even a clean freak, but every hair on his body stood on end.
Oblivious to the psychic damage he’d just inflicted, Black Seven wailed, “Something got into our carriage! And th-there are monsters in this tunnel too!”
In his agitation, he pointed back at the group behind him and stammered, “One of my brothers is hurt.”
Zhao Jixian was still standing there stiffly, so Qin Ying took the kerosene lamp from him and shone it over.
Following behind Fatty were not only his gang members, but also several ordinary passengers.
The gang members were supporting two men between them.
Qin Ying took a closer look and recognized Skinny. The other man was a stranger.
Both were badly injured, their feet dragging over the rails as they barely clung to life.
When Qin Ying saw their wounds clearly, she couldn’t help sucking in a sharp breath.
Half of Skinny’s face was gone. Something had gnawed away his skin and the flesh of his cheek.
His pale skull and a row of molars were exposed. With Qin Ying’s sharp eyesight, she could even see a cavity in one of his teeth.
The edges of the wound were jagged and coated in pale yellow slime.
The attacker was probably one of those limp, high-nosed humanoid creatures.
As Qin Ying examined Skinny, his entire body began to convulse.
Then the spasms abruptly stopped, and he breathed his last.
Qin Ying turned her face aside to avoid the foul breath that escaped him in death, then told the two men supporting him, “He’s dead.”
She turned to examine the other man and was surprised to find that his injuries had been caused by claws.
Blood dripped steadily from his clothes. A deep claw wound ran across his back.
It looked as if a tiger had raked him with all its strength, leaving his flesh torn open.
For some reason, the claw wound seemed familiar to Qin Ying. Before she could think any further, however, something suddenly happened in the tunnel.
The Thunderbird let out a piercing cry. Violet-blue lightning wrapped around the tips of its wings, dancing through the darkness like ghostly flames. A humanoid Shadowy Figure came crashing down from above.
Electric arcs crackled from the Thunderbird, making the Shadowy Figure convulse. It sprang up from the ground in a single violent motion and dashed into the darkness.
The Thunderbird wanted to hunt it down, but it was afraid Qin Ying might encounter danger if it left her. Folding its wings closer, it continued circling above the group.
The sudden commotion and flash of lightning had already frightened everyone on the tracks out of their wits.
The passengers at the back were particularly terrified. Shouting something about “ghost eyes,” they scattered like headless chickens.
Qin Ying called after them twice, but panic had already swept through the crowd.
Realizing she couldn’t stop them, she stepped aside and let them flee. At the same time, she raised the lamp high, searching the crowd for Zhang Yuqin.
Even after everyone had run off, there was no sign of the uncanny Zhang Yuqin.
Only Qin Ying, Zhao Jixian, the frightened Feng Meiyu, Black Seven, and a handful of his gang members remained on the tracks.
These people ordinarily had nothing whatsoever to do with one another, yet just like that, they formed an impromptu team.