Volume 11: The Days of Traveling on a Train
Paradise Island
The Second Night
In a situation like this, no one knew what would happen if they left the main group, so even though the man was terrified, he couldn’t possibly leave. But as a result, his status as a Player would be completely exposed.
Many Players didn’t actually know what a Scavenger was, so they had no idea what they were about to face.
Shen Maomao walked past without looking, found Zhan Zhi with a book in her hand.
Zhan Zhi was playing on his phone. When he saw her, he immediately put it on the table, flustered, and stood up to ask her, “Is there something you need?”
Shen Maomao handed him the book. “I’m returning this for my mom. And also, to thank you.”
Zhan Zhi said, “It’s no problem. If Auntie likes it, she can keep it a little longer.”
“It’s fine, she’s already finished it.” Shen Maomao gave him a smile. “I never would’ve thought that Guide Zhan would be into this kind of literature.”
Zhan Zhi said, embarrassed, “To be honest, it’s not actually for me. There’s a play being performed after we get to Russia, an adaptation of 《A Midsummer Night’s Dream》. Before I got on the train, I figured I’d bring a copy to get familiar with the plot, so I wouldn’t be totally clueless when it came time to explain it.”
Okay, that’s a reasonable excuse.
Shen Maomao said, “Then you should get back to it. I won’t disturb you anymore.”
“Hey…” Zhan Zhi hesitated, then stopped. “Well… bye bye.”
Shen Maomao nodded at him and turned to leave.
So it seemed Auntie Ning really wasn’t lying; the book had nothing to do with her at all.
After she got back, Shen Maomao went back to shamelessly stuffing her face, pretending she was an unfeeling eating machine1.
With three new corpses in the train car, even if no one could see or touch them, they still felt a deep sense of unease, and a general air of discomfort settled over everyone.
In this strange atmosphere, everyone finished dinner and went back to their own bunks to wait for the lights to go out.
As the sales attendant pushed her cart by, someone asked, “Is there any way we can keep the lights on over here tonight?”
The attendant replied, “I can’t do that. All the lights in the sleeper car are on a single switch, and the passengers in the other cars need to rest.”
The person knew it was impossible, but he couldn’t help but feel disappointed. He didn’t make things difficult for the attendant, though, and let her go.
Shen Maomao bought another pile of snacks and, like a little squirrel, went kachi kachi2, her mouth not stopping for the entire day.
Auntie Ning went to bed early as usual. After Shen Maomao finished her snacks, she took her toiletries to the mirror to brush her teeth and wash her face. While brushing, she caught a glimpse of two figures walking down the aisle in her peripheral vision. It looked like the female guide and a man.
They were walking quickly and didn’t notice Shen Maomao in the washroom.
Shen Maomao poked her head out and saw the two of them heading toward the soft sleeper section, talking about something as they went.
She didn’t think much of it. After washing her face, she used the restroom and then went back to her bunk to lie down.
Tonight, everyone in the car was unusually silent, so silent that Shen Maomao started to wonder if she was the only living person around.
Before the lights went out, the female guide and the man returned, one after the other. But Shen Maomao was facing the wall at the time, and by the time she sat up again, she only saw the man’s back.
The lights went out quickly. Shen Maomao tossed and turned in her bunk, debating whether she should even try to sleep.
She’d inexplicably fallen asleep in the middle of the night yesterday. It might’ve been some kind of internal game rule; otherwise, the number of clues one could find during the day was too limited. What kind of rule was it? Was it related to water? To food? Or was it related to her contact with Zhan Zhi?
To test her theory, she hadn’t drunk any of the hot water provided on the train all day. She had no idea if it would have any effect.
The night was long. The train moved forward tirelessly, and she didn’t know where it would stop or what its destination was. There was nothing she could do but pray that the rest of the journey would be peaceful.
But clearly, that was a pipe dream.
…
Shang Jichao was having trouble sleeping.
He wasn’t sleeping alone tonight. On his other side were three cold corpses.
When the chief attendant had taken the other two away, he’d wanted to go with them, but compared to leaving the main group, he preferred to stay with the tour group.
He’d never been afraid of ghosts before, which was why he never hesitated when doing shady things. But now, after leaving that unbelievable world, his only regret was not having been a good person.
For the next month, he’d convinced himself that it was all just a nightmare. But yesterday afternoon, the nightmare had started all over again.
He’d been completely lost after entering the game, because he had no idea what he was supposed to do.
In his first instance, an npc had assigned them jobs. He would just muddle in troubled waters to catch fish3 every day, and after work, he’d follow the veteran Players to search for clues. A few days later, he saw a group of people running toward a white light in the distance while a massive monster was on a killing spree behind them. So, he pushed his roommate into the monster’s mouth to buy himself time to escape and managed to survive that instance.
But this instance was full of npcs. He hadn’t even found a single Player.
Why is it like this? Is this a solo instance?
How could I possibly clear it by myself?
He curled up under his blanket, wishing he could roll himself into a ball. The fear in his heart grew and grew. He wanted to sleep—if he could just fall asleep, he wouldn’t be scared anymore—but it wasn’t working at all. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t feel the slightest bit of drowsiness.
Cold sweat trickled down his temples. He was terrified someone would stand by his bunk to harm him, so he’d deliberately climbed to the top bunk to sleep. But for some reason, the AC was turned up especially high today. The moment the cold sweat appeared, it was dried by the frigid wind, making him shiver uncontrollably. His mind was repeatedly testing the brink of collapse.
Cila…4
Cila…
Suddenly, he thought he heard a sound, as if someone next to him had turned over.
But… how could there be anyone living next to him?
His entire body went rigid. He perked up his ears, listening to the sounds next to him, not daring to move an inch.
Cila…
Sila…5
There really was a sound!
And it was incredibly distinct; even the rattling of the train couldn’t cover it up.
Shang Jichao started to panic.
He didn’t know what to do. Should he pretend nothing was happening and play dead on the top bunk? Or should he jump down now before something happened and go sit in the aisle or find the guides…
But before he could hesitate for long, the sound of the train suddenly grew countless times louder. Just like yesterday, it entered a tunnel. The honglong long long6 sound vibrated in his ears, making them ache.
He couldn’t stay in bed any longer.
Yesterday, those three men had gone silent right after leaving the tunnel.
He immediately sat up and scrambled to climb down. He was in such a panic that he missed a step and fell from the bunk onto the train’s green floor, making a dull thud that was completely drowned out by the noise of the tunnel.
He propped his arm on the bunk to support himself as he sat up. His eyes, as if beyond his control, glanced toward the corpse on the lower bunk. What he saw was the blue-faced man staring right at him with wide-open eyes!!
Those eyes were opened extraordinarily wide, pupils shrunk to the size of pinpricks, the whites bulging as if they were about to explode.
Shang Jichao was on the verge of screaming, but it felt as if something was strangling him. No matter how he opened his mouth, not a single sound came out.
His legs were too weak to stand, so he could only push himself backward with his feet, scuffing against the floor.
As he scrambled back, his butt bumped into a pair of shoes.
He whipped his head around and saw a pair of legs.
He followed the legs upward and saw a familiar yet strange face. “You…”
And then his voice stopped abruptly. The train slowly emerged from the tunnel, and everything returned to calm.
…
When the sound of entering the tunnel started, Shen Maomao felt a bit strange.
The train had been traveling across a plain all day long without entering a single tunnel. How was it that as soon as the lights went out at night, it entered a tunnel again?
And tonight’s tunnel was exceptionally long, so long it felt like it had no end.
After an unknown amount of time, the sound finally subsided, but Shen Maomao started to feel drowsy again. Her eyelids felt like they were glued shut, and soon after, she lost consciousness, sleeping more soundly than anyone.
The next morning, she was once again woken up by a scream.
The AC had been turned off, but the car was still a bit chilly. The sky was bright, but the curtains hadn’t been opened yet. A reddish sunlight pierced through the fabric.
The scream came from a short distance away. She quickly sat up and poked her head out from her bunk to look.
A person was standing in the corridor.
He seemed to have opened a window and stuck his head out.
The one screaming was the female guide. Right now, her back was against the door panel, and her whole body was sliding down. Luckily, Zhan Zhi was next to her and grabbed her before she could collapse onto the floor.
Shen Maomao had a very bad feeling.
The train was still moving, not stopping for this little incident.
The man in the middle bunk yanked open the curtain. The reddish sunlight shone on Shen Maomao’s face, so bright that she couldn’t open her eyes. She had to raise her arm to block it, only looking up after her eyes had fully adjusted.
It turned out that the reddish light wasn’t from the sun… but from the blood smeared all over the window.
The entire row of windows in the sleeper car’s corridor was covered in blood—not fresh, flowing blood, but the thick, dried scabs that had coagulated on the glass. It looked both disgusting and terrifying.
Besides the blood scabs, the windows were also plastered with swarms of insects attracted by the blood. The bugs were packed densely together, their wings and legs twitching in unison, nearly causing Shen Maomao—who feared neither heaven nor earth, only bugs—to die on the spot.
Several girls immediately burst into tears. The man quickly pulled the curtain shut again and said sheepishly, “What… what’s going on…”
Soon, the train attendants arrived.
They pulled the passenger standing by the window back, but they misjudged his weight and used too much force, causing the person to fall onto the floor. His mangled neck faced forward, his head no longer attached.
Another wave of screams erupted.
Shen Maomao wasn’t particularly scared, but to avoid standing out, she raised a hand to cover her eyes, peeking out from between her fingers.
The dead person was a man, and the location of his death was the window of the compartment where the three bodies were.
She didn’t have to think to know that the one who died was the Player who hadn’t left. As for the time of death… she figured it must have been when the train entered the tunnel last night, just like those other three men.
In the middle of the night, for some reason, he opened the window himself, stuck his head out, and then had it scraped off by the tunnel wall, spraying a trail of blood.
That’s why when the body fell this morning, only a drop or two of blood trickled from the neck. The majority of it had already been sprayed out over the course of the night.
Seeing this, the two attendants’ legs went weak with fear. One of them, who was braver, lifted the body and placed it in the empty space between compartments three and four. This corpse had bloodstains on it, unlike the other three, which were completely bloodless and wouldn’t have dirtied the bedding. The other attendant closed the window and drew that curtain shut.
The passengers began to cause a commotion. “What the hell is going on? This is so scary, I’m going to have nightmares!”
“Is this for real? We’ve only been on this trip for two days, and four people are dead! Who would dare to stay here?”
“We want to get off the train! We want to go home! What kind of shitty tour group is this? Refund!!”
The car was in an uproar. People argued endlessly, the sounds of crying and cursing mixing together, creating a massive headache.
The attendant quickly stood up to pacify the passengers. “Everyone, please stop shouting! We’ll be at the next station in one hour! You can decide whether to leave or stay then! If anyone doesn’t want to stay in this car, you can take your valuables and follow me to the dining car to sit. I’ll come to inform everyone to pack their luggage ten minutes before the train stops!”
Immediately, people got up and headed for the dining car.
Shen Maomao grabbed her small bag, took a large sack of snacks, and helped Auntie Ning move with the crowd toward the dining car.
The small dining car was packed to the brim.
The female guide was constantly on the phone, but the train hadn’t reached a city yet, so the signal was too poor to connect. Eventually, she just got the other two men to start dialing with her—whoever got through first, won.
Everyone was panicking, not knowing what to do.
Those who had witnessed the morning’s scene had no appetite. They just stared anxiously at their watches, hoping time would pass faster and the next station would arrive sooner.
Auntie Ning had also seen the bloody scene and her face was a little pale.
Shen Maomao placed the snacks in front of her. “Eat something. It’ll be heavy to carry if we get off the train later.”
Auntie Ning shook her head. “No thanks… I don’t really have an appetite right now.”
“Alright.” Shen Maomao didn’t press her and started eating herself.
The four people from the bunk above them were sitting nearby. The girl from the middle bunk had just been crying. Seeing that Shen Maomao was not only unafraid but also eating so heartily, she couldn’t help but say with admiration, “You can still eat…? That was absolutely terrifying… so scary and disgusting.”
Shen Maomao quickly said, “I covered my eyes fast, I didn’t see anything. Please don’t describe it to me, spare me…”
The girl said with envy, “Right now, I wish I could just poke my own eyes out. Serves me right for being so nosy, daring to look at anything.”
Another capable-looking woman in her thirties said, “We finally get to go on a trip, and now it’s all soaked in soup7. The first three with food poisoning were one thing, but what was this guy thinking? Did he not learn as a child—you can’t stick your head and hands out of a car window?”
The girl immediately looked like she was about to vomit. “Oh my mom8… Sis, please don’t say any more, I can’t take it…”
The group chatted idly, and it was much the same at the other tables. Shen Maomao was responsible for providing the background music by eating, her chewing a very enthusiastic kachi kachi.
Half an hour later, the train entered a city, and the three guides’ calls finally went through. The female guide quickly reported the situation to her company. It was unclear what the company said, but they must have agreed to everything, because as soon as she hung up, she announced loudly, “Dear tourists, I’m very sorry for this accident during our journey. This is a situation none of us wanted to see, but since it has happened, we won’t pretend nothing is wrong and continue the tour. Our local branch has already dispatched a bus to wait at the next station. It will take everyone back to the starting station for free, and you will all receive a full refund as a token of our apology. If anyone wishes to travel independently, please come register with me. I need to report it to the company so that accounting can refund the registration fee to your payment accounts.”
One by one, people went over to register.
Auntie Ning asked, “Should we register?”
Shen Maomao said, “There’s nothing we want to see around here, why register? Let’s just take the bus back.”
The two women from the top bunk each had their own plans and went to register. The two from the middle bunk chose to go back with the group, so they didn’t move.
As the train pulled into the station, the attendant still hadn’t appeared. People in the dining car grew anxious. Someone tried to push the door open to go back for their luggage but found that the door had been locked at some point and wouldn’t budge.
The moment she shouted, someone on the other side immediately tried the other door, but unsurprisingly—it was also locked.
Some people banged frantically on the doors, while others hammered on the windows, yelling for help, but no one ever appeared.
The man from the middle bunk saw this and mumbled something under his breath. The girl next to him didn’t hear clearly and asked, “What?”
The man said, “Nothing. I just think it’s a little noisy. These people are acting like it’s zombies besieging a city9.”
The girl laughed. “It does look like that Korean zombie movie.”
She hadn’t heard him, but Shen Maomao had.
What the man had said was: “It’d be strange if we could leave.”
…
The train slowly came to a halt. The platforms on both sides were empty. Everyone was in chaos. Someone tried to open a window, only to find that the windows here were sealed shut. Someone else spotted the safety hammer10 on the wall, preparing to smash the glass, but before he could act, a voice came from the broadcast speaker.
“Dear passengers, good morning. We apologize for the interruption. There has been an incident in the hard sleeper car. We have already reported the situation to the police. Passengers in the dining car, please remain calm. The police are already on board and are investigating the scene. Therefore, no one may leave the train until the cause of the incident is determined. We ask for your understanding.”
“What does that mean?” the girl asked, confused. “Does that mean none of the four deaths were accidental? So they’re keeping us here to find the killer?”
The man said, “That might be it.”
Shen Maomao said, “There are so many people in one car… how are they going to investigate?”
The man bounced his leg. “Who the hell knows what the attendants and the police are planning to do.”
The girl also hunched her shoulders and said, “I don’t want to be in the same room as a corpse anymore… Can we leave today? It’s too scary.”
Unfortunately, she didn’t get to see the train let them go. Instead, she got to see the train start moving again.
The moment the train began to move, some of the people in the car were about to explode with anger. They unleashed a torrent of curses and complaints at the railway bureau, the attendants, the Paradise Island Travel Agency, and the three guides. “Didn’t you say we could get off? Why can’t we get off now?”
“You don’t keep your word at all! What kind of shitty travel agency is this? Running into you guys is like having eight lifetimes of bloody bad luck11.”
“You have to compensate us for emotional distress! And you have to tell us exactly when we can leave!”
“I have the right to personal freedom, on what grounds can you stop me from leaving? This is illegal imprisonment! I’m going to sue you!”
Shen Maomao couldn’t watch anymore and finally stepped up. “Alright, what good does it do to yell at the guides? You think they don’t want to get off the train? Right now, it’s completely because Uncle Policeman hasn’t found the killer and won’t let us leave. When Uncle Policeman comes over in a bit, why don’t you try being so tough and yell at them? Besides, what’s the rush? What? You’re afraid the police will find out you’re the killer, so you’re in a hurry to run?”
The face of the person leading the complaints instantly turned ugly.
Shen Maomao continued, “You’re all grown adults, but you’re acting like three- or four-year-old kids. Aren’t you ashamed? Is throwing a tantrum going to help? If you’re not allowed to leave, you still can’t leave. Just sit tight and wait to see what the police say, then you can decide how to make a fuss, okay?”
Being told they were acting like children by a girl much younger than them, the adults felt a bit embarrassed. They could only suppress their anger and sit back down in their chairs, waiting for the train authorities to give them an explanation.
The three guides all shot her grateful looks. Shen Maomao sat down with a grave expression, thinking to herself: The man from the top bunk was right—it’d be strange if they could leave.
Passengers from other cars got off and on. The people in the dining car watched them come and go, their anxiety mounting.
Finally, someone couldn’t take it anymore.
A man picked up the safety hammer and smashed it viciously against the window.
Thud! A dull sound drew everyone’s attention.
The glass window was completely unharmed, showing no sign of cracking.
The man didn’t believe it. He raised his hand and smashed the window again with all his might. Judging by the sound and the tremor in his arm, he had definitely used one hundred percent of his strength, but shockingly—the window was still undamaged.
The people around him gradually realized something was wrong. The man also went crazy, striking the window again and again. After more than a dozen hits, the glass remained motionless, but he had exhausted himself. He finally gave up in frustration and cursed, “Fucking hell, is this bulletproof glass?”
Shen Maomao sidled up to the three guides and asked, “What’s really going on? Can we still leave?”
Zhan Zhi gave a bitter smile. “We’re not sure either. We’re contacting the company right now. We don’t know how they’ll handle it.”
Shen Maomao sighed. “Alright, you guys have worked hard.”
As they were talking, the train suddenly shuddered once, then actually began to move forward again.
The dining car’s broadcast speaker crackled, zila zila12, twice. Then, a bizarre female voice mixed with a piercing electrical hum entered everyone’s ears: “Welcome aboard this train. The final destination of this service is—Paradise Island.”
The author has something to say:
Everyone, please don’t stick your head and arms out the window when riding the train~
Also, there are still two red envelope spots left for chapter 388~
✨ Unlock Early Access to Chapters! ✨
Choose your perfect membership at bamboopandatl.net:
📚 Full Access ($4.99)
• Advanced chapters of ALL ongoing novels
• Access to complete finished novels
• Ad-free reading experience
📖 Single Novel Access ($1.49)
• Advanced chapters of ONE specific novel
• Ad-free reading for chosen novel
PayPal is the only current payment option!