That remark made Feng Yi’s heart skip a beat.
The sharp-mouthed man declared to the others, “Pin down his hands for me!”
He then stood up, kicked the bespectacled young man beside him aside, and barked, “Out of the way!” Making a beeline for the door, he completely failed to notice the deep shadow lingering across the bespectacled young man’s face.
With both hands held firmly in a tight grip, Feng Yi shouted a desperate warning: “You are going to get him killed!”
The sharp-mouthed man just sneered viciously and slammed his palm onto the door-opening button.
With a sharp click, the button depressed and immediately sprang back up, causing Feng Yi’s heart to leap straight into his throat.
Everyone stared fixedly at the doors of the opposite train car, waiting, but nothing happened.
“What is going on?” The sharp-mouthed man looked dumbfounded, pressing the button a few more times, yet the doors still refused to slide open. “Why is it not working?”
He began hammering his fists directly against the control panel.
Right then, a manic voice echoed from the opposite train car.
“Hahahaha, I tricked them,” the train conductor said to the youth, grinning. “Their buttons are fake. The one on your side is the real one.”
Mu Li asked indifferently, “So?”
“They wanted you to die. Why would you let them off? Press the open button, and their doors will open. The ghosts will eat every single one of them.”
Mu Li let out an oh, turned on his heel, and walked toward the control button on his side of the car.
Panic instantly washed over everyone’s faces. Their door button was fake!
Drained of all color, the sharp-mouthed man reacted immediately. “Do not let him press it!”
“But he is over there, we have no way to stop him,” the young woman stammered, trembling all over.
“We do,” the fitness coach said through clenched teeth. “Have you all forgotten? This red-haired guy’s dolls can control people.”
That was right! The red-haired guy had just pulled out dolls that were exact replicas of the youth. As long as they got their hands on those dolls, they could control the youth’s movements.
Immediately, while pinning Feng Yi’s hands down harder, the rest of them started frantically searching through his pockets.
Realizing their intentions, Feng Yi stared at them in utter disbelief. How could they discuss sending a youth to his death with such calm, righteous expressions?
“Are you all out of your minds? Let me go! I can make sure everyone survives.”
Yet not a single person paid heed to his words.
The dolls were fished out in no time.
Seeing the youth drawing closer and closer to the button, the young woman snatched the doll and screamed, “Stop!”
However, the youth did not break his stride.
“Give that to me.” The sharp-mouthed man snatched the doll away, shaking and tearing at it furiously. He even stomped on it a few times on the floor until the doll was completely caked in dust and grime.
None of it worked.
It seemed that only the red-haired guy could activate the dolls.
“Stop him right now, just like you stopped me earlier!” He shoved the doll right into Feng Yi’s face.
Feng Yi’s gaze had frozen several degrees colder. “Do you have any idea what you are doing?”
“We know. We just do not want to die.”
“Hurry up, he is about to press it!”
Seeing the youth’s figure right in front of the button, everyone’s hearts surged into their throats.
To everyone’s surprise, however, he walked straight past the control panel and headed directly toward the driver’s cabin.
Mu Li knocked on the cabin door, then peered through the one-way glass window. “Train conductor, are you in there?”
“What are you doing?” The conductor’s voice carried a hint of tension. “Hurry up and press it!”
Mu Li let out a long, puzzled oh. “You really want me to press it that badly?”
Losing his patience, the conductor snapped, “Cut the crap and press it!”
Mu Li turned around, his hands behind his back as he twirled the umbrella he was holding. “Well, I just refuse to let you have your way.”
Realizing the youth had been playing him all along, the conductor let out a chilling, eerie cackle.
“So be it.”
The lights flickered violently. The ghost passengers’ faces turned as pale as paper dolls, their blood-red maws gaping wide as they crawled up the exterior of the train doors, fixing every single one of their malicious eyes on the youth.
Mu Li spared them a casual glance, then spun around and slammed a kick straight into the cabin door.
Bang, bang, bang!
He did not show them an ounce of respect.
“Then go to hell!”
Provoked beyond endurance, the conductor shrieked in a voice that turned sharp and distorted.
With a loud crash, the train doors flew open.
The ghost passengers had been waiting endlessly for this moment. Drooling with ravenous desire at the sight of a living human, the moment the doors parted, they swarmed into the carriage like a dense wave of insects.
Before Mu Li could kick the cabin door open, the boarding ghost passengers lunged and grabbed him, a sickening wave of iron-rich blood washing over the air.
Over on the other side, seeing the opposite doors fly open and the horde of ghost passengers swarm the youth, the group finally let out a breath of relief.
“Are you satisfied now?” Feng Yi burned with frantic anxiety. “Let me go right now!”
After a hurried discussion among themselves, however, they decided against releasing the red-haired guy, rationalizing it with a single thought:
“How do we know you will not just smash the windows open again?”
Seethed in boiling rage, Feng Yi found himself completely paralyzed and unable to move.
While they were arguing, the situation on the youth’s end took a grim turn.
As the ghost passengers descended, Mu Li whipped out his pen knife to stab them, only to find the blade passing straight through their ethereal bodies.
His attacks failed to connect physically, and the ghosts’ health bars remained entirely unreduced.
A ghost passenger curled its red lips into a smile, raking its razor-sharp nails across his arm to leave five bloody gashes as the player’s HP plummeted.
Hiss.
The player could not damage the ghosts, but the ghosts could damage the player. What an absolute scam.
No matter, though. Damage Rebound ignored all defenses; once his HP dropped to a certain threshold, it would force them to suffer the backlash and die.
From Feng Yi’s perspective, however, the youth was entirely defenseless, being savagely torn apart and devoured by the razor-sharp teeth of the ghost passengers. Gaping, horrific wounds multiplied across his body, leaving him bloody, mangled, and exposing bone.
Feng Yi’s eyes turned bloodshot as an involuntary, desperate roar ripped from his throat.
Seeing this scene, the bespectacled young man also stood up against all expectations.
The conductor resumed his instigations toward Mu Li:
“Look at them. They are watching you get torn apart by ghosts and doing absolutely nothing. Press the door button. There are plenty of people on the opposite train, the ghosts will go after them instead.”
Driven to his knees by his injuries, the youth was hauled up by the ghost passengers like a rag doll, his face pressed right against the door-opening button.
A mocking curve touched the corner of Mu Li’s lips. “Save your breath. I am not pressing it.”
He calculated mentally: had the accumulated damage reached the threshold yet?
Just as the ghost passengers grabbed the youth’s arm to force his hand onto the button, the young woman let out a piercing shriek and shoved the doll into Feng Yi’s hands. “Make him stop touching the button!”
The fitness coach panicked as well. “He already said he does not want to press it, what are you hesitating for?”
“What am I hesitating for?” Trembling with fury, Feng Yi’s face flushed a deep crimson. “He refuses to press it, and why is that? Is it not for your sake?”
A sharp crack echoed out, drawing everyone’s collective gaze back to the opposite train.
To prevent himself from pressing that button, the youth had ruthlessly snapped his own arm.
The limb hung limp at his side, bent at an extreme, unnatural angle.
Another crisp crack sounded as the lenses in the bespectacled young man’s hands shattered.
“Get the hell away from me!” Driven to the brink of madness, Feng Yi’s eyes burned red like a wild beast’s. Veins popped out thick on his neck as he fought back with a desperate, explosive struggle.
Right then, the bespectacled young man tripped over his own feet, stumbling squarely into the fitness coach.
The fitness coach slammed his head against the seat, seeing stars. “What are you doing?”
Freed from the restraint of the strongest person among them, Feng Yi unleashed an unprecedented burst of strength, flinging everyone several meters away.
He scrambled to his feet, his hands trembling as he grabbed a large handful of dolls from his pocket.
Each of those dolls was the spitting image of the ghost passengers.
Clutching the bundle tightly in his palm, he twisted them apart with vicious force.
“Go to hell!”
The dolls were violently torn in half, spilling cotton stuffing everywhere.
At that exact second, the ghost passengers assaulting Mu Li froze dead in their tracks.
Deep, canyon-like cracks split across their faces, chests, and legs, spewing thick billows of black ghost qi from within.
The fissures widened and deepened until they shrieked in agony, tearing apart completely.
And vanished into thin air.
Holy shit!
The train car had been crawling with ghostly phantoms just a second ago, and now it was completely empty. Staring at the scene before him, Mu Li froze in a daze.
Feng Yi stood there with eyes as red as dripping blood, having ripped the dolls apart in a frenzy to obliterate every single ghost passenger in an instant.
Those were low-level mobs that even players could not attack.
Mu Li looked up at Feng Yi with sparkling eyes.
The player’s teammate was ridiculously overpowered!
Wait, a sudden thought struck him.
If those NPCs had not pinned Feng Yi down, he could have wiped out all the ghost passengers the moment the doors opened.
In that case, all the HP the player had just lost was completely wasted?
The mere thought made Mu Li’s vision go dark.
Seeing the youth finally collapse to the ground, no longer able to hold himself up, Feng Yi threw himself against the glass partition, worry overflowing in his gaze. “Are you alright?”
Mu Li shook his head. “I am fine.”
Realizing all the ghost passengers had been wiped out, the conductor flew into an absolute rage. A sharp, piercing screech blasted through the intercom: “I am going to kill you all!”
Seeing the red-haired guy display such terrifying combat prowess, the rest of the group froze in terror, realizing they could no longer hope to suppress him.
Exchanging anxious glances, they hurriedly flipped sides: “Our Brother Feng is so strong, he can slaughter as many ghosts as show up.”
Someone else chimed in, “Exactly, exactly.”
No matter what, this guy looked reasonably upright and probably would not do anything to them.
“Shut your mouths!” Feng Yi roared, glaring at them with murderous intent. If not for them, if not for them, how could the youth have ended up in such a miserable state?
Daring not to talk back, the others fell into a frightened silence.
Amidst the quiet, the train rolled on for a bit longer before finally pulling up to a station platform.
This time, the doors to their train car slid open, while Mu Li’s car doors remained firmly sealed.
“It is coming! It is coming!” the conductor cackled gleefully over the speakers. “Hahahaha, none of you are escaping.”
Suddenly, a massive, heavy object slammed down onto the roof of Mu Li’s carriage, punching a deep crater straight through the ceiling.
A monster of this scale radiated a wave of baleful qi that made the ghost passengers look utterly insignificant by comparison.
The others could easily bolt out of their train car and escape, but Mu Li was trapped inside.
“Wait for me,” Feng Yi tossed a reassuring word to the youth before attacking the window again.
It was completely useless.
At that moment, the lights in both carriages began to flicker frantically. Terrified, the remaining five individuals scrambled to tumble out of the train.
Glancing back at the youth one last time, the bespectacled young man caught a subtle nod from Mu Li and quickly hurried off the train as well.
Refusing to leave, Feng Yi continued bashing desperately against the window. After smashing it repeatedly without even leaving a scratch, anxiety brought him to the verge of tears.
A good teammate who actually knew to wait for the player.
“Do not rush, I am coming right over.”
Mu Li popped open his umbrella.