“I heard that this station once had a murder case, and the victim was also stabbed with a knife.”
“That man just accidentally brought a knife onto the train. There was no pregnant woman at all. What won’t those reporters write just to grab attention? He is innocent!” The conductor’s face was filled with hatred.
“Innocent?” Mu Li sneered. “What on earth is the relationship between the knife-wielding man and that monster?”
“Aren’t you quite good at guessing? Go ahead and guess.” The conductor flashed a bizarre smile.
“Not talking? Then I will wake that monster up!”
At the mention of the monster, the conductor shook uncontrollably.
Just then, the train slowly pulled into the platform.
The conductor’s gaze suddenly turned unfazed again: “When we stop next time, you guys are finished!”
Looking at this person’s carefree attitude, could it be that the next time the train enters a station, everything will return to normal?
“Then let there never be a next station.” Mu Li turned his head and glanced at the bespectacled young man.
The bespectacled young man reacted instantly, stepped into the driver’s cabin, and pressed the red and white buttons.
Then he turned the ignition key and pulled it out.
Mu Li took the key, grabbed the conductor’s ankle, and dragged him out of the train.
“What do you want to do?” The conductor felt a wave of dizziness. Dragged along by the youth, his wounds began to tear, causing him to wince in pain and howl aloud.
Feng Yi understood what Mu Li wanted to do, so he also pulled out the key from their train.
Without the keys and without the conductor, this train could not be started.
People from both trains got off and appeared on the same platform.
As soon as they stepped off the train, they saw the female reporter.
She was pacing back and forth on the platform, searching for something while muttering, “Where is the victim? The victim is gone!”
Feng Yi immediately ran over. This time he must not let her escape; he grabbed her bag.
The female reporter was suddenly blocked by a fierce-looking man and, startled, immediately swung her bag to strike him: “What are you doing? Let go of me!”
“Did you write this?” Feng Yi did not care about being hit and showed her the note he had picked up earlier at the station.
“That is my handwriting.” The female reporter froze the moment she saw the note.
She immediately pulled her notebook from her bag, discovered that a page was indeed missing, and then angrily put her hands on her hips to interrogate them: “Fine, you actually stole my things. I knew it, you were sent by them to stop me!”
“No, we are your companions.”
Mu Li dragged the conductor over and showed him to the female reporter: “Look! That criminal not only stabbed a pregnant woman, but also hacked the conductor. We must catch him.”
“Oh god, he is a victim too!” The female reporter covered her mouth in shock when she saw the conductor looking so miserably slashed, and then her expression turned despondent.
“But finding the victim is useless. That knife-wielding man was diagnosed as mentally ill, so there is no way he can face justice.”
Mentally ill?
“Isn’t that…”
Everyone looked at the hospital gown on the conductor.
Feng Yi stepped forward to flip through it and found that the man’s hospital gown was worn backward, with Xilan Psychiatric Hospital sewn onto the chest.
He grabbed the conductor by the collar: “You didn’t even spare a pregnant woman!”
“Don’t slander people.” The conductor grinned. “I advise you all to let me go. Without the train, you will be trapped here forever.”
Mu Li stepped forward and stomped down, snapping the conductor’s windpipe.
Then he turned to ask the reporter: “Speaking of which, why do you insist on finding that pregnant woman?”
The female reporter raised her head and patted her chest: “Because I am a reporter, and my duty is to report the most truthful cases.”
“I understand. We will help you find the victim.”
“That is wonderful!” The female reporter never expected anyone to help her, and she was extremely excited, warmly inviting them: “Then come to my house, I have detailed information there.”
She said this and walked off the platform. Seeing no one beside her, she turned back and beckoned: “Hurry up and keep up!”
Who would dare walk off the platform now?
Feng Yi paused, threw out a silver chain, but this time space did not distort.
“We can go out, but whether we can come back is another matter.”
Mu Li actively raised his hand: “I will go scout the way.”
Feng Yi knew he wanted to use his teleportation ability again, but: “It is too dangerous!”
Mu Li puffed out his cheeks: “But if we keep staying at the station, we will never find a way to solve the ghost train.”
That reasoning was sound. Looking at the adamant youth, Feng Yi gritted his teeth: “Then you must be careful.”
Mu Li nodded and stepped off the platform.
Then he heard a notification sound.
[Congratulations to the player for entering the World Within Paintings.]
Mu Li’s eyes lit up. He hadn’t expected a new instance right outside the platform.
He pulled the music box from his crossbody bag; the dancing girl sculpture on top had no eyes.
He took a step back and returned to the station, and the dancing girl sculpture developed a faint layer of eyes.
Seeing Mu Li return so quickly, Feng Yi breathed a sigh of relief, only to notice an extra music box in his hand: “Where did this come from? It looks quite nice.”
“This?” Mu Li shook the music box. “It is said to be the channel connecting paintings and the real world.”
What?
“A channel?!”
Feng Yi was so startled his eyeballs nearly popped out.
He stood frozen for a long time, then suddenly warned the youth with a solemn expression: “You must never let anyone else know about this.”
That was a medium that exorcists spent their whole lives searching for!
Even the company only had two, making them completely impossible to seek out by chance.
If those people found out such an artifact was in the hands of an ordinary student, it would definitely stir up a storm of blood and slaughter.
“I know.” Mu Li was clueless, but he agreed anyway.
“Outside is the world within paintings. Let us go out, I will send these people away.”
The others hesitated, afraid to walk, but after being glanced at by the youth like that, they gave a start and obediently followed.
The bespectacled young man spoke up: “What about the conductor?”
“If we kill him now, he will break out of our control again.” Mu Li looked at Feng Yi, asking for a countermeasure.
Feng Yi was still lost in deep thought at this moment.
No wonder Pei Kanyan wanted to approach Mu Li. Who wouldn’t want an artifact that could freely travel through paintings?
Wait, something felt off.
Clearly, with Pei Kanyan’s ability, taking this music box would be an effortless task. Why didn’t he make a move?
Could it be that Pei Kanyan was plotting some conspiracy behind the scenes?
Yes, it must be that.
He felt more and more convinced of his reasoning, when suddenly his arm was poked: “Ah? What?”
“I mean, make a puppet to control the conductor so we can deal with him after we figure out how to solve the ghost train.” Mu Li suggested.
“Oh, that is simple.” Feng Yi gave a pinch with his hand.
The conductor felt his limbs no longer belonged to him and couldn’t move no matter what.
Thus imprisoned in the station, he watched with resentment as the group drifted further and further away.
Everyone followed the reporter out of the platform, with only the bespectacled young man trailing at the very back.
Those five people nervously touched the music box and were instantly sucked inside, disappearing from sight.
“Did they go back?”
“They went back.”
At Zhunan Station, an overcrowded train pulled over and stopped.
Five passengers stepped off the train in a daze. Upon seeing they were at a normal platform, they collapsed onto the ground, crying and laughing in a breakdown.
Such an abnormal scene attracted a crowd of onlookers.
“Oh dear, what is wrong with them?”
Bing Wei also noticed these people and stepped forward to ask: “What happened?”
Their terror-stricken expressions hadn’t faded yet.
“A ghost train, we boarded a ghost train!”
“The passengers were all ghosts, and there was a huge monster. The conductor was slashed by that monster.”
Bing Wei understood. They were innocent people who had gotten caught up in it.
Yet they had managed to get off the train safely and soundly, something that had never happened before.
“How did you get out?”
Those people looked at each other in dismay and stayed silent.
“Did you see a red-haired guy, and a youth?” Bing Wei asked again. There was no reason they got off the train while Feng Yi didn’t.
Yet unexpectedly, the moment she finished speaking, fear began to creep across those people’s faces.
“That youth is an evil ghost, we were all tricked by him!”
“Whoever didn’t listen to him got fed to the monster!”
“That red-haired guy doesn’t know yet, he’s definitely going to die!”
“What do you mean an evil ghost? What happened to the youth?” Bing Wei asked anxiously, but seeing that these people’s expressions were becoming unhinged, she reached out to check.
Only to find that their arm bones were all broken.
“Send them back to the company.” Bing Wei told her colleagues behind her, then pondered what these people had said.
The youth couldn’t possibly be a ghost, let alone an evil spirit. How could the company’s investigations be wrong?
Besides, if he weren’t human, how could she possibly see his lifespan?
But why were they so certain the youth was an evil ghost? Why did they say an evil ghost fed the monster? The fear on their faces didn’t look fake.
Bing Wei suddenly thought of something: “Quick, use the emergency communicator to contact Feng Yi!”
“No good, his signal is cut off.” The recorder pressed the terminal in hand, unable to make contact.
Bing Wei’s heart sank.
Could this be the real reason why the youth only had 24 hours left?
Right, the doll!
She rolled up her sleeve and used a knife to carve words into her arm: “Possessed by an evil ghost”!
Bing Wei lowered her arm, her expression solemn: “I hope he can see this.”
World Within Paintings.
Feng Yi looked at the bespectacled young man still lingering in place, hostility written all over his face: “Why are you still here?”
How could Mu Li send Pei Kanyan away? He casually made up an excuse: “The music box can only send five people at a time, so he has to follow us to investigate.”
Upon hearing this, the bespectacled young man rushed forward, bumped Feng Yi aside, and grabbed Mu Li’s hem, shaking it back and forth: “I am scared.”
Mu Li patted his head: “There, there, I will protect you.”
“You are still protecting him?”
Do you even know what kind of person he is?
Feng Yi was shoved aside again, boiling with rage. He wanted to say something, but knowing he had no evidence, he could only swallow the words back down.
Just wait, I will definitely expose your true face.
The female reporter walked a distance and noticed the three of them still bickering over there: “Keep up!”
“Coming.”
The three observed the environment here. The facilities on the street were very backward, and the pedestrians were dressed very retroactively, like something out of a past decade.
They arrived in front of a residential building.
The female reporter spotted the man at the entrance and instantly hid behind them with a swish.
“Shu Lan, I see you, stop hiding.”
The female reporter was dragged out and scratched her head guiltily: “Ahaha, Editor-in-Chief, why did you come here?”
“I told you to interview the president of the Yin Group, but halfway through you ran off to investigate that groundless case. Do you not want your job anymore?”
“There really was a pregnant woman stabbed, I saw it.” Shu Lan refused to concede.
The editor-in-chief grew furious and pointed at the female reporter’s nose to scold: “Don’t tell me you saw it in a painting. Have you lost your mind?”
A painting?
The three grew alert.