Infinite: Dawn Game

Chapter 935 Floral Dress

Xu Han was so scared that he almost clung to Chen Yi. He frantically pulled out props, eager to try them out, but his breathing was unsteady due to nervousness.

"We...we just got in, didn't we?"

Xu Han whispered.

They've not just just come in... they've practically just opened their eyes.

Anjie's eyes were cold. She took a deep breath and slowly moved her hand towards her waist.

"Don't rush."

He Lingling forcefully interrupted with a deliberately lowered voice, carrying a chillingly cruel tone.

“These black mists seem to be testing us… or perhaps they’re being attracted by something, but they haven’t reached the point of attacking directly yet. Shi Jiu, try to suppress the aura emanating from your arm and see if you can calm it down.”

After speaking, He Lingling looked warily at the woman in the floral dress sitting next to Yu Shijiu.

The black mist isn't the real problem... it's the woman beside Yu Shijiu.

He Lingling has a good memory. She remembered that she had specifically checked a few minutes ago and there was no one around Yu Shijiu at all.

Yu Shijiu nodded, then lowered his head in frustration, focusing all his attention on his left arm.

He began to forcefully recall the tactile sensation of the straw bracelet, imagining the scene of sunlight and dandelion seeds... little by little, inch by inch, he forcibly soothed the cold, gloomy force in his left arm that had begun to stir due to external stimuli.

It turned out that his deliberate suppression was effective. The wriggling sensation under the cloth strip gradually subsided, and the outward-emitting "smell" that seemed to be of the same origin as the unknown things in the carriage seemed to have begun to subside.

"..."

The carriage fell silent. Apart from the sound of the bus engine and the dripping rain, no one spoke.

In the seat in front, the man in overalls who had been chattering incessantly at Yu Shijiu tilted his head, a hint of doubt flashing in his cloudy, reddish eyes. Then he paused, slowly lowered his head, and resumed his initial stiff posture. The other passengers also stopped moving.

An eerie silence returned to the carriage, broken only by the roar of the engine and the sound of rain pattering against the windows.

"Phew..." Seeing that the man in work clothes had stopped causing trouble, Xu Han finally let out a long sigh of relief, slumped in his seat, and patted his chest. "Damn... that scared me to death..."

"...This is just the beginning." He Lingling didn't relax at all; she frowned and reminded her:

"Lin Hai and the others must be on the bus too, but we don't know how they're showing up. Also, these passengers might not be human. We need to figure out the rules of this bus as soon as possible, and where the 'Echo' people are."

Xu Han was taken aback, and subconsciously began searching the carriage for the person, "Where is the person from 'Echo' if they're not on the train—"

His voice abruptly stopped.

He Lingling was right; none of the people from "Echo" were actually on the bus.

Where did they go?

Weren't they in the game instance together with them?

Xu Han looked back and forth along the seats, unwilling to give up, but finally withdrew his gaze in disappointment.

No.

No, there really isn't.

There isn't even a single player who has received an "echo".

While Xu Han was puzzled and confused, An Jie's sharp eyes quickly swept over all the seats in front and behind the carriage.

She hesitated for a few seconds before speaking: "We'll split up and observe, but don't stray too far apart. Chen Yi, Xiao Han, you two watch the sides and the backs of your seats. Lingling, you focus on the direction of the 'mist' on those 'passengers,' and as for Shi Jiu..."

Anjie looked at the woman in the floral dress next to Yu Shijiu who kept her head down, as if she hadn't heard their conversation at all, and her eyes were filled with complicated emotions.

Her lips moved slightly, and she whispered:

"Your arm doesn't seem stable yet, so try to control it for now. But if it gets strongly attracted to these 'mist' again, or if you feel anything unusual, tell us immediately. Remember, don't fight it alone."

Even though Yu Shijiu was sitting right behind her, An Jie was still a little uneasy.

"understood."

Yu Shijiu nodded obediently, his left hand secretly clenching under the strip of cloth, the fingertips of the beast claw pressing slightly against his palm, using the pain in his palm to bring him back to his senses.

The bus continued its journey through the rainy night. As the streets and shops sped past, the scenery outside the window became increasingly desolate, as if it were rapidly leaving the city streets and entering a deserted countryside.

Even the surrounding streetlights became fewer and fewer, and the distance between them grew wider and wider. Without the illumination of lights, the darkness of the rainy night, like thick ink, gradually enveloped the lonely bus that was moving forward.

The woman in the floral dress next to Yu Shijiu remained motionless with her head down.

But as time passed, Yu Shijiu could feel a faint, damp, and chilly gaze, seemingly falling on her through the gaps in the woman's wet, black hair in the floral dress.

No, more accurately, it landed on his left arm, which was wrapped in strips of cloth.

Yu Shijiu's heart skipped a beat.

He tilted his head slightly as he changed his posture, using the corner of his eye to observe the woman in the floral dress beside him.

In the occasional glimmer of light from outside the car window, he saw the woman in the floral dress resting her hands on her knees.

The woman in the floral dress was tapping her knees very lightly and rhythmically with her slender, pale fingers, which were devoid of any color.

"..."

Yu Shijiu's breathing slowed slightly, and his gaze fixed on the other person's fingertips.

The woman in the floral dress had some dark red liquid hidden under her fingernails. Perhaps due to the dim light and the constant movement of the vehicle, Yu Shijiu felt that the liquid between her fingertips seemed to have come to life, and was... wriggling slightly.

Da...da da...da da—da—

The sound of the woman in the floral dress tapping her knees was very soft, with the rustling of fabric rubbing together, yet it strangely penetrated the roar of the bus engine and the sound of rain, striking directly at one's eardrums with an eerie and unsettling noise.

After listening for a while, Yu Shijiu found that her heartbeat was unconsciously trying to keep up with the rhythm.

Bang—bang bang—bang bang—bang—

As her heart raced, the stinging pain in Yu Shijiu's left arm, which had just subsided, returned faintly, more clearly than before, and even mixed with a trace of... an incomprehensible longing?

...I was actually "desiring" to get closer to the woman in the floral dress next to me?

Don't listen to that voice.

He Lingling's voice was like ice water splashed into Yu Shijiu's ears. She didn't know when she had activated "Ghost Eyes".

A pair of huge, dark pupils, like two vortexes constantly drawing people in, stared intently at the woman in the floral dress beside Yu Shijiu in the dim light.

"...She is using low-frequency mental suggestion, and her target is you, Shi Jiu. Block out all sounds and don't pay any attention to her movements."

"..."

Yu Shijiu bit her tongue hard, the taste of blood filling her mouth. She used the pain to forcefully pull her attention back and close her eyes.

—He Lingling actually activated "Ghost Eyes" so early.

Both Anjie and Chen Yi told her to try not to activate her talent skill so early—why?

Yu Shijiu's mind raced through various possibilities, such as He Lingling encountering a strange passenger similar to herself, or guessing some even more terrifying possibility—but how could that be?

They've all been in the instance for less than half an hour now.

Half an hour... half an hour later, He Lingling activated her "Ghost Eyes"...

Yu Shijiu's mind was in chaos, and the unease spreading from the bottom of his heart made him stop trying to observe the woman in the floral dress.

Instead, he turned to look out the window at the dark, rainy night, repeatedly recalling the focused will he and Anjie had during their training.

After about five minutes, Yu Shijiu, who had calmed down, heard the knocking sound beside him seem to stop for a moment.

It's stopped?

Yu Shijiu was somewhat surprised.

Before he could think of anything, the knocking that had just stopped suddenly became more rapid and clearer, even carrying a hint of anxiety and anger.

Tap! Tap! Tap—click—click!

The woman in the floral dress seemed a little angry. Besides the sound of her pounding her knees, Yu Shijiu also heard the sound of her joints breaking.

Is he getting angry because she won't take the bait and he's not going to see her?

Yu Shijiu was a little curious, but the pain on the tip of his tongue made him stop in his tracks as he was about to turn his head.

Just then—

"oops!"

Suddenly, a startled scream, belonging to a living person, rang out from the seats in the middle of the carriage.

All five of them felt their hearts pounding and instinctively looked up.

It was a young female passenger wearing a fashionable short skirt. She seemed to have fallen asleep, which was why her head was lowered. Now that she was awake, she pointed in terror at the blurry window next to her and said in fear:

"There's...there's something! It looks like...it looks like a face! There was a face pressed against the window just now!"

"..."

The five people quickly exchanged glances and noticed that the heads of the "passengers" who were sitting with their heads down seemed to have moved almost imperceptibly.

"...They seem to be...about to wake up..."

Xu Han's low, trembling voice reached the ears of the four people, mixed with the dense, silent dripping sound falling on the car roof.

The blackness around the edges of He Lingling's pupils spread even more, and her gaze slowly shifted from the young female passenger to the window next to her.

On the car window next to her, dense rainwater gathered and flowed. In the fleeting moments when the car headlights swept across the window, the reflection of the water streaks seemed to vaguely reveal the outline of a distorted, pale face pressed against the transparent, murky glass, but it quickly disappeared into the water the next second.

"...A hallucination! It must be a hallucination!"

The female passenger's male companion quickly hugged her to comfort her, but his voice was trembling.

"Xiaojuan, it's a hallucination. You must be seeing things. Look, look at the car window. There's clearly nothing on the car window, nothing at all..."

The male companion kept talking, but his hand holding the young female passenger was trembling.

"It's not a hallucination."

He Lingling whispered, her "ghost eyes" fixed on the car window behind the two passengers.

“There are remnants of ‘black mist’ there, very familiar… There was definitely something outside just now, or rather… something was trying to get in.”

Anjie's words sent shivers down Xu Han's spine, and he stammered:

"Wh-what is this? No, I mean, is this game really going to be this exciting? Isn't something...something's not quite right?"

Xu Han really felt that something was wrong.

This is outrageous! What game's dungeon starts with monsters appearing right at the beginning?! Don't they usually have some backstory, some romance, some family drama? How can it be this exciting right from the start?!

Anjie had already stood up.

She walked towards the middle of the carriage with apparent concern, but in reality, she was warily scanning the driver who was driving with his back to everyone.

"Sir, could you turn on a few more lights? It's too dark inside the car, and it's easy to misjudge the shape of things."

This "shape"... is naturally the "face" that the young female passenger named Xiaojuan saw earlier.

As Anjie finished asking her question, a few seconds later, a deep, hoarse male voice, as if pierced by a thick veil, came from the driver's seat:

"There's a problem with the car's electrical system; some of the lights are broken."

"The lamp is broken?"

Anjie frowned. "No one's coming to take a break?"

"...It broke down on the way," the driver coughed. "I didn't notice it at first, so just bear with it for now. When we reach the final stop, a professional will come to fix it."

Throughout the entire ordeal, the driver never turned around; all anyone could see was the blurry silhouette of the man in the red hat in the driver's seat.

Anjie's eyes sharpened, and she stopped there instead of insisting. She leaned back in her seat and quickly scanned the entire carriage.

The carriage was indeed a bit dark, even darker than when they had just woken up. More importantly... some of the passengers who had been looking down, unaware of their fate, had now slowly raised their heads, staring blankly at the couple embracing each other.

It was as if... this couple was some kind of "strange sight." Taking advantage of the commotion, Yu Shijiu also stood up and quickly surveyed the carriage.

Besides the five of them, the couple, and some passengers who looked up, there were eight or nine other "passengers" who remained stiffly looking down. The woman in the floral dress next to him also stopped her inexplicable knee-tapping motion, creating a strange sense of "watching the drama unfold."

It seems like everything has returned to "normal".

But Yu Shijiu noticed that at the back of the carriage, in the shadows of the last row of seats, there seemed to be two people sitting there, but they hadn't noticed them at all before.

The two people also had their heads down, wearing dark hoodies with the hoods pulled low, covering most of their faces.

And they didn't seem to have that gray-black "mist" that permeated the passengers.

Is it someone who "echoes"? Or something else entirely?

Yu Shijiu raised an eyebrow slightly, beginning to consider whether he should step over the woman in the floral dress.

It should be fine, as long as I step over it without looking to the side...

Just as Yu Shijiu was considering whether or not to step over, he suddenly noticed one of the people in the shadows in the corner raising his head very slightly.

Beneath the brim of the hoodie, a pair of small eyes, their pupils almost slits, with shimmering light swirling deep within, met Yu Shijiu's gaze for a fleeting moment.

It is Lin Hai.