Chapter 49: Material for the Blade Sacrifice

"The passenger with the highest number of votes will be stripped of their right to ride this Bus."

The mechanical female voice, completely devoid of emotion, crackled intermittently over the intercom, sounding like the pronouncement of Gao Tian's death sentence.

Naturally, Gao Tian hadn't forgotten the Bus's most important rule:

Passengers must not slaughter one another.

But now, having received the most votes, he had been stripped of his status as a passenger. Did that mean he could attack the other passengers without consequence, no longer bound by the rules?

Gao Tian's gaze fell first on Ling Feifei in the back seat. The vicious woman still wore a smug smile, completely oblivious to what she had done and what kind of devil she had unleashed.

For the first time in his life, a monstrous rage boiled up inside Gao Tian.

He had never met this couple before today. There was no bad blood between them, and they were supposed to be on the same side. If everyone had just made rational decisions, they would have had a great chance of surviving this Green Text Mission.

Why did they have to target him? Why vote for him? Did they gain anything at all from doing so?

Even if he pondered it for three days and three nights, Gao Tian still wouldn't be able to comprehend the logic of those two baffling brains.

Evil people did bad things to benefit themselves at the expense of others. Idiots, however, harmed both others and themselves.

The minds of idiots were truly unfathomable. It was better to temporarily cooperate with a bad person than to have anything to do with a fool.

Gao Tian stopped thinking about it. Forget it, the outcome was the same anyway. He had originally planned to sacrifice Ling Feifei to the blade, but for some reason, he suddenly changed his mind. This woman might still be somewhat useful later. Sometimes, living was its own punishment—a fate far crueler than a clean, swift death.

Gao Tian activated the power of the Terror Blade in his hand.

The person he chose to sacrifice was Zhou Yan.

Zhou Yan, who had just been watching from the sidelines with a relaxed and leisurely expression, had no idea what was happening when his body suddenly exploded with a loud bang. Only his head remained, rolling off the seat as blood and gore splattered across the entire rear of the Bus. Ling Feifei was still smiling the moment her face was drenched in it; she hadn't realized what had just occurred.

Because it all happened so fast, Zhou Yan's severed head wasn't even dead yet. He only felt his body grow light as his surroundings spun violently.

'What's going on?'

Meanwhile, after paying the price, Gao Tian clearly felt the invisible pressure binding the Terror Blade temporarily lift. The blade was still chipped and covered in rust, but the chilling murderous intent it now radiated caused the temperature inside the Bus to drop a few degrees.

The instant Gao Tian raised the Terror Blade, five or six of the twenty-odd heads on the Multi-Headed Ghost's body showed expressions of shock, dread, and terror.

The aura of the unsealed blade was staggering. With the weapon in hand, Gao Tian's presence actually managed to suppress the Multi-Headed Ghost for a brief moment.

It had been bought with a human life.

But it was worth it.

He found the right angle.

Gao Tian brought the blade down. Murderous intent poured out like a torrential rain.

Bathed in that sweeping force, the middle-aged man's head—the one that had grown its own independent limbs—instantly disintegrated into dozens of fleshy chunks. It exploded across the Bus, scattering across the floor in pieces too small to ever pick up.

The Multi-Headed Ghost stood directly behind the big-headed ghost. The two formed a straight line. The impact of the blade was so immense that after shattering the big-headed ghost, it didn't slow down in the slightest, slashing squarely into the Multi-Headed Ghost.

As the clone's soul shattered, an invisible backlash struck the main body. The Multi-Headed Ghost writhed in agony. Among the faces covering its body, three or four coughed up blood and bled from their noses, while two others let out silent screams, as if enduring an excruciating, unbearable pain.

The entire Bus shuddered slightly.

Only then did Zhou Yan's head roll to a stop at Gao Tian's feet. Completely bewildered, he looked up at Gao Tian sitting in his seat and asked stupidly:

"What happened?

"Why do I feel like you've gotten taller?"

Gao Tian glanced down at him.

"Nothing major. I just used you as material to sacrifice to my blade.

"Remember to be a good person in your next life. Be someone useful to society."

He raised a foot and delivered a heavy kick directly to Zhou Yan's face, sending him bouncing away like a ball.

The very last thing Zhou Yan saw before he died was Gao Tian's size-43 leather shoe blotting out the sky as it swung toward him.

Only in that moment did he realize that he was nothing more than a severed head. He died on the spot, breathless, before he could utter a single word for mercy.

It was a truly humiliating way to die.

With a single strike, he had sacrificed one man and obliterated one ghost.

Because of Gao Tian's strike, the situation inside the Bus instantly reversed.

With Zhou Yan dead, his cast vote became invalid.

With its clone dismembered and its connection to the main body severed, the Multi-Headed Ghost lost its passenger status. The vote it had cast also became invalid.

The number of votes hanging over Gao Tian's head dropped from a peak of four down to just two.

At the same time, despite looking incredibly imposing and at the absolute peak of his life after swinging that blade, Gao Tian knew the truth. The recoil from the strike was massive. It placed a tremendous strain on his body, even his internal organs, making every inch of him feel as though it were being torn apart.

It was like firing a large-caliber shotgun; the moment the trigger was pulled, the shooter themselves risked being deafened by the blast. For Gao Tian in his current state, unleashing that strike was akin to killing a thousand enemies at the cost of two hundred of his own.

Right at that moment, the mechanical female voice rang out over the Bus intercom:

"Passengers who do not belong on this Bus, please disembark immediately. The vehicle will soon enter the next station."

"Passengers who do not belong on this Bus, please disembark immediately. The vehicle will soon enter the next station."

...

The sudden female voice meant the voting had come to an end.

The Bus was about to depart the station and had to immediately clear out the extra passenger. At this moment, the suppressive power of the rules reached its absolute peak.

The Multi-Headed Ghost now held the highest number of votes. Gao Tian had regained his passenger status, while the former had lost its own.

Its countless eyes—some cloudy, some bloodshot, others starkly black and white—stared quietly in Gao Tian's direction, looking like a mob of thousands uniformly pointing their fingers in condemnation.

It seemed determined to etch Gao Tian's face into its memory.

Gao Tian knew very well that ghosts held grudges. Though he had blown apart one of its heads with a single strike and dealt the Multi-Headed Ghost unprecedented damage, he couldn't completely kill it.

If an S-Level Fierce Ghost completely lost control and resolved to kill him tonight no matter the cost, even fighting against the Bus's suppression, the Bus might not necessarily be able to hold it down.

Now, it was a test to see who would give out first—the Bus or the Multi-Headed Ghost.

His entire body was on high alert. If the Multi-Headed Ghost really went crazy, he would pay whatever price necessary to unleash a second strike and completely cripple it.

The standoff lasted only a few seconds, but it felt like a century.

Shen Nian, Su Jiu, and the other bystanders didn't dare breathe, watching closely to see what the Multi-Headed Ghost would choose.

Finally, after piercing Gao Tian with dozens of glares over and over again, the monster built of heads slowly turned around, urged on by the mechanical female voice. Wrapped in its black coat, it limped toward the rear door with a stiff, somewhat twisted gait.

Under the Bus's suppression, it chose to disembark.

With the Multi-Headed Ghost off the vehicle, the number of passengers in the cabin dropped back down to six. Meeting the required standard, the Bus's front and rear doors squeaked shut. The engine roared to life, preparing to pull out of the station.

At the station outside, the heavily injured silhouette of the Multi-Headed Ghost stood entirely alone.

At the same time, the Bus's suppression of the Fierce Ghosts inside the cabin took effect once more. The tall male corpse slowly fell into a deep slumber, and the cross embedded in the head of the Inverted Cross old woman faded into a dark stillness.

Gao Tian slumped in his seat. A cold sweat broke out almost instantly, completely soaking through his clothes.

In this brief clash, by relying on the rules of the Bus, Gao Tian had won.

But the fear and oppressive aura brought by the Multi-Headed Ghost still lingered in every cell of his body.

The Bus drove along the dark road. As he watched the scenery change outside the window, he knew that as long as the vehicle was moving, the passengers on board were safe.

It wasn't over yet, though.

Let's not forget, Ling Feifei was still alive in the back seat.

He absolutely would not let her off.

The crisis resolved, Shen Nian, who had been watching the show from the front, stared in shock at the rusty blade in Gao Tian's hand. He was clearly terrified by the power of that strike as well.

"What an overwhelming blade. To think it actually managed to temporarily force back an S-Level Fierce Ghost.

"Why does this blade look so familiar? It's as if it originally belonged on this Bus."

Before Gao Tian could answer, a woman's tearful wail echoed from the back of the Bus.

"Gao Tian, you killed Zhou Yan! It was you, wasn't it?!"

Ling Feifei wasn't an idiot. Zhou Yan had suddenly exploded right next to her at the exact same moment Gao Tian unleashed that world-shaking strike. Although she couldn't understand the connection between the two, her instincts told her Gao Tian was behind it.

Unbelievably, her first instinct was still to accuse Gao Tian.

"Gao Tian, we're both residents of the Living Apartment! There's no bad blood between us! Why did you kill my boyfriend? Do you have no conscience...?"

This was the first time Gao Tian had ever seen someone so utterly shameless. He almost laughed out loud.

"No bad blood?

"No bad blood between us?

"Then who was it that voted for me just now?

"Who teamed up with the boarding Fierce Ghost, trying to force me off the Bus?

"Actually, I'm quite curious. We don't have any grudges, so why did you two vile, despicable people plot so deliberately to get me killed?

"Do you even have the right to utter the word 'conscience'?

"Since you want to see your boyfriend so badly, do you want me to make a move right now and send you tragic lovers to reunite in the underworld?"

Having witnessed Gao Tian's terrifying power, Ling Feifei lost all her initiative. She was nothing like the arrogant, domineering woman he had first met. Breaking down under his barrage of questions, she dropped to her knees in the pool of blood, her face streaked with tears. Begging repeatedly for mercy, she seemed like a completely different person.

"I'm sorry, I know I was wrong, I really do. I regret it, I shouldn't have voted for you.

"It was all Zhou Yan! He put me up to it, he's a bad person! Please, be the bigger man and forgive my petty offenses. You've already killed Zhou Yan, so please don't kill me, okay?

"Brother Gao, I'm just a weak woman. Whoever you tell me to vote for, I'll vote for them, okay? Just let me go, please let me go.

"I'll work like a dog for you! When we get back to reality, I'll do whatever you want, as long as you spare me this once..."

...

It was truly hard to imagine that such staggering arrogance and pathetic groveling could come from the same person. But after Gao Tian forced back a Fierce Ghost with a single strike, Ling Feifei was utterly terrified. Her mind was a blank slate, leaving only a tiny sliver of survival instinct and trembling submission.

Sitting in his seat, Gao Tian didn't even bother to mock her anymore.

Now she knew how to regret? Wasn't it a little too late for that?

He hadn't killed Ling Feifei directly for two reasons. First, because of the Bus's rules—now that he had regained his passenger status, he couldn't attack other passengers. Second, this woman might still be of some use later.

Those two hypocrites had disgusted him for so long. He had to wring some compensation out of her. Consider it recycling trash.

A long while later, Ling Feifei, clutching her chest with a look of pure agony, forced herself to stand up.