Chapter 447: Flee!

Wild joy surged through me, but before I could even show it, the distant door to Carriage 25 was violently smashed open.

The fully mutated conductor rushed in like a monster. Her eyes blazed with fury as she glared at me, several mangled limbs still draped over her body.

"Crap, she spotted us!" I shouted instantly, giving Wang Shi no chance to react. With that, I had thoroughly dragged them down with me.

They had no idea what had happened between me and the conductor. From their perspective, their first thought was that their own plan had been exposed.

"Don't panic! I've already checked. This station is the Land God Temple. Once the train comes to a complete stop, we can all get off safely!" As panic set in, I quickly spoke up to stabilize the situation. Hearing my words, everyone's expression eased considerably, Wang Shi's included.

"Everyone, whether we live or die, whether we escape this place or not, it all hinges on this one desperate fight. If we stop her, we can get away!" I looked at the others. Compared to the conductor, we were far too weak. Standing eight chi tall, she looked exactly like some legendary ghost or monster, far beyond what I and these dazed passengers could handle. But right now, they were all I could rely on.

"Stick to the original plan." Wang Shi stepped up at the critical moment. After a brief exchange with the other passengers, he pulled the iron door between the two carriages shut and quickly walked into the October 27th Carriage.

They were making a lot of noise, and the passengers sitting with their heads bowed in the seats were all showing signs of waking up.

"The train is starting to slow down. It'll probably be another three or four minutes before it comes to a complete stop. It will be too hard for just the few of us to hold out that long." I frowned in worry, silently looking at the "companions" beside me.

"She's coming! That monster is charging at us!"

"What the hell is this thing? Some kind of bug monster?"

"Hold the door! Buy me some time!" Wang Shi retreated alone into the October 27th Carriage, leaving the rest of us at the connection between Carriage 26 and Carriage 27.

I had no idea what kind of spell Wang Shi had cast on the surrounding passengers earlier, but even though they were terrified, they still chose to trust him, staying behind to brace the door between the two carriages.

The train hadn't completely stopped yet. Having no better option, I gritted my teeth and pressed both hands against the iron door.

"Bang!"

The conductor slammed into it. The immense force felt like a jeep running at full throttle. The iron door shook; that very first impact almost broke it open.

"This damn thing is so strong!" The only female passenger among us felt her legs go weak; that impact had left both her arms completely numb.

My wrists were aching terribly. I wasn't faring much better, so I switched to pressing my shoulder against the iron door. "Wang Shi! Hurry up!"

"I'm almost done! Almost done!" Wang Shi walked briskly down the middle of the October 27th Carriage. Every time he passed a passenger, he would shout a sentence at them.

These sentences were all different, but miraculously, every passenger who heard his voice had a violent reaction.

Their eyelids twitched and slowly opened, their faces contorting with expressions of pain, despair, and grief-stricken fury. Their originally intact bodies also became covered in scars and wounds at that very moment.

Watching Wang Shi's actions, I felt a jolt of alarm, but I quickly understood the key to it all.

"Wang Shi is awakening these passengers' memories from just before they died! He's trying to start a riot in the entire carriage!" I looked at Wang Shi with newfound respect. This lunatic, who could formulate detailed murder plans and evade police searches to remain at large, truly had some skills. It was likely that long before I boarded the train, Wang Shi had already tried awakening these people. He had already learned most of their memories, which was why he could wake them with a simple sentence.

"Bang!" The conductor could clearly see everything happening in the October 27th Carriage through the window on the iron door. She shrieked, slamming into the door faster and faster.

"You little bugs trying to escape your Destiny, I will crush you!" The conductor's body began to change once again. Her hands clamped down hard on the edges of the iron door, dark bluish-black veins slowly surfacing beneath the skin of her slender, pale arms. Her facial features shifted out of place as she continuously smashed her head against the iron door's glass window.

"Oh no!" I wanted to salvage the situation, but it was already too late. The door's window shattered, and the conductor's head thrust right through!

"None of you will escape!" Glass shards were embedded all over the conductor's face. Her features were twisted and crazed; not a single person present dared to meet her eyes.

That female passenger had been standing right in the middle of the iron door. We had arranged it that way to protect her, but after the conductor smashed through the glass with her head, that terrifying face was practically touching the tip of the female passenger's nose.

How could she still care about pushing against the door at a time like that? At a total loss for what to do, she panicked completely in her terror.

"Let's start with you." The conductor's mouth suddenly split wide open. Her sharp tongue pierced directly through the female passenger's neck, dragging her over to the window.

"S-save me!"

She tried to struggle, but the conductor seemed to possess some special method for dealing with passengers. With her neck impaled by the tongue, the female passenger's eyes quickly dimmed. Large patches of lividity surfaced on her body, making her look as if she had been dead for a very long time.

"You're next!" The iron door shuddered as the conductor stretched her head forward, her tongue stabbing straight toward my eye socket.

Without hesitation, I decisively let go and jumped back. At that exact moment, Wang Shi's voice rang out from the October 27th Carriage: "Fall back! Fall back! Everyone into the October 28th Carriage!"

The few of us scrambled to get away, sprinting madly through the October 27th Carriage. We had only made it about a quarter of the way when the iron door was smashed open. The conductor, thrusting out her glass-embedded head, scrambled after me on all fours.

"You can't get away!"

The train was slowing down more and more. The hope of escape was right in front of us, but the distance between the conductor and me was also shrinking rapidly.

"This isn't looking good."

Soon enough, the passenger running at the very back was caught by the conductor. His fate was much the same as the previous female passenger's: her tongue pierced through his head, leaving behind an ugly corpse covered in lividity.

People were continuously getting caught. The only good news was that the passengers whose death memories had been awakened by Wang Shi were coming to their senses one by one. Many of them reacted just like Lu Ming, full of panic and terror. Their memories were still stuck at the very last moment before their deaths. This fear, stemming from the bottom of their hearts, threw the entire October 27th Carriage into utter chaos.

"Riot, go on and riot! The more chaotic you get, the better my chances of escaping!" Wang Shi led the charge at the very front; he had been the first person to run into Carriage 27 anyway.

"This treacherous bastard." I was following closely right behind Wang Shi. When things happened suddenly, one had to act decisively.

I ran all the way to the end of Carriage 27, where I suddenly spotted a little girl wearing a red dress.

The resentment on Xu Qin's body had been cleansed by Lu Chen. Right now, she looked just like a normal little girl—well-behaved and adorable, with a hint of liveliness shining in her eyes.

"Should I take her with me?" I reached my hand out to the girl, but she didn't accept my goodwill. Instead, she shrank back into the seat, seemingly a little afraid.

"Is this your choice? That's fine too. The memories of this life are nothing but pain. I hope that after you forget them, you can have a new beginning tomorrow." Everyone had their own choices to make, and the only one who could ever decide their future was themselves. What Wang Shi and I were risking everything to hold onto might just be exactly what Xu Qin was desperately trying to forget.

Retracting my arm, I ran past her without even having the time to say "take care." After this brief crossing of paths, we would be separated by the boundary between life and death, never to see each other again for all eternity.

"Shut the door, hurry up and shut the door!" The moment I entered the October 28th Carriage, Wang Shi's face completely changed. He didn't care at all about the other passengers behind us who had yet to escape.

I hesitated for a moment, but Wang Shi was extremely ruthless right now. He kicked the iron door shut and pressed down the safety lock.

"Move!"

The train slowed down even further. The hope of escape was right before our eyes.

"Mr. Lu? Why did you come back from that direction again?" Feng Minglong saw me, a look of shock on his face. "Aren't you tired from running back and forth?"

Like I had the time to bother with him. Without even turning my head, I ran for my life toward the connection between the October 29th Carriage and the October 28th Carriage. That was where the train doors would open.

"Bang!" A massive boom rang out from behind us. The conductor had smashed the iron door open and was scurrying madly on all fours! Her speed had gotten even faster!

"What the hell is this thing now?!" Looking at the mutated conductor, Feng Minglong was overwhelmed with terror. Instinctively leaping up from his seat, he chased right after me.

"What the hell are you running for?!" Hearing the wind past my ears, I thought the conductor was catching up, but when I turned my head, I saw Feng Minglong's pale face instead.

But this was no time to bicker about such things. When Wang Shi and I finally reached the train doors, the narrow exit was already occupied by a woman.

Half of her face was covered entirely in scars, while the other half was soft and fair.

"Why is it you?"