Chapter 703: Contrast

'Drunk driving?' I looked at the car swerving in an S-shape, feeling a bit confused. 'I've been walking north and haven't seen a single car go by. Did this driver go the wrong way?'

The car was moving very slowly and wasn't too far from me.

Putting away the Good and Evil Asura Mask, I straightened my belongings, hurried down the dirt mound, and chased after the car.

The northbound road hadn't been maintained in a long time. The surface was uneven, and large chunks of concrete were missing in places. One wrong step, and you could easily trip and fall.

The car's headlights were off, and I didn't have a flashlight on me either. Anxious to catch up, I wasn't paying much attention and stepped right into a puddle. Amid the splashing water, I saw something jump high into the air and flee into a grassy ditch by the side of the road.

'Looks like a frog?' I stood there stunned for a moment. 'Even though Jinghai is in South China and has a humid, muggy climate, it's late autumn right now. How can there be frogs?'

But having seen it with my own eyes, I had no choice but to believe it.

Following the direction the frog had fled, I used my Judging Eye to take a look. To my surprise, I found quite a few frogs squatting on the rain-slicked highway.

I didn't know much about amphibians, and in the dark, I couldn't tell if these things were frogs or toads. Just looking at them made me inexplicably uncomfortable.

'I can't figure it out. I just have too few clues. I might find something once I get to the Pig Cage Apartments.' The livestream task required me to arrive before midnight. Since I hadn't even figured out the apartment complex's location yet, I couldn't help but feel a little anxious.

'If it's too far away, I might miss the livestream. Looks like I'll have to get this driver to help.' Black hair coiled inside my shadow. There was no one else around, so even if I used a ghost art on the driver right now, nobody would notice.

The car was still swerving down the road at a sluggish pace. The closer I got, the stranger it seemed.

'Did the driver see the frogs on the road and drive so slowly to avoid them? But why wouldn't they turn on the headlights? The bright light should scatter the frogs. No, the driver definitely isn't doing this to protect them...' Having dealt with too many dark things, I was accustomed to assuming the worst of human nature.

While I was thinking, the car a short distance away suddenly stopped. The engine didn't shut off, however. The driver made a U-turn and drove straight toward me.

On a pitch-black rainy night along a silent highway, a car with no headlights was driving right at me. If it hadn't been moving so slowly, I would have suspected the driver was trying to run me over to silence me.

'Is the driver a murderer? Is there a body in the trunk they're getting ready to dump?' Various thoughts flashed through my mind. I shifted a few steps toward the trees lining the road; that way, even if the car suddenly sped up, I could use a tree to dodge.

The rain poured harder. The car slowly rolled up beside me. It was an older Audi, rarely seen on the market and discontinued a few years ago.

'Is this a murderer on the loose? Or a ghost car?' Yin energy surged through my body. I formed hand seals, ready to deal with whatever was about to happen.

However, the horrifying scene I imagined never occurred. The car stopped beside me, the tinted window rolled down, and a heavy stench of alcohol billowed out.

'Just how much did they drink?' I breathed a sigh of relief. Even the most confident murderer wouldn't go dump a body while dead drunk.

I carefully stepped up to the car. Before I could speak, a woman's head suddenly popped out of the window, her dark hair hanging down to cover her face. Gripping the door frame with both hands, she hunched over and threw up right in front of me.

The rain diluted the foul smell. This rather dramatic scene left me dumbfounded.

"Are you okay?"

The woman retched for a good while before waving a hand at me. She looked exactly like a fish washed ashore, only able to occasionally flop around.

"You were the one driving just now? Do you know this is drunk driving?"

I felt like I was talking to a brick wall; saying anything was pointless. Behind my back, my fingers directed the Fate Ghost, preparing to restrain the woman first.

"I... I'm not drunk," the woman groaned and mumbled, forcefully lifting her head.

Her black hair clung to her face. The woman was extremely delicate and beautiful, though the bit of vomit lingering at the corner of her mouth completely ruined the picture.

"You drank this much and still dared to drive? Do you have a death wish?" I walked toward her, the Fate Ghost hiding in my shadow, waiting for the right moment to strike.

"I saw you walking... walking all alone, and I was afraid you'd get yourself killed, so I turned... turned around to tell you," the woman slurred, waving her slender, pale arm. "Don't walk alone at night in the rain. It's very dangerous, you know?"

"You're lecturing me now?" Whether it was because of her looks or her way of speaking, it was hard to feel any dislike for her.

"I said what I had to say. Also, don't go north! Absolutely do not go!" After finishing her sentence, the woman let out a long sigh of relief, as if she had accomplished something incredible. "Ah, I threw up. Feels so much better."

With that, she rolled up the window and prepared to leave.

"Hey, wait!" How could I let her go so easily? I stood by the front of the car and slapped the window. "If the north is so dangerous, why are you heading north?"

The woman didn't answer. Keeping her head down, she prepared to start the car. Who wouldn't be afraid of a drunk driver? Worried she might slam on the gas and crash right into me, I quickly dodged out of the way and yelled, "Can you give me a ride?! Not too far, just up north! I can pay you, however much you want!"

The windows were vibrating, but she ignored me. Without even buckling her seatbelt, she stepped on the brake and reached for the handbrake, missing it several times in a row.

Watching from outside the car made my heart pound with fear. "You're risking your life driving like this! Tell me where you live. I'll drive you home."

I grabbed the door handle and gave it a tug. Finding it unlocked, I decisively slipped inside.

"What are you doing?!"

Before I could even sit properly, the woman shrieked and tried to shove me out, reeking of alcohol.

Her arms were very thin and completely lacked strength. Rather than shoving, she was simply using her body weight to try and bump me out the door.

"I'm doing this for your own good." After opening my Heart Aperture, my physique had greatly improved and my vitality had surged. With one hand, I pinned the woman against the seat. "Sit still. I'm driving!"

This woman was truly drunk. She burrowed her head under my arm like a feral cat, opened her mouth, and bit down on my jacket, refusing to let go.

"I'm not going to do anything to you. Tell me your address, and I'll take you home." I kept the second half of my thought to myself: once we got there, I would probably need to borrow her piece-of-junk car for a bit.

When negotiating proved fruitless, I resorted to force. I opened the door, dragged her over to the passenger seat, and strapped her in with the seatbelt.

"I don't mean you any harm. Where do you live? I'll drive you back." Through our physical contact just now, I could confirm she wasn't a ghost. Her body was warm, and her heart was still thumping away.

When she refused to answer, I began rummaging through the car. To my shock, I couldn't find a single thing that might reveal her identity.

"No driver's license, no ID card. The wallet only has some cash, and even the phone has a black screen and won't turn on." I glanced at the woman. Dead drunk, she put up a token struggle for a few moments before slumping against the passenger seat with her neck lolling to the side.

Her eyes were squeezed shut, completely unconscious.

'She drank until she had no defenses left at all. No wonder there are always so many men hovering outside bars waiting to pick up drunk girls.' My gaze left her face and traced down her neck. She possessed a very unique, bony beauty. Her gorgeous collarbones looked like butterfly wings, or perhaps a masterpiece carved by a great artist. She was a deeply refined woman.

'Everyone says the outer district is chaotic, yet she dared to drive alone on a rainy night, heading straight toward the most desolate and dangerous northern part of the city. Her behavior is extremely odd. But then again, she turned around to warn me against heading north. Knowing to help an innocent passerby even while drunk shows she doesn't have a bad nature.'

I pondered this silently and quickly made a decision. I was borrowing her car for the livestream, so I would safely escort her home along the way. We both got what we needed. "You should consider yourself lucky you ran into me. If it had been anyone else, you'd be in real danger right now."

I tried to turn on the headlights but couldn't get them to work despite fiddling for quite a while. There was likely an issue with the internal wiring.

'How did she manage to drive this far in the dark without headlights?' I looked up, just about to remark that fools have their own kind of luck, when my Judging Eye caught sight of a very disgusting scene.

The rain washed over the highway. Right where the woman had been swerving back and forth, several frog corpses lay scattered. Every single one of them had been crushed alive under her tires.

My scalp tingled as a sudden realization hit me. Before she had spotted me, she had been driving the car erratically, surging forward and then reversing. At the time, I thought she was trying to avoid the frogs on the road.

Looking at it now, the truth was likely the exact opposite!

This woman had deliberately crushed all the frogs on the road that couldn't dodge in time!

Kindness probably had nothing to do with her. I had almost been deceived by that flawless, beautiful face.

'Was she afraid I would see the frog corpses, so she hurriedly reversed and tried to get me to leave?'

'Slaughtering frogs? Does this woman have a sadistic streak?'

'She's a living human being, and she seems perfectly normal on the surface, but her personality is somewhat twisted.'

Goosebumps broke out on the backs of my hands as they gripped the steering wheel. I secretly observed the drunken woman through the rearview mirror. Her delicate, elegant appearance formed a sharp contrast with the large patch of crushed frogs on the ground.

'A woman, frogs...' My expression returned to normal, but a sudden thought flashed through my mind.