In an instant, Yan Wei had already flipped off the bed, wielding the Moon Wheel as he rushed out into the dim light. Lin Qing, who had been motionless until now, suddenly sat up.
As the malice receded, the paused time and space resumed their flow. The silence was enveloped by the mechanical sounds of the train and the rain, and Xu Miaomiao’s cries immediately rang out a second time.
She was calling for Ding Xiao, but Yan Wei had already moved the moment time unfroze. He ran to the door of the sleeper compartment where Ding Xiao was, while Lin Qing had just flipped down from the lower bunk.
The entire corridor was empty except for Yan Wei standing in front of the door. In the dead silence, the sounds from Xu Miaomiao’s room were particularly noticeable. Yan Wei seemed to hear a “screeching” sound coming from inside, as if something sharp was scraping against metal or the hard iron walls, scraping against people’s nerves.
Yan Wei yanked the door open—fortunately, Xu Miaomiao hadn’t locked it.
What greeted him was the blinding beam of a flashlight, and Xu Miaomiao’s pained cries reached his ears.
In the beam of light, there seemed to be something pitch black hanging from the upper bunk, half of its body dangling, its hair hanging upside down.
After being immersed in darkness for a while, Yan Wei’s eyes were momentarily blinded by the light, and he couldn’t see anything clearly inside. But he didn’t hesitate, immediately closing the sliding door behind him, trapping himself, Xu Miaomiao, and that filthy thing inside the room. Hearing the commotion outside, Yan Wei shouted, “Don’t come in!!! We can’t attract more Ghosts/Monsters, there can only be two people at most!!”
He was still in his Undying State, so he could recklessly charge in, but if one more person entered, it would only attract more filthy things due to the exceeding number of people.
Lin Qing and the others who arrived later obviously understood this as well. As the sliding door closed, Lin Qing’s voice came from outside, “If you can’t hold on, let me take over immediately.”
“Yan Wei, come out, I can handle it,” said Yan Mingguang.
Yan Wei had no time to respond.
He directly charged to the lower bunk where Xu Miaomiao was, not even glancing at the filthy thing, and pulled out more than a dozen high-level Items he had stored during his first Ascension from the Black Ring.
This instance didn’t allow the use of Body Index, so when faced with Ghost/Monster attacks, they could only rely on the functions of Items.
In an instant, the Items scattered in front of Yan Wei, temporarily blocking the thing. Yan Wei glanced at it, seeing half of its body hanging from the upper bunk, its face bloody and mangled, a hole in the top of its head from which brain matter seemed to drip endlessly, emitting a nauseating stench.
The thing’s nails were sharper and longer than blades, its hands desperately reaching forward, the swinging nails just moments away from touching Yan Wei’s cheeks, the air beside his face turning sharp and cold.
Its head slightly tilted, and it gave Yan Wei a stiff, upside-down smile.
The Items began to shatter one by one. Yan Wei shielded Xu Miaomiao behind him, staring at the thing in front of him without turning back.
He asked, “Still alive?”
“…” Xu Miaomiao’s already hoarse voice came through, “Just now, this disgusting thing pierced through my palm, I’m injured but not dead. But I’ve used up all my Items, only the bone staff I keep close remains. If you hadn’t come in just now, once the bone staff shattered, I wouldn’t have been able to escape.”
A few more Items in front of Yan Wei shattered.
The thing, with its claws and fangs, tried to get closer, swaying as brain matter dripped everywhere, seemingly ready to splatter onto Yan Wei at any moment.
Xu Miaomiao was backed against the train’s iron wall, with Yan Wei blocking the edge of the lower bunk in front of her. She hid in this cramped space, racing against time to tend to the flesh wound in her palm.
She had suspected something would happen to her in the dead of night and had prepared herself to gamble with her Items. The person she called was Ding Xiao, who had been with her all along—her relationship with Yan Wei and the others wasn’t close enough to risk her life.
But she didn’t expect Yan Wei to charge in without hesitation.
Just as she was about to speak, Yan Wei tossed another Item at the Ghost/Monster in front of him, calmly saying, “Don’t get emotional, I’m undead right now, so I’m the most suitable person to come in.”
“I was going to say,” Xu Miaomiao endured the pain in her palm, “… your Items aren’t enough. This filthy thing isn’t just in front of you.”
As soon as she finished speaking, a chill came from Yan Wei’s right side, and a greenish-black nail suddenly jabbed toward him.
The scattered beam of the flashlight faintly illuminated the shadow of the attacking figure—it was another Ghost/Monster with a cracked head. Just as he dodged, two more hands reached out from his right front!
Yan Wei, startled, pulled Xu Miaomiao to the left and immediately threw three or four high-level Items toward the right. At the same time, he already understood Xu Miaomiao’s meaning and didn’t stop, throwing high-level Items around like they were free.
In the urgency, the darkness mixed with scattered light amplified their senses. Yan Wei listened to the slightly rapid breathing of himself and Xu Miaomiao, feeling dizzy from the surrounding stench, not noticing that in the same instant, a Ghost Hand covered in corpse spots with nails had already reached his arm.
But for some reason, the sharp greenish-black nails shrank back the moment they touched the large coat Yan Wei was wearing, as if they had encountered something even more terrifying than themselves.
Yan Wei only focused on throwing Items.
One after another, identical Ghosts/Monsters crawled out from all directions, high-level Items swirling around them, temporarily blocking these filthy things.
Outside, Lin Qing seemed to say, “I’ll go in and replace Yan Wei.”
“It’s not midnight yet,” Yan Mingguang was more composed than Lin Qing, “Yan Wei won’t be in danger.”
The people outside had a sense of proportion, and Yan Wei inside also calmed down a bit.
Identical Ghosts/Monsters had already covered the surroundings. Except for the iron wall behind Xu Miaomiao, the front and both sides were densely packed with these filthy things. The light from the dropped flashlight was completely obscured, and only the faint white light from the Moon Wheel in Yan Wei’s hand made the surroundings even more eerie and terrifying.
Xu Miaomiao sighed, “It was like this before you came in, I couldn’t find any gap to escape, otherwise I would have rushed out long ago. The moment you opened the door, it probably knew new Prey had arrived and deliberately made way for you to come in.”
Yan Wei lifted his eyelids, silently scanning the surroundings—indeed, there were no gaps left.
“There are already two of us here. Even if one more person comes in and opens the door now, it won’t have the same effect as when you came in, because three people would naturally attract more Ghosts/Monsters and cause them to kill indiscriminately. Only the two of us can figure a way out, but after midnight, your Undying skill will expire…” Xu Miaomiao had also been informed of Yan Wei’s skill, she only thought of it as the only gifted skill Yan Wei had received, “… and with no Items left, there would be no way at all.”
This was also why she had used up all her Items earlier.
When she called for help, it was partly because she really couldn’t hold on anymore, and partly because she wanted to deceive this Ghost/Monster, hoping to escape the moment the door opened.
Who knew why these filthy things were so clever tonight? The moment Yan Wei opened the door, the Ghost/Monster made way, and just as she was about to rush out, her palm was completely pierced and pinned to the iron wall.
By the time she used her last few Items to push back the Ghost/Monster, Yan Wei had already charged in, and these Ghosts/Monsters instantly filled the sleeper compartment again, brain matter covering every corner.
Once again, they were in a desperate situation.
Xu Miaomiao bit her lower lip, looking at Yan Wei’s blurred back so close to her, and whispered, “Sorry, I dragged you into this.”
It wasn’t that she was particularly afraid of death.
After being in the Tower World for so long, anyone would know that death could come at any moment.
Everyone was prepared to lose their head the next moment.
Yan Wei didn’t respond. He stared at these densely packed filthy things, pondering—according to the malice that descended into the instance, Xu Miaomiao had triggered a Death condition, but it was amplified by the malice using the rules, hence the almost unsolvable situation. So, what was this Death trigger? How to undo it? Was it by blocking a fatal blow, or did the Ghost/Monster have to kill someone for it to count?
Yan Wei raised his hand, his fingertips brushing the Black Ring, checking the remaining time of his Undying State: twenty-one minutes.
First, try letting the Ghost/Monster succeed in its attack.
He watched as several Items in a corner in front of him shattered, not replenishing them, waiting for the Ghost/Monster in that corner to pounce on him.
Xu Miaomiao, behind him, couldn’t see Yan Wei’s suicidal actions. Seeing no response from him, she thought Yan Wei was really blaming her.
She said, “I was actually calling for Sister Ding, I didn’t expect you to charge in so quickly.”
The Ghost/Monster pounced on Yan Wei, its two Ghost Hands aiming for his head, but they stopped right in front of his forehead. The bloody, mangled face seemed to enlarge in Yan Wei’s vision, so close he could see the thick blood slowly dripping down its face and the Decay Worms clinging to the edges of its hair. Yan Wei suppressed his nausea, watching the thing get closer, then seeing it being repelled by some irresistible force, the entire Ghost bouncing back.
The surrounding Ghosts/Monsters didn’t disappear.
Yan Wei: “…”
It seems using the Undying skill to block a fatal blow didn’t work.
Yan Wei threw two more Items to fill the gap.
Xu Miaomiao, seeing he had already thrown quite a few, held her last Item, the bone staff, and said, “If only Sister Ding were here. She has more experience than us newcomers, and more Items too. Even if we had to rely on Items, she could last longer than us. I see you’ve thrown so many, don’t have many left, do you?”
Yan Wei: “Not bad.” He threw another one to fill a gap on the other side.
Xu Miaomiao also kept an eye on the surroundings. She saw Yan Wei throw another one, glanced at it, and thought to herself how good Lin Qing was to Yan Wei, even finding such high-level Items that only existed in records and giving them to Yan Wei.
She said, “Why don’t we let Yan Mingguang and the others try opening the door? At worst, it’s just more Ghosts/Monsters. Your relationship… they should be willing to take the risk for you once, right?”
“No need.”
In front, the dozen or so Items Yan Wei had initially thrown had all shattered.
“Take my bone staff first, it’s almost upgraded to a Legendary Item. Legendary Items are incredibly rare, but there’s a huge gap between them and high-level Items, they can last longer…”
Yan Wei was contemplating how to break through the current predicament, feeling a bit annoyed by this constant patching of one hole after another. Without blinking, he casually pulled out several dozen high-level Items and four or five Legendary Items from his Item storage, seeking a moment of peace.
Xu Miaomiao, who saw the Items Yan Wei threw out: “???”
Even the tension of the life-and-death moment was almost diluted by the Legendary Items thrown in her face.
Then Yan Wei seemed to impatiently mutter, “Why is this side breaking so fast too?”
As he spoke, he flicked his hand again, throwing out more than a dozen high-level Items toward that side, including three Legendary Items glowing with brilliant white light.
Xu Miaomiao: “…”
