Chapter 31 The Four Seasons Train (8)
And now that they knew about moving between carriages through the windows, they could easily escape the carriages where they had collected food coupons, making it easier to survive the five days.
However, the mission required them to survive for five days. If one “day-night” cycle counted as one day, the mission should have been completed already. So, how was time calculated in this instance?
She voiced her question.
Wenren Tu nudged Zhu Ming. “Do you have any energy left?”
Zhu Ming looked at her. “Why?”
Wenren Tu said, “Why don’t you go outside again and ask the other participants if they’ve found any clues we’ve missed. If anyone wants to join us, bring them here.”
Zhu Ming rolled her eyes. “Am I your errand girl now?”
Wenren Tu replied matter-of-factly, “I hereby appoint you as a temporary employee of the Paranormal Affairs Bureau.”
Zhu Ming punched her. “You’re just an intern! You can’t appoint anyone!”
Perhaps because of the Bureau’s reputation, Jia-jie, hearing their conversation, spoke up. “Are you Bureau employees?”
Wenren Tu nodded.
Jia-jie said, “Don’t go out. We’re about to enter the tunnel.”
Zhu Ming looked ahead. Indeed, the tunnel entrance was approaching rapidly.
Jia-jie held up her wrist, showing a simple watch. “You asked about how time is calculated here. I know. One daytime cycle represents one season and lasts for one hour and fifty minutes. One nighttime cycle is one tunnel and lasts for ten minutes. We’ve been through three cycles, each with the same duration. So, one cycle of four seasons is eight hours, three cycles are twenty-four hours. That’s probably what constitutes a day here.”
Everyone was silent. They had experienced so much, yet only one day had passed.
“Not bad,” Wenren Tu said. “As long as we have enough food coupons and find an empty carriage, we can just wait it out.”
If she hadn’t said that, Zhu Ming wouldn’t have thought twice. But now…
Was it really… that simple?
The train entered the tunnel, completing the twenty-four-hour cycle. The fourth round of seasons began.
Round four, spring. Carriage 1 occupants: Zhu Ming, Wenren Tu, Jia-jie, and Legs.
Zhu Ming climbed out of the carriage again.
She couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong. If it weren’t for this nagging unease, she would have just stayed in the carriage and rested. She had enough food coupons to last a while.
She knocked on the windows of carriages that might contain participants, asking about the red ticket. No one had seen it.
Knowing they could move between carriages through the windows, several lone participants asked Zhu Ming to take them to carriage 1. Zhu Ming instructed them to collect most of the food coupons from two carriages and leave one carriage empty and safe, then, one by one, she helped them move to carriage 1.
But some were wary of her. And now that they knew about moving through the windows, they could avoid the ghost-infested carriages themselves and didn’t need to team up with Zhu Ming and the others.
Including the group of five. They had their own team, and everyone needed food coupons. Having too many participants in one carriage had its pros and cons. After considering their options, they decided to stay put and manage on their own.
Zhu Ming didn’t mind. She was happy to help, but she wouldn’t force anyone. She preferred having fewer people to worry about.
After helping the other participants relocate, she returned to carriage 1 to rest, exhausted. Wenren Tu was fast asleep, impossible to wake, useless.
There were now seven participants in carriage 1. They verified each other’s invitations and tickets. Everyone had enough food coupons, so they bought plenty of food and water, agreed not to take any more coupons from carriage 1, and went to sleep.
More than a day had passed in real-time. They were all exhausted. Since there were no ghosts at night in carriage 1, they decided to sleep as much as they could.
Legs woke up briefly, feeling hungry, ate a little, pulled on her down jacket, and drifted back to sleep. After some time, she was jolted awake by a thud. She opened her eyes to see a figure lying on the floor in front of her.
The train had just exited the tunnel. Sunlight streamed in through the windows.
The fifth round of spring had arrived.
Legs stared at the figure on the floor, unable to believe her eyes. She hadn’t interacted much with this person, but how could someone die so suddenly?
She was certain there had been no ghosts last night.
One of the seven participants had died silently, more terrifying than being killed by a ghost in front of everyone.
At least in the latter scenario, they knew the cause of death. Now, no one could be sure how this person had died.
Jia-jie picked up the deceased’s invitation and train ticket. The invitation clearly stated “mission failed.” The train ticket turned to ash and vanished before their eyes.
Jia-jie flicked her hand. “A living person’s ticket is green. I thought it would turn red after death, but it just disappeared.”
The mystery of the red ticket remained unsolved.
Jia-jie squatted beside the body, staring at it thoughtfully, chewing on her fingernail, then suddenly started to undress the corpse.
Legs, unsure what to do, looked at Zhu Ming, who had already climbed out the window again, seemingly sensing something wrong with this carriage.
But Zhu Ming just waved her hand. “I’ll go ask the other carriages if anyone else has died suddenly. You guys continue.”
A moment later, she returned.
Legs asked quickly, “Were there other cases of sudden death in the other carriages?”
Zhu Ming shook her head. “I didn’t find any, but that doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. If it occurred in a single-occupancy carriage, the body might have already been reset.”
She looked at Jia-jie.
Jia-jie was still squatting beside the body. While Zhu Ming had been gone, she had stripped the corpse’s upper body and was examining it closely. The others were a bit apprehensive.
One participant said, “If three cycles of four seasons count as one day, then it’s possible for the ghosts’ power to increase after the first day. It’s the second day now, and he died right at the transition between day and night. But there were no similar incidents in the other carriages. Could it be that each carriage has its own unique dangers?”
Zhu Ming instinctively felt he was onto something, but not entirely. She asked, “Why would they be different? Besides the carriage numbers, what else is different about these carriages?”
She had walked through several carriages and was certain they were all the same. If there was a difference… it would be between carriage 1 and carriage 60.
Wenren Tu walked to the front of the carriage and pointed at a small object near the left window. “The other carriages don’t have these. There’s one on the right side too. They look like cameras.”
Zhu Ming said, “No, they look more like lights. And other carriages don’t have them. Carriage 60 does, on either side of the back window.”
She had been to the back of the train, hanging there for a while, and had noticed them. They looked similar to the ones in carriage 1.
They had switches, but nothing happened when she flipped them. She didn’t know their purpose.
Suddenly, Jia-jie held out her hand towards Wenren Tu. “Lend me your blade.”
Wenren Tu handed it over. Jia-jie’s hand trembled, and she dropped the blade, the loud clang echoing through the carriage. The invisible conductor dutifully punished the unruly passenger.
Jia-jie rubbed her wrist. “I can’t. You do it. The blade is too heavy for me.”
Judging by the way she had been staring at the body, Zhu Ming knew it wasn’t anything good. Having just finished a massacre, she wasn’t in the mood to work. She sat down to rest.
Wenren Tu sighed and went over to the body, picking up the blade. “Where do you want me to cut?”
Following Jia-jie’s instructions, she sliced open the body, blood spilling onto the floor. Then she cut open the lungs, revealing blackened, withered tissue. Jia-jie said, “He died of lung cancer. Look at his fingers, his fingernails, his teeth. You can see he was a smoker. It’s not uncommon for smokers to die of lung cancer, and his lungs confirm it.”
Legs was surprised. “But he looked perfectly normal when he entered the carriage! He didn’t seem weak or pale like a cancer patient! And lung cancer isn’t immediately fatal, is it? Doesn’t cancer take time to develop?”
Now that she looked at the corpse’s face, however, it did have a deathly pallor.
Having determined the cause of death, Jia-jie went to wash her hands. “Yes, that’s the problem. Even if he already had lung cancer when he entered carriage 1, he shouldn’t have died so quickly.”
The corpse, its chest cavity open, lay on the floor. Legs covered it with its clothes. There was nothing else they could do.
The discovered cause of death only deepened the mystery. There seemed to be more to this than met the eye. And no one was in the mood to mourn the dead. Who knew if they would be joining him soon?
Zhu Ming suddenly asked Jia-jie, “How’s your health, Jia-jie?”
Jia-jie, a little puzzled, adjusted her glasses. “I’m in average health. I’m older, so I can’t compare to you young people.”
Zhu Ming then asked, “Do you have a regular sleep schedule?”
Jia-jie coughed. “I’m usually quite busy, so it’s not very regular.”
Zhu Ming continued, “Since entering this carriage, have you noticed yourself feeling more tired, your digestion slower, your physical condition worse?”
Jia-jie looked at Zhu Ming, considering her words. Her face paled. She was the oldest one here. If everyone was experiencing the same changes, she would be the most affected.
Zhu Ming’s eyes narrowed, a cold glint in them. “I see. This train isn’t as simple as it appears.”
Jia-jie suddenly remembered something and pulled out her invitation. Seeing their expressions, the others gathered around curiously.
Jia-jie grabbed her hair in frustration. “I know what this symbol is! I’ve dealt with a lot of occult cases, but I didn’t realize what triggered this instance when I entered. But now it seems so obvious. It’s a peach! A longevity peach!”
Legs exclaimed in surprise, “No wonder! I received my invitation just a few days after attending my grandpa’s birthday celebration! I thought it was because I watched Journey to the West with my nephew that day and triggered something related to Sun Wukong’s peaches of immortality! But what does a longevity peach have to do with his death?”
“Everything. This instance isn’t about surviving by begging for scraps from ghosts,” Zhu Ming said, flicking a food coupon. “It’s about stealing our lifespan!”
Realization dawned on Wenren Tu. “This man already had lung cancer cells when he entered the instance. It was early stage, so he didn’t exhibit any symptoms, but without treatment, he would have died within a few years—those years have been rapidly consumed on this train! That’s the real cause of his death!”
A chill ran down their spines. Even if they were healthier than the deceased, the thought of their lifespan being unknowingly drained was terrifying.
And the train… continued to move forward, without stopping.
Zhu Ming stared at the invitation, reading each word carefully: [We cordially invite you to our world: The Four Seasons Train. Mission: Survive for five days.] “I thought this instance was simple and safe, that we could just relax and wait for the mission to end once we figured out how to move between carriages. It was all a distraction. The Four Seasons Train… four seasons… it represents the passage of a year.”
They had already experienced four cycles of spring, summer, autumn, and winter. That meant everyone on this train, even those still alive, had lost four years of their lives!
Zhu Ming gripped the invitation, wanting to rip it to shreds. This was the first time she had been tricked so thoroughly.
Wenren Tu tried to calm her down. “Don’t be angry! Anger only shortens your lifespan!”
Zhu Ming: “…”
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