69 - Sense of Violation

Translated by rabbitrisu

“The story is just an ordinary story, but the one telling it may not necessarily be so.” A-Liu stood near the other trainers with his eyes covered. “Not only is it a ghost, but it isn’t weak. It’s not the person you should be looking for.”

Just now, A-Liu’s ghost eye shook the barefoot ghost lady, the family of three, and the two sick ghosts, but he didn’t shake the merchant who was shouting ‘Raise the coffin, make a fortune’ or Su Zimo’s party. That should be the basis of his judgement – the basis of Su Zimo’s strength.

Su Zimo confirmed once again that the task given to the trainers by the nightmare world this time was to find ‘living humans’ among the many people on the road.

But the situation was bad. Now that the trainers had gone all this way, it seemed that only Su Zimo and his party were left.

It looked particularly out of place.

[It’s too late! It’s too late!]

Su Zimo looked at the trainer. When the trainer looked at him, a boy who looked like a high school student carrying a schoolbag ran forward desperately while panting. Then he was stopped by Old Yan as he was passing by Su Zimo and the others.

“Little student, what are you worrying about?” Since Old Yan and the others’ task was to find a living person, then this hot and sweaty boy looked a lot like the person they needed to find.

[I’m going to be late for school!] After the boy was stopped, his expression looked even more anxious. [I don’t know why my alarm didn’t ring. It was already eight when I woke up, and our class teacher is extremely fierce. This is awful!]

“Look at the weather now!” Old Yan patted the boy’s shoulder. “Is it still time for school?”

[What?] The boy looked at the sky blankly. [Why is it so late?]

“Is your home far from the school?” Su Zimo also asked curiously. He attracted the attention of the trainers, but he didn’t care too much.

[Very far!] The boy was crying. [It takes seven or eight stops by car!]

“Then why are you running? You should go by car.” Su Zimo said gently.

[What! Yeah, why don’t I take a car? Why don’t I take a car? Why don’t I take a car… Why don’t I take a car?] Su Zimo’s words were like pressing a bad switch. The boy’s expression became entranced, and he even forgot that he had to go study or go home in the dark. He bypassed Old Yan, pacing nearby and repeatedly chanting.

Su Zimo actually asked that because of his own doubts.

Before then, all of the nightmare worlds he had seen were based on reality. Except for the illusions created by Zhang Xiaoqing, almost all of them where places that actually existed in reality.

But the road they were on now had only four lanes for cars, no sidewalks or even non-motorized vehicle lanes. Just like that, fifty or sixty people were walking on the four lanes only for cars. Su Zimo didn’t know why they gave him such a strong sense of violation.

He felt… it shouldn’t be like this.

“Excuse me, will you hurt us?” The girl who claimed to be An An in the team of trainers stood a little far away from Su Zimo and asked cautiously.

“People don’t offend me, I don’t offend people.” Su Zimo responded with a smile, and specially emphasized the word ‘people,’ which seemed to add some extra meaning to his eight words.

“Then can you tell us which ones on the road are humans?” Old Yan asked suddenly, focusing on the subject.

But this time, Su Zimo smiled and said nothing.

Naturally, he couldn’t tell what he didn’t know.

“Mr. Yan, wanting to learn this kind of think from a malicious spirit’s mouth, isn’t that a bit of wishful thinking?” A-Liu seemed to have recovered a little by then, but the thin red blood vessels had spread to his forehead. It wasn’t good at all.

The so-called backlash, it may be the next time.

“This gentleman.” Su Zimo’s eyes rolled, and he glanced at A-Liu. “That eye, don’t use it anymore.”

“……” A-Liu didn’t speak, but looked at Su Zimo through his sunglasses.

“You will be devoured by the eye…”

Su Zimo’s last few words had just exited his mouth, then he pressed the black umbrella down again and covered most of his face. He led Peng Peng and Zhang Xiaoqing to the side of the road. He’s spent a long time abiding by the law, and walking on the main part of the road gave Su Zimo an uncomfortable feeling.

“A-Liu, what’s the matter?” Old Yan and the others didn’t see A-Liu using the ghost eye, so they didn’t know why Su Zimo said that.

“It’s just a ghost whispering ghost words.” A-Liu glanced at Su Zimo, then turned and continued walking forward like the other trainers.

Since they had stayed for a while, many on the road had started moving forward at a faster speed. Even the barefoot ghost lady who was shaken by A-Liu’s ghost eye earlier had already reached them. Their speed seemed quite fast.

So the trainers also began to speed up, and Su Zimo who was following them also sped up, but he felt that Peng Peng, who was following by his side seemed a little sleepy. His head drooped little by little, as if he was about to take a nap.

But he was still holding Su Zimo’s hand to go forward.

The group of people walked for a long time. They would look at the countdown on their right arm from time to time, and then mutter, “Why are we still on the road after over an hour?’ Their walking speed was very fast, so even Su Zimo’s body began to feel a little tired.

“Old Yan, I can’t do it anymore. I have to take a break.” The trainer who claimed to be called Ling-jie stopped and sat down next to a tree on the side of the road.

There was an open space and a few benches under the water firs that seemed to be specially provided for passing travelers to rest.

They didn’t know how long they’d been walking. They’d finally caught up to the rushing figures.

They still couldn’t see the end of the road in front of them. The reason why Ling-jie slowed down was because the figures surrounded them slowed down for no apparent reason.

Su Zimo also stopped and occupied a bench not far from the trainers. Peng Peng fell asleep directly on Su Zimo’s lap. Zhang Xiaoqing sat on the other side of Su Zimo, looking down at a book in her hand that she had pulled out from nowhere.

The cloth strip called ‘Ghost Eye of the Blind’ didn’t seem to hinder Zhang Xiaoqing’s vision.

[Excuse me, have you seen any tourists?]

At that time, a woman holding a small flag suddenly walked up to Ling-jie and the others, and asked in a panic: [Have you seen the tourists from our travel agency?]

The woman did look like a tour guide. Whether it was the flag or the clothes she was wearing, she seemed like a tour guide, but there was no agency name or ID badge. It was like it was blocked by the nightmare world.

[I was dizzy just now. When I recovered, I noticed that the tourists from our travel agency were gone.] The young female guide looked very anxious.

“Don’t worry.” It was a rare person who took the initiative to speak. Regardless of whether the other person was human or not, Old Yan hoped to learn more useful information from them. “You said you’re a tour guide. You should be familiar with the area here, right? Where is this road? Where does it lead? Is this a tourist attraction?”

The tour guide who came to ask for help was asked a lot of questions by Old Yan before he even got an answer, so it was inevitable that she was stunned and then said–

[I, I don’t know! We haven’t reached the destination yet! We were in a bus, ah!]

“What?” Old Yan was completely dumbfounded, and hurriedly asked, “You said you were in a bus, what about the bus? Why are you walking on this road alone? Where’s your touring bus?”

[Touring bus?] The female tour guide dumbly repeated those two words, and then, just like the late student from before, turned around in despair and repeatedly murmured: [Yes, where’s our touring bus? Where’s our bus? Where should we be now?]

“These people are more like madmen than ghosts.” A-Liu stood aside and wrinkled his brows. “Maybe the madmen here are living people. Just pick one and finish the road. Of course, you could also take a few more people away. After all, according to the task requirements, the more living people who accompany us on this journey, the more nightmare points we’ll get. So it’s a good place to score points no matter how we think.”

After hearing what A-Liu said, Su Zimo was very clear on the nightmare world’s task. Not only did they need to find living people amongst these indiscriminate figures, they also needed to take them down this seemingly endless road.

And the more living people who walked with them, the more nightmare points they would eventually get.

But when he saw the tour guide lady, Su Zimo couldn’t help but think of the family of three who had left an impression on him before. They were wearing matching clothes that they shouldn’t normally wear, and they all carried their bags. Such people looked like members of a tour group.

[Don’t go any further! Don’t go any further!]

The weird tour guide lady had just left, and suddenly a figure rushed toward them from the road ahead, shouting: [You can’t go any further! Don’t go any further!]

When the figure approached the,. Old Yan and the others didn’t dare to step forward to talk. There was a thick layer of grey and black smoke floating around the figure. In addition to making it hard to see the figure through the smoke, it made them appear more ghost-like.

Moreover, no matter how the figure hindered those walking forward, none of them paid attention to him. Some even went through the thick smoke, as if they could hear nothing and see nothing.

It was as if only Su Zimo and the trainers could see it.

Because Old Yan and the others hesitated for a while and still didn’t walk over, the figure surrounded by heavy smoke continued to walk back, yelling for them to not come closer as they walked. Although no ‘person’ responded to him, he still walked along, shouting all the way.

“I keep feeling like this nightmare world isn’t as simple as the task implies.” Old Yan said to himself as he watched the smoke-shrouded figure leave.

Turning his head, Old Yan saw another desperate scene.

While they walked, tired and hungry, the three ghosts who were following them for some reason were already sitting on the benches in the small open space nearby.

The ghost who had spoken to them before unexpectedly took out a water bottle that looked like a full 100ml and contained a nicely colored milky white drink.

And on the ghost’s knee, there was a delicate lunch box. After opening it, a milky and floral snack scent was faintly noticeable. It belonged to the type of food that could make someone hungry just by looking at the color.

“Old Yan, are you hungry? I brought some biscuits and mineral water here.” At that time, the well-prepared Ling-jie added fuel to the fire brought about by the dry food. “But water is a bit heavy, so I didn’t bring much. We’ll have to share.”

“It’s okay. I also brought water and dry food.” Old Yan touched his dry lips. Thinking of the biscuits in his backpack, his throat felt a bit panicked.

Why were ghosts eating better than them?

“Can we eat together?”

A-Liu, who was standing with the trainers before, had approached Su Zimo and the others at some point. The half of his face that wasn’t covered by his sunglasses was full of smiles. He spoke in a very intimate manner, “We let you follow us this whole way, it shouldn’t be too much to let us have some snacks?”

“……” Su Zimo was silent for a moment, feeling that after only following them for an hour, he didn’t gain anything. It was really a loss.

After thinking about it, Su Zimo’s mouth raised into a smile again. He said kindly, “How about we make a deal?”