Time Game

Chapter 2: Strange Bus (2)

Buses are always the prime targets for horror novels and movies. Of course, as a renowned writer and screenwriter, Lu Pingsha prefers to set his stories on buses purely to save money. After all, bus rentals are much cheaper than those for grand mansions. Also, almost everyone had ridden a bus, helping create a strong sense of immersion and making it easier to scare the audience.

But now that he's the one being scared, Lu Pingsha isn't so happy. Now, government policy supports horror and supernatural films and literature, and many authors write about it. Why is he the one who's unlucky enough to get into this trouble?

Is it because he hasn't been praying enough? Lu Pingsha feels a pang of regret and silently turns on his phone's camera. Although time seems to have stopped on the phone, the camera function is still quite good. Lu Pingsha's phone is the latest model, capable of capturing everyone's expressions even in the dim light.

Lu Pingsha's ostentatious display wasn't just seen by Xiao Zhang; the other passengers on the bus also witnessed it. Many people cast envious and resentful glances at him.

So young, so handsome, and so rich, yet he takes the bus? The thoughts of the wealthy are truly beyond their comprehension. Xiao Zhang stood speechlessly for a moment, quite certain he'd just been humiliated by an ordinary person flaunting their wealth.

So what if you're rich? So what if you're handsome? He still got on this weird bus, and he's still going to die, isn't he?

Thinking this, Xiao Zhang's resentment towards the rich subsided little bit. He could only turn around, take his money, and walk towards the young man sitting in front of Lu Pingsha.

However, their wariness towards Lu Pingsha lessened considerably.

If “ that thing" in the cyan-level missions could still exhibit this kind of human-like flaunting of wealth, then they should just give up and wait to die.

"Hey bro, look..."

"!"

The poor still make up most of the world's population. The man sitting in front of Lu Pingsha looked to be in his early twenties, with an average appearance, a receding hairline, and wearing the most ordinary plaid shirt—clearly a newbie just starting out in the corporate world. Now, with such a windfall right in front of him, only a fool wouldn't take it.

"Then I'll leave it to you," Xiao Zhang said, smiling sincerely at him. Chen Qufang and the others also feel a bit relieved. They seemed to be talking with their heads down, but they were actually secretly observing the plaid shirt to see if he could play the role of a qualified pathfinder.

The man in the plaid shirt decided to start by asking people at the very front of the bus.

"Hello, could you please help me fill out a questionnaire...? What's your name...?". The man diligently got to work.

First one.

Second one.

Third one...

In just ten minutes, the man in the plaid shirt had collected the information of the first ten people, and he hadn't changed at all.

Lu Pingsha noticed the mixture of disappointment and excitement on the faces of these people who offered the money. They seem to want something to happen, but also hope nothing would happen.

Their faces practically screamed "I'm suspicious."

Lu Pingsha couldn't help but question their intelligence.

"Hey handsome, could you please fill out one for me too? It's not easy to earn money, you know." The man in the plaid shirt quickly approached Lu Pingsha, grinning. He knew his "extra income" came from this man's "sacrifice”.

"Okay." Lu Pingsha quickly wrote down a random name and fake contact information on the questionnaire. He is not that foolish to fill in his real information. Names are a crucial element in horror films. If a "real name kill" occurred, he'd be an innocent victim.

"Next stop approaching. Passengers, please prepare to disembark." The bus announced shortly after Lu Pingsha finished filling out the form.

The passengers all looked up. "Hey, which road are we on? It's really dark outside, we can't see anything. We'll call the city hotline tomorrow to complain. Why aren't they installing streetlights?" an elderly man in the back complained.

"Hey, sir, why aren't you home yet?" Chen Qufang asked "casually." "It's really late."

"A few of us old folks formed a choir, and we have a competition coming up soon, so we practiced a bit late today. But we're old, and it's not easy for us to fall asleep. Kind of jealous of you young people, always being so energetic!" The old man replied to Chen Qufang with a smile, but his energy doesn’t seem to be inferior to the young people.

"Sir, judging from your accent, you seem to be a local. Could you tell me which road this car is on? I can't seem to find it on the map," Chen Qufang asked casually and slightly friendly.

"Sure, I've lived here for decades, let me show you." The old man was quite pleased with the young man's admiration and readily agreed. However, when he looked out the car window, he was momentarily dumbfounded.

The old man pulled a pair of reading glasses from his pocket, rubbed his eyes, and immediately called out, "Hey driver, which road are you on? Stop the bus!" Meanwhile, the old man got up from his seat and walked towards the driver.

Chen Qufang and the others, along with Lu Pingsha, couldn't help but gaze at the elderly man. Lu Pingsha clearly remembered that he intended to escape this bus, but after the driver asked him something, he suddenly boarded. This bus seems abnormal in every way, and the driver was probably not a normal person either.

"Sir, your route isn't..." The elderly man reached out to pat the driver's shoulder, but the words caught in his throat, his whole body trembled slightly, and he stood still.

Silence instantly!

Lu Pingsha and Chen Qufang stared intently at the elderly man standing next to the driver, though the dim light made it difficult to see clearly. At this moment, Lu Pingsha noticed that the youngest woman was tightly clutching her glasses, motionless.

Were those glasses something important? Lu Pingsha felt a slight curiosity about the glasses, but he suppressed it for now.

"Station 4 has arrived. Passengers who need to get off, please exit through the rear door." The driver's voice was hoarse and low, which seemed a little eerie at this moment.

"I'm getting off."

"Wait, I'm getting off too."

...Even though no one had noticed anything amiss before, the passengers on the bus now belatedly sensed the strange atmosphere. Besides, they don't know which route the driver was taking; what if he was some ruthless bandit?

No one dared to risk their lives. They could secretly call the police after getting off the bus.

“Get off?” Lu Pingsha's mind raced. Perhaps after getting off the bus, he, an ordinary passerby innocently caught up in this strange and bizarre event, could escape and wake up the next day, and find that nothing had happened. Besides, there were quite a few other passengers getting off the bus as well.

But his mind told him things weren't that simple.

Thinking about it carefully, the government has indeed become quite strange in the last two years. Suddenly, they've started supporting horror and suspense films, even though the creation of demons and monsters was constrained before. And there are emergency evacuation drills every few days, leading some people online to wonder if a world war is imminent?

Lu Pingsha considered himself just a normal person; it was unlikely he was chosen as a victim of a paranormal event. Unless, of course, these paranormal events had become so frequent that even ordinary people like him were being drawn into them.

Add to that the clearly unprofessional and dim-witted people with "I know the inside story, those of you who get off are definitely going to die" written all over their faces, and the recent reports of various disappearances, along with the frequent police visit, he got a seemingly absurd but perfectly reasonable answer.

Perhaps the government already knew the inside story, but didn't know how to explain it to the public, so they gradually relaxed the restrictions and expanded their troop recruitment.

In recent years, the admission scores for military academies have been much lower than in previous years!

"It's so late. Even you get off the bus, you won't be able to get a taxi outside," Lu Pingsha tentatively advised. This bus is so strange; if getting off meant escape, he wouldn't have been tricked into getting on in the first place!

"You should get off with us," a young girl said, looking at Lu Pingsha's handsome face with some sympathy. She saw this handsome guy was always on his phone and probably hadn't noticed the strangeness of the bus, but she couldn't be too explicit. She cares her own life.

"I think staying might be better," Lu Pingsha said. Shortly after, Chen Qufang and the others all looked at him.

Does this guy know something?

Wait a minute, only they should have received this mission.

“Never mind, let’s go first,” the girl’s friend pulled her. “Hurry up and come with us,” seeing Lu Pingsha still sits at his place, she said this anxiously and immediately followed her friend off the bus.

With a few people getting off the bus, the other passengers also began to disembark one after another, including the “spy” group that Lu Pingsha and Chen Qufang had previously suspected. Lu Pingsha watched them disappear quickly into the night, unsure if they were safe.

Perhaps getting off the bus was the only way out? But a strange thought came up to his mind.

Stay.

Perhaps staying would allow him to see the truth of this world.

This seemingly ordinary world might have already changed silently. If he missed this opportunity to uncover the truth, who could guarantee that he wouldn’t be involved into something else and die quietly in the future?

He doesn’t want to die!

Chen Qufang and the others remained unmoved, didn’t show any intention of stopping the passengers. Instead, they all stared intently at Lu Pingsha. Instead, they all stared at Lu Pingsha.

Lu Pingsha knew he had aroused suspicion, but at this moment, it might be a good thing. These "insiders" had no mercy for ordinary people. If he still pretended to know nothing, he might be used as cannon fodder by them. In horror films, those who die first are always the ones who doesn’t show any values!

I need to do something! Lu Pingsha gritted his teeth, quickly stood up, and walked to the rear door of the bus. But he didn't get off, instead he took out his phone, switched to camera mode, and zoomed in as far as possible. He’s trying to use his phone to observe what’s in the dark!

Damn, they forgot this! Chen Qufang looked at Lu Pingsha. Nowadays phones are incredibly powerful; they can take pictures of far-away objects, even the moon. To observe what's hiding outside, you don't have to get off the bus! Now she’s suspecting Lu Pingsha is also a player, and probably a highly experienced one!

Just as Chen Qufang was about to approach Lu Pingsha to exchange clues, her glasses suddenly became hot.

The elderly man standing next to the driver suddenly moved, walked step by step with dull gaze to the last row of the bus, the sat down stiffly.

Meanwhile, in the picture captured by his phone, Lu Pingsha notices something familiar, which seems to be a yellow talisman affixed to a pillar, about a hundred meters from the bus stop.