Just as Ke Su was deep in thought, the passengers in the carriage, who had been scared out of their wits, finally came to their senses.
The few surviving passengers' expressions gradually became more animated. They could hardly believe they had survived. They slid from their seats to the ground, covering their faces and crying uncontrollably. Fearing the return of the monsters that had just fled, they dared not cry loudly, only allowing themselves to sob softly, trying to vent their fear and despair.
Zhao Gang also stood up from the corner, his tense nerves slightly relaxing. He put away his gun and looked at Ke Su, who was still standing in the carriage.
"Little brother..."
*The little brother used here is not for biological brothers, it's more like "little bro."
Faced with this young man who had suddenly appeared, Zhao Gang didn’t know what to say for a moment, feeling somewhat awkward.
After all, he had just declared that there was a monster in the carriage, and then the monster ran away, making it seem as if he was lying or playing a prank. Under these circumstances, facing this bewildered young man, Zhao Gang felt very uncomfortable.
Actually, Zhao Gang was also puzzled. He couldn't understand why such a dangerous monster would suddenly leave.
His intuition couldn't give him an exact answer, only a vague guess that it might be related to this young man who had barged into the carriage to face the monster, yet survived.
As for what that connection might be...
Zhao Gang glanced at Ke Su, who seemed to lack any strength to even truss a chicken, and secretly thought that perhaps this young man triggered some condition that scared the monster away.
It couldn't possibly be because this young man was more terrifying than the monster, right?
Zhao Gang jokingly thought.
"Cough, little brother, you weren't too scared, were you?" Zhao Gang thought for a moment and took a step forward, intending to reassure Ke Su, who still seemed unaware of the current situation, to prevent him from being scared out of his wits by the earlier scene.
Although the monster had left, that sight was still terrifying for an ordinary person.
Ke Su broke off his thoughts and looked at the middle-aged man in front of him.
A middle-aged man with a firm and righteous appearance, tall in stature, dressed in simple black attire, yet exuding an air of integrity.
Like a police officer.
Ke Su’s eyes swept over Zhao Gang’s pocket, where a police badge was half-exposed.
He really was a police officer.
"I'm fine."
Ke Su glanced at the bodies in the carriage, thinking Zhao Gang was asking if he had been frightened by the murder scene. He shook his head, indicating that he wasn’t scared at all. After watching many horror movies, such bloody scenes didn’t faze him.
Completely unaware that Zhao Gang was asking about something completely different, Zhao Gang felt relieved, then turned to the others in the carriage. His calming methods were extremely skilled, quickly easing the atmosphere of sorrow in the carriage.
The people in the carriage gathered together, supporting each other, as most were too frightened to stand.
Zhao Gang looked at everyone, his expression serious as he said, "Everyone, although we are temporarily safe, no one knows if that monster will come back, so we still need to find a way to escape from here."
"But, Officer, the monster ran to the front of the train. How can we escape?"
A young female student among the passengers spoke with a sobbing voice, her tone full of despair.
Zhao Gang calmly comforted her, "We can still go to the driver's cabin at the rear of the train. Although in the real world, the power to the rear driver's cabin is cut off during subway operations, this place has already become a supernatural zone. It can't be judged by normal logic, so maybe we can stop this running subway there."
Upon hearing this, hope rekindled in the hearts of the passengers, and their expressions became less bleak.
"Officer, you’re right! How come I didn’t think of that! You really are quick-witted! Let’s hurry up and go! We don't want that monster coming back for us!" A middle-aged man with a balding head said excitedly, his previously weak legs suddenly straightening.
"Yes, yes! Let’s go check out the back of the train!"
"Great! Let’s get moving! I’m so scared! I want to get off this train as soon as possible!"
Watching the passengers inexplicably become excited, Ke Su felt as though he had walked into some sort of fanatical pyramid scheme scene, his expression indescribable.
Monsters and ghosts, and they can still be this excited at a murder scene?
Ke Su stifled his desire to voice his sarcastic thoughts, looked at the anxious passengers around him, and thought that, since he had nothing better to do, he might as well go along with these people immersed in ghost stories.
Besides, he was quite curious to see what would happen. If he got tired of walking, he could just find a random carriage to sit in and wait until the train reached the station.
So, Zhao Gang led the group in the direction opposite to where the suited monster had fled. Just as they reached the carriage where Ke Su had been, the opposite door opened, and a few blood-covered strangers ran out.
"Captain! Hurry! We should be near the front of the train, just one more carriage to go!" A short-haired, robust young man anxiously supported their leader, Zhao Jun.
"Captain! Hold on! We will definitely win!"
A beautiful woman named Hong Lan had tears in her eyes as she looked at her beloved, who was now weak, nearly crying out loud.
"It's all my fault! If I hadn't been so reckless, the captain wouldn’t have been seriously injured trying to save me..." Another team member, who was supporting Zhao Jun, was full of guilt.
The four who escaped into the carriage were all in bad shape, looking as if they had just been through a fierce battle, their tight combat suits stained with blood.
"I'm fine, let’s move quickly! This injury is nothing to me!" Zhao Jun, who was being supported in the middle, clutched his bleeding abdomen, his voice steady.
After saying this, Zhao Jun tightly held a black USB drive in his pocket, his expression heavy.
He hadn’t expected that he and his team would be so unlucky, encountering the big boss before even reaching the front of the train.
At that time, they had made all the necessary preparations, activating their protective charms, thinking they could at least hold out for a while to escape.
But they only saw the big boss in a suit and tie pick up his own head from the ground, and then three team members were killed in succession by headshots. To save a team member, Zhao Jun had used a voodoo doll substitution tool, losing a third of his internal organs except for his heart. If he didn’t get treatment soon, he wouldn’t live much longer.
This big boss’s killing methods were impossible to defend against, far beyond the bosses in previous dungeon instances, utterly unsolvable.
If this continued, he really would die in this dungeon, fulfilling the Overseer's wish.
Zhao Jun rubbed the USB drive in his hand, his eyes filled with sorrow.
Could it be that there really was no way to deliver this USB drive, containing the information on the Overseer’s space, to the real world?
And just as Zhao Jun was about to resign himself to his fate, a familiar voice suddenly came from ahead.
"Deputy Zhao?!!"
Zhao Gang stared in shock at the bearded middle-aged man being supported by a few strangers, blurting out a name he was all too familiar with.
Zhao Gang could hardly believe his eyes. His deputy team leader, who had died in the line of duty three years ago, was now standing alive in front of him.
Zhao Gang’s eyes instantly turned red. They say men don’t cry easily, but facing the reappearance of someone from his past, he couldn’t help but shed tears. Deputy Zhao had been someone he idolized, and seeing him again in front of him, Zhao Gang couldn’t control his emotions.
"Zhao Gang! How did you get here?!" Zhao Jun looked up, stunned for a moment, then showed a look of surprise.
Zhao Jun had once been the deputy team leader of the Special Incident Department in the City of Li, a high-ranking position, having mentored many interns and juniors. Zhao Gang was one of those who had left a deep impression on him—righteous, kind, and reliable.
If it were him, he could definitely take the USB drive out!
Zhao Jun’s eyes brightened. He knew that sometimes the Overseer’s game dungeons would intersect with the real world, causing some ordinary people to accidentally stumble into dangerous horror dungeons. If they managed to survive the dungeon’s time limit, they could return to the real world without the Overseer even noticing!
Zhao Jun had tried to use these accidental intruders to pass on messages several times before but failed, as few could survive the dungeon. This time, he had unexpectedly run into one of his juniors!
This was his last hope! There must be no mistakes!
Zhao Jun endured the intense pain in his abdomen, letting his teammates support him as he walked toward Zhao Gang, urgently saying, "Although it’s been a long time, now is not the time for reminiscing. I need your help with something! When you return to the real world, remember to give this to the team leader! Make sure he takes it to headquarters! Remember! It must be opened in a location with A-grade or higher protection level!"
This USB drive was a special tool he had found, with its contents indestructible, not even the Overseer could delete them. But he wasn’t sure if the Overseer had tampered with the surface of the USB drive.
Zhao Jun quickly said, "You must get out of here alive. I'll give you all of my items, though I'm not sure if you can bring them back to the real world..."
Zhao Jun rattled off a long list of instructions as if he were firing a machine gun, leaving Zhao Gang completely bewildered. All he could do was nod repeatedly while taking the items, and everyone around them looked equally puzzled.
"Even though I know you won't hear this name, I still have to say it: the Overseer's space is very dangerous. The headquarters needs to prepare for this as soon as possible!"
Zhao Jun gripped Zhao Gang's hand tightly, his tone grave. The Overseer's methods were unfathomable, and he knew that the moment he tried to reveal its existence to an outsider, his words would be silenced. Despite this, he couldn't suppress his urge to warn Zhao Gang. He wished he could personally go to headquarters to relay this information, hoping his reliable junior would pass his message on.
"The Overseer's space?"
Zhao Gang instinctively repeated the name, which sounded ominous.
Zhao Jun stammered, "Y-You heard it?"
Zhao Jun stared at Zhao Gang in disbelief, and his teammates behind him were equally astonished.
"You actually heard it?" Hong Lan's beautiful eyes widened. She had been wallowing in sorrow over the fact that the captain had been hiding so much from them, but this unexpected event quickly interrupted her emotions.
"Uh, yes, I heard it." Zhao Gang, confused by the situation, noticed everyone else's shocked expressions and realized that this was not normal.
The Overseer's space?
Ke Su, who had been silently observing, asked the question in his mind.
Was it the same Overseer from the novel Infinity Terror? (1)
Ke Su held back for a moment but couldn't resist interrupting Zhao Jun and the others. He asked, "Excuse me, is the Overseer a glowing egg?"
In his previous life, the Overseer setting in that novel was all the rage, and Ke Su had heard of it.
Zhao Jun and the others were stunned by the question. They reflexively denied it without even seeing who asked, "How could it be? No one has ever seen the true form of the Overseer."
Hearing this, Ke Su regretfully averted his gaze.
So, it's not that, then. Never mind.
If it's not a crossover into the world of Infinity Terror, then the nature of this Overseer doesn't matter.
He had thought he could use his knowledge of the plot to achieve great success, but it seems that was just a dream. He should focus on finding a job instead.
With that thought, Ke Su sat down in his previous seat, the same one he had taken when he first boarded the train, and continued to zone out, no longer interested in the commotion.
Zhao Jun had no idea who this random youth was, but he knew now was not the time to dwell on it. Seeing that the youth had fallen silent, Zhao Jun ignored him and continued to bombard Zhao Gang with more information about the Overseer's space.
Zhao Jun still hadn't figured out why the Overseer's censorship function had failed, but he wasn't about to waste this opportunity. He took the chance to relay all the information he hadn't been able to store on the USB drive, practically exposing all of the Overseer's secrets.
At the same time, both groups realized something was off about the direction of the train car.
For instance, Zhao Jun and his team had clearly followed the map inside the train and passed through eight cars, yet they hadn't reached the front. Instead, they had somehow ended up back at the rear, reuniting with Zhao Gang's group.
This outcome confirmed one fact: this endlessly moving subway was like a Möbius strip, leading nowhere and always looping back to the start.
"As expected, the Overseer wouldn't leave such an obvious loophole," Zhao Jun sighed self-deprecatingly, abandoning the idea of finding the control room as a safe zone.
It was clear that there was no control room left on this train, or rather, they were never going to reach it. They would just keep looping through the cars until they were killed by the lurking boss.
Faced with this young man who had suddenly appeared, Zhao Gang didn’t know what to say for a moment, feeling somewhat awkward.
After all, he had just declared that there was a monster in the carriage, and then the monster ran away, making it seem as if he was lying or playing a prank. Under these circumstances, facing this bewildered young man, Zhao Gang felt very uncomfortable.
Actually, Zhao Gang was also puzzled. He couldn't understand why such a dangerous monster would suddenly leave.
His intuition couldn't give him an exact answer, only a vague guess that it might be related to this young man who had barged into the carriage to face the monster, yet survived.
As for what that connection might be...
Zhao Gang glanced at Ke Su, who seemed to lack any strength to even truss a chicken, and secretly thought that perhaps this young man triggered some condition that scared the monster away.
It couldn't possibly be because this young man was more terrifying than the monster, right?
Zhao Gang jokingly thought.
"Cough, little brother, you weren't too scared, were you?" Zhao Gang thought for a moment and took a step forward, intending to reassure Ke Su, who still seemed unaware of the current situation, to prevent him from being scared out of his wits by the earlier scene.
Although the monster had left, that sight was still terrifying for an ordinary person.
Ke Su broke off his thoughts and looked at the middle-aged man in front of him.
A middle-aged man with a firm and righteous appearance, tall in stature, dressed in simple black attire, yet exuding an air of integrity.
Like a police officer.
Ke Su’s eyes swept over Zhao Gang’s pocket, where a police badge was half-exposed.
He really was a police officer.
"I'm fine."
Ke Su glanced at the bodies in the carriage, thinking Zhao Gang was asking if he had been frightened by the murder scene. He shook his head, indicating that he wasn’t scared at all. After watching many horror movies, such bloody scenes didn’t faze him.
Completely unaware that Zhao Gang was asking about something completely different, Zhao Gang felt relieved, then turned to the others in the carriage. His calming methods were extremely skilled, quickly easing the atmosphere of sorrow in the carriage.
The people in the carriage gathered together, supporting each other, as most were too frightened to stand.
Zhao Gang looked at everyone, his expression serious as he said, "Everyone, although we are temporarily safe, no one knows if that monster will come back, so we still need to find a way to escape from here."
"But, Officer, the monster ran to the front of the train. How can we escape?"
A young female student among the passengers spoke with a sobbing voice, her tone full of despair.
Zhao Gang calmly comforted her, "We can still go to the driver's cabin at the rear of the train. Although in the real world, the power to the rear driver's cabin is cut off during subway operations, this place has already become a supernatural zone. It can't be judged by normal logic, so maybe we can stop this running subway there."
Upon hearing this, hope rekindled in the hearts of the passengers, and their expressions became less bleak.
"Officer, you’re right! How come I didn’t think of that! You really are quick-witted! Let’s hurry up and go! We don't want that monster coming back for us!" A middle-aged man with a balding head said excitedly, his previously weak legs suddenly straightening.
"Yes, yes! Let’s go check out the back of the train!"
"Great! Let’s get moving! I’m so scared! I want to get off this train as soon as possible!"
Watching the passengers inexplicably become excited, Ke Su felt as though he had walked into some sort of fanatical pyramid scheme scene, his expression indescribable.
Monsters and ghosts, and they can still be this excited at a murder scene?
Ke Su stifled his desire to voice his sarcastic thoughts, looked at the anxious passengers around him, and thought that, since he had nothing better to do, he might as well go along with these people immersed in ghost stories.
Besides, he was quite curious to see what would happen. If he got tired of walking, he could just find a random carriage to sit in and wait until the train reached the station.
So, Zhao Gang led the group in the direction opposite to where the suited monster had fled. Just as they reached the carriage where Ke Su had been, the opposite door opened, and a few blood-covered strangers ran out.
"Captain! Hurry! We should be near the front of the train, just one more carriage to go!" A short-haired, robust young man anxiously supported their leader, Zhao Jun.
"Captain! Hold on! We will definitely win!"
A beautiful woman named Hong Lan had tears in her eyes as she looked at her beloved, who was now weak, nearly crying out loud.
"It's all my fault! If I hadn't been so reckless, the captain wouldn’t have been seriously injured trying to save me..." Another team member, who was supporting Zhao Jun, was full of guilt.
The four who escaped into the carriage were all in bad shape, looking as if they had just been through a fierce battle, their tight combat suits stained with blood.
"I'm fine, let’s move quickly! This injury is nothing to me!" Zhao Jun, who was being supported in the middle, clutched his bleeding abdomen, his voice steady.
After saying this, Zhao Jun tightly held a black USB drive in his pocket, his expression heavy.
He hadn’t expected that he and his team would be so unlucky, encountering the big boss before even reaching the front of the train.
At that time, they had made all the necessary preparations, activating their protective charms, thinking they could at least hold out for a while to escape.
But they only saw the big boss in a suit and tie pick up his own head from the ground, and then three team members were killed in succession by headshots. To save a team member, Zhao Jun had used a voodoo doll substitution tool, losing a third of his internal organs except for his heart. If he didn’t get treatment soon, he wouldn’t live much longer.
This big boss’s killing methods were impossible to defend against, far beyond the bosses in previous dungeon instances, utterly unsolvable.
If this continued, he really would die in this dungeon, fulfilling the Overseer's wish.
Zhao Jun rubbed the USB drive in his hand, his eyes filled with sorrow.
Could it be that there really was no way to deliver this USB drive, containing the information on the Overseer’s space, to the real world?
And just as Zhao Jun was about to resign himself to his fate, a familiar voice suddenly came from ahead.
"Deputy Zhao?!!"
Zhao Gang stared in shock at the bearded middle-aged man being supported by a few strangers, blurting out a name he was all too familiar with.
Zhao Gang could hardly believe his eyes. His deputy team leader, who had died in the line of duty three years ago, was now standing alive in front of him.
Zhao Gang’s eyes instantly turned red. They say men don’t cry easily, but facing the reappearance of someone from his past, he couldn’t help but shed tears. Deputy Zhao had been someone he idolized, and seeing him again in front of him, Zhao Gang couldn’t control his emotions.
"Zhao Gang! How did you get here?!" Zhao Jun looked up, stunned for a moment, then showed a look of surprise.
Zhao Jun had once been the deputy team leader of the Special Incident Department in the City of Li, a high-ranking position, having mentored many interns and juniors. Zhao Gang was one of those who had left a deep impression on him—righteous, kind, and reliable.
If it were him, he could definitely take the USB drive out!
Zhao Jun’s eyes brightened. He knew that sometimes the Overseer’s game dungeons would intersect with the real world, causing some ordinary people to accidentally stumble into dangerous horror dungeons. If they managed to survive the dungeon’s time limit, they could return to the real world without the Overseer even noticing!
Zhao Jun had tried to use these accidental intruders to pass on messages several times before but failed, as few could survive the dungeon. This time, he had unexpectedly run into one of his juniors!
This was his last hope! There must be no mistakes!
Zhao Jun endured the intense pain in his abdomen, letting his teammates support him as he walked toward Zhao Gang, urgently saying, "Although it’s been a long time, now is not the time for reminiscing. I need your help with something! When you return to the real world, remember to give this to the team leader! Make sure he takes it to headquarters! Remember! It must be opened in a location with A-grade or higher protection level!"
This USB drive was a special tool he had found, with its contents indestructible, not even the Overseer could delete them. But he wasn’t sure if the Overseer had tampered with the surface of the USB drive.
Zhao Jun quickly said, "You must get out of here alive. I'll give you all of my items, though I'm not sure if you can bring them back to the real world..."
Zhao Jun rattled off a long list of instructions as if he were firing a machine gun, leaving Zhao Gang completely bewildered. All he could do was nod repeatedly while taking the items, and everyone around them looked equally puzzled.
"Even though I know you won't hear this name, I still have to say it: the Overseer's space is very dangerous. The headquarters needs to prepare for this as soon as possible!"
Zhao Jun gripped Zhao Gang's hand tightly, his tone grave. The Overseer's methods were unfathomable, and he knew that the moment he tried to reveal its existence to an outsider, his words would be silenced. Despite this, he couldn't suppress his urge to warn Zhao Gang. He wished he could personally go to headquarters to relay this information, hoping his reliable junior would pass his message on.
"The Overseer's space?"
Zhao Gang instinctively repeated the name, which sounded ominous.
Zhao Jun stammered, "Y-You heard it?"
Zhao Jun stared at Zhao Gang in disbelief, and his teammates behind him were equally astonished.
"You actually heard it?" Hong Lan's beautiful eyes widened. She had been wallowing in sorrow over the fact that the captain had been hiding so much from them, but this unexpected event quickly interrupted her emotions.
"Uh, yes, I heard it." Zhao Gang, confused by the situation, noticed everyone else's shocked expressions and realized that this was not normal.
The Overseer's space?
Ke Su, who had been silently observing, asked the question in his mind.
Was it the same Overseer from the novel Infinity Terror? (1)
Ke Su held back for a moment but couldn't resist interrupting Zhao Jun and the others. He asked, "Excuse me, is the Overseer a glowing egg?"
In his previous life, the Overseer setting in that novel was all the rage, and Ke Su had heard of it.
Zhao Jun and the others were stunned by the question. They reflexively denied it without even seeing who asked, "How could it be? No one has ever seen the true form of the Overseer."
Hearing this, Ke Su regretfully averted his gaze.
So, it's not that, then. Never mind.
If it's not a crossover into the world of Infinity Terror, then the nature of this Overseer doesn't matter.
He had thought he could use his knowledge of the plot to achieve great success, but it seems that was just a dream. He should focus on finding a job instead.
With that thought, Ke Su sat down in his previous seat, the same one he had taken when he first boarded the train, and continued to zone out, no longer interested in the commotion.
Zhao Jun had no idea who this random youth was, but he knew now was not the time to dwell on it. Seeing that the youth had fallen silent, Zhao Jun ignored him and continued to bombard Zhao Gang with more information about the Overseer's space.
Zhao Jun still hadn't figured out why the Overseer's censorship function had failed, but he wasn't about to waste this opportunity. He took the chance to relay all the information he hadn't been able to store on the USB drive, practically exposing all of the Overseer's secrets.
At the same time, both groups realized something was off about the direction of the train car.
For instance, Zhao Jun and his team had clearly followed the map inside the train and passed through eight cars, yet they hadn't reached the front. Instead, they had somehow ended up back at the rear, reuniting with Zhao Gang's group.
This outcome confirmed one fact: this endlessly moving subway was like a Möbius strip, leading nowhere and always looping back to the start.
"As expected, the Overseer wouldn't leave such an obvious loophole," Zhao Jun sighed self-deprecatingly, abandoning the idea of finding the control room as a safe zone.
It was clear that there was no control room left on this train, or rather, they were never going to reach it. They would just keep looping through the cars until they were killed by the lurking boss.
(1) A popular chinese novel in the 2007 which has the same premise as the overseer storyline here, This is the link to the English translated version (Here).
☞ Chapter 12
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