116: Chapter 116 No Boarding

When the first bus truly revealed itself, the hoardings outside Liuqiao Old Station seemed to be pushed upward from underground.

The blue metal sheets bulged out piece by piece, screws flew off, and gravel rolled down along the cracks.

The ground did not collapse into a large pit, but instead, a set of stairs that shouldn't have been there appeared.

The stairs led downward, and at the end stood an old-fashioned bus; the color of its paint was no longer discernible, and the window frames were filled with damp darkness.

The bus door was open.

There was no driver.

Yet, inside the carriage, there were rows of people sitting quietly.

Shen Qinghe stood outside the yellow line, the bronze bell pressed against her palm.

She did not let anyone approach the bus door.

The rules inside the bus were much more complex than outside; just looking wasn't enough. Someone had to go in to confirm who was driving, who the tickets were written for, and where the final destination actually was.

"I'll go," Chen Shi said over the remote channel.

His side was very quiet, with only the ticking sound of the clock on the wall.

Chen Shi's phone was always thirteen minutes behind reality.

He could see the gaps in the departure nodes and could hear the station broadcasts earlier than anyone else.

Theoretically, he was indeed the most suitable.

"You cannot go," Wu suddenly spoke up.

Chen Shi paused: "Why?"

Wu looked at the carriage, his Adam's apple bobbing.

"Because you have a name."

This sentence sounded abrupt and nonsensical.

Wu raised his wrist; there was no Mark of the Torch there, only an old scar blanched by the rain.

"It will ask for your name first. Once you answer, a seat will be yours. Those thirteen minutes of yours aren't a protective amulet; they are a rope it has left for you."

Chen Shi fell silent.

He wanted to retort, but his phone screen happened to light up.

There was no caller ID on it, only a line of station announcements popped up.

[Next stop: Chen Shi.]

He flipped his phone face down on the table, his expression grim.

Zhao Ye looked at Wu: "If you go in, you won't be recorded?"

"It's not that I won't," Wu said, "it's that it can't record me completely."

Three years ago, after he crawled out of Liuqiao Old Station, his name began to fall out of all reality records.

At first, he wasn't on the school roster, then his bank account disappeared, and later, even old photos at home couldn't retain a clear image of his face.

He hadn't escaped the anomaly.

He had been bitten in half by the anomaly.

Liuxia Passenger Station wanted to add him to the passenger list, but it was always missing the final stroke.

This was also the reason he had been hiding.

"If you go in, you might not come back out," Xu Minglan said over the channel.

Wu glanced at her.

"I'm not really 'out' even when I'm outside."

This statement left no one in the channel replying.

Lu Chen watched the bus door through the Grey Net.

Spark Post Road had just been recorded by the Ticket Inspector; they couldn't let Zhao Ye force his way into the carriage again.

Shen Qinghe needed to stay outside to continue listening for the rules of the first bus.

Chen Shi's name had already been targeted by the station broadcast; he couldn't take the risk.

Wu was not the safest person.

He was simply the only person at the moment who hadn't been completely written into the rules by the carriage.

"Give him a Temporary Fire Seal," Lu Chen said.

Zero immediately prompted.

[Observation subject does not meet the requirements for an Apprentice.]

[Temporary Fire Seal only provides positioning, warnings, and a one-time coordinate pull-back.]

[Cannot resist deep list registration.]

"I know," Wu said.

He wasn't speaking to Zero.

He was speaking to himself.

Shen Qinghe walked over and stuck a Temporary Fire Seal, as thin as a piece of paper, to the inside of his wrist.

When the Fire Seal lit up, Wu frowned in pain, but he did not pull his hand away.

"After you go in, do not ask for the destination, do not accept any tickets, and do not call anyone's name," Shen Qinghe said.

Wu nodded.

"What if I see Han Yue?" Chen Jue suddenly asked.

Everyone looked at him.

Chen Jue stood outside the safety line, his eyes bloodshot from exhaustion.

He regretted it as soon as he asked, as if afraid others would think he hadn't learned the rules yet.

Wu did not laugh at him.

"Even if you see him, don't call out."

Chen Jue gritted his teeth: "Could he really be inside?"

Wu looked at the last row.

There sat a person with a very familiar silhouette, head slightly bowed, just like Han Yue when he used to flip through his notes while he was alive.

"Whether he is there or not is not decided by whether we want him to be," Wu said, "but if you call out, he will turn into a ticket."

The rain outside the bus door suddenly stopped.

It wasn't that the weather had cleared.

It was as if all the raindrops were blocked by something invisible in front of the bus door, hovering for half a second before sliding down along the sides.

Wu stepped over the yellow line.

He did not run.

Every step he took was steady.

When his first foot landed on the bus step, the passengers in the carriage looked up simultaneously.

Many faces he did not recognize; there were elderly people, children, people in hospital gowns, and workers whose clothes were still covered in mud.

They all watched him quietly, as if looking at someone who was late.

The person in the last row also looked up.

Han Yue's silhouette was very faint, as if separated by a layer of old glass.

Yet when he spoke, his voice was very clear.

He called out two words.

Wu's real name.

That was a name Wu thought no one knew anymore.

His entire body froze at the door, and a response almost escaped his throat.

The Temporary Fire Seal suddenly became scorching hot.

Wu bit his tongue hard, and the taste of blood rushed into his mouth.

He did not answer.

The bus door slowly closed behind him.

the first bus, carrying a carriage full of silent passengers, drove off into the darkness.

After the first bus left the old station, the yellow line outside the bus door did not close immediately.

Shen Qinghe stood where she was, closed her eyes and listened for a while, cold sweat slowly seeping from her temples.

"It has remembered Wu," she said.

"What does that mean?" Zhao Ye asked.

"It couldn't write the name fully, so it started using things around him to fill it in."

In the Grey Net, a thin red circle appeared around the edge of Wu's observation file.

It was not an official registration, but it looked like someone had repeatedly used a pen to trace the outline where his name was.

Xu Minglan immediately had people move all the old photos, papers, and clothing left behind by Wu out of the observation room to prevent the anomaly from continuing to fill in his identity using real-world objects.

After hearing this, Chen Jue stood outside the safety line, saying nothing.

He remembered the last words Han Yue shouted, "Don't follow my example," and also recalled what Wu said before boarding the bus: "I'm not 'out' even when I'm outside."

"If he comes out," Chen Jue suddenly spoke up, "will he still be able to be called Wu?"

Shen Qinghe did not give him a pleasant answer.

"It depends on how much of himself he can keep."

Zhao Ye stared at the direction where the bus had disappeared, his fists slowly loosening.

"Then we will keep him here."

No one responded to this statement, which sounded like a fit of pique.

But the Fire Seal of the second anchor in Jiangbei lit up simultaneously at this moment, and a small, faint image of the inside of the bus appeared in the Grey Net.

Wu had not disappeared; at least for now, he was still standing in the aisle.

This was enough for them to continue moving forward.

After the carriage went far away, Chen Shi flipped his phone, which had been face down, back over.

The station announcement on the screen had disappeared, leaving only a text message that hadn't been sent: Don't go.

He stared at those two words, deleted them, typed them again, and finally sent it to Chen Jue.

When Chen Jue received the text message, he only replied with a "Got it."

After sending it, he stared at the screen for a long time, finally stuffed the phone back into his pocket, and turned to help Lin Zhao move the Guardian Lamp equipment.

He did not stand there waiting for news.

This was the first time he understood that worrying about someone didn't necessarily mean one had to chase after them.