Free Web NovelChapter 164: Chapter 164: Masked Strange Person Has Not Disappeared
"Let their family of three go through, I have an extra ticket here."
The sobbing of Wen Hao’s family of three suddenly stopped, as Bai Wu holding the boat ticket approached the checkpoint behind them.
The ticket inspector looked at the ticket with surprise:
"Are you sure? This is a ticket to the shelter, I don’t know how you managed to get your hands on such a precious suite ticket, your appearance doesn’t seem like someone who could get this ticket, but I think you must understand the value of this ticket."
Like other cruise ships, the cabins were divided into inside cabins, ocean view rooms, balcony rooms, and suites.
From left to right, the class of accommodation increased in luxury, and the ticket Bai Wu took out from Homestead Manor was for a suite, and within the location of the suites, it was the best one.
Bai Wu only found out now, that there were different levels of tickets, he was certain at this moment that the shelter plan must have not been fake from the start.
Perhaps it was real at the beginning, because only if it was real would the builders try to construct various classes even in this desperate environment.
It is possible that the toilet in the suite is bigger than the entire living quarters of many passengers. If the cruise liner still existed, it could well be a miniature of High Tower.
The ticket inspector looked as though he had seen something rare, he had seen many granting their tickets away.
Some people had a kind human nature, harmonious families facing separation, husbands giving up their chance for their wives and children to have the possibility of survival.
Elderly people were giving up their remaining years, leaving hope to the younger ones who had more time ahead.
But there were also many heart-wrenching ticket transfers.
For example, a man gave his ticket to his girlfriend out of love, but she had actually gotten hers from some greasy rich man through physical transactions, and then turned around and gave the extra ticket to another young and handsome man.
After entering the cross-sea bridge, they hugged each other and kissed under the sea breeze and setting sun, driving the bootlicker who had given everything for love into impotent rage.
Throughout this week, many strange ticket transfers and thefts had occurred, and when people returned to the cruise ship, there were many discussions about these events in the dining hall.
But the ticket inspector had never seen anyone give a ticket to a stranger.
Wen Hao’s family of three could not believe their eyes as they looked at Bai Wu, although they were very reluctant, they still decided... to give up their child.
The cruel scene ultimately did not happen.
Bai Wu did not choose the other two options provided by his Innate Force. Humanity should not be tested too frequently, the best method is to use wisdom to solve resource problems, rather than waiting until resources are insufficient and then dealing with ethical dilemmas.
At least, Wen Hao’s parents loved him, even if this love... could not withstand too many setbacks.
"I’m sure, stop dithering and let them through quick, take good care of this child, don’t waste my ticket."
At this moment, Bai Wu, under the bright illumination above the sea, looked like an unreal movie character.
Some people were deeply moved by this scene, while others said to themselves, "Idiot."
"Benefactor! Oh, benefactor!" Wen Hao’s father, named Wen Bin.
From the notes, he was a newspaper employee, he had reported many false stories in his lifetime, using a pen that twisted right and wrong to cover up many disgusting deeds.
This was the kind of situation not even a newspaper would dare to fabricate, happening right before him, made him tear up with emotion.
"Big brother... Thank you..." Tears flowed from Wen Hao’s eyes, his expression differing from that of his parents.
This child’s face bore a relieved expression that should not belong to a child.
Wen Hao had called out for help many times from here, or shall we say, in the world of the telephone.
In seven hundred years, no one had ever been able to rescue him.
He looked like a child, but his soul had become twisted due to being abandoned over and over again, until this moment when he revealed the most innocent smile:
"Big brother, can you tell me your name?"
"Bai Wu."
"I will remember you, big brother. I hope big brother can get a ticket, I will pray for you on the cruise ship."
"Don’t worry, I have extra tickets, and we will meet on the cruise."
Wen Hao was overjoyed upon hearing this, and then he and his parents boarded the cross-sea bridge that he had yearned for seven hundred years.
Having done something kind, Bai Wu felt his mood was pretty good.
But he was sure that he and Wen Hao would not meet on the ship.
Only after leaving the world of telephones would the spent tickets return. Even if he really went to the cruise area, he wouldn’t come across Wen Hao.
At least that’s what Bai Wu thought.
But as Wu Jiu always taught the team, the world outside the tower cannot be inferred by common sense.
Bai Wu also didn’t know whether he would really encounter anything miraculous on the cruise.
The scene began to disintegrate bit by bit, just like before, like a jigsaw breaking apart, the real world slowly began to appear.
Rarely, his eyes popped up a message:
[Title: Journey across the sea. Content: The sea breeze on the ship carried the taste of salt, the deck was like the playground at his school, if happiness could stay on the sea, he hoped this ship would never dock. Author: Poet Yan. Congratulations on successfully taking a call, this is much more perfect than the last two calls. You still don’t know the significance of making these calls, but you may understand soon.]
Bai Wu was already used to this kind of vague explanation, old riddles to his eyes.
His consciousness returned to reality again, Bai Wu checked the time, and it had only been four minutes.
Yin Shuang had not yet awakened.
However, looking at the values on her wristwatch, her pain was slowly fading away.
He wondered, which damn son of a bitch’s call had this girl taken, and who was the damn son of a bitch who tortured her like this?
"Exactly four minutes, seems like it’s time-locked? Speaking of which, Yin Shuang seems to be the same... Does it mean that no matter how long you stay in the world of telephones, the experience in reality is always four minutes?"
Bai Wu found it quite interesting.
"It seems like you need to be in a certain emotional state to enter the telephone world? Let me try again."
What was magical was that when Bai Wu left the phone booth, the phone booth began to visibly transform.
Becoming transparent.
Bai Wu stared at the phone booth for more than twenty seconds, finally convinced that the phone booth was disappearing.
About half a minute later, the place where the phone booth had been was empty.
"So that’s how it is, like letting go of an obsession, thus being liberated? In that case, these phone booths... are they really transformed from Evils Fallen?"
Without a definite answer, Bai Wu did not know why these Evils Fallen turned into the very concrete objects that were phone booths.
To understand the truth, Bai Wu could only continue to answer calls.
He hoisted Yin Shuang on his back and began to head towards the phone booths ahead, but as he took a step and a phone booth completely disappeared, aside from the one Yin Shuang and Bai Wu had entered earlier, the rest of the phone booths seemed to "go crazy", ringing incessantly.
It was like people stranded on a deserted island who had finally seen a cruise ship in the distance, waving their hands and shouting hoarsely, wanting to be saved.
The sound from all the phone booths made the entire city street buzz with an eerie noise.
Bai Wu thought about it and, having no specific goal, decided to continue answering the phones in order.
He went into the phone booth opposite with Yin Shuang on his back, picked up the receiver, and this time he heard a child’s voice.
"My name is Lin Rui... save them... save them..."
The voice crying for help sounded very young, although not a child’s, it was clearly still within the adolescent range.
What made Bai Wu curious was that this person, who seemed to be about his age, was not crying "save me" but "save them."
"How should I help you?"
"Save someone... save someone quick... Evil Fallen is coming to kill us."
Fighting Evil Fallen? That’s a job I’m familiar with.
"But the problem is how do we enter the phone world?"
Bai Wu speculated that it probably required some emotion; one couldn’t be too calm.
"Hmm, the previous two calls didn’t lead to a deep interaction mainly because my emotions were too bland. I need to think... What else is there, what matters enough to make me sad?" freeweɓnovēl.coɱ
Bai Wu pondered this as the voice on the phone grew increasingly urgent, but since Bai Wu was nearly immune to the effects of various emotional infections, he was never able to enter the phone world.
Then he suddenly thought of his pot.
Since entering High Tower, his biggest regret was this disappointing pot!
An uncomfortable sense of substitution came over him at once.
The world before his eyes started to crumble like a puzzle, and then another scene began to form, just like a puzzle being put together again.
By the time Bai Wu could see his surroundings clearly, he found himself and a few teenagers hiding behind some cover.
The word ’cover’ typically described a scenario of evasion during combat, and at that moment, Bai Wu and a group of young men and women were hiding from the eyes of monsters behind a cover—in the side of a dilapidated office building.
"Shui... Shui, what is that monster? Are we... are we going to die here today?"
The speaking teenager was wearing glasses, his nose dripping with snot, clearly having cried from fear, with tears and snot mingling together.
Shui was relatively tall and burly, with blond hair and holding a baseball bat; from appearance alone, he seemed the most capable fighter of the group.
Bai Wu found his position was in the corner, actually very similar to the previous scene, almost unnoticed by anyone. He was rather distant from everyone else, but with the help of Innate Force and Enhanced Vision, he could clearly hear and see these people.
From the remarks given by Prayle’s Eye, Bai Wu realized that these people were students from Shi Cheng Third Experimental High School’s senior year class.
Then he saw Lin Rui.
[Title... never mind, I have no inspiration this time, I’ll write a poem next time. Congratulations on finding this unremarkable protagonist, a boy who likes to read hot-blooded comics but is not very hot-blooded himself. The girl he likes is fancied by the school bully, so he comforts himself with "She wouldn’t fancy me anyway." When bullied, he explains to himself: It’s okay, the world is still peaceful, it’s just me getting beaten up. His parents worry about his lack of prospects, but deep down he always feels that the world isn’t going to suddenly collapse. Even if he ends up serving tea and pouring water in the future, he can survive. Since childhood, he’s been muddling through life, abiding by some naive beliefs. What his obsession is, you will find out soon.]
This... a very ordinary and common child. Even his hairstyle was so commonplace, the kind that parents and teachers would suggest a child to keep. His clothing was also very plain.
"Shh! Damn it, keep it down! What do we do if that monster finds us! Fei Bo, peek out and see where the monster is now!"
Fei Bo was fat, but he was not waving; the name Bo had no connection to waves.
Calling a portly individual ’Bo’ like this was quite common in Hong Kong. Bai Wu took note of Fei Bo’s reluctant demeanor.
There were eleven people here, four girls and seven boys. Lin Rui’s gaze sometimes drifted towards a certain girl.
The girl was named Cheng Shishi.
Cheng Shishi’s remark was also quite interesting:
[Although Lin Rui always comforted himself by thinking, "As long as she’s happy, that’s fine," life isn’t about convincing yourself once you know the truth, is it? Do you know how innocent high school students were back then? They wouldn’t even dare fantasize about the girl they liked because they thought it was a desecration ~ Oh ho ho ho, I’ve literally turned into an Octopus laughing.]
Bai Wu understood, Cheng Shishi was Lin Rui’s first love.
Incidentally, this was indeed Lin Rui’s Illusionary Realm, obviously looking at the girl but introducing Lin Rui indirectly.
He still didn’t know how the story would develop.
However, one thing was clear: Wen Hao wouldn’t survive the night he was abandoned by his parents, because he heard Evil Fallen’s gnawing sounds, and Evil Fallen was already approaching the Shi Cheng harbor. His fear would guide Evil Fallen there.
Lin Rui and these kids... probably the same.
Lin Rui would die here, but the question was after saving him, even if completing the task perfectly, would his obsession be erased?
Evil Fallen was slowly getting closer, with a massive body. Through Enhanced Vision, Bai Wu saw it was an Evil Fallen that resembled a lizard, looking from afar like a miniature Godzilla.
Fei Bo poked his head out but immediately saw Evil Fallen drawn by the scent of fear.
This was a Level Four mutated Evil Fallen, with a mutation grade that wasn’t considered high. It wasn’t human and instinctively preyed on living creatures in the city.
Such Evil Fallens could be seen every day in this era, except that people used to be able to use weapons against them. Eventually, it was discovered that weapons seemed to have lost their effectiveness.
Hearing the monster’s footsteps, the man known as Shui was so frightened that he almost failed to grip the baseball bat in his hands:
"Go! Run fast!"
He bolted, and the others, including Lin Rui, started to run as well.
Bai Wu realized that if the script played out this way... all these people were going to die.
It seemed that this mission was simply about saving people, fairly straightforward.
But just as Bai Wu was preparing to make an appearance, the clumsy Lin Rui suddenly turned back.
This utterly average boy, whose whole life had been ordinary and timid, suddenly stood still when he realized that the target of the lizard monster was his first love.
His legs were shaking from fear, yet he let out loud wailing cries, attempting to attract the monster’s attention that way.
At that moment, Bai Wu found everything in his vision slowing down, as if everything before his eyes and this moment in history began to superimpose and emerge.
A second later, Lin Rui would have half his head bitten off by the lizard, the Evil Fallen chewing on the boy’s blessings for the girl and his inner regrets.
The others thought they had been saved, but in the end, not one of them would survive.
Seven hundred years ago in the streets of Food City, this scene truly took place.
Young students organized themselves to scrounge for food in the city, but ultimately encountered an Evil Fallen and were killed to the last by it.
Lin Rui would die, his life’s most glorious moment being the sudden stop to run away alone to attract the monster’s attention. Yet the first love of his heart might not even spare him a glance.
Before his death, he wouldn’t even have time to utter "Cheng Shishi, I like you" and could only let out wailing cries.
It was time to take action, Bai Wu thought.
But just as he was preparing to intervene, he saw the ordinary boy—pull out a mask.
The mask bore a smile that was all too familiar to him.
He had once worn that mask for live broadcasts outside the High Tower, and even earlier, someone else wore it while fighting against the Evil Fallens, protecting the people of the city.
Bai Wu suddenly realized what Prayle’s Eye had meant by the phrase—"believing in some naive things" in his mind.
In the early years of this city, there was a Masked Strange Person who hunted Evil Fallens. Although he became a villain in the eyes of the security forces, in the eyes of many youngsters, the Masked Strange Person was a hero.
But later, this strange person disappeared... He vanished so completely that it was as if he had never existed at all.
Many people even doubted whether the Masked Man was real. Could he just be a figment of imagination, like the Little Match Girl’s matches?
More and more people doubted the existence of the Masked Man. At the height of his popularity, even in the apocalyptic era, there were comics, posters, novels, and stories about him.
But now, these things were no longer collected by anyone. This world never had a savior... Perhaps there were some hot-blooded youths, but what could they do in the face of the apocalypse?
Only Lin Rui was adamant in his belief in the existence of the Masked Strange Person. He always carried that smiling mask with him, and over the years, many people had ridiculed him for his naivety.
The comic books of the Masked Strange Person in his bag were taken out by Shui for a public execution, mocking Lin Rui for being so childish despite being sixteen or seventeen years old.
Lin Rui was like those children who were mocked for believing in the nonexistence of Ultraman yet stubbornly insisted that Ultraman was real.
Until the moment of his death, the heart of this young man still carried the innocence of a child.
"The Masked Strange Person isn’t fake, he’s just... gone to protect somewhere else. One day... he will surely come to save us all!"
The youth, crying loudly in fear of death, put on the mask, awkwardly and bravely standing between the lizard and his classmates, facing the final moment of his life.
Meanwhile, in a corner, another man also put on a mask.
(This Chapter was initially planned to be completed around five to protect against content theft, but I really can’t keep up until four or five o’clock... Coming up with these stories is exhausting, I hope you all can enjoy the genuine version.)
