Chapter 52: Fifty: Lost Property (Two-in-One)

Fifty: Lost Property (Two-in-One)

Xin Junmao looked at the young man before him, who appeared even younger than himself, and felt a sense of annoyance in his heart. He did not know why he felt so reserved toward someone younger than him, and why his manner of apologizing had been slightly overblown.

As expected, the life of an unemployed drifter still made him feel inferior.

Lin Ling sized up the rash young man before him, a trace of peculiar interest slowly appearing in his eyes, but he did not speak; he merely nodded at him with a smile, then departed.

Xin Junmao scratched his face and cast this small interlude to the back of his mind. While waiting for the bus at the bus stop, he crossed his arms and fell into reflection, then suspiciously thought: "Why, now that I think about it carefully, does it seem like that cheongsam beauty wasn't all that breathtakingly beautiful?"

Lin Ling arrived at the subway platform and stood there quietly, motionless. The people around him seemed not to notice him, never casting a glance at the handsome young man, as if he were a plain, unremarkable statue on the platform. He observed every person entering and exiting the subway with great interest, earnestly recording the expression and behavior of each one in his mind; no one knew what he was actually planning to do.

Not until the last subway train at 10:56 PM arrived before him did Lin Ling finally move, walking into the subway of his own accord and sitting casually in one of the empty seats.

There were only a few people in the large carriage: a sleepy corporate slave who had just finished working overtime, a female university student holding a tablet to binge-watch a drama, a sweet couple being lovey-dovey, a black-clad woman as quiet as a virgin, and a mentally ill person on the run with a weak sense of presence.

Six people were squeezed into one carriage, which was also the only carriage that still had people in it.

The black-clad woman sat upright, holding a spotless, slightly large luggage bag in the corner of the carriage. When she heard the announcement that the subway was about to arrive at the next station, her eyes slowly opened.

Those were a pair of cold, heartless gray eyes. She calmly turned her eyeballs, scanning everyone present, and whispered a count: "One, two, three, four." It was as if, in her eyes, these people were all lambs waiting for her to slaughter.

"Five." A soft voice, evenly spaced, followed immediately after. When the black-clad woman heard it, her whole body jolted violently. She widened her eyes, turned her head to look, and revealed an expression of astonishment.

She never imagined that someone could sit beside her without her noticing, and despite the distance being so close, she had only just noticed the young man's existence, catching the faint scent of incense burning on him.

The woman gripped her luggage bag tightly, her gaze becoming vicious and unkind.

As if he did not see the other's vigilance and malice, Lin Ling said to himself: "Have you heard of an Urban Legend about the subway?"

Lin Ling's voice was clearly not loud, but for some reason, it had an inexplicable magic that made everyone in the carriage turn their eyes toward him in unison. Even the sweet couple, the female student watching a drama starring her favorite celebrity, and the corporate slave who had been burning the midnight oil at the company for two days straight all suddenly lost their sleepiness, feeling suspicious and curious.

"What Urban Legend?" the female university student asked with a curious face; she was a bit scared, yet also a bit excited.

"Legend has it that for some people who die unnatural deaths on the subway, if they leave behind personal belongings in the corners of the subway before they die and those items aren't found or picked up by anyone for an entire night, then those unclaimed lost items will turn into some kind of evil object of misfortune. The person who picks them up will become inexplicably proactive, obsessed with returning the items to the owner, and the picked-up item can never be shaken off until they repeat the owner's fate and die, personally returning the lost item to the owner; only then will the strange Curse end," Lin Ling said nonchalantly.

After hearing this, the couple couldn't help but look at each other and smile. The man in the couple laughed: "That's not scary at all."

"Is that so?" Lin Ling looked at the other with some surprise, then suddenly grinned. The suddenly exaggerated smiling face made everyone feel a jolt in their hearts. He pointed to the feet of the man in the couple and smiled, "There is a diamond-encrusted necklace under your feet. It looks like a custom piece and is worth a lot. Any interest in picking it up?"

Hearing this, everyone turned their eyes to the man's feet. Sure enough, behind the man's heel, they saw a silver diamond-encrusted necklace, only the color of the necklace was too close to the color of the metal seat, making it hard to notice without looking closely.

The couple only glanced at the necklace, and having a tacit understanding, they immediately exchanged looks and caught each other's meaning.

The man in the couple suddenly let out a "Wow," then scolded: "Look at you, isn't this the necklace I gave you? This is a gift full of my heart, how could you be so careless?" As he spoke, he picked up the necklace, his eyes brightening as he looked at the shimmering jewelry brilliance on it.

The woman in the couple shrank her neck, pouting aggrievedly: "I didn't mean to, I'm sorry, honey~" Her gaze was also attracted by the necklace.

Subsequently, the man in the couple waved his hand and said: "Sigh, sigh, sigh, it's no big deal. This is just something we accidentally dropped. Little brother, don't talk nonsense and scare people."

The crowd looked at this shameless pair with disdain. They naturally saw through it too; the owner of that necklace was definitely not them, and just as Lin Ling said, this was a piece of lost property.

The female student had a sense of justice and kindly advised: "You guys shouldn't pretend anymore. This necklace looks expensive. If the owner looks for it and finds out you took it, be careful about getting sued. There are cameras everywhere now."

As she spoke, she looked at the camera holes in the corner of the carriage and on the top of the carriage door, then couldn't help but be stunned. Why were there no red dots? It seemed the cameras weren't on?

Others seemed to notice this too. The couple, who had been a bit discouraged upon hearing "surveillance," suddenly became full of confidence and clamored sarcastically: "Little sister, you can eat whatever you want, but you can't just say whatever you want."

"Little sister, looking at the School Badge on your satchel, you're a student at Xiangcui University, right? You've read so many books, do you know that everything requires evidence?" the woman in the couple said with a giggle, "Wait, let me guess, could it be that you don't have a boyfriend, or your boyfriend can't afford such small things, so you're jealous?"

"You!" The female university student was full of shame and anger, but seeing the arrogant faces of the couple and the wolf-like gaze faintly radiating from the man, and seeing that others seemed not to want to meddle in other people's business and chose to remain silent, she suddenly felt extremely aggrieved, clenched her fists, and dared not speak again.

"Getting off," Lin Ling said with a smile. Before the next station, he did not forget to wink at the black-clad woman who was still staring at him fixedly; that meaningful look seemed to know exactly what she was going to do next.

The black-clad woman gritted her teeth in secret, a glimmer of ferocity appearing in her eyes, but she seemed to be restrained by something. She only gripped the handle of her luggage bag tightly without making any move, and could only watch with unwillingness and hatred as Lin Ling got off the train with a calm and composed air.

The female university student who had been wronged on the subway heard Lin Ling's "getting off" and felt she couldn't stay here either. Acting out of spite, she followed Lin Ling off the subway.

Soon, seeing the last subway train start up again and leave her sight, the female student suddenly felt some regret. Because getting off at this station early and taking a car back to the university would cost who knows how much wasted money, but thinking of the awkward situation on the subway just now, she felt she hadn't done anything wrong.

"I hope the horror story you told is all true. I really hope that couple goes to hell!" the female student said to Lin Ling.

The female student was just making a casual complaint; she didn't expect Lin Ling to give a response to the corresponding topic.

However, Lin Ling chuckled and said: "They probably won't be able to go to hell, but they will see hell."

At 11:11 PM on an autumn night, with a young man who always spoke weird ghost stories and had a stiff smile standing before her, the female student felt even colder in her heart from the chilly night breeze. She felt that the handsome young man before her seemed to have something wrong with him.

The female student stopped talking to Lin Ling, picked up her tablet computer, and hurried upstairs to leave the platform, not intending to stay at all.

Just as the female student walked out of the subway station, feeling more and more afraid, she didn't forget to look back every few steps to see if Lin Ling was following, muttering low whispers like "Don't come looking for me."

Suddenly, the female student who was moving forward was scared into jumping a big step backward. She looked at Lin Ling, who had appeared before her out of nowhere, with terrified eyes, her lips trembling: "You, you, you, you..."

"Zhang Xiaoxiao, is this your School Badge?" Lin Ling glanced at the inscription on the back of the School Badge and returned the Xiangcui University School Badge to her.

Hearing that the other had picked up her School Badge, Zhang Xiaoxiao looked down at her satchel and found that it was indeed her School Badge that had fallen off at some point. She felt slightly relieved inside, yet still had some fear, and asked: "You, how did you run ahead of me?"

"Oh, that's simple. I took a big detour from the other passage at a speed several times faster than you," Lin Ling said with a straight face, showing his back, which revealed sweat stains.

"... So that's how it is." Once Zhang Xiaoxiao heard this, she only felt that this little brother might be sick. Instead of chasing from behind, he specifically took a detour to run the long way. It was truly a waste of his handsome face.

"Thanks." Zhang Xiaoxiao took the School Badge, nodded in thanks with a dry laugh at Lin Ling, then walked past him to the bus stop to call a ride-hailing car. In just this short moment, she couldn't see Lin Ling's figure again. For a moment, her heart was filled with mixed feelings; she didn't know if tonight was just a bad night to go out, which was why she ran into such a weird person.

Zhang Xiaoxiao felt she was having the worst luck tonight: acting out of spite to get off the subway early, taking the long way back to school near midnight, and running into a handsome young man who was a suspected mental patient. Now that she was calling a ride-hailing car, the driver was also so slow to arrive.

After waiting at the bus stop for a full seventeen minutes, the ride-hailing driver finally arrived late.

After getting in the car, Zhang Xiaoxiao couldn't help but complain: "Master, this took way too long."

"Oh, sorry, little girl. Recently, this subway station is being rebuilt and expanded, and the roads have to be changed to match the station's scale, so there's road construction everywhere. I also had to take a winding path to finally manage to drive here," the driver explained apologetically.

Because Zhang Xiaoxiao had never gotten off the subway here, and it was her first time hearing about this, she immediately said apologetically: "Ah, I see. Then I'm really sorry."

The driver uncle smiled politely and said: "The stops at this subway station are not convenient now, going up and down, and there is only this one road to enter and exit. It's not easy for everyone to travel, and I'm just earning some hard-earned money. We should all understand each other."

"You're right." Zhang Xiaoxiao nodded with a smile. Then, just as she was about to take out her tablet again to binge-watch her drama, she suddenly stiffened, her eyes turning red, looking like she was so scared she was about to cry.

"Oh my, little girl, what's wrong with you? Why are you crying?" The driver saw the suddenly tearful female student and panicked in his heart, "Sigh, sigh, sigh, don't cry, our platform records audio..."

"Waaa..." Zhang Xiaoxiao sobbed uncontrollably.

"Oh my god!! I won't be able to clear my name even if I jump into the Yellow River!!!"

"I must pass the interview today." The next day, Xin Junmao, having regained his spirits, came to the subway station again. He watched the train entering the platform from afar at the subway transfer station entrance, wanting to be as indomitable as the train. He secretly cheered himself on, thinking that he had accumulated rich interview experience and that he had to secure today's job no matter what.

He carried a sense of drive, walked onto the platform, and then... his interview today ended in failure once again.

It was not that Xin Junmao was unprepared for his interview, but rather that after arriving at the platform, the horrific scene he witnessed would remain unforgettable for the rest of his life; a massive shadow shrouded his spirit, and that bloody, terrifying image was destined to be a nightmare he could not escape for some time to come.

High-spirited, Xin Junmao rushed onto the platform, and in an instant, he saw a woman dressed in black, wearing a silver chain around her neck, suddenly jump off the platform with a ferocious smile; even the presence of a platform screen door could not stop the black-clad woman's agile movements, and just before a train that was decelerating but still moving at high speed arrived, she threw herself toward it like a joyful moth to a flame.

Bang!

Xin Junmao could not hold back his nausea, and in agony, he clutched the floor and began to vomit; terror filled his brain, and he muttered to himself, "Why do this... why do this... jumping onto the tracks to commit suicide... why jump onto the tracks to commit suicide..."

The panic on the platform lasted for a full half-hour, the subway service on the 3rd Line in Cuizhu City almost completely ceased operations, and all passengers who had just entered the station were calmed and escorted away from the scene; passengers with more severe emotional distress who had no one to accompany them were gathered together in the station's duty room to rest until their guardians arrived to pick them up.

Xin Junmao had already been living in anxiety these days, and after this incident, the overly stimulating scene directly shattered his spirit; now he was dazed and muddled, as if he did not know who he was, his reactions sluggish.

"It's real... this is real... the legend is real..." Xin Junmao vaguely seemed to hear someone nearby muttering something; he looked blankly at the person beside him, a girl carrying a satchel with the School Badge of Xiangcui University, a well-known university in the city, on the bag.

Probably a university student, he thought indifferently.

Thump, thump, thump.

The door to the duty room was knocked upon, and a crew member carrying a luggage bag walked halfway inside, softly asking the few passengers in the room who were in extremely low spirits, "Sorry to disturb you, is this anyone's bag?"

"Ah!!!" Suddenly, Xin Junmao was startled awake by a scream from the female university student beside him; his terror was swept away, or rather, his fear had shifted onto the female university student, while he himself was left only with confusion and bewilderment.

Only then did he hear Zhang Xiaoxiao retreat into the corner in terror, crying out, "Don't take that thing, don't take those things..."