Chapter 182: Lifelong Beloved

The green-skinned train only looked old on the outside; its interior decoration was brand-new and luxurious.

Leather sofas, walnut wood tables, hand-woven wool carpets, vintage decorative lamps—it was more like a luxury sightseeing train than a regular one.

Red Carver piloted the drone to explore both the front and rear of the train, seeing not a single soul—no passengers, no crew.

The door to the driver's cabin at the front was locked tight; through the glass, one could see the levers and buttons operating on their own.

"What kind of place is this?"

Red Carver frowned, the radar's virtual arrow still pointing straight ahead—the clearest proof this was the correct path for the mission.

"I think I've heard something like this before."

Midnight Howl hesitated and said: "It was in a shabby bar on a backstreet. A guy at the next table, drunk, was bragging—he once got trapped in a killing ground, a place sealed with spatial anchors, impossible to teleport out of."

Just as he was about to die of thirst and hunger, a train suddenly emerged from the wall, picked him up, and took him away.

Before he stepped off and returned to safety, the train conductor took away his lifelong beloved as payment for the ticket."

"Lifelong beloved?" the carver exclaimed in shock. "Are they kidnapping people?"

"No,"

Midnight Howl's expression turned strange. "They confiscated his original pair of hands—he now uses Prometheus Corporation's mechanical prosthetics."

That's allowed?

Red Carver's face twisted, about to speak—when suddenly, a loud "Bang!" echoed as every carriage door slammed shut at once, sealing off any chance of escape.

The whistle emitted a low hum, and the train began accelerating rapidly.

Bandage Man and the others grabbed the sofa armrests for support.

Zhao Zijing stood up, pulled a shimmering silver alloy arrow from her backpack slot, and used telekinesis to make it float, carefully sensing the train's speed.

One hundred, two hundred, three hundred kilometers per hour.

The train raced wildly, finally stabilizing at seven hundred kilometers per hour, gliding steadily through the void.

Red Carver clicked his tongue, feeling like he'd been forced onto a criminal's train. He frowned at Li Cheng: "Brother Pi Fu, what exactly did you see on that drawing? How could you be so sure we won't die on this train?"

Li Cheng leaned back against the sofa and asked: "Are you sure you want to see?"

Not just Red Carver—everyone else nodded.

With that, Li Cheng took out the drawing and placed it gently on the wooden table.

In the next instant, everyone who saw the drawing stared wide-eyed in shock, especially Red Carver, whose hand trembled involuntarily.

The drawing was simple: Li Cheng stood in a patch of grass one meter tall, his feet surrounded by the severed limbs and scattered remains of Midnight Howl, Mendoza, and others, along with the mission battery.

Before him stood Red Carver and Zhao Zijing, both covered in blood, their faces twisted in fury as they jointly drove an alloy arrow into Li Cheng's chest.

This was the prophecy given by the 【Death-Seeking Notebook】—the most likely way Li Cheng would die in the near future.

"."

The atmosphere turned eerie. Midnight Howl stared at his own shattered remains scattered across the floor, his face frozen.

Catherine, Mendoza, and the others turned pale. Red Carver, who had first demanded to see the drawing, scratched his head, utterly at a loss.

"Don't worry,"

Li Cheng smiled, still calm. "The background in the drawing is a grassland—completely different from this train's environment. That means we're not in immediate danger."

As for the drawing showing us killing each other, there could be many reasons: we might be under illusion, enchanted, or the figures might be monsters wearing human skins."

The 【Death-Seeking Notebook】 only gives predictions—it doesn't explain causes or consequences."

For example, someone sees on paper that he'll die in a plane crash, so he cancels his flight and stays safely at home.

But he still dies in a plane crash—a passenger jet malfunctions and crashes directly onto his house.

So you can't fully trust the prophecy's outcome."

"Exactly,"

Zhao Zijing also stepped in to calm everyone. "From the effect description, this isn't a self-fulfilling prophecy—it's a future that can be avoided."

If we start distrusting each other now, we might be manipulated into turning against one another."

In the Global Supernatural Alliance, there are a few seers known internally by the mocking nickname "Fates."

Most of the time, the Fates' predictions are accurate, helping GOC and other organizations prevent disasters before they happen, making outstanding contributions to human society.

But sometimes, their prophecies are genuinely annoying.

The Pope looks pained, drenched in sweat—suspected assassination by a powerful foe!

In reality, the Pope was constipated in the toilet.

Terrorist attack at New York Airport—armed militants take over a thousand hostages!

In reality, it was the trailer for the new Call of Duty game.

A nickel-iron meteorite is hurtling from outer space straight toward Earth!

In reality, due to the lack of scale in space, the meteorite was only the size of a basketball—and burned up in the atmosphere before it even reached the ground.

These kinds of blunders happen constantly, just like fake news churned out by clickbait sites.

Having seen so many, Zhao Zijing could now view prophecies with a level head.

"This train seems like it'll keep going for a while. Why not rest for now? There's probably no danger yet."

After Zhao Zijing spoke, Mendoza, Catherine, and the others sighed in relief. Their bodies and minds were exhausted from the escape—they immediately collapsed onto the sofas, closed their eyes, and tried to rest, despite their lingering anxiety.

As for the transcendentals, they dared not sleep.

Midnight Howl swallowed two pills and immediately perked up. Red Carver took out menthol oil, inhaled deeply, and snapped back to alertness.

Li Cheng, meanwhile, held a sudoku book in his left hand, filling in numbers, and turned a high-level Rubik's Cube with his right—juggling both like a casual mental game.

The train kept moving until it reached the edge of this void, then crashed headfirst into a solid wall—as if activating a spatial phase function, passing straight through into the rock strata.

The front of the train tilted slightly upward, emerged from the rock after half an hour, and entered a dark, lightless deep ocean.

Through the windows, lit by the train's interior lights, one could clearly see bizarre deep-sea creatures—and even non-carbon-based lifeforms that could never exist in Earth's oceans.

Mendoza and the others snored like thunder; the players had no heart to wake them, watching silently as the train surged upward, finally bursting through the sea surface and slowing to a stop.

The moonlight was cold and clear; a single long stone slab stood alone on the sea, similar to the stone platform where Li Cheng and the others had stood before, serving as a platform.

A vast, indistinct shadow waited for the train's arrival.

The players exchanged glances and, without a word, silently drew their weapons, raising their vigilance.

Boom!

The train doors opened again; the shadow moved into the train, entering the eleventh carriage where everyone stood.