At the same time, in the wasteland approaching Lungmen, the members of Penguin Logistics were humming little tunes as they made their way back to their destination: Lungmen.
They had landed a massive contract this time; simply hauling something from Chernobog to Lungmen would earn them nearly half a month's salary. Everyone felt incredibly lucky. They had reached their destination with high spirits, picked up the goods, and returned toward Lungmen smoothly, without even a single bandit sighting along the way.
"Mm~ mm~ mm~ mm~ Apple Pie~ Apple Pie~ Apple Pie!"
Exusiai was humming happily, clearly in a great mood. She was so excited she felt like speeding for a stretch right then and there. "Hey, if I speed on the way back to Lungmen today, do you think the LGD will catch me?"
Thinking of speeding made Exusiai recall her two recent experiences of losing control, which led to her memories of sitting in the LGD lockup. It wasn't that she had a grudge against the LGD for catching her; she just felt it was a bit embarrassing that she had fainted twice while driving and got caught both times.
"You still want to drive?! Can't you just wait a couple of days? Don't forget, your luck hasn't been great lately!" Croissant, hearing Exusiai's words, recalled those two life-or-death high-speed incidents with lingering fear and spoke to her with concern. She was mainly worried about Exusiai fainting again. Hitting something out here in the wilderness wasn't the scary part—the real issue was that if the cargo in the back got damaged, they truly couldn't afford the compensation!
Looking at the cargo, Croissant felt a bit apprehensive. Although Exusiai had never actually damaged the goods, under her hands, the vehicle itself was practically a "fragile item."
"You can rest easy on that. The LGD probably won't have time for you today. However... I'll take the wheel. Croissant is right, just in case."
As she spoke, Texas handed her phone to the two of them to show them a video. It was a clip she had just seen; she guessed the LGD wouldn't have any spare time to check traffic today. On the screen, a massive fireball, as dazzling as the sun, hung suspended in mid-air. It seemed Lungmen wasn't so peaceful today after all.
"Regarding the specific details of the situation inside, our LGD will issue a specialized announcement after the incident concludes! We ask everyone to stay as far away from here as possible..."
In the video, Officer Swire was trying her hardest to persuade the reporters to stay away. But the effect was clearly negligible; reporters were still trying to scramble for the headline news. Swire was practically going insane on the scene! These people kept trying to barge into the danger zone despite all her polite warnings!
Aren't you even a little afraid of this thing falling down? Anyone with eyes could see how much damage it would cause if it exploded; these people were truly risking their lives for a headline. Once she got back, she'd have to apply to Governor Wei to properly crack down on these news media outlets—though she didn't know if doing so would actually work.
Swire was also feeling extremely anxious. Every second the fireball in the sky accumulated energy meant its destructive power when it exploded would increase, and currently, there was no sign of it slowing down. This incident could no longer be brushed off with an excuse like a "drill," but whether they made up an excuse or told the truth, it would have to wait until it was over!
The next moment, everyone froze in their tracks. They noticed that the fireball, which had expanded to the size of Times Square, had finally stopped its growth, as if it were brewing something. Everyone could feel the sensation of scorching flames licking their skin, a feeling as if they had been dropped into the center of a desert. No one cared about rushing in for news anymore; wasn't this giant fireball itself a ready-made headline? Everyone began snapping photos frantically.
"Officer! Officer!"
Just as Swire was about to order the reporters to leave, a nearby officer quietly found her, looking at her with a face full of concern.
"Yeah, what is it?" Swire turned back to her subordinate, wanting to hear what he had run over to say.
"Officer Ch'en just said that the fireball is about to blow, and told us to find cover immediately!" As he spoke, the officer pointed toward the fireball in the sky.
"How could it be that simple?! There are so many people here, how can we just easily find cover? Holy—!"
As Swire was speaking, the fireball suddenly began to expand rapidly, like a balloon that had reached its breaking point, looking ready to explode at any second.
"Lungmen Profanity! You and your 'timely' warnings, Pink Sausage Dragon!"
The words had barely left her mouth when the fireball suddenly exploded. The massive sound made Swire's four ears ache, and she could only hurriedly cover them with her arms.
Along with the explosion, the expected scenario of flames purifying the earth did not happen. Instead, there was only a blinding white light and a violent storm. The piercing white light forced everyone to squeeze their eyes shut; because the light was so intense, many people couldn't help but shed tears uncontrollably. The accompanying storm blew the reporters over, and many cameras fell to the ground as their owners lost their balance, causing significant losses for the journalists.
But no one noticed that within this dazzling white light, countless tiny clusters of fire flew off in all directions across Lungmen. These flames seemed to have locked-on targets; the vast majority of them flew into the slums, heading straight into the headquarters of various gangs. The flames entered the bodies of certain people silently—those were the participants who had once dragged these Infected into that hell. At this moment, the wrongful souls had come for their revenge.
"Is this your description of 'not harming the residents of Lungmen'? I'm curious—where exactly are those flames flying to, and what are they going to do?"
At this moment, Ch'en, who was prepared, wore a pair of sunglasses she had gotten from somewhere and watched with her own eyes as countless streaks of fire vanished into the nearby prison van. Inside were the soldiers Rhine Gold had illegally stashed, as well as the two supervisors who had committed those atrocities.
Strangely, after the flames entered their bodies, these people weren't burned to ash as Ch'en had imagined. Instead, they showed no abnormal reaction. Looking at these normal-looking prisoners, Ch'en guessed that perhaps because the white light was too blinding, they didn't even know that flames had entered their bodies.
This piqued Ch'en's curiosity. What exactly did those angry souls intend to do? They could actually restrain themselves from physically harming those who had caused their deaths?
"They've gone to take their revenge, naturally. Don't be fooled by their outward lack of problems; I suspect the rest of their lives will be... very difficult."
Jeanne stood by, witnessing the flames entering those bodies as well. In truth, she hadn't encountered this situation before, so she was naturally curious about this transformation. She watched as the flames entered the targets like a time bomb being planted inside; when it would detonate depended on when those souls were willing.
However, based on Jeanne's communication with the souls, before they took their final revenge, they intended to collect some "interest" first. After entering the targets' bodies, these people would reach a state where they wouldn't even be able to sleep peacefully. Every day, they would feel the sensation of these wrongful souls whispering in their ears.
In Yan, they usually referred to this as "Ghost Possession" (Gui Shang Shen). Generally, one would need to find a ghost-catching Celestial Master from the Tianshi Mansion to help dispel the calamity.
"Is your Originium Art that terrifying? Not only can it start fires, but it can also manipulate spirits to possess people?" Hearing Jeanne's description, Ch'en also thought of the term "Ghost Possession." But for a Yan person like her, such a thing was rare to a certain degree. The reason was that this was Lungmen; compared to the heart of Yan, these strange and mysterious arts were quite rare here. Furthermore, those itinerant charlatans didn't like to travel this far to scam people, because most people here didn't believe in such things, making "possession" useless.
"No, I don't know that kind of Originium Art. This is the result of a mutation in my flames under the interaction of a massive number of Infected souls. Though, it has given me quite a bit of inspiration."
As she spoke, a cluster of fire flickered in Jeanne's half-closed hand, feeling no different from the flames that had just entered the prisoners' bodies.