Chapter 45 (1/2)

K took off his hood, his hair that was soaked by the rain stuck to his forehead like little curly black snakes. With the help of the rainwater, K cleaned off the cobwebs on himself.

“Any discoveries?” asked Tang Luo.

When he first arrived earlier on, he had seen K charging out of one of the houses.

He looked just like a raging bull with his head down, and his eyes closed. He wasn’t even looking at where he was going.

Thus, Tang Luo had stopped him along the way.

“There’s something wrong with these two houses. There are ghost walls here,” replied K angrily as he turned around and cast a glance at the houses. “Let’s hurry and leave.”

“Oh?” Tang Luo said, “Interesting.”

Upon detecting Tang Luo’s interest, K immediately replied, “Monk, let’s concentrate on clearing the mission instead! If we get ourselves involved with something that we shouldn’t, we won’t even know what hit us when we die.”

K had managed to escape by a stroke of luck. Hence, he wasn’t willing to go back in with the monk in front of him at all.

It wasn’t so much as him being worried about Tang Luo’s safety. Rather, he was worried that Tang Luo might incur the wrath of whatever might be inside and end up implicating him.

K had already gone in once earlier.

Should he go in again… Did they really think that the ‘presence’ inside the houses had such a good temper?

What if it left the house and came after them?

As he spoke, K reached out and grabbed Tang Luo’s arm, stopping him from going over. At the same time, he was stunned for a moment.

Beep, beep, beep!

At that moment, they heard the sound of a vehicle’s blaring horns.

“The bus is here!”

K couldn’t care less about anything else anymore. He let go of Tang Luo and ran toward the bus stop.

Tang Luo glanced at the two lone solitary houses. He didn’t go in. Instead, he turned and followed after K.

Although the two houses were at the end of the path and the vanishing point of one’s vision, since these were winding mountain paths, the houses weren’t actually very far from the bus stop.

Otherwise, K might not even have reached the houses yet at this point.

After running for a while, K spotted a public bus that had stopped at the bus stop.

It was facing the direction where he had come from. The bus had already gone through quite a few years of use and looked rather old and run-down. The body of the bus was an orange-red color. The windows on one side were filthy, while those on the other side where the driver was seated were very clean.

A white rectangular board was attached to the area diagonally above the driver. The words Feng Village were written on it in red.

On the other end of the board was East Station.

In the middle was a bi-directional arrow.

On top of the arrow was the Bus Service Number: 330.

All the text was in red and clearly visible.

Beep, beep, beep!

Upon seeing K standing in the way in front and making no move to board, the driver blared the horns again.

K gestured to the driver and walked to the side of the bus. Lin Zi-ang and the other two stood on the platform. They didn’t board the bus.

When they noticed K and Tang Luo, who was also coming back, their uneasy expressions relaxed at once.

“Where are you going? Are you boarding or not?!”

They heard the driver’s voice coming from the bus.

“Mister, does this bus go to the terminal?” asked Auntie Shufen.

“Yes, it goes to Feng Village, the terminal. This is the last bus for today. If you’re not boarding, then you can walk there by yourselves,” replied the driver.

“We’re boarding, we’re boarding!” shouted Auntie Shufen.

She was the first to hurry on-board the bus.

This wasn’t one of those bright and spacious large buses of the contemporary age. There was only a door that was used for both boarding and alighting at the front of the bus.

There weren’t pivot grab handles or grab bars in the bus. Neither were there side-facing seats perpendicular to the front of the bus.

On one side was a row of single seats, while on the other side was a row of double seats.

The bus conductor’s seat was located slightly behind the door.

To the right of the driver and in front of the window was another seat.

Tang Luo was the last one to board the bus.

He had only just boarded when he noticed the whole group of them standing along the narrow passage.

They weren’t moving forward either.

The conductor glared at them with an unfriendly expression. “Thinking of taking the bus when you don’t even have any money?”

Yes, they didn’t have any money. None of them did!

During the previous mission, why had they been able to stay in a hotel and have a change of clothes?

That was because Master Xuanzang was skilled at begging for alms.

Money was necessary even in the world of the dead!

Presently, they needed money as well to take the bus.

Now, this was very awkward.

The mighty Employees of Gods and Demons had actually sunk to a point where they couldn’t even afford to take the public bus.

Was this because of the distortion of humanity or the degradation of morals?

Perhaps it was because humanity wasn’t sufficiently distorted, and morals hadn’t sufficiently degraded yet.

K, who was already in a foul mood because of the ghost walls earlier, was close to flaring up.

So what if they had no money? He was going to take the bus today, money or not!

Fortunately, the driver spoke up at this point. “Forget it, forget it. This is already the last bus for today. This place is so remote and out of the way, and it’s even raining. Just take a seat, just take a seat.”

As he spoke, he shut the doors.

The birth of people doing a board-and-run was successfully prevented.

The conductor gave them a vicious glare and didn’t speak any further.

Auntie Shufen paid her no mind and spoke joyfully. “Oh, thank you.”

“Sit tight, we’ve got a lot of mountain roads ahead,” said the driver.

The bus with its engine still running started to slowly inch forward.

Clouds of black smoke could be seen through the filthy rear windows. This was practically no different from a tractor.

Apart from Tang Luo’s group of five, the driver and the conductor, there were five other people on the bus.

One of them was an old lady with a head of white hair. Although her hair was all white, she didn’t have many wrinkles.

A young man was seated beside her.

Both of them were very quiet.

The other three were dressed in long white tunics resembling traditional clothing. They even had long hair. Their heads were down and didn’t look up.

They gave off a strange feeling.

If Tang Luo joined them, they could form a traditional clothing squad.

These five people were seated at the front.

Naturally, Tang Luo’s group sat at the back.

Auntie Shufen and Mico sat next to each other. Behind them was the Fake Breasts Appraiser, Lin Zi-ang, who was more bluster than anything else.

Behind Lin Zi-ang was Tang Luo.