After being stared at by Chen Ge for a long time, the man tightened the collar of his shirt and coughed lightly.
"Do we know each other?"
His voice was cold and weathered like he did not care about anything that happened in the outside world.
Chen Ge did not expect the man to speak so suddenly. He paused for a moment before continuing the conversation. "You look like a friend of mine. The air is almost the same. Have we met somewhere before?"
The man turned around, and there was a trace of tiredness in his eyes. "You might have the wrong person."
"Impossible, I must have met you somewhere before." This was the first time that Chen Ge had met the man. He said that because he wanted to chat with the man and gain more useful information.
The man was silent. He knew that Chen Ge did not look like he was lying. After some hesitation, he raised his hand to remove the mask from his face.
The man had a high nose, pale skin, and purple lips. After removing the mask, he coughed violently. "You've got the wrong person. I'm not the person you're looking for."
Then he put the mask back on, and there was an incomprehensible emotion in his eyes. "I don't have friends."
The man was not afraid of Chen Ge. He was a passenger who had boarded the bus later, and he was a living person. He did not know what was hiding in Chen Ge's shadow. Perhaps in his eyes, Chen Ge was no different from the other passengers.
Chen Ge wanted to get to the bottom of what had happened in Eastern Jiujiang, and he wanted to bring all the ghosts on the bus back to the Haunted House, but to his surprise, there were two living passengers on the bus that night.
He did not want to expose his secret, and it was not convenient for him to do anything out of line before two living people. Therefore, he changed his plan and kept a low profile for now. When they reached Li Wan City and the two living passengers got off the bus, he would have a good chat with the other passengers.
Sitting obediently in his seat, Chen Ge moved his eyes away from the man and looked out the window.
The rain fell on the glass. The buildings on both sides were already blurry, and the surroundings were dark. The bus on Route 104 that they were on was like a small island floating on a black ocean.
The car suddenly became quiet. The man realized that Chen Ge hadn't spoken since he finished talking to him. He thought he had said something wrong.
He put his hands on his knees and suddenly asked Chen Ge in a low voice, "Did he want to ride in this car to find your friend?"
Chen Ge's eyes gradually focused, and the expression on his face began to change. It was as if the man had seen through the secret in his heart. There was some uneasiness, some pain, and some self-blame.
Nodding slowly, Chen Ge looked at the man beside him. "How did you know?"
"The passengers on this bus have their own stories and secrets. Otherwise, they wouldn't have taken this bus after midnight."
"From your tone, it sounds like this isn't your first time taking this bus, right?" The corner of Chen Ge's mouth twitched, revealing the same smile as when he got on the car, but there was a trace of suppressed pain in his eyes, which made people feel sorry for him.
"When I go to work, I take Route 104. I've been on it for almost twenty years." The man spoke slowly like he had not talked to anyone for a long time. "At the time, the department was busy, and we did not have enough manpower. I often worked overtime, and I always took the last bus home. Initially, I liked taking the last bus because there were few people, and it was very quiet. However, as I took it more and more, looking at the dark buildings on both sides, I felt a little lonely. "
"Department? What did you do before this? "
"A doctor, a doctor from the burn unit." The man emphasized the term burn unit, and there was a ripple in his eyes like he was reminded of something.
"Burn unit?" Chen Ge had only interacted with psychologists before, so he did not know much about the burn unit.
"Surgery, skin grafting, rehabilitation, that is our job," the man said lightly, but Chen Ge heard the heaviness behind those few words.
The man also noticed the extremely suppressed pain in Chen Ge's eyes. He seemed to see his own shadow in Chen Ge, and subconsciously, he treated Chen Ge as someone like him.
After a short conversation, the two fell silent again. After a long time, Chen Ge said, "Are you taking this bus to look for someone?"
The man nodded lightly, and his gloved hand pressed on the scarf.
"Was this scarf knitted for you by your wife?" Chen Ge found the right time and pretended to ask casually.
Hearing Chen Ge's question, the man was stunned for a moment. He moved his hand away from the scarf and slowly shook his head.
"It's not a gift from your wife?" The truth was different from Chen Ge's speculation. He was curious. "Can you tell me your story?"
The rain became heavier, and the raindrops slammed against the window, creating a continuous sound.
The man was silent for a moment before he removed his mask and took a deep breath. "The patients in the burn unit are different from other departments. Their bodies are covered in cuts and bruises, their faces are unrecognizable, their skin is torn, and their flesh is torn. Here, they are everywhere. When I was doing my internship, I thought I had arrived at hell until I slowly got used to the bloody mess, the Foul Odor, and all kinds of strange smells.
"At the time, I thought that I would not have too many emotions when I faced patients.
"That was until I was thirty, and I met a fourteen-year-old patient.
She was still a child, and her back was seriously scalded by boiling water. I used half an hour to separate her clothes from her skin.
"The girl was very quiet. She did not cry or make a fuss.
"To prevent the child's brain from being affected, I did not use general anesthesia. When I separated her clothes from her skin, the child kept her eyes open and looked at me.
"Her back and her face were two extremes. I comforted her like how I comforted other patients.
"After the wounds were dealt with, I found the person who had sent her to the hospital. I planned to give him some instructions, but after some questioning, I realized that it was a neighbor who had sent her to the hospital, and the injuries on her body were not due to an accident. They were the doing of her parents.
"I called the police." When the man spoke, he would occasionally cough. His physical condition was very poor.
"The girl's father had serious violent tendencies, and her mother was deaf and mute. She was weak.
"The police detained and educated her father for a month. In the end, it was her mother who went to the police station to plead for mercy. After all, the whole family depended on her father to support them.
"While she was treating the girl, I stayed with her. The child was like a small white flower that bloomed by the roadside. Accompanying her made me, who had gotten used to cruelty and Foul Odor, feel a trace of happiness that I had not felt in a long time.
"One day, two months after she was discharged, I suddenly received a call from a stranger. It was her voice on the other end.
"Unable to endure her father's drunken rampage, she ran away from home.
"I took her in and hid it from the police and her family.
"I knew that I might have done something wrong, but I couldn't imagine what would have happened to her if I had sent her back."
At this point, the man paused. Seeing as there was no change in Chen Ge's expression, he continued. "When she was twenty, she confessed to me.
"That year, I was thirty-six years old. In order to skip the process of dating, we held a wedding just for the two of us."
"I spent the happiest five years with her, but I was also under unimaginable pressure.
"When I was forty-one, her parents found her. They insulted and beat her up. They made a scene at school and then at the hospital where I was staying.
"Life changed so quickly. Gossip is a fearful thing. I could accept it, but she gave up.
"That day, when I took the last bus home, I called her many times, but no one answered.
"When I returned home, there was a meal on the table and a long letter that she had written for me.
"In the end, I found her in the bathroom. Her body was soaked in the water, and she was no longer breathing."
The man's face was frighteningly white. His coughing intensified, and Chen Ge reached out to pat him on his back.
"Thank you." The man did not put on the mask, but the tiredness in his eyes could not be hidden. "Actually, every passenger on this bus has their own story. In the day, everyone is busy, hiding their hearts, but at night, these helpless, pained, and despairing people will take this bus to the last station."
From the man's words, he did not seem to know that the other passengers were ghosts, or perhaps he already knew, but he had mistaken them for humans.
"You know other things?"
"Too many. For example, the mute next to her. I've run into him before." There was a trace of sympathy in the man's voice. "He has a mental disability, and he cannot speak. He works as a porter at a supermarket. He is often bullied, but he still smiles and praises others."
"Then why would he get on this bus? A person with a pure heart shouldn't be targeted by those things. "Chen Ge was confused.
"He went to the last station to look for his daughter." The man did not have the heart to continue. "Due to some reason, someone found a group of ruffians outside the school to bully his daughter. She burned her palm with cigarettes, and her hair was pulled out. There were even worse things recorded on the surveillance. His daughter never told him, but in the end, she could not take it anymore and ended her life. "
"School bullying?" Chen Ge's eyes darkened. These things had indeed happened, and he had seen them before. "Did you call the police? How did the police deal with it? "
The man next to him had a mental disability, and his body was uncoordinated. He would trip when he walked, so it was very difficult for someone like him to defend his rights.
"Call the police?" The man's lips cracked into a smile. "This father, who was born with a mental defect, couldn't speak, and couldn't even walk properly, knocked out the gangsters and the culprit and locked them up in an abandoned building in Eastern Jiujiang. Then, he poured gasoline over them and burned them all."
"His body is weak, and he has a mental disability. How did he do all this on his own?"
"The police could not figure it out, so even now, they still haven't caught the culprit."
The doctor and Chen Ge turned to look at the man at the same time. The man looked rather uneasy, and he smiled dumbly at the two of them.
"Using violence to control violence will leave more problems in the future. A heart that is already broken from the pain will not be able to withstand the pressure of revenge. He might go from one extreme to another." Chen Ge could not comment on the father's actions. If he was in the father's shoes, he could not guarantee what he would do.
"An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. I think that's fair. Not just him, I've seen people with worse conditions on this bus, "the doctor said casually. The doctor from the burn unit said casually, "There was a time when it was raining heavily. After I got on the bus, I saw a young man in a suit and leather shoes. He was well-dressed and looked different from the other passengers, but who would have known that he was a complete lunatic?"
"What has he done?"
"The young man was a wedding host. He had been in the business for a few years, and he had hosted hundreds of weddings. Finally, it was time for his wedding. He dressed in a suit to welcome his bride, but on the way back, he got into a car accident.
The bride could not be saved. Even though his life was spared, his face was ruined.
"The wedding company fired him, and he changed his career to become a funeral designer. When people found him, he would help them design funerals, and when no one was around, he would look after the graveyard.
"That's quite normal, but in the subsequent conversation, he inadvertently revealed a piece of information."
"In the dead of night, he would help the dead bodies pull up their Yin fate, match them for Minghun, and then host the ceremony himself."
The man's words sounded scary. "He got on the bus to search for his wife, and then he planned to hold a special wedding."
After hearing the stories from the burn doctor, the mentally challenged father, and the funeral designer, Chen Ge realized that this last bus on Route 104 was different from what he had imagined. This bus seemed to have become the path for the living people of Jiujiang to enter the shadows of the city. Many people used it to search for their last hope.
Chen Ge did not know how to explain it to the doctor. Everyone treated this bus as their last hope, but they were destined to fail because the final destination of this bus was made up of the deepest despair and pain.
Chen Ge even suspected that the culprit in Eastern Jiujiang had created this bus to collect despair and other negative emotions.
The Society of Strange Tales kept creating ghost stories to collect despair and negative emotions. The ghosts behind the door needed these things. Other than that, only those who were controlled by despair and pain could become the ghosts' vessel.
There were ghosts on the last bus. They came to the last stop with their last hope, but what awaited them was another world of endless despair.
I can't let something like this happen again. Looks like I'll have to drive this bus away. Perhaps I can create a new route that leads directly to the Haunted House.
These abnormal living passengers reminded Chen Ge of the game he had played at Fan Cong's house.
In that game, there were not only Specters and Red Specters, but there were also many crazed murderers. Chen Ge suspected that those murderers were the living passengers on Route 104.
The whole town is filled with ghosts and murderers. The culprit in Eastern Jiujiang is much crazier than the Society of Strange Tales.
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