"Ghost Head, what did you say?"
"Nothing..."
"Forget it, when we get there, you can do whatever you like. I’m not getting involved. Once we arrive, we’ll go our separate ways."
Crooked Neck said this, and the others in the car remained silent. The atmosphere inside fell into a tense stillness once again, and this ti, no one broke the dead silence.
The long-abandoned car rattled along the weed-covered road, its worn-out components screeching consistently as it traveled alone toward the distance.
...
Greenery spread across the mountains and fields. The once-proud skyscrapers, untouched by human feet for years, had beco dilapidated under the ravages of ti. Man-made decorations had peeled away, and stubborn vines climbed upward bit by bit, ultimately engulfing the bustling streets. The walls inside crumbled naturally over ti, accumulating into heaps of dust, though no one could see what lay within from the outside.
These plants made the buildings appear swollen, as if fused with the earth to form small hills. Given enough ti, these remnants of human civilization would morph completely into so-called towering mountains. Any intelligent beings who stumbled upon them in the future might never guess that long ago, there existed such a civilization—now slowly crumbling and vanishing with the passage of ti after the calamity struck.
Amid these hills, tall walls still stood visibly proud. The gates in the middle had been violently forced open, and countless people stread out. Before long, a long procession ford outside, accompanied by sporadic pulses of laser gunfire, cutting through the air and splattering blood wildly, like black ink spattered on the ground.
People turned toward the "execution platform," but no sounds escaped their lips. Heads lowered, gait hastened, they marched numb and hopeless toward destinations devoid of any promise.
So raised their heads. At dawn, they could still see a clear sky, but the clarity did not last long. No one paid much attention. When they looked up at the sky again, the once-blinding sun had been swallowed by thick clouds.
Now and then, patches of thinner clouds let sunlight seep through, illuminating the ground and falling on people’s bodies. Yet, winter had not yet fully receded. The sunlight carried no warmth, instead feeling cold, like the air around them.
A weapon-toting gang of murderous robbers walked past the line of people, occasionally stopping to call out survivors who seed less disheveled than others.
"Hey, you few over there—co over here!"
The silence was shattered by the robbers’ rough voices. As their shouts echoed, the procession looked around, trying to match faces to the robbers’ targets. Soon, a hesitant group of survivors spoke up, "Us... is it us?"
"Yes, you. Get over here and kneel down!"
The ard robbers aid their guns at the unlucky survivors. Realizing they were indeed being called, the group stepped forward and imdiately dropped to their knees! Among them were n and won, young and old, although most were elderly or won. Adult n were scarcely seen, perhaps as a result of long-term malnutrition. The survivors were thin and feeble, just like the others in the surrounding crowd. After all, in this destitute situation, ordinary people who weren’t fleeing in cars were rarely from affluent families.
"Please... let us go. We have nothing left. We were robbed just monts ago—if you don’t believe us, search us!"
Around them, the other people watched coldly, maintaining their silence. Countless gazes turned toward the scene with varied emotions—so sympathetic, others indifferent, and even a few holding a tinge of schadenfreude. They did not see the survivors as pitiable; most harbored a sense of relief that they themselves had not been singled out.
The robbers paid no attention to the survivors’ pleas. One thief, seemingly their leader, sneered cruelly, "Nothing, huh? Search them all! If we find even a scrap, send them on their way!"
Oddly, the survivors visibly relaxed. If finding sothing ant being killed, then not finding anything should spare them, right?
They hadn’t lied—everything on them had long been snatched away. Whether they were robbed once or multiple tis afterward made no difference, as long as their lives remained intact.
At the leader’s command, the other robbers rushed forward, rifling through the survivors’ tattered clothes. Just as they claid, there was indeed nothing—no valuables, no supplies, nothing left but hollow desperation. The robbers ca up empty-handed.
"Boss, they really don’t have a damn thing on them!"
The leader had watched the search the entire ti. Seeing the lack of results made him increasingly agitated.
"F*cking hell, a bunch of penniless rats!"
"You’re just gonna let them go?"
The leader cursed loudly, and his underlings grumbled in frustration. This line of work had yielded diminishing returns with ti—profit was slim now compared to when they first started. The worsening situation gnawed at their patience, especially since other gangs prowled nearby. Even robbery operated on a first-co basis; the early birds took the at, and the latecors could only scavenge scraps.
"Let them go?! Hell no! Kill them all!"
Infuriated, the leader snarled his decision loud enough for everyone to hear. His words sent a shiver through the dood survivors, their faces instantly pale with terror.
"Boss, please! Spare us! We already have nothing left—we just want to leave this place alive!"
One elderly man among the survivors, trembling, crawled closer to the leader, bowing his head until it hit the ground with a heavy thud. His voice cracked with tears and desperation as he begged.
Yet the robbers remained indifferent to his pleas. As so of them raised their laser weapons to execute the survivors, a jarring screeching sound broke the tension, capturing everyone’s attention. Heads turned swiftly toward the noise’s origin—a rusted car rattling its way toward them. The cacophony ca from the vehicle’s tiworn chassis grinding during its movent.
"It’s a car!"
The sight of the automobile instantly ignited a fla of greed in the crowd.
The survivors stuck here were trudging on foot while cars had long beco precious commodities, either seized or destroyed during panic-stricken escapes. Even though this car appeared in shambles, the fact it could move made it invaluable compared to using bare feet.
The robbers, rifles still in hand, lowered their weapons as their eyes locked onto the vehicle.
As the car rolled to a halt, the gang leader motioned for his n to follow him as he stepped forward toward the stationary car.
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