Chapter 970: Chapter 970: The Ninth-Layer Nightmare Night Bus
“Alright, alright, there’s no one else here, stop acting,” Huang Ying said as he entered the building shrouded in thick fog. His resolute deanor and cool aura instantly collapsed as he looked at Han Fei with a speechless expression.
At that mont, Han Fei was still imrsed in his role, looking at Huang Ying with eyes full of devotion and admiration.
“You’re overdoing it, aren’t you? This is too much…” Huang Ying felt that even with a master-level acting mask, he wasn’t as convincing as Han Fei. It was only at tis like this that he rembered Han Fei’s real job was being an actor.
“Before you arrived, I already cleared the eighth level of the nightmare. Because I used forbidden power in the nightmare, it is now fully targeting . Are you sure you want to enter the ninth level of the nightmare with later?” Han Fei grabbed Huang Ying’s arm, “Since you’re already here, why not give it a try?”
“Let’s try it, then.” Huang Ying and Han Fei walked side by side, passing through the first floor’s lobby and into the stairwell, step by step moving upward.
“The shrine of dreams is on the top floor, and each ti you clear a nightmare, you get one step closer to it.”
As they reached the corner of the second floor, a feeling of weightlessness hit them, and both Han Fei and Huang Ying were swallowed by endless darkness.
A scorching wind blew across their cheeks, and as Han Fei and Huang Ying opened their eyes, they were facing a two-story building engulfed in flas.
Not far from the building, there was a man dressed rather abnormally, carrying a barrel of gasoline as he rushed towards the sea of fire.
“He’s not trying to save the fire, is he?” Huang Ying pointed at the man, “Should we stop him?”
“No need, let’s just watch and see what happens.”
The gasoline barrel was thrown into the sea of flas, soon followed by an explosion; the building’s roof was blown apart, all the windows shattered, and fragnts were everywhere in the sky!
“Hahaha! Delightful!”
The man’s fingers were also burned, but he didn’t care at all. He picked up a fire ax nearby and smashed it into the flower pot outside the building.
After destroying everything, he sat in the middle of the courtyard, watching the burning house like a child admiring fireworks.
“Beautiful, absolutely beautiful!”
After resting for a mont, the man grabbed the fire ax and turned around, spotting Han Fei and Huang Ying by the roadside, “What are you looking at?! Want to call the police? This is my house! I’ll burn it however I like!”
“If you suddenly saw soone burning their house down while walking down the street, you’d stop and watch too,” Han Fei said casually. “Is your house haunted? Why are you burning it down?”
“Because I want to!” The man had an air of lawless abandon, “You two don’t seem like good people either, want to escape here with ?”
“Escape?” Han Fei looked around. Apart from the burning house right in front, the surrounding area of the ninth level nightmare was completely drowned in darkness. Based on his previous experience, players can’t enter pure darkness, so to explore other places they would have to follow the madman.
“If you don’t leave, you might end up stuck here forever, trapped in this cage, becoming a prisoner of life.” The man’s words seed to carry a deeper aning.
He carried the axe to the roadside, getting into the only car there.
“The ninth level nightmare should be larger than the eighth; we can’t be trapped at the starting point, let’s follow him.” Han Fei and Huang Ying opened the back door and got in.
“Great, having the two of you for company on this late-night trip ans it won’t be lonely.” The man placed the fire ax on the front passenger seat and turned the car’s stereo to maximum, “Life is short, indulge when you can, don’t wait until you’re old, can’t party anymore, and end up crying alone in a nursing ho.”
“But what does that have to do with you burning your own house?” Huang Ying, entering a nightmare for the first ti, didn’t quite understand.
“I’m saying goodbye to the past! That house was filled with the garbage of my life. Only by burning it can I be reborn!” The man handed the tablet from the car to Han Fei, “Pick any song you want to listen to, don’t hold back, since we t by chance, my car is your ho!”
Opening the playlist, Han Fei glanced at it roughly – “It’s a Misunderstanding”, “It’s Not What You Think”, “Just a Simple Drink”, “I Got Drunk and Don’t Rember”, “Think What You Want, I Can’t Help It”…
“Your playlist has quite a story.” Instead of selecting a song, Han Fei quickly searched for other information; apart from so gas, the tablet was filled with pictures of a girl, but her face was obscured by various layers.
“Saying it has a story is an understatent, it’s downright heart-wrenching! I’m such a fool!” The man cursed, “Let’s not talk about the past, what are your nas? We should at least have sothing to call each other.”
“I’m Han Fei, and this is my brother, Huang Ying.”
“One nad Han, the other Huang; your story doesn’t seem simple either.” The man’s personality was wild, and he spoke very directly, “I’m Zhang Mingli, a high-level network engineering designer, a mber of the Xinhu Photography Enthusiasts Association board, and I’ve even participated in teaching support, teaching language, music, and moral education.”
“You teach moral education?” Han Fei glanced at the fire ax on the front passenger seat, his expression odd.
Huang Ying, however, remained calm because he knew that even soone like Han Fei, the ‘Midnight Butcher’, had done a stint as a patrol teacher, so it wasn’t too hard to understand that a moral education teacher might carry a fire ax around.
“Damn it, I’m very civilized, okay?” Zhang Mingli argued loudly. He was about to reason with Han Fei when he suddenly saw an old man wearing a burial robe on the road in the distance.
The old man leisurely walked from the roadside to the middle of the road, and when he saw the car coming, not only did he not dodge, he stopped directly.
Zhang Mingli’s reaction was also straightforward. He slamd down the accelerator; this guy had just burned down his house, seemingly with no intention of living anymore.
The car speed suddenly soared, the night wind howled, and Zhang Mingli had no intention of slowing down!
“Calm down! Worst case, I’ll pay for the extortion!” Huang Ying was a bit anxious, and next to him, Han Fei had silently fastened the seat belts for both of them.
“What extortion? This road is often haunted. How could soone wearing a burial robe running in the middle of the road at midnight be human? It must be a ghost!” Zhang Mingli accelerated again, and the car rushed forward like a mad beast.
As the car got closer and closer, the old man in the burial robe finally beca frightened. At the last mont, he couldn’t care about anything else and rolled to the side like a mule.
“Are you blind?! Can’t you see there’s soone on the road? Driving so fast, are you rushing to reincarnate?” With the burial cap crooked on his face, the makeup on the old man’s face was soaked with cold sweat.
Hearing the old man’s insults, Zhang Mingli didn’t hold back at all. He slowed down, rolled down the window, and stuck his head out of the car: “**** you, you extorting old dog! Call you *****! Hit you dead *****! Get lost ****! You ****!”
Zhang Mingli’s attack was extrely fierce, hard enough to turn the face of the old man in the burial robe, who had been covered with white foundation, black with anger.
“I’ve encountered this old man three tis already, and every ti he extorts . I suspect this old geezer rembers my license plate number! I can’t take it anymore!” Zhang Mingli grew angrier as he spoke. He braked, opened the car door, and rushed out with a fire axe: “Co on! Say one more word of insult and let hear it! Don’t run!”
Han Fei and Huang Ying sat in the car, watching Zhang Mingli chasing an old man in a burial robe down the night road with a fire axe.
“Is this the ninth layer of nightmare?”
“How should I put it? This layer is a bit different from the previous nightmares I’ve passed.”
A few minutes later, Zhang Mingli returned, breathless: “That old bastard runs quite fast, no wonder he dares to extort; he’s got skills.”
Restarting the car, Zhang Mingli continued driving forward.
Sitting in the back seat, Han Fei glanced at the navigation. Zhang Mingli wasn’t driving aimlessly; he had a destination. Han Fei was a bit curious about where this journey would end.
“Why aren’t you two talking? We just t, and now it’s a heated mont, why is everyone silent?” Zhang Mingli seed to dislike the quiet, even to the point of fearing silence.
The driver was in an extrely unstable ntal state, so Huang Ying truly had no mind to speak now.
Han Fei recalled the clues he’d seen in the car and casually said: “Actually, I’m very confused right now, about life, about love; I often feel perplexed and have been suffering from insomnia for months.”
“Isn’t that a coincidence? Professionally matched! I can counsel you; I was a moral education teacher before.” Zhang Mingli laughed: “At your age, people generally only worry about two things: first, lack of money, and second, lack of love.”
“Indeed, I have so troubles with love.”
“Go ahead, is it that the person you like doesn’t like you? Or the person you like ran off with soone else? Or did she betray you?” Zhang Mingli was driving with one hand and lighting a cigarette with the other.
“Actually, I’ve had eleven girlfriends.”
“How many?!” Zhang Mingli almost bit the cigarette in half; this wasn’t the story he wanted to hear.
“Eleven.” Han Fei nodded, fully getting into character, while Huang Ying turned his head to look out the car window, not daring to say another word.
“Then what the hell are you worried about! You’re banned from listening to my playlist!” Zhang Mingli was no young man, but his ntal state now was very “pure.”
“Among them are my subordinates, my superiors, school teachers, and even my childhood sweetheart…”
“Alright, alright, stop introducing them.” Zhang Mingli waved his hand repeatedly: “Childhood sweetheart? I’ve never even heard such words; girls who grew up with used to call a village loser.”
“Although I’ve had so many girls, to this day I still don’t understand what love is. I don’t know what true love ans.” Han Fei was in the zone, and his emotions were conveyed through subtle facial expressions, a mix of sadness, pain, agony, and longing.
“People like you who can easily get love surely don’t understand what love is.” Zhang Mingli lit another cigarette: “I’ll tell you, love is pain! Love is hurt! The deeper you love, the more it hurts!”
“Has Teacher Mingli ever had similar experiences? What is your love like?” Han Fei asked the question he truly wanted to ask, the strange playlist, the photos of girls with their faces covered, the night car racing to a certain destination, all seed to hint at love.
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