"No wonder Tang Hai had strutted around in the fog and darkness for so long. Those monsters wouldn't hurt him at all..."
It clicked for Lin Xian. His suspicions back then had been right. Tang Hai must have been injured, and the smell of blood had drawn the zombies to bite him. Yet that was precisely how he had completed his evolution.
The thought made him regret not putting a bullet through the old bastard's head sooner. Now he had left a threat alive.
Still, he was glad he had chosen to repair the Close-In Defense Cannon to save their lives.
Kiki had already passed out. Lin Xian could never have dealt with both the Mist Spider and Feng Yuming on his own, let alone the overwhelming Corpse Tide. Fortunately, Tang Hai and Feng Yuming hadn't known how to operate the complicated Close-In Defense Gun System, and they hadn't taken any critical equipment from it. Otherwise, tonight would have been the end for him and Kiki.
Returning to the subject, Lin Xian looked at Kiki. "So do you know how to upgrade your own ability?"
To his surprise, Kiki gave a faint smile and shook her head. "I think I might be a Psychic Type or a Telekinetic Type. There isn't much information on either in the records. But I don't know how to upgrade my ability, or how to complete that 'ritual.'"
"As for you..." Kiki gave Lin Xian an odd look. "Honestly, I don't know what type you are. You can control machinery, so your ability should be a Functional Type. Abilities like that don't necessarily score high in Spirit Purge Value assessments, but the Angel Project calls them 'of immense strategic value.' Yours seems more like the No. 27 Inorganic Matter Control Type to me. But how can you also use Elemental Type abilities?"
Kiki frowned more deeply as she studied him. "Do you have more than one ability?"
"Take a guess..."
Lin Xian's face betrayed nothing, but a chill ran through him. He had a strong, inexplicable feeling that what he had... wasn't an ability at all.
What kind of ability came with a progress bar?
"One more thing," Kiki said. "Apparently, a tiny number of Espers have lost their abilities completely. Some of them were even King Kong level."
"Lost them completely? What does that mean?"
"How would I know? The records didn't say." Kiki pursed her lips. "All I know is that these Espers suddenly lost their abilities without any outside interference. The Research Bureau thought it might have something to do with their mindset or mental state, but they never found the real cause."
What Kiki had told him nearly overturned Lin Xian's understanding of the world. Only a few months had passed since the apocalypse shattered the old order, yet Espers had already become a vast group, one that was directly shaping humanity's chances of survival.
After everything that had happened that night, everyone was tired. To be safe, Lin Xian kept the train moving at a slow fifty kilometers per hour. Chen Sixuan stood watch in the Cockpit while he stayed there to rest.
"Kiki seems to have a lot of secrets," Chen Sixuan said as she watched him doze.
"Everyone has secrets. As long as she helps us, we don't need to pry."
"What... did she say to you just now?" Chen Sixuan's gaze wavered. She knew it was awkward to ask, but she couldn't contain her curiosity.
Lin Xian gave a soft snort without opening his eyes. "What else? She made me promise I wouldn't get intimate with her unless she wanted to."
"I see," Chen Sixuan said, her expression complicated.
She wasn't sure whether what had happened between her and Lin Xian counted as something she had wanted. She only knew she was glad he had saved her. By now, he was the only person she could rely on.
And he was a good man. His personality even seemed to be the kind she liked. Perhaps that was why the thought of being with him didn't bother her as much as it should have.
Was this the suspension bridge effect people talked about?
Oh, what am I thinking...
"Yesterday, dawn came at 16:26. We covered about fifty kilometers toward Beiwan Station. By my calculations, if we want to arrive by 16:00 tomorrow, we'll have to travel at least another 370 kilometers."
Chen Sixuan kept working through the figures in the Logbook. "But this stretch of the JY3365 detours around Qu Pass and Jade Pool. If we plot Star Abyss No. 3, Lu City, and Dingzhou against the straight line from Jiang City..."
"Teacher Chen."
Lin Xian interrupted her, his eyes half-closed. "Do you think Star Abyss No. 3 might not be the source of the Dark Tide?"
Chen Sixuan fell silent for a moment.
"I... don't know."
Geometrically speaking, if every Star Abyss was producing a Dark Tide, then they were all expanding across Blue Star at the same rate. Their radii would grow linearly over time.
"If the area each Star Abyss affects is fixed, there might still be pockets between them where humans can survive. But if the first Polar Night wasn't the end, and the second tide spreads farther, then it's only a matter of time before Polar Night covers all of Blue Star."
After Polar Night, networks and communications had collapsed. Ordinary people like them had no way to see what was happening across the world. They could only piece together clues from radio broadcasts.
Without Kiki, they wouldn't even have known that the Federal Government had classified Espers and drawn up a set of standards for them.
Lin Xian nodded uneasily. If that was true, there was nowhere left to run. Humanity would have to find a way to live in the dark.
Seeing the worry on his face, Chen Sixuan suddenly asked, "Student Lin, do you remember Jiang University's motto?"
Lin Xian looked at her, and they spoke together.
"Since the dawn of humanity, the struggle has never ceased!"
After a long moment, they smiled at each other.
The wheels were already turning. Everyone was fleeing the darkness and racing toward Dawn. Even if darkness swallowed the world forever, they could not give up the fight while one last spark of human life remained.
Lin Xian's resolve steadied. If he grew strong enough, he could survive even in a Long Night with no dawn in sight. That only strengthened his determination to turn the train into the ultimate fortress!
Whooo...
The fog ahead gradually thinned, and the train's lights reached farther into the open country. Lin Xian rose and looked at the outlines of the distant hills. Relaxing, he brought the train to a slow stop inside a tunnel.
"Why did you stop?" Chen Sixuan asked, puzzled.
She turned around, only for Lin Xian to sweep her up in his arms. Smiling, he said, "Teacher Chen, there's something else humanity has never stopped doing since its dawn: making new life."
"..."
Caught off guard in his arms, Chen Sixuan flushed bright red. She hurriedly avoided his gaze, her pale ears and neck blooming pink as peach blossoms in March.
"Weren't you exhausted...?"
Lin Xian carried her to the bed in Carriage 1. "I suddenly got my energy back."
The doors between the carriages were shut. Carriage 1 was now Lin Xian's private living space.
Chen Sixuan's cheeks burned as she murmured, "Oh... about that..."
"Is it a bad time?"
"N-no."
Chen Sixuan's skin was smooth and soft as jade. When Lin Xian pressed his lips to it, he caught her faint, alluring scent despite the apocalypse beyond the train.
A shiver ran down Chen Sixuan's back. His breath brushed cool against her skin, stirring a shameful longing she couldn't suppress.
She hid her face under the blanket and whispered, "Could you... get my bag? There's something inside."
"Okay."
"Mm... gently..."
The heavy train rested quietly beneath the dark sky. Beyond its thick armored shell lay the terrifying depths of the tunnel; inside, warm yellow light fell across a soft eiderdown bed, sheltering them from the world outside.
They clung to each other, crossing the last boundary between them. Their bodies moved together, rising and falling like a racing train, like a great ship breaking through the waves...
Night was black as ink. In Carriage 2, Lou Shasha slept soundly in the upper bunk. Below her, Kiki pressed a pillow over her head, her face burning as a strange rhythmic sound came through the wall. Gritting her teeth, she muttered curses and wished every misfortune she could think of on a certain scoundrel.
Tomorrow, I'm putting up the soundproof panels in Carriage 2 first. And I'm welding on an extra layer of steel!
New writer here—please keep reading and recommend this story!
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