I need to get out of this bus as soon as possible.
Having heard about the horrors of the Ash Domain on the player forum, Wang Zhifan quickly armed himself, then hurried from his seat through the passengers with their eyes shut, all frozen like wooden statues, making his way from the rear of the bus to the middle doors.
The bus was still moving forward at its previous speed, but Wang Zhifan could see that the driver had also fallen into that wooden-statue state and was completely unable to control the vehicle.
For safety's sake, he went to the driver's seat, stopped the bus himself, and prepared to press the door-opening button to the right of the steering wheel.
But just as Wang Zhifan's finger was about to press it, a cool, calm voice suddenly came from behind him.
"I advise you not to open the door right now."
Turning around, Wang Zhifan discovered that the speaker was a young girl sitting in the second row of the bus.
She wore a white baseball cap, beneath whose brim peeked neat, light-brown hair cut short to her ears. Her eyes were bright and calm, while her delicately featured face, adorned with only light makeup, radiated youthful charm.
Wang Zhifan remembered glimpsing this girl when he had come to the front of the bus earlier. He had naturally assumed she was another wooden statue like the rest, but it turned out she had been concealing her abilities. Without a doubt, she was also a player.
"Why can't I open the door?"
When someone tried to dissuade him, Wang Zhifan generally chose to hear them out. Whether he followed their advice afterward was another matter.
Seeing the young man in front ask for her reasoning, the short-haired girl, still seated steadily in her seat, slightly raised her head and replied to Wang Zhifan at the front of the bus.
"There may be danger outside. We should hold our ground and wait for rescue. This Ash Domain appeared in the city, so the Special Administration Bureau will definitely arrive soon."
Her reasoning sounded somewhat sensible, but Wang Zhifan did not particularly agree. After a brief moment of thought, he replied.
"I think we should get out of here as quickly as possible. Rather than place our hopes of escape on others, we should rely on ourselves."
After saying that, he prepared to press the door-opening button beside him.
But, by sheer coincidence, something unusual stopped Wang Zhifan from doing so at that very moment.
This time, however, it was not the short-haired girl on the bus trying to dissuade him. From the murky grayness outside, urgent and chaotic footsteps sounded from every direction at once.
"They're here."
The sign was obvious. The only two people on the bus who could still move freely both knew what it meant, yet neither of them panicked.
The short-haired girl in the white baseball cap rose unhurriedly from her seat and stepped into the center aisle. With a casual wave of her hand, the phantom of a stern woman with waterfall-like long hair appeared beside her, floating in the air.
"What class are you?"
Having given up on pressing the door button again, the young man gripped the Wolfslayer longblade and stood ready. As he watched the unclear scene outside through the bus windows, he asked his temporary companion.
There was no helping it. At this point, as the only two players on the bus, they had to work together to survive.
"Summoning class. Spirit Mage."
The girl replied at once.
"Warrior class. Blademaster."
Wang Zhifan also explained his situation, though anyone could have guessed it from the longblade in his hand.
As soon as their brief exchange ended, the strange sounds outside the bus drew near. Only then did they clearly see what was coming.
Humanoid monsters with blackish-purple skin, limbs bent like insect joints, and faces as savage as evil ghosts charged across the muddy ground on all fours, lurching toward their bus from every direction! At a glance, there seemed to be more than a hundred of them! Farther behind them, a unique individual roughly three times their size crawled closer at a leisurely pace. With its unhurried demeanor, it looked exactly like an overseer supervising its subordinates in battle!
"There are so many monsters?! And when did it turn into muddy ground outside? Wasn't this a city block?"
Wang Zhifan now understood just how bizarre the Ash Domain was. Moments ago, he had been riding this bus through the bustling city, but in the blink of an eye, everything had changed. Beneath the bus wheels was now an unfamiliar, desolate wasteland, and more than a hundred revolting, terrifying monsters had appeared all around them.
The situation instantly became extremely dire. There was no need to think further—he and the girl would have to fight these monsters to the death, or they would not live up to the monsters' frenzied rush to surround them.
"We need to hold out for as long as possible, until the Special Administration Bureau gets here."
In the tense, suffocating atmosphere, Wang Zhifan heard the short-haired girl reiterate her opinion. Then she quickly moved toward the rear of the bus, leaving only her Long-Haired Female Ghost-like summon behind.
"Alright. Let's cooperate and do everything we can to eliminate the monsters that get inside."
Wang Zhifan knew that charging outside now would be idiotic, so he immediately agreed to the girl's plan to hold their ground and wait for rescue.
The oppressive atmosphere lasted less than two more seconds before the overall calm was abruptly shattered.
A window in the middle of the bus was violently smashed from outside, and a black, hideous monster climbed up from beyond the bus, sticking its horrifying head inside!
In an instant, the Long-Haired Female Ghost-like figure that had been quietly floating in the bus flickered and appeared directly before the window. Its pale, slender claw swung out, and five translucent, razor-sharp nails sliced across the ugly head that had just entered through the window. The monster's head instantly split apart. Several pieces, splattering black viscous fluid, landed on the wooden-statue-like passengers inside the bus, while the rest fell outside.
Yet killing one monster meant little. Immediately afterward, more fearless monsters leaped high from the ground outside the window guarded by the Long-Haired Female Ghost, trying to jump through it. At the same time, shattering sounds came from the other windows of the bus as even more monsters chose to break in from elsewhere!
"There are too many of them! I'll guard the front! Use your summon to keep them occupied as much as possible!"
At this critical moment, Wang Zhifan did not impulsively charge toward a random window and start attacking. Instead, he immediately chose the best way for him and the girl to cooperate: he would act as her guard and protect the front, while the girl used her seemingly powerful Long-Haired Female Ghost summon to tie down and eliminate as many enemies as possible, reducing the pressure they faced.
Before you continue