He turned slightly and brushed nonexistent dust from his clothes. Holding his palms loosely together, he circulated his spiritual power and silently swept away the intense chill clinging to his body.
Then he reached out and turned the handle of the small door at the rear of the carriage. Its hinges gave a faint creak.
Cui Jiuyang stepped inside with his usual composure, as though he were merely walking from one carriage to another.
It was late at night, and most of the passengers had drifted into a stupor of sleep, leaning or lying in various positions. No one noticed how he had appeared in the carriage.
The train was packed, with people filling even the aisles and scarcely anywhere left to sit.
Cui Jiuyang paid it little mind and continued calmly toward the front of the carriage.
At the junction between two carriages, he found a relatively vacant spot with just enough room for him. He leaned against the cold sheet-metal wall and closed his eyes to rest.
The train traveled steadily along the rails, producing a monotonous, rhythmic clack-clack.
The carriage was quiet, broken only by occasional snores and muttered dreams.
Passengers seated beside one another instinctively leaned together, huddling for warmth against the cold seeping through the gaps.
This was the Changchun-to-Harbin section of the Chinese Eastern Railway. The entire railway was currently under Russian control.
Their treatment of Chinese people was hardly any better than that of the Japanese.
Although they did not openly distinguish between second-class and third-class tickets, there was not a single Russian face in these rudimentary, poorly equipped carriages at the very rear of the train. Clearly, certain forms of discrimination and class division remained implicit.
Cui Jiuyang had not fallen asleep.
With his divine sense turned inward, he continuously circulated the