Yang Yong shook his head, casting aside that dispiriting thought.
He turned to look at the survivors inside the bus. Every one of them looked listless, their eyes vacant. Clearly, the sudden turn of events had scared them out of their wits.
These people were all ordinary humans. He wondered whether any of them could awaken Sequence Transcendence.
Perhaps Cao Xianming had already calculated their chances of awakening?
Yang Yong cleared his throat, abruptly raising his voice with an unquestionable authority. "Listen up, everyone! I've contacted the captain! He said we can survive if we follow the Blood Moon!"
He paused, sweeping his gaze over the crowd. He raised the Little Golden Flood Dragon Scissors slightly, their edges gleaming coldly. "For the rest of the journey, I don't expect you to help. But if anyone dares to hold us back-"
He left the rest unsaid, but his meaning could not have been clearer.
"Yes, yes! We'll do whatever you say, Mr. Yang!"
"We absolutely won't hold you back!"
The survivors nodded frantically in fear, not even daring to breathe too loudly.
Yang Yong's lips curled in satisfaction.
That was exactly the effect he wanted.
Who had room for so many bleeding hearts in an apocalypse?
If someone benefited him, he would lend them a hand;
if they offered him no benefit, he would cut them down and be done with it.
Even another facial expression would be a waste.
He sat in the front row and closed his eyes, trying to calm himself.
He had planted the One-Yang God-Sealing Banner on the roof of the bus, where it could absorb the Blood Moon's energy to the greatest extent.
His cultivation was only at the beginner level of Qi Induction. He could not even perform the most basic task of opening his meridians. Put plainly, he was all show, only a little stronger than an ordinary person.
Without the Blood Moon's energy, he could not even activate the Little Golden Flood Dragon Scissors!
Making the most of this safe moment to absorb energy was what mattered!
He had thought another fierce battle would await them after entering the grassland, but the bus drove for several hours without incident.
Only when the horizon began to pale with dawn did the bus slowly enter a sea of flowers.
It was a blood-red sea of flowers, their blooms alluring and lush. Their petals resembled open palms, giving off an eerie sheen beneath the Blood Moon's light.
Other Shore Flowers!
Yang Yong's pupils abruptly contracted.
Weren't these the flowers said to bloom in the realm of the dead?
Just what was this place?
Could it be the Netherworld Small World?
The thought startled him the moment it surfaced.
But on second thought, even transmigration had happened. Why would a realm of the dead be impossible?
"They're so beautiful..."
One survivor could not help exclaiming, his voice full of fascination.
Yet as Yang Yong looked at the Other Shore Flowers outside the window, he only sneered inwardly.
Beautiful?
You'll be crying soon enough!
In the apocalyptic materials he had read, highly venomous demonic snakes often lurked beside Other Shore Flowers!
He wondered whether the Other Shore Flowers in this world would be the same.
Yang Yong went on full alert, watching their surroundings warily.
But even at the very last moment before dawn, no danger appeared.
Instead, as daylight approached, those alluring Other Shore Flowers withdrew into the ground in unison, like an ebbing tide.
In an instant, the sea of flowers became a stretch of blood-red earth, looking no different from an ordinary red-earth plateau.
"We... we survived..."
Yang Yong slumped in his seat. His nerves, taut all night, suddenly relaxed, and drowsiness washed over him like a tide. His head tilted to one side, and he fell fast asleep.
When he woke again, it was because Old Zhao was shaking him.
"Mr. Yang, wake up!"
Yang Yong opened his eyes groggily and rubbed his temples. "What time is it?"
"Four in the afternoon. It'll be dark again in another two hours."
Old Zhao's voice carried a trace of exhaustion.
Yang Yong abruptly sat upright, instantly wide awake.
Old Zhao handed him a bottle of water and two compressed biscuits. "No one dared to light a fire, so we can only fill our stomachs with these."
In truth, they had nothing to burn, either!
Yang Yong took the water and biscuits and wolfed them down.
The place where they had parked was barren. The Other Shore Flowers, the only things they could have burned as fuel, had long since retreated underground. They could not get even a spark going.
Most of the survivors were still fast asleep. After last night's terrifying ordeal, they were utterly exhausted.
Only after finishing the biscuits did Yang Yong feel a little more alert.
Old Zhao sat beside him the whole time, hesitating to speak.
"If you have something to say, say it." Yang Yong glanced at him.
After a long hesitation, Old Zhao finally forced out the words. "Mr. Yang... the bus is running out of fuel."
"We can drive another thirty kilometers at most... We won't be able to keep moving tonight."
The mineral water bottle in Yang Yong's hand crumpled with a crack.
He jerked his head up, his eyes filled with disbelief.
Running out of fuel?
Earlier, Yang Yong had wondered why he had never seen the bus refuel.
Only later had he discovered that the bus had been fitted with a large fuel tank, and even the luggage compartment underneath was packed with gasoline cans.
Now...
Even this bus, a "mobile gas station," was out of fuel?
Where were they supposed to find fuel in this eerie wilderness, miles from anywhere?
His head buzzed, his mind going blank.
The bus's fuel was almost gone.
Yang Yong's expression grew grave.
The One-Yang God-Sealing Banner could indeed propel the bus, but its drawback was plain to see.
The larger the vehicle it propelled, the slower it went.
With a vehicle the size of the bus, the One-Yang God-Sealing Banner could manage twenty or thirty kilometers an hour at most.
That speed was nowhere near enough to deal with sudden dangers in an apocalypse!
Just as Yang Yong stared blankly ahead, racking his brains for a solution, a sharp-eyed survivor outside the bus suddenly cried out.
"Mr. Yang! Look over there! Is that a house?"
A house?
Yang Yong froze.
Would anyone live in this godforsaken place?
He hurried off the bus and looked in the direction the survivor was pointing.
Sure enough, a solitary building stood on a small earthen rise in the distance!
He glanced at the sky. There were still two hours until dark.
Yang Yong made an immediate decision, turning to shout at Old Zhao, the driver. "Old Zhao, let's go! Let's check out that house!"
"Sure thing!"
Old Zhao nodded and immediately called everyone in the convoy back onto the bus.
The engine roared. With nothing obstructing its path, the bus soon stopped in front of the building.
But only up close did they realize that it was no house.
It was clearly a ruined temple!
The temple was dilapidated. Most of the plaque above its entrance had broken away, and not one person present could recognize the two crooked, damaged characters that remained.
Yang Yong studied the damaged characters for a long while, barely making out the outline of the last one. The two before it looked like "Divine Lady"?
Of course, that was only his guess. No one could be sure.
The ruined temple was small, and everyone filed inside.
The moment they stepped through the entrance, they all froze.
Enshrined in the center of the main hall was a statue as tall as a person.
It was not one of the usual Buddhist or Taoist deities, but a woman wearing a bright red bridal veil!
Yang Yong's gaze fell on the statue, and his vision suddenly blurred.
An illusion sprang up.
Around him was a room furnished in an antique style.
A large double-happiness character was pasted on the window.
There was a woman dressed in bridal robes.
His attention shifted to that red veil.
The next moment.
He seemed to see the veil slowly lift, revealing a face of breathtaking beauty.
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