**Chapter 136: Did She Really Pay?**
Where should I go? This is one of the three ultimate philosophical questions by Socrates, alongside “Who am I?” and “Where did I come from?”
Faced with such a question, Luxianbei thought for a long time and finally could no longer withstand the rising numbers on the taxi meter, which made her heart race, and made a decision.
“Uncle Zhang, could you please take me near the Cross-River Bridge?” Luxianbei said.
After thinking it over, she felt that, in her current state, there was nowhere else to go, only Gu Qiqi’s “den” could offer her shelter.
“Okay, no problem.” Uncle Zhang Shan replied nonchalantly, appearing calm on the surface while secretly criticizing his situation in his heart.
It’s clearly only a twenty-minute drive from University City to the Cross-River Bridge; why go the long way? After driving for an hour, I could have gone all around the city. Does my gas come free?
Even freeloaders have principles, right? What benefits are there to milking a sheep to d*ath?
Wait, when did I just assume that she wouldn’t pay for the ride? No, I must remember to ask her for the fare this time!
Uncle Zhang thought, and as if he was determined, he shifted gears and accelerated, heading towards the Cross-River Bridge.
During the speeding ride, Uncle Zhang occasionally glanced at Luxianbei through the rearview mirror.
He saw her half-leaning against the car door, resting her chin on her hand, looking outside the window with a heavy expression, lost in thought, and he couldn’t help but frown slightly.
Strange, why is she so quiet today? She’s not insisting on telling me another story. Zhang Shan thought.
His feelings towards the urban legend stories Luxianbei talked about were mixed.
He loved that he could gather high-quality material for his radio show, which attracted a lot of listeners.
But he hated that those stories were too eerie, making it sound like real events happening around him, leaving an unsettling feeling.
Time passed quickly as Uncle Zhang contended with whether to bring up the urban legend stories with Luxianbei, and around twenty minutes later, the taxi stopped near the Cross-River Bridge, and another question entangled in his heart.
This time, should he actively ask for the fare?
As Uncle Zhang was thinking, a voice floated from the back seat, “Uncle, can you wait for me here for a bit? I don’t have cash on me right now; I need to go back and get some before I can pay you for the ride.”
I’ll just dig through Gu Qiqi’s piggy bank and give Uncle Zhang the fare, right? I can’t keep not paying for the ride; it’s tough for him to drive late at night too. Luxianbei thought, and she could always pay Gu Qiqi back later.
Hearing that Luxianbei took the initiative to offer to pay for the ride, Uncle Zhang felt an inexplicable nervousness. He tightened his grip on the steering wheel and glanced out the window.
Outside, the asphalt road was wet from the rain, glimmering under the streetlights, and a thin white mist floated in the air. In the distance, the mountains and rivers appeared hazy.
All he could see was desolation; where could anyone possibly be living?
“This…” Uncle Zhang hesitated. “You live around here?”
“Yes! Just under the bridge!” Luxianbei looked seriously at Uncle Zhang and nodded.
Upon hearing this, Uncle Zhang’s expression instantly grew serious.
“The bridge, under the bridge? I remember that last month, a strange corpse was pulled out from under the Cross-River Bridge. She lives under the bridge…”
No way, Zhang! No matter what, you need to make sure you get the fare this time!
You can’t back down. How much gas money have you lost because of her over this month? It’s not going to work like this! Uncle Zhang thought fiercely.
When someone gets poor, what money won’t they dare to earn? As long as it’s not illegal, the money from urban legends can still be earned.
While Uncle Zhang was deep in thought, Luxianbei had already gotten out of the car and walked toward the side of the road, disappearing into the freshly washed bushes in the heavy rain.
After Luxianbei left, the desolate Langjiang Avenue quickly fell into silence at night. The white mist thickened in the distance, stirred by the cold wind, transforming into various eerie shapes, slowly drifting toward the parked taxi.
A chill passed over Uncle Zhang’s dark skin, causing him to shudder slightly, tightening his collar and silently rolled up the car window.
It felt almost as if, at the instant he rolled up the window, he heard a faint sound, like a car door opening and gently closing again.
The inside of the car grew colder, as if the hard exterior and glass couldn’t block out the frigid air outside.
Uncle Zhang faintly felt a hand lightly, silently resting on him and heard a sound of cool wind blowing from somewhere, amidst the scattered sound of the wind, there seemed to be secretive whispers speaking of things Uncle Zhang wanted no part of knowing.
“Gululu—!”
Feeling the unsettling phenomenon in the car, Uncle Zhang swallowed hard but didn’t dare to check through the rearview mirror for any abnormalities in the back seat.
His face turned pale, hands gripping the steering wheel tightly until his knuckles turned white, cursing inwardly.
d*mn it, I don’t even need to look to know something is definitely in the back seat!
Is this the outcome of asking that guy for the fare?
What should I do? Should I just skip the fare and take off quickly?
Just then, a rustling sound suddenly came from outside the window, sounding as if something was coming from the shadowy bushes.
Hearing that, Uncle Zhang silently released the handbrake, pressed the clutch, and shifted gears, then gently placed his foot on the gas pedal, ready to speed away at the first sign of trouble.
…
Luxianbei arrived at the third bridge arch under the Cross-River Bridge and dug out a large handful of change totaling 200 yuan from Gu Qiqi’s piggy bank, then turned back to the road by the bridge.
From a distance, she saw the back seat of the taxi crowded with “people.”
Those “people” were all ghostly pale figures, floating between reality and illusion, looking similar to the thin black shadow she saw at the Flower Language Sunshine Resort Hotel.
They twisted their bodies, sat in the back seat, their long necks stretching toward Uncle Zhang, curiously sizing him up with their malicious gazes, their hands and feet restless, stretching out their tongues to lick.
Seeing this, Luxianbei frowned. This should be the kind of incomplete urban legend mentioned in “The Book of Siye,” right?
When she was studying the types of urban legends in “The Book of Siye,” she saw relevant content. These seemingly ghostly forms without a fixed body mainly belong to incomplete urban legends. Their types differ slightly based on body color after the legend forms.
But if these things don’t turn into urban legends, won’t they cease to exist for long? Like mayflies, they live at dusk and d*e at dawn. Why are there suddenly so many of them?
Luxianbei thought, quickening her pace towards Uncle Zhang’s taxi.
Although incomplete urban legends are said to rarely cause substantial harm, the sheer number of those shadowy figures even caused the car tires to slightly deform.
In such serious “overload” conditions, if Uncle Zhang hurriedly drove away, an accident could easily happen.
As Luxianbei approached the taxi little by little, the eerie figures seemed to sense something, turning their gazes toward her and then freezing in place.
Seeing this, Luxianbei hesitated briefly, crossed her arms, and expressionlessly threw a highly intimidating glare at those figures in the car. The residual spirit energy fluctuation from her earlier battle surged, and a flicker of fiery light flashed in her eyes.
Then, unexpectedly, what happened next was not what Luxianbei imagined, where those shadowy figures would scatter in fear.
Instead, spots of light suddenly appeared on their bodies, and then those spots spread like paper ignited by fire, swiftly covering their pale forms. After a few breaths, accompanied by the illusory flicker of flame, those figures disappeared without a trace.
In the air, a faint sound of screaming drifted along with the breeze.
Luxianbei, “…”
This… should it not be that they simply died because I looked at them? Most likely, their time limit had reached, and they vanished on their own since things like that typically don’t last long.
She thought, shaking her head gently, retrieving her thoughts, stepping forward to knock on the driver’s side window and said softly, “Uncle, I’ve brought your fare.”
In the driver’s seat, Uncle Zhang, who had sensed something was off inside the car, remained in a highly tense state, completely unaware that Luxianbei had returned.
The moment the window glass was knocked on, he suddenly felt something taut in his brain snap in an instant with a “pop!” He didn’t dare to see what was outside the window, screamed and suddenly slammed on the gas, bolting out.
After driving a couple of hundred meters, he finally regained his composure, turned around cautiously, and slowly pulled up beside Luxianbei, staring at her through the window for a while. After confirming she wouldn’t suddenly become some terrifying monster, he slowly rolled down the window halfway.
Taking the large handful of change Luxianbei handed over, Uncle Zhang stuffed it into his pocket without counting, and just as he was about to roll up the window and leave, she stopped him.
“Uncle, wait a moment, there’s one more thing.”
Hearing this, Zhang looked at Luxianbei’s small hand resting on the window and suppressed his urge to escape, saying in a deep voice, “Speak.”
“I just wanted to give you something…” Luxianbei said, lowering the guitar bag on her shoulder, unzipping it to reach inside, after rummaging for a while, with a “whoosh!” she pulled out a chilling kitchen kn*fe.
Zhang, “!!!”
The silvery light from the kitchen kn*fe swept across his field of vision, instantly making beads of sweat form on his forehead, and his legs softened.
Luxianbei glanced awkwardly at the kitchen kn*fe in her hand and said, “Uh, sorry! Wrong one.”
Zhang, “…”
Luxianbei stuffed the kitchen kn*fe back into the guitar bag, rummaged again, and her eyes brightened as she pulled out two or three Talismans of Initial Spring Breeze, presenting them to Zhang.
“Uncle, I see you always drive at night, which can be quite dangerous, so I have a few protective charms here; they’re very effective, we’re familiar now, so please, you have to accept them!”
“…” Zhang stared hesitantly at the charms in Luxianbei’s hand, hesitated for a moment, nodded and said, “Thank you!” He then rolled up the window and slammed on the gas, speeding off.
Watching the taxi disappear into the distance, Luxianbei tilted her head to the side, muttering to herself, “Uncle Zhang is really an impatient person, always so hasty.”
…
At 1:30 a.m., in the western district of Huacheng, inside an old building.
After returning home with the taxi, the first thing Zhang did was not to start his radio broadcast but to turn on all the lights in the living room and spread out the cash Luxianbei had paid him on the table.
He sat on the sofa, resting his chin on his hands, staring intently at the pile of change as if afraid it would suddenly turn into ghost money.
Zhang was worried the money Luxianbei gave him would undergo some horrific change, so he skipped today’s radio broadcast and kept staring at the pile of cash for over three hours before he could finally rest easy.
“She actually really paid? And covered the fares from the last two times as well,” he thought…
“No, no, don’t let your guard down. It could be just a momentary reprieve, the calm before the storm. I need to wait until morning to check again.”
As he spoke, Zhang got up, found a glass jar, stuffed Luxianbei’s fare inside, tightened the lid tightly, and then placed it on the balcony, the spot with the best morning light.
I heard those dirty things are most afraid of sunlight; if this money dries up nicely without any changes, I can confirm there’s nothing fishy. Zhang thought.
…
That night, in the third arch of the Cross-River Bridge shanty.
Luxianbei lay on Gu Qiqi’s sofa, tossing and turning, unable to fall asleep. She didn’t know if it was because of the eerie sounds occasionally drifting in from outside or because she was worried about Gu Qiqi’s safety, or perhaps both.
Finding it hard to sleep, she decided to get up. Due to her previous experience, this time she only touched the electric switch once to turn on the light.
With the dim yellow light from the low-wattage bulb, she took the bamboo slips from the cedar chest, brought them in front of her, and carefully examined them under the light, not triggering any of the strange phenomena as she did the first time.
It was as if the mysterious power within the slips had completely vanished in just a few days.
At that moment, the bamboo slips were merely an aged artifact.
“Ah—!” After observing for a long time, Luxianbei sighed softly, putting down the bamboo slips and staring blankly at the ceiling.
The mysterious girl told me to find a way to enter the bamboo slips, but how would I know how to get in?
Now the slips aren’t reacting at all, perhaps they “ate” Gu Qiqi and are now in a state of hibernation after getting full.
I wonder if Gu Qiqi is still alive after being swallowed. Luxianbei thought, Gu Qiqi, you must stay alive! Otherwise, I won’t pay you back…
