Forces of Temptation

... Nanzhou has a headache.

He didn't wake up naturally just now, he was sleeping on the window, and after being frightened by the girl's scream, he bumped his head against the latch.

It hurts.

After waking up, there was a strange colored big mushroom head in front of his eyes.

It took Nanzhou a while to figure out that he was not dreaming.

"second--"

Mushroom was very satisfied with the dead silence in the carriage, and the undulating arc of the mushroom umbrella seemed light and joyful.

"Among you, three are ghosts."

The language is appalling.

Mushroom ignored the dead faces of everyone, and pointed to the violator who was lying on the seat, and the white pulp had slowly flowed to his shoulder: "Coincidentally, this one was not just now."

"A friendly reminder, when the ghost's head explodes, it is a white mushroom."

The deceased was listed as a textbook by Mushroom, but in just a few seconds, the body was no longer visible.

Gray mycelium extended from his rapidly decomposing and shriveling hands and feet, and burrowed into the seams of the car, the shelf, and the towel on the seat.

They stretched thinly and densely to where the blood spattered, like a conscientious scavenger.

Mushroom is very satisfied with everyone's expressions at the moment.

Until it caught a glimpse of Nanzhou from the corner of its eye.

There was a striking red mark at the end of the eye on the side of Nan Zhou sleeping with his pillow on the window, and a few strands of his half-curly mid-length hair curled up from sleep.

He's still looking at it.

The look of curiosity far greater than fear.

... Mushroom somehow felt offended.

Nanzhou noticed that Mushroom was looking at him, so he reminded him kindly: "It's the second time."

mushroom:"……"

It shook the canopy unhappily, adjusted the brim of the hat with its little short hands angrily, and turned the canopy completely to the Nanzhou side.

"Third, ghosts, like you, have basic common sense, normal thinking ability, exactly the same physiological structure and physiological reactions, so players can skip the step of hurting each other and start your judgments in a civilized manner."

Speaking of this, Mushroom tried to put the two short hands together, but only the stubby fingertips barely touched together.

"However, players don't need to feel frustrated so early!"

"You are not helpless in the face of ghosts."

"To put it simply, each of you has the right to vote!"

"Three people can form a team."

"As long as there are three people—of course, it doesn't matter if there are too many people—you can rely on the judgment of the team to identify a suspected "ghost"."

"After the whole team agrees on the suspect, just use this thing, in the suspect's hand—"

Mushroom took out a silver bracelet shaped like handcuffs, and took out another one that was exactly the same. After aligning the two obvious grooves on the bracelet, they touched it lightly.

"drop--"

The wristband made a short mechanical sound of swiping the card for boarding.

Mushroom clapped happily again.

The wristband used as a demonstration turned into two puffs of silver powder.

"As long as three players stamp on the same bracelet, the owner of the bracelet will be automatically judged as a 'ghost'."

"Of course, the system will determine whether you are actively stamping or passively stamping."

"There is no upper limit to the number of passive stamps for each player."

"Before the game ends, ghosts cannot kill players by means other than voting~"

"You will go through six tunnels before this car reaches the finish line."

"You can understand that there are six rounds of voting, a total of six times."

"After entering the tunnel, one round of voting will automatically end; out of the tunnel, the next round of voting will automatically open."

"Next, it's time for you to verify whether this round of judgment is correct~"

"After coming out of the tunnel, will there be more white mushrooms in the car, or colorful mushrooms?"

"It depends on the choice of each player."

"When the finish line is reached, all the ghosts are caught, and the player wins~"

"On the contrary, the prohibition on the ghost will be revoked~"

"It's a pity, if the players just now didn't leave the instance without permission, you might have eliminated all the ghosts in the first round."

When Mushroom was talking enthusiastically, the annoying player next to him actually spoke.

He twisted his cuffs and said in a low voice, "Don't make trouble."

"That's not an edible mushroom."

mushroom:"……"

Nan Zhou raised his head and politely gestured "I'm sorry, please continue" to Mushroom.

...subtle and irritating.

The evidence is that the speed of the mushroom's speech has been accelerated, and the weird particle particles are no longer added.

"When the entire army of ghosts is wiped out, this bracelet will become an ordinary prop, and I will leave it for you as a souvenir."

"Excessive violence is not prohibited in this game."

"But I have to remind you again that voting is still the fastest and most effective way."

"When the game is over, the system will accumulate points based on your contribution, which determines your next game experience."

"Use your brains. It's an absolutely fair game."

"The trial level experience time is one hour."

"So……"

"Have a nice game."

With a thud.

The mushroom quickly shrank into a flat light in the center and disappeared without a trace.

Crash.

With the disappearance of the mushroom, the silver bracelet fell to the ground, rolling and bouncing all over the ground like the balloon celebrating its debut.

There was silence in the car.

Under the snow-white skylight outside the window, eight people and three ghosts sat inside the closed bus.

Even though it was daytime, everyone felt as if they were immersed in a cold pool.

The first to break the silence was the man in the entire carriage who took action first.

He walked to the front row and picked up a bracelet with his body.

Everyone took away their own bracelets, but did not dare to wear them, and observed each other.

Until the silver-haired scorpion braid tentatively put the bracelet on his wrist.

When picking up the bracelet, someone took a chance and checked the driver's seat.

Unsurprisingly, the only possible identification of the original occupant of the vehicle was the driver who had disappeared without a trace.

On a bus without a driver, they were flying towards an unknown place at a speed of [-] kilometers.

This discovery undoubtedly aggravated the stagnation of the atmosphere in the car.

"Don't waste time."

Because he was the first to speak and the first to try to walk towards the driver, the man was stared at by several eyes.

Invisibly feeling that he shouldered some kind of responsibility, he coughed dryly and said, "How about...introduce yourself first?"

He was the first to speak: "My name is Zhao Guanglu, I'm 37 this year, and I'm in the first phase of Zhanghua Community. I work in a construction company...uh... divorced for three years..."

As the first person to introduce himself, he didn't know what else to say, so he could only add dryly: "I am the second one to get on the bus. The driver said I am number two."

Li Yinhang hurriedly raised his hand: "I am number three! It also belongs to Zhang Hua!"

She still remembers the warm touch of the driver's uncle patting her on the shoulder, as well as the kind "number three".

Unexpectedly, Zhao Guanglu scratched his scalp and said, "Why didn't I see you?"

Li Yinhang's heart suddenly went blank, and cold sweat fell down suddenly.

... The passenger seats on the bus are still too high, and it is too easy to block people's sight.

Besides, when he got into the car, he was still sleeping with his clothes covering his face.

She hurriedly said: "My name is Li Yinhang. I am 24 years old. I graduated from the Department of Finance of X University. I work in the Songzhou Street Branch of Guangming Bank as a customer service operator."

Everyone: "..."

Li Yinhang works in a bank.

It doesn't get more like a made-up name than this.

Li Yinhang: "..."

Although she didn't like her name very much since she was a child, and she couldn't help being laughed at every time she introduced herself in the exam class, but she never wanted to prove her innocence like this time.

She tried her best to find other evidence: "Bright Bank has a staff dormitory building in the second phase of Zhanghua Community, you know it?"

"...Really. I really don't know about this." Zhao Guanglu shook his head apologetically, and emphasized, "I fell asleep when I got in the car."

He hasn't realized what his words mean to the ears of some new players.

At least so far, as the first person to take the initiative, his words and evaluations carry the most weight.

The way many people looked at Li Yinhang changed.

Li Yinhang was anxious like a fire in her heart, but what she had honed in her customer service work was the ability to organize language that would not easily get out of control in times of crisis.

Otherwise, it will be rated poorly.

She said: "After I came up, I talked to some people, do you remember?"

She didn't hold out much hope for that.

She did strike up conversations with other people in the car.

But in order to take care of the sleeping person, her voice was kept very low.

Besides, those people have already got off the car.

All that was left now were some unfamiliar faces sitting in front of her that she had no memory of at all.

Sure enough, no one testified for her.

In the numbing silence, Li Yinhang exhaustively listed the evidence that he was already on the bus: "The bus passed Dalong's pickled vegetable and fish shop, 31 Food Street, and finally passed the cross-river bridge ..."

... The more she talked, the more she got no response, the more she felt scared, and the more she fell into deep self-doubt.

She was probably the only one who noticed the bus was full of people the moment it went through the tunnel.

Do other people think that the ghost has already boarded the car?

Can you believe what she said now?

"……All right."

A voice interrupted Li Yinhang whose voice was already trembling.

The silver-haired beauty with scorpion braids who was regarded as a "beauty" stood up and glanced at her, with gentle encouragement in her pale gray eyes.

"She was sitting behind me from the moment I got in the car," he said.

Li Yinhang felt like hearing the sound of nature, and the sweat all over his body suddenly fell down.

Everyone couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief.

Although eager to catch the ghost, but out of the psychology of avoiding harm, everyone didn't want to talk to the ghost so soon.

Another complained: "Why didn't you say it earlier."

"As the rules say, we need to form a team. I don't want to preconceive the team." He said, "After all, I speak for her. In the eyes of others, she and I are on the same team, so I just wanted to wait and see one time."

He spoke eloquently, with a very humble attitude, the kind of tone and demeanor that make people feel like a spring breeze.

"My name is Jiang Fang." He introduced, "I am 25 years old, and my father is Ukrainian. I should be a witness of the great friendship between China and Ukraine."

Li Yinhang finally saw his face clearly.

Indeed a mixed race.

His facial features, especially his nose and eyes, have Russian beauty, but the lower half of his face has a charming oriental feature, with red and thin lips.

If it weren't for the special situation, no one would not imagine his mother's beauty.

He continued: "I returned to China not long ago because after my mother passed away, I wanted to visit the city where she grew up. I rented an apartment in Donghua."

The girl in the front row who woke Nan Zhou up with a scream questioned in a low voice: "I'm from Donghua Apartment. Why didn't I see you when I got in the car."

"I came up from the back door, and I live in the expatriate area." Jiang Fang pointed to another door at the middle rear of the vehicle, and asked Li Yinhang, "Did you see me?"

Although he had no memory of when Jiang Fang sat in front of him, Li Yinhang knew that if she didn't follow his words, she would still be the target of public criticism.

She nodded vaguely to get out of the predicament.

Zhao Guanglu was quite vigilant: "What's your number?"

Jiang Fang asked calmly, "Should we have a number?"

Zhao Guanglu: ...What do you mean?

He looked at the girl who also got on the bus in Donghua Community.

The girl really shook her head, saying no.

After Zhao Guanglu thought about it, he understood the reason.

While he was drowsy, he also felt that people were walking around frequently, getting on and off the car.

You know, Donghua Apartment is very close to the cross-river bridge. Before that, if there were too many people getting on and off in the car, the driver might give up telling everyone their boarding order in order to avoid the trouble of counting. And record the existing number of people on the car by oneself.

In other words, reporting the number is meaningless.

Jiang Fang had nothing to ask here, Zhao Guanglu soon thought of another suspicious person in the car.

But when he looked around, he found that the person had disappeared again.

Zhao Guanglu: "..."

When everyone's attention was on the back row, Nan Zhou lay down on the seat and groped intently, and finally reached the only wristband that rolled down under the seat from the crack in the chair.

When he lowered his head to put on the bracelet, the hard and cold inner wall brushed against the slightly raised black butterfly tattoo on the inside of his right hand.

He twirled the bracelet, thinking about something.

Suddenly, Nan Zhou felt like being spied on.

He put his hands on the headrest of the seat next to him, and looked back from the side.

Immediately, he buried half of his face in the folded arms, and let out a small breath.

... No wonder it feels that way.

Because almost the whole car was staring at him.

… sat in the front row, showed up most abruptly, and reacted most abnormally to mushrooms.

Changing Nanzhou, he also felt that he was the most suspicious.

"Luoyan." Nan Zhou introduced himself, his tone was very natural, with an air of coolness, "26 years old, teacher of Longtan No. [-] Middle School, usually lives in Longtan District, and goes back to mother's house to visit relatives during summer vacation."

After several rounds of speeches, everyone gradually gained courage.

"When did you get in the car?"

"Why aren't you afraid?"

"What is there to prove what you said?"

These three questions do require a reasonable explanation.

...So, how would he explain that he was teleported here suddenly and that he is not a ghost?

The author has something to say:

Nan Zhou: Am I mad at you?

mushroom:……