Chapter 54: Zhang Rong
The bus door opened slowly, and the young couple holding hands walked out.
“Hold on!” I grabbed the railing and stood in front of the two of them.
“Do you have a problem?” The man’s tone was gloomy, and his eyes were filled with a fierce light.
At this moment, I didn’t have time to reason with him. I knew he wouldn’t believe me if I told him in front of everyone that his girlfriend was a female ghost who would take his life.
So I came up with an extreme solution. Standing with my hands on my hips, I scolded them like a shrew, “Do you really think that you, this pair of despicable lovers, can ignore my existence?”
“Are you looking for trouble? Get lost! Who is this lunatic?” The man hugged the woman, and his attitude was obvious—this was my girl!
“You shameless person! Stop right there!” I pushed the man aside, grabbed the woman’s right hand, and straightened her middle finger. “Everyone, look carefully—there are still traces of a ring on this finger! This woman had already been engaged to me but dared to run out and seduce other men!”
In fact, I had been secretly observing various details on the woman’s body. Her palm had calluses, and there were marks of wearing a hairpin and a ring on her right middle finger. Her bag had a corner of the sleeve exposed, and since the previous stop before the Miyun Mansion was a textile factory, it was very likely that she was a married female worker before her death.
Combined with my dream experience of the woman seducing the man and then brutally murdering him, it indicated that they were not a couple but only had a kind of sexual relationship.
The woman’s face turned pale, and she tried to explain to the man, “I don’t know him, Ah feng, you have to believe me!”
“You’re caught red-handed, and you still won’t admit it? Come with me back home; your eldest and second child are waiting for you to breastfeed!”
I scolded loudly, and the woman looked very aggrieved. She grabbed Ah Feng’s arm and said, “Ah Feng, let’s go. Don’t mind this crazy person.”
“Crazy person?” I pretended to be angry and kicked the woman out of the bus, saying, “Get back home and take care of your child!”
“What the hell! You dare to use force!” The man called Ah Feng suddenly got nervous and pulled out a spring knife from his pants pocket.
“I knew you weren’t a good person.” I wasn’t flustered and carefully avoided the knife before wrestling with him..
“How lively! It’s different in this city. Even riding a bus is like watching a drama,” one of the three drunk construction workers said while sitting in the back, laughing and joking, but with no intention of coming over to help.
The young driver was solely preoccupied with wiping his sweat and tapping the steering wheel in anxious anticipation, while intermittently glancing at the time.
Instead it was that lively auntie who approached us and firmly declared, “If you want to fight, take it outside the bus and spare others from your disturbance.”
Immediately after her statement, she seized mine and Ah Feng’s arms, determined to pull us out of the bus. The other woman also came over and pretended to mediate by pulling and tugging.
“You want me to get off the bus? No way!” After experiencing that desperate scene in my dreams, how could I comply with their demands?
I shook off the auntie’s hand, pushed her off, and ran to the front of the bus, cursing as I ran, “You old woman trying to harm me? Go home and take care of your child! Today, I will teach this pretty boy a good lesson!”
Ah Feng was also enraged and charged towards me with his small knife. The two of us started fighting again at the front of the bus. What surprised me was that the woman and the auntie who had gotten off the bus couldn’t get back on and could only bang on the bus door.
The young driver turned a blind eye to my fight with Ah Feng and only focused on the electronic clock at the front of the bus. After about two or three minutes, he pulled the manual lever, and both the front and back doors of the bus closed, and the vehicle started moving.
“What the hell! Stop the bus and let me off!” Ah Feng shouted, but the driver showed no intention of stopping.
With his pale face, he stole a glance at Ah Feng secretly, and he stammered, “We can’t stop at each station for more than five minutes, otherwise, there may be other passengers who want to board the bus.”
“Other passengers?” Perplexed by his choice of words, I probed for more information.
“Passengers who are different from you guys…” He didn’t say more and focused on driving the bus.
Looking out the window, I realized the woman and the auntie had vanished without a trace, as if they were never there.
Ah Feng also noticed the strange atmosphere on the bus. He put away his small knife and sat back in his seat, his face stiff. The half-closed window let in the cold wind, and after the commotion I had caused earlier, the bus grew even quieter.
“We finally escaped that danger,” The warnings in my dream ended here. The rest of the journey could no longer be predicted.
I picked up my phone and checked the live stream. One of the comments caught my attention. “Host, you shouldn’t have saved that man. He seems to be a fugitive perverse murderer,” wrote a user named “Police Dog Loves Rice.”
“A perverse murderer?” I remained silent and searched the internet on my phone. The national public security system was now interconnected, and all wanted fugitives could be found.
Comparing the man’s appearance and his nickname, I quickly found information on him. “Yuan Feng, 25 years old, 173cm tall, also known as Ah Feng and the Lunatic.”
“On May 12th, a stabbing homicide occurred in chrysanthemum garden, Jiangcheng Huaxin district. The victim, Wang Amei, was a female worker at Huaxin Textile Factory. Through investigation, Yuan Feng was identified as a major suspect and is currently on the run. Yuan Feng speaks with a Beijing accent, is approximately 1.73 meters tall, of medium build, and was last seen wearing a white checkered shirt, blue jeans, and black sneakers. A reward of 50,000 yuan will be given to those who provide useful information leading to his arrest.”
Silently reading the contents on my phone, my mind was in turmoil, “Did I just save a murderer?” The female ghost clearly wanted Yuan Feng to pay with his life, but I accidentally thwarted her plan.
“If I survive tonight, I will make sure he faces justice. It’s better to leave matters of the living to the living.” Glancing at the thick darkness outside the window, I put away my phone and clenched my fists.
The bus passed through two more stops, Martyrs’ Street and Red Nine Brick Factory, without any passengers getting on or off. However, every time the bus stopped at a station, the driver would open the front and back doors and wait for a period of time, no less than three minutes and never more than five.
“The bus is now departing. Please remain seated and hold on tight. Thank you for riding the No. 14 autonomous ticketing bus. If you are boarding, please have exact change ready, as the fare is one yuan. Passengers getting on should proceed to the back door. The next stop is一station Qicun Maternal and Children Health Center.”
As soon as the bus started moving, the woman with the wavy hair’s phone rang, and the ringtone was extremely piercing in the quiet bus.
As soon as she answered the phone, a man’s furious voice roared from the other end of the line, “Zhang Rong! Why did you send our pictures to my wife? Damn it, don’t you know she’s pregnant now?”
“Pregnant? Is it not also your own flesh and blood that is in my belly?” The wavy-haired woman became somewhat hysterical, her pent-up anger finally bursting out, “Li Zijian, since you refuse to tell her, I’ll tell her myself. I have many more pictures taken while you were sleeping. If you don’t give me an explanation, I’ll ask your wife which position she prefers. Then I’ll specially choose one and frame it to send to your house!”
“Shut up! Stop talking!”
“Why shouldn’t I speak? Why am I always the one being hurt?” The woman with wavy hair shouted loudly. “We’re both pregnant with your child, but she’s lying on your villa’s memory foam mattress, while I’m sitting here on this broken bus getting bullied by a few hooligans!”
“Zhang Rong, let me be honest with you. I can’t divorce my wife. If you still care about our relationship, you must abort that child immediately! I will compensate you…”
“You bastard! Say that again?” The wavy-haired woman thought the man on the phone would comfort her, but she was disappointed. He only treated her as a disposable toy.
“Our relationship was a mistake, and I do not want to make any more mistakes. If you persist in your stubbornness, it will only harm both of us. Zhang Rong, with that being said, take care of yourself.”
The phone was abruptly disconnected, and the beeping busy signal sounded cruel even to an outsider like me.
The wavy-haired woman clenched her phone tightly, her face twisted into a terrifying expression. “Fine, I’ll do it! I’ll follow your words, Li Zijian. Don’t regret this!” she screamed.
Pressing her pale hand against her stomach, her long nails left bloody scratches on her skin. She gasped heavily for air, her lips bloody and her heavy makeup smudged by tears, giving her an almost ghostly appearance.
The No. 14 bus continued its journey, forcing together a group of people who had no connection with each other. They came from different places, but the bus had only one final destination.
Time flowed silently through the dark night, and before long, the broadcasted announcement sounded again. “Ding dong! We have arrived at Qicun Maternity and Children’s Health Center. Please take your personal belongings and exit through the back door. Please watch your step when disembarking.”