Doomsday Wonderland

Chapter 1365: The Fish Caught in the Net?

Wu Lun spent three hundred yuan on a long-distance bus ticket, which should have only cost a hundred and fifty yuan.

After climbing down from her home balcony, she ran out of the residential area, realizing that she had not brought any identification—without identification, she couldn’t use public transportation.

With her family having to deal with medical treatment and reporting the incident, it likely took them a while to realize she was missing. She didn’t dare to go directly to the long-distance bus station in the city; instead, she found a truck transporting vegetables and fruits, giving the driver fifty yuan, begging him to take her to his next destination, wherever it may be. Fortunately, the next destination was a small town, even smaller and more dilapidated than her hometown; to earn an extra hundred and fifty yuan, the ticket seller was willing to turn a blind eye.

Only after the bus departed did she suddenly remember that sometimes there were identity checks on the road. Sitting in the last row, she curled up into a ball, feeling nervous every time the bus stopped; she knew whether it was in front or behind, the net had already been laid to catch her.

But her luck was still relatively good. After more than ten hours, she almost returned to the city where she had met Lin Sanjiu and had not yet encountered any identity checks. At least up to this point, the big net had not caught this little fish named Wu Lun; only the heavens knew how long she could keep swimming forward.

Perhaps getting caught wouldn’t be a bad thing. If everything ended, she would be able to see her mother again.

The phone of a man next to her rang, interrupting his doze. The phone had a poor signal, and a woman’s voice came from the other end, sounding like either a girlfriend or a wife.

“Hmm, it will take about two more hours… Oh, not yet, we still have to stop once in Hexi,” he said as he rubbed his feet, which had long been freed from his leather shoes. Wu Lun had endured the smell for over ten hours and no longer found it repulsive.

The morning sun hadn’t yet heated the glass. She leaned her head against the cool glass window, imagining what the situation at home might be like now. She felt lost and empty inside.

The man raised his voice, saying, “What?”

Someone nearby turned to look at the man.

“Really?” He returned the glances of the passengers nearby, implying that he had received news they hadn’t. “There are really terrorists who have infiltrated the city? Is there a notification now? Oh, that’s not far from Xiao Li’s house.”

The passengers nearby reacted, turning their heads and exchanging glances, scanning them constantly. When the man saw they were all waiting for him to hang up the phone, he spoke more, “Is anyone injured? Oh, no.” He seemed disappointed, then said, “Don’t worry, what’s there to be afraid of? It’s so far from our home, in the complete opposite direction… Hey, could they possibly be more powerful than a machine gun? They’ll be dead with just two shots; they won’t be able to make it.”

When he finally hung up the phone, half the carriage woke up. The whispering voices were immediately cut off by an auntie’s question, “What happened? What’s going on?”

“My wife said terrorists have infiltrated the city, and she has been blocked at the Copper Harbor Pier since yesterday,” the man said, standing excitedly, “Her unit deals with imports and exports. Today, they issued an internal notification telling people not to go to the pier.”

“No one died?” a passenger asked.

“It seems not,” the man said and realized that his news wasn’t sensational enough. Seeing the others’ attention waning, he added, “She said it’s difficult to enter the city now. There are roadblocks on every road, and they’re checking identification cards. It’s going to be blocked next.”

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Wu Lun suppressed her tremors and asked as steadily as possible, “What… what kind of terrorists?”

“Who knows? Anyway, my wife heard that ships aren’t allowed to dock now because they’re afraid of bombs on the pier.” The man shook his head and sighed. “I think it’s because security isn’t strict enough. We need to strengthen security in the future.”

Excited and afraid, Wu Lun’s mind was in chaos. It was Copper Harbor Pier again and the so-called terrorists. Was it just a coincidence, or was it related to Lin Sanjiu? Could it be her?

However, how could ordinary people block Lin Sanjiu at Copper Harbor Pier for a whole day?

“What time is it now?” she asked.

“6:20,” the man said, glancing at his phone.

A passenger in front suggested turning on the television to watch the local news. Someone asked the driver for a remote control, turned on the bus’s tiny TV screen, and flipped through four or five channels in a row. The news wasn’t found, but they saw many other things, such as the kindergarten’s milk expiration date incident, the Journey rocket launching at ten o’clock today, and the new policy of attracting investment to a certain place.

When the bus stopped in Hexi City, Wu Lun hurriedly got off. It was still at least sixty or seventy kilometers from here to her original city; without identification, she couldn’t pass the checkpoints by bus. After much thought, she didn’t know what to do, so she went to a gas station to buy a map and set off on foot. When she didn’t need to look at the map, she put it on her head, pretending to shield herself from the sun, hiding her face from the numerous surveillance cameras on the roadside.

She had never experienced such hardship in her life.

Wu Lun avoided the main roads with checkpoints and specifically chose residential areas and alleys to walk through, inevitably taking many wrong turns. When she finally reached the city’s outskirts, she was exhausted. Seeing a sparsely populated sidewalk lined with trees, she sat down on the roadside, feeling weak and sweaty.

She dared not think of her mother because she couldn’t help but feel like a child about to cry from grievance every time she did.

After resting for an unknown period, Wu Lun slowly got up, feeling thirsty and hungry. She had brought a thousand yuan from home, but now there were only six hundred and fifty left, so she had to be careful with her spending. If there was a nearby convenience store, she could buy a loaf of bread and a bottle of mineral water, but why wasn’t even a single open convenience store around?

All the shops across the street were closed and locked up.

Wu Lun walked around in circles until her gaze fell on a sign on the building behind her— ‘Qingshan Kangning Hospital.’

Anyone who lived in this city would know that this hospital was a psychiatric hospital.

Behind the iron fence-like locked gate came the sound of comfortable and cool water. Wu Lun would have liked to put her feet up and leave, but her throat was so dry and thirsty that she couldn’t help but look towards the place with water sounds—of course, she wouldn’t go to a psychiatric hospital to ask for water to drink; it was just a natural instinct.

A woman in her thirties wearing patient clothes was watering the plants beside the gate. It was normal for mentally stable patients with self-care abilities to be assigned such tasks; Wu Lun’s gaze swept over her, took two steps forward, and couldn’t help but look back at her again.

Although it looked like she was watering the plants, the woman’s real intention wasn’t focused on that.

She deliberately held the spout of the watering can high, causing the water to flow slowly. The task that took about ten seconds would take half a minute at this rate. Most importantly, her long oval face was tilted upward, her black eyes scanning constantly over the top of the courtyard wall—Wu Lun followed her gaze and saw the surveillance cameras on the wall.

She was too familiar with this expression. Wu Lun had been doing the same thing, stealthily searching for blind spots in surveillance cameras.

She stopped her feet, stood next to a tree, watched as the woman finished watering the plants, and walked back. Suddenly, an old man resting in the yard approached her and whispered a few words to her. The two turned their heads toward outside the yard simultaneously, meeting Wu Lun’s eyes. Wu Lun was startled, feeling that these two mentally ill patients were somewhat scary, and hurriedly left.

She was thirsty and hungry but still focused on buying food and water. Her attention was all on the roadside shops, and after walking several streets in a row, she finally realized something was wrong.

At that moment, Wu Lun bent over and looked through the glass door of a convenience store. The store was dark, with no one inside, and seemingly closed for the day. When she straightened up and turned around, two men in uniform stood behind her.

“What are you doing?” one of them asked.

“I… I wanted to buy a bottle of water,” Wu Lun said hesitantly.

“Buy water?” the man said with a frown. “Don’t you know the city is under martial law today? All the stores are closed, what are you buying water for?”

Martial law? The man on the bus didn’t mention it—could it be that it started after she got off the bus? Wu Lun had no phone and couldn’t receive emergency alerts about martial law.

“Show me your ID,” the other person ordered.

“I… I didn’t bring it… I live nearby. I didn’t think I needed to bring it.”

The two men exchanged glances. Violating the rules like this was generally a minor matter, depending on whether the other party was willing to let it go. Sometimes, they would just give a verbal warning and forget about it; sometimes, they enforced the rules strictly, which wasn’t trivial.

Wu Lun swallowed hard. She was wearing jeans and sneakers and didn’t have a bag in her hand. Maybe she could get away with it if she said she lived nearby. But when one of the men’s gazes fell on her hand, she felt shocked, her heart plunging straight into the abyss.

The man sneered. “You live nearby, but you’re carrying a map? Come with us; let’s take a trip.”

Just as Wu Lun gritted her teeth and prepared to run, bustling footsteps from the other end of the street stopped her movements and froze her. She glanced in the direction of the footsteps and heard someone say, “Wu Lun?”

She shivered all over, staring at He Huan’s face, unable to speak.