Chapter 178 - 177: Death Train

Chapter 178: Chapter 177: Death Train

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The abrupt sound of a train whistle echoed through the night sky, and Gu Su’s heart clenched.

He didn’t have time to think, spinning around and sprinting toward the top of the wall. At the same time, he grabbed the Communication Puppet from his waist, about to ask Alice what she had seen.

But by the time he reached the top of the wall, panting, and gripped the railing to look out, the questions all died in his throat.

There was no need to ask.

A straight set of railroad tracks had appeared out of nowhere on the battlefield, which just moments ago had been strewn with corpses.

The tracks appeared from thin air, stretching across the scorched earth and piles of wreckage. The metal surface of the rails gleamed with a cold light in the darkness, as if they had always been there, never having moved.

At the end of the tracks, three blinding white lights, like the eyes of a Giant Beast, pierced through the thick darkness and shot straight toward him.

Then, a rhythmic roar drew closer.

KA-CHUNK, KA-CHUNK, KA-CHUNK!

It was the heaving breath of a steam locomotive, the shudder of giant metal wheels on rails, the pronouncement of some behemoth awakening in the dark.

An incredibly long train, moving at about thirty kilometers per hour, slowly approached along the tracks that had appeared from nowhere.

"Slowly" was a relative term; it moved in fits and starts, decelerating after every short distance, sometimes coming to a complete halt for a moment, or even for a long while.

From the time Gu Su heard the first whistle to when the train finally approached his defended section, it had stopped a good seven or eight times.

When the behemoth finally came to a complete stop in front of the Graveyard Demon, Gu Su had already come down from the wall and was standing at the edge of the railway.

Up close, he could finally see the train in its entirety.

At the very front was a normal-sized steam locomotive, pitch-black all over, but not an ordinary kind of black.

It was a black that had settled after being repeatedly baked by smoke and time, a black mixed with rust and bloodstains.

The front of the locomotive was inlaid with densely packed Skeleton decorations—some large, some small, some whole and some fragmented. They were fixed to the sides of the boiler, in front of the driver’s cab, and even at the base of the smokestack.

When Gu Su’s gaze swept over them, a faint, eerie green light lit up in the empty eye sockets of the Skeletons. They all turned toward him in unison, as if scrutinizing this stranger who had appeared late at night.

The locomotive’s smokestack was thick and menacing, its top cast into the shape of a wide-open mouth. Billowing black smoke gushed out, trailing a heavy band of smog across the night sky.

The band of smoke churned, and one could faintly see distorted faces struggling within it. The piston rods on either side of the boiler moved rhythmically with the intake and exhaust of steam, each push accompanied by the clang of metal on metal, like the heartbeat of some Giant Beast.

After the locomotive came a line of train cars that stretched as far as the eye could see.

A quick glance told Gu Su there were at least a hundred cars.

Each car had a completely different style, yet they were bizarrely connected as one.

The surface of some cars was covered in withered vines, their roots dug deep into the cars’ iron plating, fused with the metal. Shriveled leaves and unknown fruits still hung from the vines.

Some cars were made entirely of patched-together rusted metal plates. Their surfaces were covered in rivets and welding marks, with bullet holes and claw marks visible everywhere, like a mobile fortress.

Other cars were even stranger. Their walls looked like the flesh and blood of some creature, gleaming with a dark red luster, and you could even see thick blood vessels twitching slightly on the surface.

What shocked Gu Su even more was that a quad-barreled artillery piece was mounted on top of every single car.

The barrels were short, thick, and menacing, angled toward the sky, as if ready to unleash a barrage on anything that dared to approach. The bases connecting the artillery to the cars were also decorated with Skeletons, some of which even had unburnt fuses dangling from their mouths.

This wasn’t a train; it was clearly a mobile war fortress.

Just as Gu Su was staring in a daze, a side door of the locomotive’s cab was pushed open, and a man leaned out.

It was a man who looked to be in his thirties, wearing a set of oil-stained work clothes. A flattened cap was perched askew on his head, and beneath its brim was a face somewhat blackened by coal dust.

He grinned, revealing a set of reasonably white teeth, and shouted to Gu Su:

"Are you the player defending section 71 or 72?"

Gu Su came back to his senses and quickly replied, "Section 72. But the player for section 71 was killed in action. Their replacement hasn’t arrived yet, so I’m responsible for coordinated defense."

He briefly explained the previous situation.

The man nodded. His gaze swept over the nearby Graveyard Demon, then to the mountain-like piles of corpses and the busy Undead, a hint of approval flashing in his eyes.

"No wonder the Death Qi is so thick here." He jumped down from the cab, landed on the gravel beside the tracks, and walked a few steps closer. "You’ve got some real skill. The situation with the Cabbage-head Lizardmen this time was unusual; a lot of players in the defense sectors didn’t make it. For you to hold off the pressure of two sections by yourself... that’s impressive."

He extended his oil-stained hand. "My name is Lu Chen, the No. 3 driver for the Death Train Head Guild.

And you? What’s your name? Got a Guild?"

Gu Su shook his hand. "Gu Su. I’m a rookie, haven’t joined a Guild yet."

Lu Chen pulled his hand back and looked him up and down, his tone tinged with a bit of regret. "That’s a shame.

Your Mobile City has a lot of potential. Being able to withstand an attack of this scale on your own means you’ll definitely make it big. But your Golden Finger isn’t train-related, so we can’t take you.

Want me to recommend a few Guilds to you?

I know a few reliable ones."

Gu Su shook his head, his tone firm but polite. "No, thank you, Brother Lu.

I want to try out a few Game Worlds on my own first, get the hang of things before deciding."

Lu Chen was taken aback for a moment, then laughed. "Alright, you’ve got a plan of your own.

Everyone’s like that when they first get their Golden Finger. They think they can conquer the world on their own.

I thought the same thing back in the day. Didn’t I end up joining an organization in the end?"

He clapped Gu Su on the shoulder. "No worries. When you need help, feel free to look me up. Our Guild runs this route often. Just say hi if you see us."

He turned and walked back toward the train, saying as he went, "Right, almost forgot the important stuff. The higher-ups said the Cabbage-head Lizardman attack was an unexpected situation, so they told us to bring some supplies for the surviving players on the defensive line.

You’re in charge of two sections, so you get two shares.

Come take a look. See anything you want?"

Before he had even finished speaking, a side panel on the fifth car suddenly slid open, revealing a pitch-black space within. Immediately after, a wide metal table extended slowly out of the car, coming to a steady stop right in front of Gu Su.

The table was covered with all sorts of items.

There were neatly stacked ammunition boxes, weapons gleaming with a metallic luster, sealed supply crates, and some potions and materials in glass bottles. In a corner of the table, there was even a small, casually piled stack of blueprints and architectural designs.

However, everything on it was glowing with a green light.

Gu Su’s gaze swept across the table, and for a moment, he didn’t know what to look at first.

Lu Chen leaned against the side of the car, lit a cigarette, and took a deep drag. "Take your time, no rush," he said leisurely.

"The train’s going to be stopped here for a bit. After we supply you guys, we have to keep moving. There are still a few more players in the sections ahead waiting for us."

He exhaled a cloud of smoke, which drifted away on the night wind, mingling with the black smoke spewing from the train’s smokestack before gradually dissolving into the thick darkness.

Gu Su took a deep breath, his eyes falling back to the table piled high with items.

’Finally, some compensation for this terrifying night.’