The train, which had been running smoothly, suddenly shook violently. The people in the carriage tilted to the side uncontrollably, and the baggage and wheeled carts all rolled to the side of the carriage, making ping-pong sounds.
There were many heavy things in the freight car, and Shi Yu had no place to gain leverage while sitting. Fortunately, Tan Wang was standing and grabbed the iron railing high on the inner wall of the car in time, and pulled him with his other hand, just able to maintain the balance of both of them.
After the tremor of the train passed, faint discussions were heard in the passenger compartment. Dissatisfaction and abuse gradually grew louder and spread along the corridor.
Tan Wang let go of his hand: "How is it?"
Shi Yu shook his head: "It's okay, thank you."
Not long after, the noise of debugging came from the broadcast on the top of the carriage, followed by the voice of the conductor: "Passengers, please remain calm."
"There was a small amount of debris from the landslide on the track where the train just passed, which caused the carriage to vibrate. The train will continue to run to the ancient capital as usual. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause you."
The explanation was repeated three times over the radio to ensure that everyone at the front and rear of the car could hear it before the car stopped.
Shi Yu suddenly seemed to realize something and looked up at the door of the freight car opposite.
There are no windows in the freight car. The only place where light can come in, apart from the passage connecting to the passenger car, is a gap about half an inch wide between the bottom of the door and the threshold, through which a rectangular patch of sunlight leaks in.
The railway track was built on a mountain road with dense woods on both sides. The black shadows of the trees were cast on the train, passing through the half-inch wide gap like gratings, and being thrown far behind.
※
The first carriage.
"Captain!"
Someone opened the door and rushed in: "Captain, what just happened..."
The conductor stood beside the train driver's seat and frowned at the newcomer: "Why are you so reckless?"
The man was wearing a blue work suit of a train attendant, a work hat on his head, a translucent gamer bracelet on his wrist, and an ID tag on his chest with his name written on it: Duan Wenqing.
He put his hand on the door handle, glanced at the people in the cab, then closed the door, looking anxious: "What happened to our car just now? Why was it shaking so badly?"
The conductor who had just read the announcement said, "Didn't I just explain it all? There is rubble piled up on the track."
Duan Wenqing's face showed obvious disbelief, and he stared at the other person closely: "Just because of this?"
The two looked at each other. The conductor probably avoided his gaze for a moment because he felt guilty, but then he was caught: "If that's all, why don't you dare look at me?"
Conductor: “I’m watching you…”
Duan Wenqing stepped closer, his tone becoming more aggressive: "Then do you dare to say in front of me that the content of the broadcast just now is completely true and there is no lie?"
Conductor: “Why wouldn’t I dare!”
"Okay."
The conductor finally spoke up to interrupt the two men's tense conversation, and called out in a gentle voice, "Xiao Wen, don't force him. I told him to say that."
Duan Wenqing frowned and turned his head in confusion: "Captain?"
"What he said is true. There was indeed a small amount of gravel on the track where our train just passed, which caused the bumps. But the problem is that it's not just the gravel now." The conductor sighed, "It may be difficult for our train to stop now."
【Mr. Duan is the first in progress.】
[The plot line here is moving so fast. 】
[Being a conductor in a game about trains... is really a foul. 】
※
"Boss."
Tan Wang secretly checked his identity and the content of the main mission when he boarded the train. Being on a moving train and knowing that the mission was to "stop the train", he naturally did not believe a word of the explanation given on the broadcast: "Do you know what happened just now?"
Shi Yu was silent for a while: "It should be difficult to stop this car now."
【？ ？ ？】
[Damn, did he peek at the script? ]
[I thought I had misread it. I confirmed three times that the player who just received this news was obviously Duan Wenqing next door. He must have taken advantage of his identity to know it so quickly. How did he figure it out? ? ]
Tan Wang walked around the carriage and didn't find anything unusual. As soon as he sat back down, he heard him ask, "Why?"
Shi Yu rubbed his eyes: "This train is speeding up."
Tan Wang was stunned: "Isn't it normal for the train to get faster and faster after it starts moving?"
"It usually takes only about ten minutes for a train to go from rest to a constant speed. After ten minutes, if nothing unexpected happens, the speed won't fluctuate much. The radio just said that the train passed a section of gravel track, and the bumpy time was quite long. Considering the principle of speed bumps on the road, the train's speed should have slowed down."
Shi Yu said: "The vegetation in the mountains and forests has evolved over a long period of time, and the distances between the same species will not differ too much. Based on the speed of their projections passing through this carriage, the speed of the vehicle after the bump was nearly twice as fast as before the bump."
Tan Wang turned his head to look at the vent at the bottom of the car door, which was less than half an inch long, and the trees that were so fast that only their afterimages were left when they swept back under the vent. He was shocked by his inhumane method of measuring speed.
To be able to see clearly objects moving at this speed, to what extent would the eyes' dynamic vision have to be abnormal?
"So what is this car now..."
"I haven't been to the front carriage, so I can't be sure for now." Shi Yu said, "The increasing speed of the train is obviously an abnormal phenomenon. It may be a problem with the driver, or the engine, or more likely there is some inexplicable supernatural force behind it. But no matter what the reason, the acceleration will only prompt the train not to stop."
Tan Wang digested his meaning: "So what the broadcast just said about the turbulence caused by track problems is actually true? They didn't lie?"
"It should be half true and half false."
Shi Yu looked at the connecting passage of the carriages: "The train speed has increased. The driver cannot be unaware of this, and the conductor of this shift cannot be unaware of this either. The broadcast can be made, and the content must have been judged by these two people in advance. They are probably hiding something that they don't want the passengers to know."
Tan Wang: "Do we need to go to the cab and ask them now?"
Shi Yu shook his head: "They can't keep this secret for too long."
Tan Wang didn't understand why the matter couldn't be kept secret for too long, but he simply changed his proposal: "So should we go find our teammates now or start hunting directly?"
Shi Yu was silent for a while: "Why do you want to fight other players so much?"
Tan Wang: "Kill them and you can pick up their items. I just entered the Ninth Heaven. Compared to other experienced players, I lost at the starting line. I can't lose at the finish line. I have to get something to fill it up."
Shi Yu listened to his calm words "Kill them" and asked, "Do you still remember that you are a player who just entered the Upper Nine Heavens?"
"uh-huh?"
"Can you beat those veteran players?"
"Aren't there other advanced players like me?" Tan Wang smiled, "Besides, how can we know if we don't try?"
Shi Yu looked at him, and after a second or two, he said "Oh".
"Are you afraid that I might accidentally hurt the other poor people in our group and reduce their combat effectiveness?" Tan Wang listened to his ambiguous "oh" and thought for a few seconds, "I'll ask clearly before I take action."
Shi Yu: "You and I are the only two players who are assigned the status of paupers."
Tan Wang's hat instantly fell off his head: "Didn't they say that the twenty people were randomly divided into four identities?!"
Shi Yu tilted her head slightly and looked at him: "It is random, but it doesn't say whether it refers to the randomness of the players who get a certain identity card, or the randomness of the number of players with a certain identity card, or both."
Tan Wang widened his eyes, finding it hard to accept this fact: "But why? If there are only two of us in the poor group, then the other groups at least..."
He calculated: "Even if the other groups have an equal number of people, each group will have at least six people. Such an unbalanced random assignment is completely unnecessary."
Shi Yu didn't discuss this with him. She said in a straightforward tone, "Do you remember the number of players in each team before the game started?"
Tan Wang nodded subconsciously.
"Two teams of four, three teams of two, and one team of five. According to conventional thinking, the twenty players are divided into four identities, and each identity has five people. But there are two teams of four among the players, and I am the only one who is confirmed to be alone. The five-person team is a group of its own, and one of the four-person teams is in the same group with me. The remaining four plus two plus two plus two, no matter how you arrange and combine them, it is impossible to divide these ten people into two equal groups according to the teams they privately belong to."
Shi Yu said: "Based on this point, the conclusion that there are five players of each identity when the number of players of the four identities is equal can only be a false proposition. The number of players of different identities is not equal from the beginning."
Tan Wang was confused when he heard this.
"Your identity is that of a pauper, so in the dungeon you are a character who can't even afford a train ticket and can only get on the train by sneaking on the fare, which is a logical behavior consistent with your identity. And besides you, I was the only player who was preparing to sneak on the fare with other paupers, so even the landing location was the same when we first entered the dungeon. The other players were not in the freight car, so they could only be in the first 20 passenger cars of this train. Being able to afford a ticket is inconsistent with your identity as a pauper."
Shi Yu said: "There are only two players who have obtained the status of pauper."
Tan Wang picked up his hat and flicked off the dust on it: "But, except for you, the other 19 out of the 20 players in this game teamed up with their teammates, just like me and Sister Chao. If there were only two of us in the Poor, wouldn't Sister Chao be assigned a different identity?"
Shi Yu: “It should be.”
Tan Wang: "But this game is obviously a team competition game. If the 19 players who originally had teammates were also assigned different roles, wouldn't they all become enemies in order to win?"
Shi Yu: “Probably.”
Tan Wang tried to hold it in for a long time, but couldn't hold it in anymore and cursed: "Fuck."
He was in a complicated mood for a while, and then he came out of his emotions. His muddled mind suddenly became clear: "According to this statement, no matter who I attack, I won't be afraid of attacking the friendly forces of the Poor Group. Isn't that just the right thing to do?"
Shi Yu leaned against the pile of cargo boxes and began to feel drowsy after sitting for a while. He was half a beat late to respond: "...Because of my identity."
"Like you said, unless the system itself is intended to attract the audience's interest, there is no need to divide the players into four forces of varying numbers. Excluding this reason, the identity itself is related to the world in which the game is located."
Tan Wang looked confused.
Shi Yu knew from the look in his eyes that he didn't understand. He lowered his eyes and remained silent for a few seconds, then changed his words to something simpler: "Players of different identities should receive different treatment on this train. If you rashly let other people, such as the crew, find out that you are boarding the train without paying a ticket, you may get into trouble."
Before Tan Wang had the time to ask "what's the trouble", clear footsteps were suddenly heard in the aisle between the carriages.
The next second, the key was inserted into the keyhole and began to rotate clockwise.
Everyone: “……!”
The "cargo packages" scattered and huddled in this carriage heard the sound coming from the door, and one after another they started to get agitated and tried to hide in hidden places, for fear that the newcomers would discover their small, shameful group.
Unfortunately, the person outside did not have the habit of taking several minutes to turn a key like the characters in other movies and TV shows, and he opened the door quickly and efficiently.
Tan Wang quickly pulled off the rain cloth on the wooden box next to him, squatted on the ground, and covered the two of them with the cloth with his hands.
Unfortunately, they dodged quickly enough, but the other people in the car didn't react in time. Then they heard a "crash" and the car door was suddenly opened.
The people who came were the staff on the train.
He pressed the light switch on the wall of the carriage, and the next second he saw seven or eight strange people in the carriage. He was stunned for half a second, his eyes widened: "Who are you?!"
[…What do you mean by “Speak of the devil and he will appear”? ]
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