Chapter 3
"Achoo!"
Before him stretched an endless wasteland, its pale yellow tinged with gray, and a cold wind swept through his thin prison uniform. Ye Yihe sneezed crisply.
There's no one around here, could he have been exiled to Siberia to dig potatoes...? Ugh, it's so cold.
Thick clouds obscured everything, so much so that even the sunlight seemed weak and listless.
Before me lay the scene of an accident where two vehicles had collided and overturned, their tires and bodies leaving exceptionally deep marks on the hard soil on either side of the road.
Besides the prison van he was in, another vehicle, a black van with privacy film on its windows, also lay over in a more distant place, its doors blown off.
Two such conspicuous transport vehicles somehow managed to have a serious accident in this desolate wasteland where they should never have collided.
If it's understandable that his guards weren't watching where they were going, since the other side was at least driving in a straight line, why didn't they swerve in time?
Ye Yihe was a little curious about this, but not much.
A thin, coarse prison uniform was not enough to keep him warm, and the flat terrain, where there was not even a field of grain to be seen, made Ye Yihe realize that if he did not find a way to keep warm, he would die of hypothermia before he could finish his good deed.
The wound on his head also needs to be bandaged.
He walked around to the front of the car, which was dented in one section. Through the broken window, he could see that the airbags had deployed. The two equally burly guards were both unconscious in their seats, but they seemed to be alright.
They're already guilty of an even greater crime, so what's the harm in adding two or three more? The most important thing is to save the life of the brother whose body he's been using.
Ye Yihe reached for the guard's belt, found the key to unlock the heavy shackles binding his hands and feet, and then pulled a military-style winter coat with a fur collar from behind the chair.
This coat, designed to withstand temperatures of tens of degrees below zero, is made of exceptionally sturdy material. Wearing it makes movement extremely inconvenient, but its advantage lies in its warmth—which is probably why the guards driving the car chose to drape it over the back of the seat rather than wear it.
Ye Yihe guessed that it was also possible that his body was too weak. Maybe those burly Russian natives would not feel the cold weather at all after downing a bottle of vodka.
He adjusted his thick coat, zipping it all the way up to keep out the howling wind.
Because of her poor physique—even though this body was already considered tall and slender—the hem of her clothes, which originally only reached her calves, still covered Ye Yihe's ankles. However, it still looked quite suitable in such a difficult situation, since this body wasn't wearing thermal underwear.
Ye Yihe reached into his pocket and pulled out a rather old-fashioned black-and-white flip phone, not even a slim model, about the thickness of two fingers held together.
...If this phone represents the most advanced civilian technology available today, then it's highly likely that it's no longer in its own world.
Ye Yihe was somewhat prepared for this, since the combination of a system and transmigration to another world is quite common and perfectly reasonable.
Having finally solved the problem of keeping warm, he, now a lawless outlaw, picked up a piece of what used to be a rearview mirror from the ground and aimed it at the body whose appearance he still didn't know.
In other words—align yourself.
As he expected, the person in the mirror was very young and handsome, even deserving of the title "beautiful boy." Ye Yihe was estimated to be around fifteen or sixteen years old, a typical Caucasian, with slightly long, dark black hair that fluttered lightly in the cold wind and then fell softly down when the wind paused briefly.
A few strands of black hair at her temples, soaked with blood, were now cold and congealed into several locks. Ye Yihe did not intend to leave his blood sample on this borrowed coat, so he did not bother to wipe it clean. Instead, he used his thumb to wipe away the blood clots stuck to his skin, and then used his fingertips to brush the hair in that area to make it look more natural, so that at least no trace could be seen from the outside.
He felt he was likely going to become a fugitive, so he couldn't make things any more difficult for himself—but if he looked at it from another angle, maybe the original owner of this body was the one he was trying to do something good?
Think about it, the original owner is most likely still a minor! Looking closely in the mirror, her face was obviously pale from anemia and weakness, and even when she pursed her lips, there was not much healthy color, which made the friendly smile she tried to show cold and mocking, without any friendly meaning.
...Ye Yihe seemed to understand why that Russian brother was angry.
As for the eyes, he was quite surprised that the body's irises were a dark, rich color, like red wine, or perhaps a deeper purple—a color he had never seen before.
Those who wear colored contact lenses don't count.
Is it possible for such eye color to exist in reality? He remembered that albinism could cause red irises, but that was usually accompanied by light-colored hair, photophobia, and extremely poor vision, which obviously did not fit his situation.
Perhaps it's some kind of special mutated gene; after all, he's not an expert in medicine or biology and knows nothing about this field.
Having roughly figured out his situation, Ye Yihe planned to leave before the guards woke up.
Vehicles transporting criminals like these regularly communicate with personnel at the target location via walkie-talkies. He wasn't worried at all that no one would notice the accident and that he would rescue both the criminals and the guards.
As for him, it might take him a long time to find a place where people live, but that's still better than being locked up in prison and trying to stage a Shawshank Redemption—the system is completely unreliable, and he can't dig a tunnel out by picking his ears.
Moreover, what if he couldn't find a way to do good deeds in prison and his body never recovered? Wouldn't that mean he was going to jail for the other person...? That would be a real injustice.
Speaking of which, the guard clearly stated that it was a "prison van for minor offenders," so why was the original owner of this body, a minor, also in it? Doesn't Russian law have any provisions for mitigating criminal penalties for minors, such as exemption from criminal punishment for minor offenses...?
Ye Yihe was completely unfamiliar with the laws of other countries and had no way of asking anyone, so he simply ignored this anomaly for the time being.
Since the road beneath our feet is solid, it means there will always be human settlements along the way—for example, supply stations would love to sell things to customers who are on a long journey.
However, Ye Yihe, wrapped in a winter coat, hadn't walked more than a few steps when he understood why a car accident had suddenly occurred on such a main road.
The black van was lying diagonally on that stretch of road, with the side whose door had been flung off facing him.
There were three people unconscious inside the car. The person in the front driver's seat had the airbag help to reduce the impact, but their legs were trapped between the seat and the collapsed front of the car, and were obviously twisted and deformed. A lot of blood soaked through the fabric.
Ye Yihe could smell a strong rusty odor, and the passenger in the front seat probably wasn't in much better shape.
The person sitting in the back was even more unlucky; half of his body was already sticking out of the car door, and his face was covered in blood from the broken glass, making him look particularly miserable.
But the focus is on the woman whose body is stuck between the front and back rows. She is also unconscious, but her hands are bound behind her back with extremely thick hemp rope, and her expression remains frozen in extreme resentment and anger.
This situation is clearly related to a kidnapping. The people sitting in the van were either kidnappers or human traffickers. Due to the hostages' violent resistance, the van veered off course and crashed directly into the prisoner transport vehicle.
...Judging from the current situation, the number of Russian criminals he has encountered in such a short period of time is overwhelming, and it seems that the only one who truly needs help is the kidnapped woman in front of him.
Fortunately, she didn't seem to be seriously injured, and the car's frame structure was still relatively intact. Ye Yihe used some effort to free her from between the two seats, and then used a shard of glass he picked up to cut the ropes binding her.
This is a beautiful woman around twenty years old with a great figure. Her coat is made of very high-quality material, suggesting that the kidnappers wanted to get rich by demanding a large ransom.
Having roughly confirmed that she didn't have any serious injuries like fractures—abrasions are extremely lucky in this kind of car accident, and can even be ignored—Ye Yihe tried to carry this woman, who didn't look very heavy, in a princess carry, but unsurprisingly failed.
Ye Yihe: ...Please, this body's stamina is really bad.
If it were my old body, I could easily carry her for at least half an hour.
He had no choice but to continue forward with his back to the people, at least to get away from that place full of outlaws, lest they cause him trouble again when they woke up.
He came here to do good deeds, not to play Mortal Kombat.
...But Ye Yihe still overestimated the physical limits of this body.
He was exhausted after walking a distance off the road. His heart was beating faster than when he used to do anaerobic exercise, and he felt like he was about to kick the bucket at any moment. The only good thing was that he didn't feel cold at all now. He even had a thin layer of sweat on his temples, which felt chilly when the wind blew.
Before long, he even began to feel a slight chill on the tip of his nose. Ye Yihe looked up and saw snowflakes slowly drifting down from the sky.
Beneath these dense clouds, where even light struggles to penetrate, the falling snow appears damp, imbued with an indescribable gloom and heaviness. It falls straight down with the wind, rapidly and heavily carpeting this desolate wilderness.
Compared to the light, fluffy snow he had seen in his homeland, here even the falling snowflakes felt like powerful bricks flying, full of the feeling of "a punch leaves a crater," as if someone was shouting slogans and leading the charge.
Ye Yihe watched helplessly as the snow fell faster and faster, turning into a howling blizzard in the blink of an eye.
...Achoo.
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