Chapter 125: Machine or Reality?
The van slowed down and stopped beside the police officers after they stopped it.
"You have a traffic violation that hasn't been processed," the police officer said, glancing at the driver and explaining why he had stopped him.
The driver scratched his head and chuckled awkwardly, "Sorry, I have a bad memory and forgot. I'll take care of it right away."
Perhaps out of professional habit, when the police officer's eyes caught sight of the tattoo peeking out from the driver's collar, he subconsciously glanced into the car.
Several burly men sat in the car as if nothing had happened.
"Are you going on vacation or a business trip?" the police officer asked casually.
The driver's answer was impeccable: "I was going to X city with a few brothers to attend my brother's wedding. It's not very far, and I thought it would be convenient to drive, so I drove."
The police officer looked away and was about to let them go when the back seat of the car suddenly shook, followed by a very deep groan.
"Oh," the police officer asked jokingly, without showing any emotion, "Did you bring a live animal with you?"
The group tensed up.
"I brought a golden retriever, my own dog," the driver laughed. "The dog is a bit unruly; it's prone to causing trouble in the car."
As he spoke, the driver yelled at the back seat, "Don't you fucking bite my seat! If you bite it again, I'll stew you into a dog meat hot pot, you hear me?"
Several police officers came out of the guard post not far away, pretending to stop other cars, and slowly moved closer to the van.
The police officer leaned against the car window frame and asked, "Sir, could you pull it down so I can take a look?"
The driver's temple veins bulged, and a drop of cold sweat slowly slid down his forehead.
“It’s just a routine check, comrade, don’t be nervous,” the police officer said, reaching out to take his car keys. “Please understand our work.”
Seeing the police officers gradually closing in on him in the rearview mirror, the driver suddenly became aggressive, shoving the officer's hand away. He then floored the accelerator, and with a sharp screeching sound, the van sped straight through the checkpoint that was about to be lowered.
"License plate xxxxxx resisted inspection and violently broke through the checkpoint. There are suspicious items in the vehicle. We must stop it!!!" The police officer immediately contacted his colleagues at a nearby checkpoint via radio, and then the group rushed into a police car parked on the side of the road and gave chase.
The sirens wailed as they sped away.
"Damn it...you little bastard, you're trying to make me miserable, aren't you?!" The driver spat, accelerated to top speed, and sped off the ramp.
The men turned around and glared fiercely at Jin Cheng, who was tied up tightly. Then they grabbed a storage box and threw it at Jin Cheng. "Find a place to dump the car and shake off the police first, then teach this brat a lesson!"
Jin Cheng suddenly felt darkness before his eyes and let out a muffled groan.
The sharp corner of the box grazed Jin Cheng's forehead, leaving a shocking wound.
The van sped off the side road and drove straight into a nearby village.
Jin Cheng was so shaken in the car that he almost threw up.
In his dazed state, he thought of the ghost that had just given him the hint, and his feelings were very complicated.
He was harmed by a human, but saved by a ghost...
What on earth is going on here?
The rope beside me moved again.
Listen to my movements, then run.
Jin Cheng gritted his teeth and tried to stay awake, nodding slightly.
Xin Que sat to the side, watching the group drive the car into the deserted cornfield, and then roughly lifted Jin Cheng from the back seat and got out of the car.
The burly men didn't even glance at the van; their expressions were tense as they grabbed Jin Cheng and raced into the woods.
"Is the third brother from this village?" one of the burly men asked his companion as he ran. "Have your family make room for you in a car!"
The third brother responded and immediately called home.
They only slowed down when they reached an abandoned hut.
"You little brat dare to ask for help, huh?" The burly man grabbed Jin Cheng and slammed him onto the overgrown grass. "So you just wanted to borrow some money from the richest man... Now you're fucking not going home alive!"
Jin Cheng gripped the loosened rope tightly, and as soon as his body touched the ground, he immediately feigned fear and shrank back, constantly moving backward.
"Brother, the police are on their way, you should leave! I swear I will never betray you!" Jin Cheng was terrified and desperately tried to appear weak.
There's only one way to deal with Jin Cheng.
The remaining few were either keeping watch, calling for a car, or discussing how to evade the police.
Jin Cheng's mind was filled with the words that the ghost had written in his palm.
As the burly man's fist swung heavily toward Jin Cheng's temple, Jin Cheng finally flung the rope away and threw the stone beside him toward the man's eye.
"My eyes!!!" the burly man screamed, clutching his eyes. "Chase that little beast!!!"
Jin Cheng ripped off the loose hemp rope around his ankle, got up, and ran into the woods as if his life depended on it.
【run! 】
【Don't stop!!!】
Jin Cheng no longer felt tired; his will to survive and surging adrenaline forced him to constantly push his physical potential to the limit.
The boy ran wildly through the woods like a madman, trying to escape the deathly curses behind him and buy himself a chance to survive.
Xin Que followed Jin Cheng from the height of the sun until sunset.
He couldn't tell if the sound in his ears was the wind or his own frantic breathing; all he knew was that if he didn't run, he would die.
Jin Cheng couldn't remember how long he had been running; he only knew that the woods in front of him were getting darker and darker...
"Bang."
Suddenly not seeing him, the boy tripped over the winding tree roots on the ground and fell heavily onto the grass.
Ignoring the pain, Jin Cheng immediately scrambled to his feet on all fours and continued running forward.
Until the forest was completely covered by night, until the deadly shouts could no longer be heard.
"Huff... huff..." Jin Cheng hid himself under a sloping hill, curled up, and his chest heaved violently.
My throat was throbbing like a bellows being used for heating, and my brain was buzzing from the rush of blood to it.
"You escaped?" He couldn't make a sound, so he tried to speak in a breathy voice, lying on his back looking at the night sky above him, which was divided by tall, dense birch trees.
The woods at night weren't exactly quiet; the rustling of the dense leaves and the incessant chirping of cicadas made it quite noisy.
But areas devoid of human voices always exude a sense of insecurity and loneliness.
Fortunately, he had a ghost with him.
Now that he was temporarily safe, he even had time to find some joy in his suffering. However, after moving his sprained ankle, he immediately winced in pain and lost all interest in thinking about anything else.
Xin Que wandered around the neighborhood for a while, then returned to Jin Cheng's side and used a blade of grass nearby to write on his hand: 【Safe.】
Jin Chengchang breathed a long sigh of relief.
Jin Cheng forced himself to sit up and straightened his ankle himself.
"Sigh," he leaned against the earthen slope, staring blankly at the small patch of starry sky visible above, "How did you die?"
Xin Que "..."
Did they mistake her for a ghost?
Xin Que realized that something was wrong with the space she had been transferred into by the virus.
This doesn't seem to be the default room set up by the data.
Jin Cheng's growth, the police officers who would proactively investigate the kidnappers' vehicles, and the Luo family... all seem to be people with their own logic.
Aside from the time discrepancy, all the other details here, rather than the program loopholes the virus found for her, seem more like... a genuine time travel back to Luo Huayi's childhood.
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