Only after the locomotive vanished into the thick fog did the crowd gradually snap out of their daze.
"How could this be? Where are the carriages?"
"I think... I saw Officer Chen in there?"
"I saw him too! That red outfit is impossible to miss!"
"Why didn’t Officer Chen stop to save us?"
"That train didn’t even have carriages—how could it take us? He must’ve run off by himself!"
"There seemed to be someone else next to Officer Chen... I couldn’t see clearly."
"Was it Zhao Yi? If I’m not mistaken."
"..."
"Stop looking... Let’s go." Boss Xu shook his head. "Officer Chen can’t save us. We can only rely on ourselves..."
The roaring locomotive hadn’t changed their fate. With envy and sighs, they trudged onward.
Meanwhile, inside the locomotive’s control room.
"Chen Ling, I think I just saw Boss Xu and the others." Zhao Yi rubbed his eyes, speaking uncertainly.
"Hm."
"Aren’t we going to give them a ride?"
"There’s barely enough space here for three or five people. How could we?"
Zhao Yi opened his mouth but ultimately fell silent.
"I... I can scrunch up." A tiny voice piped up from the side.
Zhao Yi turned to see the girl curled up in the corner of the control room, hugging her knees, taking up no more space than a watermelon.
Zhao Yi couldn’t help but chuckle. "No one’s getting on right now. Why are you scrunching up so hard?"
The girl buried her face in her knees and said nothing.
With nothing else to do, Zhao Yi crouched in front of her and softened his voice.
"By the way, I never got your name."
"Grandma... calls me Ling'er."
"Ling'er" Zhao Yi nodded. "How did you get on the train?"
"Grandma brought me... She told me to crawl under the train and sneak in without anyone noticing. She said she’d come get me when we arrived." Ling'er pursed her lips, answering quietly.
Zhao Yi fell silent.
From what Ling'er said, she and her grandmother—one old, one young—had no chance of walking to Aurora City. Their only hope was boarding this train. Her grandmother, knowing she couldn’t get on herself, must’ve come up with this plan. As for the grandmother... she was likely shot dead by the law enforcers.
At the station, Zhao Yi had lost his father. Ling'er had lost her grandmother. Their fates were painfully similar, deepening Zhao Yi’s sympathy for her.
"My name’s Zhao Yi. If you ever need anything, just come to me!" He thumped his chest.
Then, as if remembering something, he hesitated before adding,
"Uh... this is Chen Ling. Sometimes... he might be more useful than me..."
Chen Ling didn’t join their conversation, focusing solely on operating the train. The last time he’d seen such an antique was in a museum in his past life. If not for the manual in the control room, getting it to move would’ve been impossible.
Even so, the train kept stalling intermittently. Only after a long while did a familiar platform slowly come into view.
"We’re here."
Chen Ling jumped down from the locomotive, followed closely by Zhao Yi and Ling'er.
The town before them was eerily silent, devoid of life. A thin mist hung in the air, pierced only by the biting winds from the Frozen Sea, howling through the empty buildings like a mournful whisper.
"This is Winterport?" Zhao Yi shivered violently. "Feels way colder than District Three..."
Ling'er, frightened by the wind’s wail, clung to Zhao Yi’s sleeve, her face pale.
"Not a soul in sight... Looks like this place fell too."
Chen Ling frowned. "Stay alert. There might still be Calamities lurking here."
Zhao Yi’s expression soured instantly. "Chen Ling, what the hell are we doing in this ghost town?"
"Follow me."
Without answering, Chen Ling quickly oriented himself and strode forward.
Left with no choice, Zhao Yi gripped Ling'er’s hand and hurried after him. The faint mist drifted through the dim streets as they ventured deeper into the town, the scent of blood thickening in the air.
Chen Ling’s eyes swept over the houses lining the road—no signs of forced entry, no bodies on the streets. The entire town was silent, as if asleep...
Narrowing his eyes, Chen Ling approached one of the homes and gently pushed the door open.
Creak—
The interior was just as dark. On the bed in the far bedroom lay a figure, neck grotesquely swollen, eyes wide open in death.
"What’s that awful smell?" Zhao Yi covered his nose at the doorway.
At the same time, he reached out to shield Ling'er’s eyes. Even if the corpse was far away, it wasn’t something a child should see.
"Seawater."
Chen Ling crouched, running his fingers along the floor. A damp residue clung to his fingertips, reeking of indescribable decay.
He checked several more houses—all identical. Even the deaths were the same. The streets, too, were slick with the same foul seawater.
Chen Ling’s frown deepened. Following his memory, he made his way to a small telegraph office and pushed open the shuttered window.
A woman’s corpse lay slumped over the desk, her hand resting on the telegraph equipment. A half-finished message was frozen mid-transmission, cut short by death.
Chen Ling recognized her. During his last visit to Winterport, this very office had been his contact point with the Twilight Society. This woman, a peripheral member, had likely been trying to send a warning when she died.
"You know her?" Zhao Yi asked, noticing Chen Ling’s complicated expression.
"...No."
Chen Ling took a deep breath.
"Something came ashore from the Frozen Sea... Every resident here probably died in their sleep, completely unprepared."
Zhao Yi stiffened, his gaze following the main road until it disappeared into the mist-shrouded sea. In the eerie silence, the sound of waves lapping against the shore was as grating as sandpaper.
"Then... is that thing still here?"
"Hard to say." Chen Ling shook his head.
"Either way, we need to hurry."