Chapter 152: Approaching the Truth

Before Sword Rises could finish speaking, he met the expressionless gaze and walked directly over to the burly man lying on the ground.

He gave the man a kick.

Seeing no reaction, he finally squatted down to examine the wound on the man's chest.

The silver revolver possessed immense destructive power, tearing a hole about the size of half a fist into the man's chest.

Peering into the cavity, aside from blood and minced flesh, one could see a heart that was more than half destroyed.

Although this was a game, the man obviously could not survive under such circumstances.

Sword Rises crouched down and began searching the sturdy man's body.

To his disappointment, however, there was nothing of value on the man.

"It seems it must be stored in his inventory space. What a pity."

Yin Chen sighed.

He had roughly figured out the true identity of the burly man.

Like Uman, he should be an immersion-mode player.

However, since this man had already cleared one dungeon, he was aware of the general situation regarding regular players like themselves.

That explained the earlier stunt.

He had wanted to lower the guards of Sword Rises and Expressionless to make it easier to strike.

"In that case, the burly man's mission should be to eliminate other players."

"Which means those two players were most likely killed by him."

"Yet if the burly man did it, and Lucy killed Lina, then whose was the shadowy figure I saw when I woke up back then?"

"A ghost wandering inside the train?"

"Right, there is another question—how did Lucy squeeze through such a narrow passage..."

At this thought, Sword Rises felt that once the true nature of that ghost was uncovered, the mystery would be completely solved.

However...

He looked at Expressionless, who was now at his last gasp.

At this moment, Uman walked over to Expressionless, appearing as though he wanted to help tend to his wounds, though his eyes never once left the silver revolver in Expressionless's right hand.

Clearly, his intentions were far from pure.

Expressionless was well aware of this and aimed the muzzle straight at Uman.

This frightened Uman so badly that he scrambled and scuttled away to hide behind a wooden crate.

"Brother, calm down, please! I just wanted to help bandage your wound. If you don't treat that wound right now, you're genuinely going to die."

Uman tried to reason with him, not daring to poke even an inch of his body out from behind the wooden crate.

He was genuinely terrified that Expressionless might act on impulse and put a bullet through him too, which would be an utterly unjust way to die.

Ignoring Uman, Expressionless rolled his eyes to look at Sword Rises, who had stepped up in front of him.

Only then did Sword Rises truly get a clear look at the wound.

The left scapula had been completely torn apart by immense force.

The spine and ribs were faintly visible.

This showed just how terrifying the burly man's strength had been at that moment.

This was simply not something a normal person could accomplish.

It was most likely related to an item from his starter pack.

Without wasting words, Expressionless directly tossed the revolver in his hand to Sword Rises.

"There's still one bullet left inside."

Knowing he could no longer survive, he detachedly handed over the firearm.

As for why he didn't give it to Uman, it was clearly because he despised the man and suspected he might be an NPC.

Hearing what Expressionless said, Sword Rises opened the cylinder of the revolver to verify it.

There was indeed only one bullet remaining.

The bullet was also silver, with a cross symbol stamped on its base.

It was identical to the cross found inside that box.

Stowing the revolver away, Sword Rises looked at Expressionless. "Is there anything else you want to say?"

"Can you throw me out? I want to see what consequences follow after being thrown off a train."

Upon hearing this, Sword Rises nodded, then placed him inside a wooden crate.

He called out to Uman, and together they pushed Expressionless off the train.

"Bang!"

The moment the wooden crate was pushed off the train, it was torn into several pieces by the tremendous force.

Fortunately, most of the impact was absorbed by the wooden crate, sparing Expressionless from any further trauma.

Though already half-dead, he still had a breath left in him.

Then, under the watchful eyes of Sword Rises and Uman:

In the yellow desert below,

A vast swarm of venomous insects crawled out, completely engulfing Expressionless's body in mere breaths.

Minutes later, the swarm scattered, revealing a skeleton caked in fragments of flesh and residue.

"Gulp!"

Seeing this, Uman's Adam's apple involuntarily bobbed up and down.

If one were to fall off this train, survival was truly an absolute impossibility.

"Alright, let's head back."

With that, Sword Rises turned around and walked back.

Recovering his wits, Uman hurried after him and asked anxiously, "Then what about our cooperation?"

...

...

"Bang!"

Inside the compartment,

The thunderous report of the revolver echoed into the ears of the three occupants.

Irene, who had been fast asleep, snapped awake instantly.

"What happened?"

She asked her question, but neither of the other two in the compartment answered her.

Both Lucy and Roth were holding their breath, listening intently for any movement from the rear carriages.

Yet all they could hear was that single gunshot; any other sounds were drowned out by distance and the roar of the moving train.

Not the slightest trace could be heard.

A look of doubt crossed Lucy's face, her brows furrowing tightly.

She seemed to be worried about something.

"Aren't you going to go take a look?"

Seeing her expression, Roth narrowed his eyes and spoke up, "It must be that fellow Expressionless."

"When he was searching that corpse earlier, he hid the bullets."

"I just wonder how many bullets are left, and if there are enough to give each of us one."

Roth spoke with total nonchalance.

Yet his final sentence made a cold glint flash through Lucy's eyes.

After long consideration, she stood up.

It seemed she intended to investigate for herself.

However, before she could even reach the door, another 'bang' suddenly rang out from the rear.

This sound came from much further away than where the previous gunshot had originated.

Combined with the noise of the moving train, the sound was not particularly clear.

It was hard to determine what had made the noise.

Still...

"Another shot. It seems they've run into some trouble."

Hearing the sound, Roth didn't care whether it was a real gunshot or not; his only goal was to pile more pressure onto Lucy.

Yet he completely failed to anticipate that upon hearing his words, Lucy's previously tense expression would instantly relax.

She flashed a relaxed smile toward Roth.

"I think you're just trying to find an excuse to run away."

With that, Lucy ignored Roth, turned around, and sat back down on the bed, beginning to explain the situation to a bewildered Irene.

Seeing this, Roth's face instantly darkened.

Judging by Lucy's reaction, she clearly knew the exact number of bullets.

That explained why her formidable, facing-an-enemy-at-the-gates reaction had vanished the moment she heard two gunshots.

But how could she possibly know?