Chapter 54: Back on the Train

A hard, long baguette was pulled out of the chest of a certain Level 2 player.

The hood of the cloak was pulled back, revealing long golden hair.

An Lan breathed a sigh of relief.

If she hadn’t obtained this cloak at the Trading Station, it was hard to say who would be the one lying on the ground.

The cloak could blur her appearance, making it difficult for others to see her clearly, and it could also block one fatal injury for her…

It was a good item she had obtained from a Low-magic World merchant for two Train Coins.

The Level 2 player who attacked from behind had been overconfident.

Seeing her get shot and fall to the ground, he wanted to come closer to loot her corpse, only to be instantly killed when she faked her death and sprang back up.

Luckily, he didn’t have any teammates.

Perhaps they had already died in the chaos…

She searched the body and obtained five Train Coins.

Adding the three coins she had earned within the Slaughter Station, she still didn’t have the ten coins required to reach Level 3.

An Lan sighed softly and looked toward the research base in the distance.

The fortifications appeared blurred at the edge of her vision.

She was certain that place was most likely the mission’s destination, but she didn’t dare approach it now.

Earlier, many players had tried to enter, only to be immediately discovered and shot by the guards, resulting in heavy casualties.

With the firepower of over a dozen assault rifles, she wondered how the people in that armored car had completed the mission…

Even if they had a sniper rifle, it wouldn’t be much help for infiltration, would it?

An Lan regretted not taking the initiative to reveal her status as a Level 2 player.

She knew she suffered from a bit of “persecution mania,” but her ability to survive until now and safely pass through two Trial Stations was inseparable from this defensive way of thinking.

As a result, she had failed to hitch a ride to the military district to reap the benefits, nor did she play a role in leading the ordinary players, which led to a very low Contribution Value.

Her only gains from this station were the three crystal nuclei she had scavenged, as well as the firearm and Train Coins obtained from killing the Level 2 player.

But these weren’t the things she truly regretted.

An Lan thought of the scene last night where Mu Bai and the others were happily eating barbecue together, and she wished she could have joined them.

It hurt, it hurt so much.

Just thinking about it made her so envious she wanted to cry.

Heaven only knew how difficult it had been for her to endure these past few days alone.

She couldn’t eat well, she often woke up in the middle of the night from nightmares, and she struggled to survive in the train all by herself.

If only she had reliable, pretty girls as teammates…

It would be even better if they could cook delicious food.

If she hadn’t been so cowardly when she first entered the station, she wouldn’t have missed the only opportunity to mingle with those girls.

Even if she survived this time and obtained a Team Merge Card, she had no idea who to use it with!

Should she take the initiative to approach them?

Anyone could see that those four were most likely going to merge their teams once they left this place.

If she tried to squeeze in now, she would seem redundant.

[The number of remaining players has reached the standard. Team Merge Cards have been issued. Surviving players may return to the train at any time.]

An orange card fell into An Lan’s hand.

Identification.

[Team Merge Card: Consume two cards to use a high-level train as an anchor point and merge a lower-level train’s main carriage onto the high-level train. All materials from the latter will be transferred, and the Train System information will be updated… Note: Members of both teams must be present simultaneously to use.]

An Lan withdrew into herself.

Consuming two cards at once, being present at the same time…

She shouldn’t even think about merging teams for a while.

Although it didn’t say the Team Merge Card couldn’t be traded, ignoring that fact was also quite despairing.

Through how many stations would she have to go to happen to meet those girls again, happen to show her strength to be valued by them, and happen to build a bond with them?

How much longer would she have to survive painstakingly on her own?

The highlights in her emerald-green eyes faded.

“Possessing two cards at once and being present at the same time… we happen to meet the criteria!” Mu Bai said in surprise.

Moreover, the system actually allowed different levels of trains to merge using the higher-level train as an anchor.

The Train System was rarely so reasonable.

“How do we use it?”

Mo Cha asked Mu Bai while observing the card Tang Shifu had handed her to study.

As for Tang Shifu… she was currently looting a corpse.

Scarface was a Level 2 player after all.

Although they couldn’t directly search his train in the Slaughter Station, he might be carrying some good things on him.

“Should we put the cards together and silently think ‘use’?”

Mu Bai guessed.

After all, the Talent Upgrade Scroll had a similar method of use.

Logically, if two cards were to be consumed together, touching them while thinking about it might work.

‘Use…’

Mo Cha placed her card against the one in Mu Bai’s hand and thought the command.

Mu Bai did the same.

Sure enough, the two cards instantly dissipated into points of light, and a structural diagram of a train appeared in Mu Bai’s mind.

Was this her and Ye Yuan’s train?

The one next to it must be the main carriage belonging to Mo Cha and Tang Shifu…

Did she have to decide where to connect the main carriage?

Mu Bai described the image in her mind to Mo Cha.

After a brief discussion, Mu Bai shifted her thoughts and set the new main carriage to be connected next to her and Ye Yuan’s carriage.

If the four of them lived closer, it would be easier to communicate daily.

“I’m finished searching. The crystal nuclei aren’t on him. Besides the coin pouch and the Serum, he has four Train Coins on his person… There are nine coins in the pouch, so thirteen coins in total,” Tang Shifu calculated.

Mu Bai’s eyes flickered.

Counting it up, thirteen Train Coins plus her and Ye Yuan’s nineteen, and Tang Shifu and Mo Cha’s eleven, that made forty-three coins.

Upgrading to a Level 4 train was just around the corner!

“Chacha and I have three more here, so that’s 46 coins… It should be enough for the next upgrade, right?”

Tang Shifu said innocently.

“Not quite.”

“Eh?”

“But it’s close. A Level 4 train requires 50 Train Coins. One trip to a Trading Station should be enough,” Mu Bai calculated.

The Serum definitely couldn’t be sold; it was a life-saver in a Zombie Apocalypse Station.

But they had two assault rifles, and counting Scarface’s, they had three in total.

Selling one or two would surely be enough to make up the difference.

Hopefully, a Trading Station would appear sooner…

Otherwise, they would have to put them on the Trading Market, which always felt like a bit of a loss.

“What’s a Trading Station?”

Tang Shifu was stunned.

“Ah, right…”

Mu Bai just remembered that she hadn’t told Tang Shifu about it at all.

Back when she was trying to scrape together Train Coins, she had intended to sell this information as a commodity.

She hadn’t expected them to become teammates so quickly…

“Anyway… let’s talk about that later. We should go back to the train first. If five minutes pass, who knows what will happen.”

Mu Bai quickly changed the subject.

“Oh right, the system said to just think it— ”

Tang Shifu disappeared halfway through her sentence.

Immediately after, the remaining three looked at each other and disappeared from the spot as well.

***

Inside the train.

Mu Bai and Ye Yuan appeared in their main carriage one after another.

Mu Bai didn’t rush to find the other two.

Instead, she tapped the touch panel to check the train’s current status.

Tang Shifu and Mo Cha’s carriages were indeed connected at the designated position according to her plan.

Mu Bai then took out her Serum Box.

She placed the empty golden box in the Material Stacking Area.

The collection progress for the 5 kg of gold instantly jumped by one-fifth.

This single box actually contained 1 kg of gold.

With the Serum boxes from the four of them plus the one Scarface had provided, they could fill the progress bar directly.

Now… aside from the gap in silver and Train Coins, the only thing missing was a Train Upgrade Module.