Chapter 71

Shi Jian was furious. She felt awful right now. Although she had dodged in time so that the ghost’s hand didn’t touch her shoulder, what if it had?

She almost got dirty!

Her brand-new little Chanel-style outfit had only been on for about ten minutes—was it going to be thrown into the trash just because of a touch like this?

As soon as Shi Jian thought of this, she didn’t care about whether it was a ghost or not; she just wanted confirmation.

Ghost: ???

Shi Jian’s livestream viewers: ???

Is this the main concern now?

[“Although, coming out from the toilet is really unhygienic, ew. (disgusted jpg)”]

[“That’s a ghost with a smell.”]

The viewers were also led astray by Shi Jian.

The ghost felt she wasn’t getting the respect she deserved. She stood face-to-face with Shi Jian, was silent for a moment, then quickly rotated her head 360 degrees, looking back at Shi Jian.

“Were you scared?!”

Shi Jian: “...” She wasn’t scared, just disgusted.

Her faintly angry expression remained on her delicate and beautiful face. Shi Jian clenched her fists. She had only one question: “Did you crawl out or not?”

Extremely persistent.

In the end, the ghost honestly replied to Shi Jian, “No.”

But Shi Jian remained skeptical.

She pointed out, “Your face looks pretty dirty.”

When she had her back to the ghost, Shi Jian hadn’t seen her appearance, but now facing her—

The ghost’s face was unevenly black and white, the area around her eyes smudged like a panda, eyelashes curled with strange clumps, and her lips were purple...

Before the ghost could answer, Shi Jian took out her phone and shouted, “I want to file a complaint!”

...

The complaint function was something Shi Jian learned about in the judgment room after being complained about by Doctor Feng, but this was her first time using it; she didn’t know what to expect or what the process would be.

Shi Jian thought a page might pop up requiring manual or voice input of the complaint content.

Unexpectedly, a flash of white light passed in front of her, and when she opened her eyes again, she was sitting on a familiar slightly cold iron chair, facing a man in uniform with a pixelated head.

“What’s the complaint about?” The uniformed man held a pen as if writing something and looked up at Shi Jian.

Shi Jian was still dazed. She looked around and said, “Wasn’t I just in the copy? How did I get here?”

Immediately, Shi Jian grew nervous. “Is my soul here or my body? If my body isn’t here, will she use dirty hands to touch me?”

Asking this made her feel suffocated.

She needed to get back quickly.The uniformed man answered in a matter-of-fact tone, “Your consciousness is here; your body is still in the copy. But don’t worry, time has already stopped when you arrived here.”

Shi Jian recalled when the fish monsters froze during the bug fix on the royal cruise.

So they also remain static in this copy.

That ghost really couldn’t touch her.

Shi Jian momentarily relaxed, then the uniformed man asked again, “Tell me, what are you complaining about?”

Shi Jian got fired up, leaning slightly forward as she said, “I suspect the ghost crawled out from the toilet hole.”

“...”

The uniformed man was silent for a moment, probably didn’t expect to receive such a complaint—more ridiculous than selling pamphlets like From Poor Beauty to Owning a Hospital.

Then he reminded Shi Jian, “Complaints aren’t for playing around.”

Shi Jian raised her brows, “Playing?”

“Who told you this is a game!”

“This is very important to me. Can the ghosts in the copy be so unhygienic? If she really crawled out from there and touched my new clothes, that would be worse than killing me.”

Her good character and personality would be destroyed by that one touch!

Shi Jian spoke seriously and solemnly, but at least she got the answer she wanted.

“No.”

Then the uniformed man said, “Our time is precious; don’t complain frivolously.”

“Next time, if there’s no valid reason, twenty thousand points will be deducted.”

Shi Jian: “...”

Shi Jian had received 100,000 points last time for free, but now she learned that invalid complaints would deduct 200,000 points.

Before she could react, Shi Jian was bounced out of the judgment room. Her consciousness returned to the train as if she had never left.

So indeed, time was frozen when she entered the judgment room.

Before Shi Jian could continue thinking about what happened there,

The ghost seemed angered by Shi Jian and called her name again, this time with anger.

“Shi Jian!”

Shi Jian shot back immediately, “Call me the Universe’s Number One Red. Bing Liuli. Ai Shang. Shi Jian.”

The ghost frowned, “...What nonsense, all this messy stuff.”

The ghost clarified, “I didn’t crawl out of the toilet hole. Also, I’m not dirty—that’s makeup!”

Shi Jian: ?

She really didn’t realize at first that it was makeup, but after the ghost’s reminder, she took a closer look and it did seem like it.

Though that makeup was quite outrageous and non-mainstream.So Shi Jian gave this female ghost a new name in her mind—

Non-mainstream Female Ghost.

The Non-mainstream Female Ghost felt quite proud, “I’m a ghost, I can change into all sorts of shapes. I came in through the crack of the door, huh.”

What a foolish guy. How could she crawl into such a disgusting place?

Shi Jian seemed to suddenly understand and nodded, “I see, then I can just…”

The Non-mainstream Female Ghost was still basking in the joy of thinking Shi Jian was an idiot. After hearing Shi Jian’s words, she repeated confusedly, “Can do what?”

Shi Jian didn’t answer. Instead, she took action—lifting her high heel and gave a sharp knock on the Non-mainstream Female Ghost’s head.

Then she pushed the door open and ran out.

Of course, she could knock her.

Otherwise, she’d ruin her props.

The Non-mainstream Female Ghost didn’t dodge in time, not expecting Shi Jian to suddenly attack. She got hit right on the head, howling in pain, while the culprit had already fled.

...

Actually, Shi Jian had gotten the answer in the judgment room. Her continued back-and-forth with the Non-mainstream Female Ghost was purely to buy time and find a chance to escape.

While the two of them were talking earlier, Shi Jian had picked up the Barbie-pink high heel with one hand and quietly reached for the door lock with the other.

When Shi Jian felt the Non-mainstream Female Ghost relax her guard, she seized the opportunity.

Shi Jian: Knock on your head! Make your brain buzz buzz buzz!

It turned out Shi Jian did the right thing. She escaped from the toilet, and the Non-mainstream Female Ghost didn’t chase after her. Whether it was due to some restriction or temporary hesitation, she didn’t know.

And the ticket inspector had already left.

Shi Jian returned to her seat.

But Shi Jian didn’t feel the crisis was over; this was obviously just the beginning of the danger.

After making sure she could keep her expression steady, Shi Jian chatted briefly with a young girl she had helped earlier.

Shi Jian had lent a hand when the young girl was being troubled, and the girl quickly opened up.

After chatting a bit, Shi Jian casually asked,

“Does this train often check tickets?”

The young girl confirmed, “They check once at every station.”

Shi Jian: “...” Why so often!

She flipped the bird in her mind.

But Shi Jian kept calm on the surface, “Do you know how many stops there are before the final station?”

The young girl thought for a moment, “Not exactly sure, but probably more than ten stops?”

More than ten stops...Shi Jian felt a sudden chill; this also meant she absolutely had to find the train ticket. The ticket inspector probably wouldn’t let her get away every time.

Shi Jian looked up at the sign above at the front of the carriage.

Next stop: Haidong Station. Less than two hours until arrival.

She needed to try to find the ticket within those less than two hours—assuming the ticket existed on the train, of course.

...

Shi Jian had originally thought she’d have to go it alone. Tang Tian didn’t enter the instance with her this time, and she hadn’t seen anyone who looked like a streamer.

But just as Shi Jian was about to act, a young girl who looked like she might still be underage approached.

She looked very well-behaved, with eyes curved into a smile. She seemed a little nervous, like she was gathering information.

“Sister, are you a streamer too?”

“I’m a streamer, called Jiang Xinyue. I’m in the carriage behind you. I saw you go into the restroom when they checked tickets.”

Shi Jian nodded, “I am.”

Shi Jian hadn’t expected to run into other streamers so quickly.

After Shi Jian confirmed she was a streamer, Jiang Xinyue called over a man who was about 1.8 meters tall.

“Brother, come quickly!”

Jiang Xinyue introduced him to Shi Jian.

“This is my brother, Jiang Hai.”

Jiang Hai wore a sleeveless T-shirt exposing his shoulders. His skin was tanned, and his arm muscles were firm. He eagerly introduced himself to Shi Jian, telling her everything from his age to his profession.

Jiang Hai was 28 years old. Before becoming a horror game streamer, he was a physical education teacher.

Shi Jian was used to men being friendly and wasn’t surprised. She mainly noticed that Jiang Xinyue and Jiang Hai looked somewhat alike, and since they shared the same surname, she glanced at them a few more times.

Shi Jian didn’t ask outright, as that would be impolite. But Jiang Hai seemed to notice, or was used to being asked many questions. He openly answered.

“We are biological siblings. My sister is still a high school senior, and she has very good grades... We were in a car accident together.”

Jiang Hai reached out to stroke his sister’s hair. Jiang Xinyue leaned her head into his palm, her eyes full of dependence.

Jiang Hai looked at his sister warmly and promised, “Brother will always protect you.”

This was the first time Shi Jian had seen a family enter the instance together.

She could imagine how painful it must be for a family to lose both a son and a daughter at the same time, but in such a situation, supporting each other might be their motivation to survive.

Shi Jian was somewhat touched. Then Jiang Hai suddenly turned his head to look at Shi Jian, enthusiastically promising,

“I will also protect Miss Shi Jian.”

Shi Jian: Hold back the emotions, thanks, but I’m flattered.

Shi Jian politely but firmly refused, “I can protect myself.”

Jiang Xinyue was confident in her brother’s abilities, “Brother is really powerful.”Shi Jian didn’t respond one way or the other, unsure if Jiang Xinyue had a filter when it came to her brother.

“Are you streamers too? Are you also looking for the ticket? Let’s go together.”

As Jiang Hai continued to charm Shi Jian, another somewhat surprised male voice spoke up.

The fourth streamer appeared—a man, slim, ordinary-looking, a bit socially anxious. He told Shi Jian his name was Du Zhifan.

Having one more or one less person didn’t matter much. They found a relatively quiet spot—the smoking area—to gather information.

Jiang Xinyue was in the carriage behind Shi Jian; those two carriages were connected. Jiang Hai and Du Zhifan were in another carriage, not too far from Shi Jian and the others.

None of them had encountered other streamers.

The other streamers were probably in other carriages, since the train was very long.

Like Shi Jian, none of them had found any tickets since opening their eyes.

Jiang Hai scratched his head. “I’ve searched around several times but haven’t seen anything.”

Du Zhifan also mentioned the next station’s arrival time: “Our urgent task now is to find the ticket.”

...

Many people mean more strength, but no matter how many people, on such a long train it was like looking for a needle in a haystack.

During the ticket search, Shi Jian saw many realities of life—older men spitting everywhere, and young couples sneaking kisses.

Shi Jian: “...”

After walking for a while, the carriage was hot, stuffy, and smelled bad. Shi Jian felt like she was about to explode.

Jiang Hai and Du Zhifan had a bit of a quarrel because Jiang Hai felt Du Zhifan was also trying to flatter Shi Jian and thought he should know his limits.

Jiang Hai was the first to notice Shi Jian wasn’t feeling well. Since he had to take care of his sister, he was always attentive. After handing Jiang Xinyue a cooling patch, Jiang Hai gave the rest of the cooling patches to Shi Jian.

“Shi Jian, here you go.” His face was full of smiles.

Before Shi Jian could react, Du Zhifan took out a cooling fan and directly turned it on toward Shi Jian.

Jiang Hai: “...”

When Du Zhifan said he also had small robots that could detect specific people—like inputting “crew member” would make it alert him—they all felt this function was quite necessary. The four of them wandering the carriages might get noticed by the crew, which obviously wasn’t ideal.

Jiang Hai lost his temper and kicked the ground.

“Showing off what?”

“Just showing off how cool he is!”

Du Zhifan, though socially anxious, frowned and questioned, “What do you mean?”

Jiang Hai raised his head, using his height advantage to approach aggressively, “I mean exactly that. What, you wanna fight?”

Jiang Xinyue quickly grabbed Jiang Hai, urgently saying, “Brother, what are you doing?!”Then Jiang Xinyue apologized to Du Zhifan, “Sorry, my brother gets carried away easily, his temper isn’t very good, but he doesn’t have bad intentions…”

Shi Jian frowned, “Why are you men so noisy?”

“Is this really the time to argue? Shouldn’t we be finding the ticket?”

Shi Jian glanced at the red text reminder above the carriage entrance—only ten minutes until the next stop. The next stop meant ticket checks would start.

“Do you want to get kicked off the train?”

How could they not tell what was urgent? She was focusing all her energy on finding the ticket, and yet they were still arguing.

Jiang Hai: “…”

Du Zhifan: “…”

Both fell silent.

But Jiang Hai was still a bit dissatisfied. He quietly complained to his sister, pouted, and gestured toward Du Zhifan, “He doesn’t look that impressive, why does he have so many gadgets?”

...

[“Hahaha, what a showdown this is.”]

[“I just love watching beautiful girls being fawned over, so satisfying.”]

[“But I have zero interest in shipping these two guys. Both male streamers aren’t great—Du Zhifan is too ordinary, Jiang Hai looks like muscle without brains, bad temper, and too emotional.”]

[“Why ship? The streamer is obviously my wife.”]

[“How many bottles have you drunk? If you’d just eaten some peanuts, you wouldn’t be this drunk, right, Shi Jian’s wife?”]

[“Sis, be harsh with me, please scold me fiercely!”]

Shi Jian’s personal livestream audience felt like they always unlocked something different here. Even during intense searches, they could still have these dramatic showdowns, which was rare elsewhere.

But Shi Jian’s search results were not optimistic.

Even though they searched hard, they hadn’t found a single ticket.

Shi Jian even suspected:

“Is there really a ticket on the train? Have we only searched about one-sixth of it?”

This was Jiang Xinyue speaking, voicing Shi Jian’s doubt.

But there was no time to care about that now. The train sounded an alert—

“Next stop: Haidong Station. Passengers preparing to disembark, please get ready.”

Shi Jian once again saw the crew member she had seen when first entering the instance. She and the other three streamers dodged and rushed into the restroom.

All four entered the restroom simultaneously.

The crew member was about to stop Shi Jian, recognized her, but then saw a jaw-dropping scene.

The crew member knocked on the door, “Passengers, are there four of you in the restroom?”

Shi Jian responded through the door, “No, you must be seeing things.”Lying with her eyes open.

[Here the man doctor with the perky butt would say: playing is so twisted.]

...

Shi Jian was originally worried the non-mainstream female ghost would appear again, but maybe because the four of them were cramped in the tiny restroom—such a strange scene—the non-mainstream female ghost did not show up.

Of course, if she did appear, there was no place left for her except the squat toilet spot.

Instead, as the train doors were about to close and the next journey was about to begin, the crew member started urgently pounding on the door, knocking so loudly it shook the whole restroom.

“Bang—bang—bang—”

Each knock was heavy and grew more urgent, accompanied by questions like, “Passenger, are you in there? Why aren’t you coming out yet?”

Shi Jian felt her heartbeat tremble along with the shaking door.

She even started to worry about the quality of the train restroom door.

Thankfully, the crew member did not break the door down.

After confirming the train had started moving again, Shi Jian and Jiang Xinyue and the others waited a moment before opening the door and stepping out.

What Shi Jian didn’t expect was the crew member standing not far away, a cold smile on her face as if waiting for Shi Jian.

Shi Jian read the meaning on her face—

Next time, you won’t be so lucky.

...

Shi Jian had no intention of relying on luck. Inside the restroom stall, she had already thought of how to find the ticket.

Shi Jian was confident in this approach: “If the ticket is definitely on the train, then it must be found.”

If they still couldn’t find it, that would mean it wasn’t on the train at all, that the ticket didn’t exist.

After one round of searching, Shi Jian understood clearly that relying only on the four of them wouldn’t guarantee when they would find the ticket, and they could easily miss it even if they passed by it.

Shi Jian’s plan was to go to the train’s broadcast station. She made a lost-and-found announcement: “This is a lost-and-found announcement. Passengers who find the tickets of Shi Jian, Jiang Xinyue, Jiang Hai, and Du Zhifan, please come to the broadcast station. A generous reward awaits.”

A clear female voice echoed in every train carriage. Important parts were repeated three times by Shi Jian.

Tempted by the high reward, whether playing on phones, watching videos, eating snacks, or even arguing couples, everyone stopped what they were doing.

They immediately began searching around to see if there was a ticket with one of the four names.

“Quick, look for it, there’s money.”

“If you find it, I’ll buy you toys.”

Even the grandmother of a naughty kid in the same carriage as Shi Jian was directing her grandson to look for the tickets.

Shi Jian put down the microphone and smiled: the train staff won’t upgrade her or give her a ticket replacement, don’t want to make money off her?

No problem.

The passengers will want to.Sure enough, tempted by money, the four tickets were soon successively brought to the broadcast station by other passengers. There was still more than an hour before the next station arrival, which meant ticket checks were coming.

The streamers were still assigned tickets, but they were scattered far apart in different carriages. According to Shi Jian’s inquiries, the passengers who brought the tickets found them in tricky places.

Some tickets were found under seats; others were found in bags used to hold trash and newspapers behind seats...

In any case, the locations were very hard to find. If Shi Jian and the others tried to find them on their own, who knew when they’d ever be found.

Shi Jian and the others successfully got their tickets, which at least meant they didn’t have to fear ticket inspection anymore and could return to their seats to rest.

Jiang Xinyue looked at Shi Jian with admiration. “Sister Shi Jian, you’re amazing!”

Not long after Shi Jian and the others got their tickets, Shi Jian heard other lost-ticket announcements broadcast.

Shi Jian’s method had also inspired the other streamers in this instance.

...

As the journey continued, the crew member became increasingly abnormal.

Specifically, the first time Shi Jian hid in the restroom, the crew member didn’t knock but was still somewhat polite; the second time, she kept knocking persistently.

But this time, once the train reached the station and the ticket inspectors got ready, the crew member rushed toward the restroom.

Shi Jian’s seat was empty, and the restroom door was closed.

The crew member pressed her entire body against the restroom door as if feeling no pain, forcefully pounding on it with her hands. The knocking grew sharper and sharper, mixed with a tone that was part smile, part cry, shouting:

“Passenger, please open the door.”

“Passenger, open the door.”

“Open the door!”

“If you don’t open it, I’ll have to get other staff to open it and check on you.”

“If you don’t open, I’m worried about you!”

Just as the crew member tried to break in, applause and praise sounded behind her.

“Such a responsible staff member! Doesn’t train 4444 want to give you an outstanding employee award at year-end?”

Crew member: ?

That voice was damned familiar.

The crew member turned her head and saw Shi Jian leisurely passing by, watching the scene with a look of amusement.

Shi Jian held her ticket like a fan, fanning herself coolly. No one knew how long she’d been standing there, or watching.

“Hi.”

Shi Jian politely greeted the crew member.

The crew member looked confused, utterly baffled. “Why is it you? How are you outside?”

Shi Jian looked innocent. “I’ve been outside all along.”

The crew member was even more puzzled—if this woman was outside, then who was inside?Shi Jian egged her on, "You keep doing your thing, don’t mind me," then briskly returned to her seat and let the ticket inspector handle the ticket checking.

The restroom door opened, and an old man shouted at the crew member, cursing, "What are you howling about outside!"

“Eat shit, you.”

The crew member was blasted with curses from the old man. Shi Jian, not far away, turned her head and showed a small white smile, silently mouthing to the crew member:

“Hurry, complain about me!”