Last Bus of Route 13

Hearing Xiao Liu say Bai Fan was in a car accident made my heart drop like a roller coaster plunging down.

“What? How is she? Is she seriously injured?”

Xiao Liu replied, “I heard it from Bun Hairstyle. He couldn’t reach you either. It happened last night, and I’m not sure about the details. You should hurry back.”

I asked a few more questions before hanging up and tried calling Bai Fan, but her phone was off.

Back at Zhou Zhuang’s house, I quickly told Old Liu about the situation and dragged him along.

Seeing my anxious expression, Old Liu didn’t refuse. We bid farewell to Zhou Zhuang and his wife and hit the road.

I was so worried about Bai Fan that I wished I could fly to her side immediately. Old Liu, noticing my anxiety, tried to distract me by asking quietly, “You said you met Semi-Immortal Xu. What did he tell you?”

Even though I wasn’t in the mood to think about my own issues, I patiently recounted my conversation with Semi-Immortal Xu in the shabby tent to Old Liu.

Old Liu nodded reassuringly. “Semi-Immortal Xu pointed you in the right direction. Our trip wasn’t in vain. The soul transfer rooster is dead, so that’s settled.”

Remembering what Xiao Chu had told me, I asked, “But what about Da Lao Wang? If he continues to harm people, what should we do?”

Old Liu chuckled, “Da Lao Wang has always had a good reputation among the villagers. This soul transfer rooster incident was probably a momentary lapse. Even if he harbors ill intentions again, it doesn’t matter. Yangcaogou has Semi-Immortal Xu watching over it. You can rest easy.”

With Old Liu’s reassurance, I felt a bit relieved. I was stretched thin and could only take things one step at a time.

Once we reached the city, I quickly contacted Xiao Liu and Bun Hairstyle to visit Bai Fan at the hospital.

Bai Fan was staying at the city center hospital, where Bun Hairstyle had arranged a private room for her.

As soon as I entered the hospital, I rushed to Bai Fan’s side, my heart breaking at the sight of her lying unconscious on the bed.

Inside the hospital room, a couple of doctors and a group of nurses were examining her. Seeing so many people suddenly crowding in, one of the doctors frowned and grumbled impatiently, “Out, out, out. We’re changing shifts. Come back in half an hour.”

Anyone who’s been hospitalized knows that some doctors and nurses, accustomed to life and death, can be quite indifferent to the emotions of the patient’s family, often displaying a rude attitude.

If it were just Xiao Liu and me, it might have been fine, but Bun Hairstyle, used to being the Big Brother, couldn’t tolerate this. He grabbed the doctor’s collar and pulled him forward, demanding, “Say that again. Who are you telling to leave?”

The doctor, seeing Bun Hairstyle’s shaved head and tattoos, realized he wasn’t dealing with someone easy and nervously tried to negotiate, “Please, don’t resort to violence. We’re just exchanging shifts and don’t want any noise to disrupt our communication about the patient’s condition.”

Bun Hairstyle wasn’t buying it. With a single motion, he tossed the doctor over a meter away.

This wasn’t the time for arguments or emotional outbursts. I stopped Bun Hairstyle and quietly asked the doctor, “Doctor, how is she?”

The doctor was helped up by the nurse behind him. Glancing at Bun Hairstyle, he swallowed hard and said, “The patient isn’t in any critical condition. She was hit by a car, which caused a mild concussion. To be honest, this isn’t considered serious. But for some reason, it’s been over ten hours, and she still hasn’t regained consciousness. We’re still investigating.”

A mild concussion?

I remembered when I was a kid, I fell off a tree while playing and hit my head. I felt dazed for days, but when I went to the hospital, the doctor also said it was just a mild concussion. It didn’t stop me from eating, drinking, or playing, let alone knock me unconscious.

After explaining the situation, the doctor didn’t dare linger and left the room with the nurse.

I sat by Bai Fan’s bedside, staring at her head wrapped in gauze. Her pale face lacked any trace of color. As I debated whether to transfer her to another hospital, Old Liu walked over, his gaze fixed on Bai Fan.

Standing by the bed, he scrutinized her for a moment and said, “The concussion is real, but this unconsciousness isn’t something that can be fixed with injections or just waiting around.”

Old Liu’s words carried a hidden meaning. Just as I was about to ask him what he meant, the door to the room opened again, and Tang Yao walked in.

Seeing Tang Yao made my heart tighten. Bai Fan’s family wasn’t here, so why was Tang Yao?

Bun Hairstyle, noticing my unease, chuckled and explained, “Bai Fan was out shopping with Tang Yao when the accident happened. It’s a good thing Tang Yao was there.”

Shopping with her, and then this happened?

I didn’t bother hiding my displeasure. Fixing my gaze on Tang Yao, I asked bluntly, “You were with her on the street. How come Bai Fan got hit by a car, but you’re perfectly fine?”

Tang Yao hadn’t even started explaining when Old Liu waved his hand and asked, “Miss, what kind of car hit her?”

Without hesitation, Tang Yao answered, “It was a red Mazda.”

Old Liu nodded thoughtfully and asked again, “Do you know where the car is now?”

“The driver fled after hitting Bai Fan. The police are investigating,” Tang Yao replied without a moment’s pause, her tone suggesting she wasn’t lying.

Old Liu sighed and turned to me. “Bai Fan’s soul has been lost. The hospital can keep her stable with IV fluids, but if you want her to wake up, you’ll need to find that car.”

Lost her soul?

I was taken aback. “There are car accidents every day. How come Bai Fan gets hit and loses her soul?”

Old Liu shook his head. “I don’t know yet. We’ll figure it out once we find the car.”

Bun Hairstyle chimed in from behind, “Leave finding the car to me. I’m already on it. I’ll track it down faster than the police.”

I glanced at Tang Yao again and asked in a low voice, “Bai Fan’s in such a serious condition. Why are you the only one here? Where are her parents?”

Tang Yao’s face took on an innocent expression. “I don’t know. Her mobile phone doesn’t have her parents’ numbers, and the police said they couldn’t reach them either. So I’ve been the one taking care of her.”

I sighed. Bai Fan’s parents lived in Tangwazi Village. How could the police not be able to contact them?

I remembered Bai Fan mentioning back when I visited Tangwazi Village that her parents were away from home. Could they still not have returned?

I considered going back to Yangcaogou to find Semi-Immortal Xu for a divination to locate the car, but Old Liu firmly opposed the idea. He simply told me that Semi-Immortal Xu was no longer someone I could turn to for help.

After a while, everyone dispersed, leaving just Tang Yao and me at the hospital to watch over Bai Fan.

Bai Fan got hit by a car while out with Tang Yao. To say Tang Yao had nothing to do with it? I just couldn’t buy it.

I’d always worried that Bai Fan wasn’t safe hanging around with this ghostly best friend of hers, and sure enough, something bad finally happened.

But Semi-Immortal Xu had made it clear to me: among the four people I suspected of being ghosts, only one of them actually was. That answer nearly drove me mad!

Old Tang had been dead for a solid ten years-there was no disputing that. The evidence was ironclad. Sixth Uncle’s death records were also clear as day, and I’d even seen Tang Yao kneeling before his corpse.

Even if I ruled out the old lady with the vegetable basket, there should still be three ghosts, right?

But if there was only one ghost…

I didn’t dare let my thoughts go any further. The deeper I dug into this mystery, the more tangled it became. Now wasn’t the time to get caught up in these questions.

The priority was to follow Old Liu’s advice and find that red Mazda as quickly as possible!

Tang Yao and I sat on opposite sides of Bai Fan’s hospital bed. At one point, Tang Yao went out to buy food and came back wearing that same red-dress again.

I was absolutely fed up. Every single time we were alone together, she’d show up in that red-dress. But the moment there were other people around, her outfits would change endlessly-skirts, pants, you name it.

I decided to probe her a bit.

“Tang Yao, you’ve been Bai Fan’s best friend for so many years. Don’t tell me you don’t know anything about her family. Even if you can’t reach her parents, what about other relatives?”

Tang Yao shrugged. “Believe it or not, I’ve never met any of her family in all the years I’ve known her.”

“Bai Fan mentioned to me once that there’s someone near her home called Sixth Uncle, someone who’s watched over her since she was little. You’ve never met him either?”

My question carried multiple layers of meaning. On one hand, I wanted to confirm if Bai Fan and Sixth Uncle really had a connection. On the other, I wanted to see if Sixth Uncle was even a real person.

“No idea. She’s never mentioned anyone like that to me.”

Her answer left me disappointed. Even the slightest bit of information about Sixth Uncle could’ve been a huge help.

Tang Yao, knowing I didn’t think much of her, brushed me off with a casual response and went back to fiddling with her mobile phone.

Her attitude infuriated me. She didn’t seem like someone who’d tell the truth anyway.

We sat there in silence, ignoring each other.

Not long after, I got a call from Bun Hairstyle. He told me there was news about the red Mazda that hit Bai Fan.

Without saying a word to Tang Yao, I bolted out of the room, hailed a cab, and headed straight to the address Bun Hairstyle had given me.

At the video surveillance room of the Zhongdong shopping mall, Bun Hairstyle was huddled with a few people, whispering as they pointed at the monitor.

When he saw me enter, he frowned and pulled me aside, leaning in to speak quietly.

“Bro, we found the surveillance footage from when Bai Fan got hit, but something’s off. Just a heads-up-don’t freak out when you see it.”

I was taken aback. Bai Fan had only suffered a minor injury. Surveillance footage would just show the incident; there shouldn’t be anything scary about it. What was there to freak out over?

I nodded and stepped up to the monitor. A security guard began playing the footage.

On the screen, Bai Fan and Tang Yao were walking hand-in-hand along the roadside. The street was bustling with cars, but everything seemed normal. Suddenly, a car came speeding up behind Bai Fan. Tang Yao pushed her out of the way, but the car still grazed her, sending her sprawling onto the roadside.

The car was moving so fast that its details were a blur. This didn’t look like an accident-it seemed deliberate, as if the car had intentionally aimed for Bai Fan!

And then I noticed something else: the car didn’t appear to be red.

I asked the security guard to slow down the footage. Bun Hairstyle’s warning proved true. A chill ran down my spine.

The car that hit Bai Fan wasn’t a red Mazda at all. It was a white vehicle with a compartment.

It was a hearse-a funeral home vehicle used to transport the dead!