Little Frost walked over to the young mother holding the child.
The child was asleep.
Breathing steady—truly asleep, not dead.
The child was about a year old.
Wearing a light yellow onesie with a little bear printed on the chest.
The mother’s phone screen was lit.
It was the hospital’s appointment booking app.
Pediatric appointment confirmed.
Affiliated Children’s Hospital.
Little Frost silently stared at that line.
The next morning, that child had a hospital appointment.
But the next morning never came.
Mu Yingying walked to the back of the carriage.
The old man in the sanitation uniform was holding a thin plastic bag with red and white stripes.
She reached out and touched the bag.
Not hot. A faint lingering warmth.
Inside the bag were baozi.
Four meat buns.
Mu Yingying straightened up.
She looked around the entire carriage.
Over forty people.
Each one had an unfinished story.
Some were big—about a four-or-five-year-old daughter, a hospitalized child, a son who lost his job.
Some were small—just meat buns to bring home for a wife, or a snack to treat themselves.
White Peace stood in the middle of the carriage.
She didn’t move.
She was watching the driver.
She could see the shape and color of the obsessions, but she couldn’t read the specifics. The specifics were something only the living could discover.
Little Frost circled around to Mu Yingying’s side and lowered her voice. “Is this thing a threat? Could it hurt Little White Night?”
White Peace answered, “Not much of a threat to you three.”
“It doesn’t have the obsession to harm anyone. It’s just trapped itself in that one second, refusing to move forward.”
Little Frost said, “If it’s not harmful, then let’s not disturb it. Let it stay here quietly.”
White Peace said, “No.”
“It’s been stopped here too long. All the filthy things on this street have been drawn to it, like the center of a whirlpool. If we wait much longer, it won’t just be a bus anymore. It will become a nest.”
“When that happens, it will start actively luring living people passing by to board.”
“And once they get on, they’ll be assimilated—become part of these forty-one passengers, trapped in this loop forever.”
Little Frost fell silent.
Mu Yingying stepped forward and looked at White Peace, lowering her voice. “Then how do we deal with it? Directly kill it?”
White Peace said, “We can’t force-kill it.”
“There are forty-one lingering thoughts inside this bus. If we force-kill, they’ll all realize the truth that they’ve been dead for a long time, and all those lingering thoughts will collapse instantly.”
“In that moment of collapse, it will unleash an extremely powerful spiritual shock.”
Little Frost said, “Then we absolutely cannot force-kill.”
White Peace said, “The only way is to let this bus drive to its final stop.”
Mu Yingying asked, “Drive to the final stop? What does that mean?”
White Peace replied, “Let the driver drive.”
“Follow his original route, take this last trip all the way to the terminus, and let the passengers get off steadily and smoothly.”
“For them—these lingering thoughts—when the bus reaches the stop, it’s time to get off. That’s an instinct carved into memory. When they get to the stop, they’ll get off on their own and disperse quietly.”
“This way, they won’t feel pain or fear.”
Mu Yingying thought for a moment, then glanced out the window again. Outside was still the silent ruins. She frowned. “But this bus can’t move right now, can it? Outside is nothing but collapsed rubble. The wheels are stuck in broken bricks. How can it drive to the final stop?”
White Peace said, “It can move—in the world inside the bus.”
“The real world outside the bus has already collapsed, but the world trapped inside this bus is the complete world from that last second of doomsday. Outside it’s frozen, but inside it can still move forward a little more.”
“Right now, it just needs someone to give it a push.”
“The driver can’t do it himself. His obsession with that last brake is what’s keeping him firmly stuck in place.”
Little Frost looked at her and asked, “So, this person who gives it a push—you?”
White Peace said, “I’ll do it.”
She walked toward the driver’s seat.
As she passed by Lao Chen, she raised a hand and rested it on his shoulder.
Not hard.
Just a light touch.
Lao Chen moved abruptly.
The focus in his eyes shattered, and his gaze re-focused on the steering wheel in front of him.
His right foot twitched, loosening the pressure on the brake.
His left hand lifted and mechanically wiped his face.
Like someone being roused from a long nap.
He blinked twice.
Lao Chen stared at the windshield in front.
Outside was the street before doomsday.
That woman in the light trench coat was still crossing the road, forever frozen in that crossing posture.
He didn’t notice her.
What he noticed was the dashboard.
The needle was stuck at 0.
He gently tested the accelerator with his toe.
The engine let out a soft hum and started.
He wasn’t fully awake.
He still hadn’t realized he was dead.
He just felt like the bus had stopped for a moment.
Now it could drive again.
He instinctively turned his head and glanced at the rearview mirror.
The mirror reflected the entire carriage.
All the passengers were still looking down at their phones, a natural posture.
He confirmed.
No one in the bus was hurt.
No one had fallen forward, no one had stumbled.
That last brake had been successful.
Lao Chen let out a gentle breath.
He gripped the steering wheel again.
Then he did one thing.
He raised his right hand and pressed the broadcast switch on the ceiling.
Above the switch was a small microphone icon.
When he pressed it, the switch glowed green.
A faint electrical hum sounded through the carriage.
Lao Chen spoke into the microphone.
His voice was a middle-aged man’s, raspy from smoke.
Not loud, but very clear.
“Dear passengers, hello.”
“The bus experienced a brief, temporary malfunction. It has now been fully repaired and can resume normal operation.”
“Thank you all for your patience and cooperation.”
“We are about to arrive at the final stop of this route. Passengers who need to get off, please prepare in advance.”
After the broadcast, the passengers in the carriage didn’t look up.
But their fingers paused.
The young man in the cheap white shirt loosened his grip on his phone just a little.
The man in glasses stopped tapping the confirm button on the shopping app.
The mother holding the child felt the child stir, then fall back asleep.
The time on every passenger’s phone screen in the entire carriage.
Jumped one second.
Just one second.
The electronic sign at the front of the bus flickered.
The words “Final Stop” on the red LED went out.
Then, new words lit up.
Arrived.
Lao Chen gently released the brake.
The bus stopped steadily.
Pulled in, stopped, engaged the handbrake.
The whole sequence was clean and precise—twenty-six years of muscle memory.
A “clack” sounded through the carriage.
The door opened.
All passengers raised their heads at once.
White Night watched from the bike basket.
She thought there would be some dramatic reaction.
But there wasn’t.
After each person lifted their head, their faces wore that expression of “Ah, we’re here.”
Tired, plain, very ordinary.
The young man in the cheap white shirt was the first to stand.
He put his phone into his pants pocket, bent down, and picked up the laptop bag at his feet. The bag’s strap had broken once and been sewn back together with black thread—the stitches were coarse, sewn by himself.
As he walked down the aisle, he instinctively edged past White Peace.
Like passing a stranger.
He reached the door and stepped off.
After stepping off, he didn’t go far.
He stood on the platform for a few seconds.
The platform was the one from before doomsday—with a rain shelter, a route map billboard.
The ground was paved with neat square bricks.
He didn’t leave.
He set the laptop bag down at his feet, pulled out his phone from his pocket.
Opened that notes app.
The unfinished line of text was still there.