Apocalypse Star House Hoarding

Chapter 244

{Please present your ticket.}

{Ticket verification in progress, please wait…}

{Verification complete. Please be mindful of the remaining stops on your ticket.}

{Reminder: All forms of conflict are strictly prohibited within the train.}

This time, Yu Xi stepped onto the platform carrying a Gatling gun. Ya Tong’s MP5, as her bound weapon, rested naturally on her shoulder. As for Lin Wu, his sharp, cautious gaze made him look like someone you wouldn’t want to cross.

A team like this, standing together in full view, gave even the most desperate travelers pause. Some, seeing their strength and organization, cautiously approached, hoping to join forces.

“We’ve got enough people,” Ya Tong said coldly, glancing at the nearest hopeful. She tilted her head slightly and lit a cigarette, taking a few drags before boarding.

This time around, most of the travelers who survived the Death Sand Desert were seasoned veterans—capable, resourceful individuals who had endured the relentless monster attacks, the harsh climate, and the scarcity of water and supplies. Many had been on the same train as Yu Xi and Lin Wu during their initial arrival.

They remembered these two clearly. After all, Yu Xi and Lin Wu had been among the first to step off the train at the start of the journey. They’d also led the charge through the horde of Black Crawlers on the platform and even helped several stragglers survive.

People like that—strong, principled, and reliable—were more useful as allies than enemies. So, although everyone knew the trio carried valid tickets, no one dared to provoke them.

The three boarded without incident. Once the ticket gate recognized their passage, their phones vibrated with a notification:

Departure Time: 17:00

Previous Stop: Desolate Land

Next Stop: Not Yet Selected

Teammates Detected. Please Select Next Destination.

Yu Xi opened her list of available destinations. Three options appeared:

Fairy Tale Park (S-Level)Hope City (A-Level)Paradise Island (A-Level)She sighed. Once again, it looked like a choice, but it wasn’t really.

Lin Wu’s phone displayed three options as well:

Whitebird Lake (A-Level)Fran City (A-Level)Paradise Island (A-Level)And Ya Tong had just two choices:

Fran City (A-Level)Paradise Island (A-Level)Yu Xi rubbed her temples. “Same trick as always,” she muttered. The choices looked varied, but the overlap was glaringly obvious.

They exchanged a glance and selected Paradise Island in unison.

Next Stop Confirmed: Paradise Island

Please Proceed to Carriage 6.

They secured their weapons, shouldered their backpacks, and walked through the train’s narrow corridor toward the assigned carriage.

Carriage 6 was dimly lit, its atmosphere muted. Only a handful of passengers occupied the space—ten or so, scattered in small clusters or sitting alone.

The mood was heavy with silent tension. Every passenger remained alert, even if they appeared relaxed. As Yu Xi’s group passed by, eyes followed them briefly before retreating again.

It was obvious: these were seasoned travelers. The type who knew better than to let their guard down in unfamiliar territory.

Inside the train, the calm was palpable. But outside, the sounds of battle echoed through the platform.

The Death Sand Desert had forced more travelers than usual to form teams for survival. Now, with limited tickets available, those same teams were tearing each other apart.

Some groups stuck together to face attackers as a unified front. Others, driven by desperation or distrust, had turned on their own members.

The train’s departure time ticked closer.

Yu Xi leaned against her seat, listening to the distant chaos beyond the thick glass windows. She tightened her grip on the armrest. No matter how many times she experienced this transition, the brutality of survival never seemed to fade.

“Next stop: Paradise Island,” she whispered to herself, eyes fixed on the empty tracks ahead.

It was hard to say if that name promised hope or danger.

In the world of the Endless Train, it was usually both.

Some people may belong to the same team, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they trust each other completely. Forming a team requires mutual consent, but leaving a team can be done unilaterally.

All it takes is for a traveler to open the team menu, click “Leave Team,” and confirm the action.

Of course, such a sudden, unilateral exit triggers a protective buffer: for four hours after leaving the team, the former teammate is immune to attacks from the person who left.

But these last-minute deserters aren’t usually planning an ambush; they simply want to avoid being dragged into a team battle. Once they have a valid ticket, the most rational move is to board the train as quickly as possible. As for teammates? They can always find new ones at the next stop. After all, the immunity rule applies to anyone in the same team, regardless of trust or loyalty—two concepts that have long lost their meaning here.

An hour later, the train began to move, gliding away from the platform. Behind it, the station was left in eerie silence—except for the bodies sprawled across the ground, the crimson trails of blood, and the haunted faces of travelers who lacked the courage to fight for a ticket.

As the platform lights flickered off, the now-familiar, bone-chilling screams pierced the night.

Still, no one knew what truly happened to those left behind. Were they transformed into the same soulless black creatures they had seen when they first arrived—consciousness stripped away, leaving only a predatory instinct to hunt and kill?

Outside the station, others who should have boarded this train but hesitated or missed their chance also fell to the ground, writhing in agony. Their limbs twisted unnaturally; their necks stretched into grotesque shapes. Flesh melted into obsidian blackness.

They, too, lost their humanity. Their awareness was replaced by insatiable bloodlust. From that moment on, they would wander the Death Sand Desert—day after day, year after year—until time itself forgot them.

**

{Next Stop Approaching: Paradise Island. Stop Duration: 10 Minutes.}

{Passengers with the next-stop notification must exit through the correct door.}

{Reminder: Do not exit through someone else’s platform. Do not use the wrong door.}

As the announcement echoed through the carriage, Yu Xi’s phone lit up with a new puzzle beneath the ten-minute countdown:

Yu Xi: 2378 = 2, 6918 = 4

(8436, 9690) – Select the correct door.

Ya Tong: 2378 = 2, 6918 = 4

(9861, 1346) – Select the correct door.

Lin Wu: 2378 = 2, 6918 = 4

(4100, 5461) – Select the correct door.

Yu Xi’s brow twitched. Great. Another puzzle to determine the correct exit.

Lin Wu was in the same boat as her—he’d skipped this step entirely on his first arrival, waking up directly in the station. Like her, he’d only solved a puzzle like this once before.

Ya Tong, on the other hand, had only ever brute-forced her way through. Her first stop had started the same way: waking up disoriented in the middle of a station. Her next two stops? She powered through with sheer strength.

This was her first encounter with these cryptic numbers. Her reaction mirrored that of many new travelers: a string of frustrated curses directed at the glowing screen.

But if Ya Tong was frustrated, she was still far calmer than the handful of newcomers huddled in the corner of Carriage 6.

These fresh faces hadn’t boarded at the Death Sand Desert station. This time, for reasons unknown, the train had briefly stopped at a different platform midway through their journey—a station bathed in chaos and slaughter. Yu Xi, Lin Wu, and Ya Tong had sat in their seats, forced to watch the carnage through the windows.

When the train resumed its journey, these newcomers had appeared: unconscious and disoriented, their clothes pristine compared to the veterans around them.

Now, they were wide awake—and panicking.

“2378 equals 2? What the hell does that even mean?” one man shouted, his voice cracking.

“They didn’t tell us we’d need math for this!” a woman wailed, eyes glued to her phone.

Yu Xi watched them for a moment, then glanced at the countdown. Eight minutes left.

“Calm down,” she said, loud enough to cut through the rising hysteria. “Panic won’t solve the puzzle.”

“But we don’t even know the rules!” the man barked back. “How are we supposed to know which door is right?”

Yu Xi’s gaze sharpened. “Rules don’t change just because you don’t know them.”

She tapped her phone screen, staring at the numbers again. The clock was ticking—and getting this puzzle wrong didn’t just mean inconvenience. It meant stepping off the train into a world where survival was measured in seconds.

The newcomers didn’t know that yet.

But they would.

They had appeared in the carriage as if out of thin air.

Now, the new travelers were all awake. Some sat quietly, fear etched into their faces as they scanned their surroundings and checked their belongings. Others paced nervously, muttering questions and ignoring the crucial puzzle displayed on their screens.

Yu Xi didn’t bother with them. They had only ten minutes to crack the code.

“First, the first line of numbers is the same for all three of us. The differing numbers are in the parentheses. Based on past experience, those numbers likely correspond to the carriage and the specific door we need to use.”

She looked at Lin Wu. “Check if the doors are still numbered and if we still have four of them.”

Lin Wu stood, made a quick circuit of the carriage, and returned with a nod.

“So,” Yu Xi continued, “the two sets of numbers in parentheses should match a carriage number and the door within that carriage. We’ll probably exit through different doors.”

Her finger tapped the first line of digits on her screen. “This line, which is the same for all of us, might be a sample or a rule. Otherwise, these four-digit combinations would be nearly impossible to solve with any certainty.”

“But what does it mean?” Ya Tong squinted at her screen, lips pressed in frustration. “2378 equals 2? 6918 equals 4? It’s not a simple pattern like multiples or sums. I tried addition, subtraction, multiplication—nothing.”

“It’s simpler than it looks,” Yu Xi said after a moment of silence.

Ya Tong: “??”

Lin Wu studied the numbers again. His eyes flicked toward the digits before his brow smoothed. He pointed to one of them. “Is it this?”

Yu Xi didn’t answer immediately. Instead, she pulled out a pen and a small notebook from her storage space and scribbled down the key information:

Yu Xi: (3,4)

Ya Tong: (4,1)

Lin Wu: (2,1)

She held the paper up for Lin Wu to see. “Is this what you were thinking?”

Lin Wu nodded. “Exactly.”

Ya Tong let out a long sigh and leaned back in her seat. “Fine. Whatever. I’ll stop trying to figure it out.”

“We’ll be exiting from different carriages, but they’re adjacent, so we should move into position ahead of time. The puzzle-based exit likely means a puzzle-oriented station. We still don’t know what we’re walking into, so let’s regroup as soon as possible after we leave the platform.”

The others nodded, committing the instructions to memory. Yu Xi returned the notebook and pen to her storage space.

Around them, the other passengers were reacting to the puzzle in their own ways. Some wandered aimlessly, eyes darting between their phones and the unchanging interior of the carriage. Others sat still, occasionally glancing up as though waiting for some revelation. One man wept softly into his hands, while another quietly cleaned the edge of a serrated knife with meticulous focus.

Two minutes before arrival, a heavy thud sounded from above.

The noise came from the roof of the carriage—a dull, metallic impact that reverberated through the walls.

The newcomers froze, wide-eyed. The train was moving at high speed, yet something had landed on top of the carriage.

The silence that followed was suffocating.

Thud. Thud.

Two more impacts. This time, the ceiling vibrated visibly with each strike.

“What… what the hell is that?” one of the newcomers stammered, voice cracking.

Another turned to the veterans, desperation in his eyes. “What is it? Do you know what it is? Please, tell us! What is this place? Why is this happening?”

“Stop asking questions,” snapped a young woman who clutched her phone in both hands. “You’re wasting time. Solve the puzzle. The instructions are clear—choose the correct door to exit. Standing here wondering ‘why’ won’t help you survive.”

As if in response to her words, a crimson handprint smeared across the outside of one window.

The print was upside down, palm pressed flat against the glass.

Whoever—or whatever—had left it was clinging to the roof of a train hurtling through an unnaturally dark landscape.

The hand twitched.

Then it began to slide downward.