Chapter 4: Chapter 003 Flight 444_1
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[Because of fate, five strangers boarded Flight 444 together, but unfortunately, the much-anticipated accident still occurred...]
[Ah, in life we shared sympathy, in death we share a coffin...]
[The fate of Flight 444 tugs at the hearts of countless people...]
[We all want to know if the five people on Flight 444 can die neatly, die startlingly...]
[And thus...]
[Main Mission: Escape to Survive!]
Boom!
As the four blood-red characters of "Escape to Survive" flashed before Yi Lin's eyes in a shocking display, a loud noise suddenly erupted from ahead, accompanied by intense vibrations. Yi Lin's seat tilted bizarrely downwards!
This opening filled with malice...
Still a familiar taste.
Honestly, Yi Lin even inexplicably felt a bit of nostalgia.
The word "flight" was foreign to Yi Lin.
The four immense Towers brought cataclysmic changes and also created a "No-fly zone" that covered the entire planet.
A decade ago, with the advent of the no-fly zones, airplanes, a kind of high-altitude transportation, were suddenly removed from human life overnight, turning into remnants of history.
By the way, aside from airplanes, all technology and hot weapons that depend on satellites and aviation were rendered meaningless overnight.
With the dawn of the Tower Epoch, human technological civilization regressed by several decades instantly.
It's worth mentioning that many young people, let alone flying, haven't even had a chance to see a real large commercial plane. Spiral helicopters do exist, however.
At least, in the eyes of "ordinary people," this is the harsh reality of the world. Heh, this trial mission is on a plane destined for death.
Rumble, rumble—
Outside the window, there was a series of thunder and lightning flashes.
Terrifying to the extreme.
With a violent jolt, Yi Lin was harshly thrown about. Had it not been for the seat belt restraining him, Yi Lin would have been thrown who knows where by now.
Yi Lin had no time to ponder what the Apocalypse Knight module was; he gripped the armrest tightly, fearing he would be flung out.
Bang!
A strange noise came from the front cabin.
However, following this sound, the turbulence eased somewhat, but the whole plane began to fall toward the ground at an angle at a certain speed!
The plane continued to shake uncontrollably, but compared to the initial jolt, it was far less violent.
The lighting in the entire cabin flickered on and off, as if it could go completely dark at any moment.
Yi Lin thought for three seconds, and in those seconds, he did three things.
First, Yi Lin recalled the brief mission description.
Second, he made five possible assumptions about this trial mission.
Third, he unbuckled his seat belt.
Wait a moment.
Yi Lin suddenly noticed that the clothes he was wearing weren't the black sweater he had worn when he sneaked into Siao Yang's house.
Opening his palm, he saw a scar on the back of his hand.
This wasn't the hand Yi Lin recognized.
Yi Lin's expression was calm as he quickly rummaged through his suit's pockets.
Sure enough, he found a metal piece the size of a coin inside the lining of his suit.
"Is it a 'role-playing' type of mission..."
"If I remember correctly, this should be what 'flight tickets' used to look like in history books..."
"Previously, all facilities on flights operated on a one ticket to one seat system, whether it was emergency oxygen supply, life jackets, or parachute packs, all required a 'flight ticket' to access. Ah, I got it..."
Yi Lin mumbled to himself as he pulled out a life-saving kit from under his seat.
Drip.
Swipe the card, open the life-saving kit.
[Obtained "Fruit knife"]
[Obtained "Aged Parachute Pack"]
…
[Fruit knife]
[Rarity] None
[Description] A small knife that can peel fruit, hidden by someone in the life-saving kit.
…
[Aged Parachute Pack]
[Rarity] None
[Description] One of the distinguishing features of Flight 444, a parachute pack with a certain age, which has not been maintained or inspected for many years. Whether it opens after you jump out depends on your luck.
…
"..."
This trial task to officially become an Angel Envoy truly lived up to the infamous title of "Newbie's Grave"...
Seeing the parachute pack made Yi Lin involuntarily smirk. It is said that in the last century, it was impossible to safely parachute from a commercial plane... Such a foolish design.
Yi Lin tucked the fruit knife into his chest and casually slung the unreliable parachute on his back.
As he stood up from his seat, at different positions in the cabin, the other four passengers, each with different expressions, also stood up from their seats in turn.
Yi Lin quickly glanced over the four.
A non-mainstream youth with dyed blond hair.
A beautiful woman in formal business attire.
An old man in his seventies or eighties, hunchbacked.
A middle-aged man wearing glasses, who looked very scholarly.
Including Yi Lin, all five people became aware of each other's presence as they stood up one after another.
Suddenly!
The slightly shaking plane jolted violently again; including Yi Lin, all five instinctively grabbed the seats beside them, trying hard to maintain balance.
Fortunately, the shaking was quick to come and go.
Unfortunately...
Yi Lin's pupils contracted slightly; after the shaking, the plane was tilted even more than before, now at an angle of about thirty degrees from the horizontal.
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"Did you all… see those words? What's happening here? Are we being kidnapped?"
The woman's eyes flickered with panic, her pale palm gripping the armrest tightly, not daring to move.
"How is that possible!" The bespectacled man shuddered, his teeth chattering, unable to hide the fear in his heart, "I was clearly working overtime in the office, how did it suddenly… Am I dreaming? This is an airplane! An airplane that stopped operating ten years ago!"
"Hey…" The punk-style Blondie chuckled, "We all chose YES to come here, since we believe in a god, what's so strange about everything here? Didn't you pay attention to the prompt at the beginning? If I'm not mistaken, we must have been captured by some kind of mysterious force to complete some sort of trial…"
"I thought it was a hallucination…" The businesswoman went limp, muttering to herself, "Could it really be… God?"
The punk-style Blondie glanced at the woman, licking his tongue, "Whether there is a god or not, the most important thing now is to survive! I was already squatting in prison for two years, now… heh heh, rather than wasting away in prison, it wouldn't be so bad to really die here."
Upon hearing that Blondie was "summoned" from prison, the woman and bespectacled man couldn't help but look at him with increased wariness.
The hunchbacked old man, however, did not utter a word. He looked around and suddenly, his cloudy eyes slightly lit up as he took a small red life hammer from the cabin wall.
At that moment, the punk-style Blondie looked towards Yi Lin, who had yet to speak, and chuckled with a glint of danger in his slightly narrowed eyes, "Brother, that thing on your back, it wouldn't happen to be a parachute, would it!"
No sooner had he spoken.
The bespectacled man, hunchbacked old man, and the businesswoman all looked involuntarily towards Yi Lin.
High altitude + Plane + Escape = Parachutes.
Anyone who wasn't brain-dead would quickly come to this conclusion.
Yi Lin just shrugged indifferently, explaining the origin of the parachute.
"You should all have a 'plane ticket' on you. Open the life-saving box under your own seat, and you should find it."
As Yi Lin said this, he struggled to maintain his balance amidst the varying turbulence and walked towards the front.
He wasn't planning to jump with the parachute.
In fact, without being 100 percent certain, he wouldn't risk his luck jumping from high altitude.
That wasn't relying on luck; that was tempting fate.
Yi Lin had witnessed the apocalypse.
He had seen firsthand the purgatory of human bodies strewn everywhere and cities turned into ruins.
He understood the value of life more than anyone else in this era.
You only have one life.
If he died again, Yi Lin dared not to expect to be reborn once more.
Therefore, upon his rebirth, in order to ensure that on July 8, 2121, he could kill Siao Yang and take the Angel Envoy status, Yi Lin planned for 832 days.
He slit throats 41,600 times.
Imagined 26 different poses.
Ran through the assassination map in his mind 2,542 times.
Developed 18 contingency plans for finishing the job.
All for the sake of leaving nothing to chance.
To Yi Lin, as long as there was a plan, preparation, and a scheme, there were no accidents.
That was the theory.
And in practice… it should be the case.
So, this parachute pack, was absolutely not an option to jump with.
Yi Lin suddenly remembered the 4.0 'Luck' on his panel.
He had a feeling that if he relied on this little luck to jump with the unreliable parachute pack...
He would die.
...
Yi Lin walked through the aisle, and the other four, after his reminder, also found their "plane tickets" and fumbled to open the life-saving boxes.
Just as Yi Lin was passing by the bespectacled man, he noticed a person lying next to the man's seat.
To be precise, a person who was unconscious.
The bespectacled man, while opening the life-saving box, noticed Yi Lin's gaze and quickly waved his hands, "No, it's not my fault, I don't know him. He undid his seatbelt himself, and when the plane shook, his head hit the cabin roof and he passed out…"
Indeed, there was a faint trace of blood near the luggage rack.
Yi Lin was originally not inclined to care, but after thinking it over, he approached the unconscious man, checked for breathing; his breath was weak. Although he appeared to still be alive, he might not be far from death.
"I found it!"
Just then, the woman uncovered a parachute pack, crying tears of joy, she immediately slung it on her back.
Yi Lin casually looked back.
Hmm, it seemed to be the same model.
Old parachute pack.
"There's actually text on this parachute pack!"
A flash of surprise crossed the woman's eyes, many items in the Inside World were datafied, which to a newbie was a magical experience.
For Yi Lin, who was used to such oddities, there was naturally not a hint of surprise.
As the businesswoman found her parachute pack, the punk-style Blondie stood up from his seat with a gloomy expression, holding a helmet in his hand… and a life jacket.
It looked like a motorcyclist's helmet.
What use could it be in this situation?
Head-first jumping?
As for the life jacket...
Anyone could guess that without a parachute, jumping with a life jacket would only help one's body float after the fall.
No wonder Blondie's forehead was dark and foreboding.
The hunchbacked old man helplessly found a life jacket in the life-saving box, and… a can of coconut juice.
Given the rust on the can, no one could tell if it was expired or not.
"There's none, I don't have a parachute!"
The bespectacled man's face turned deathly pale, his hands came up empty.
"Things are getting interesting…"
The corner of Yi Lin's mouth subtly curled.
Which meant…
On this plummeting Flight No. 444, a flight of death.
There were five survivors.
And unreliable parachute packs…
Only two!