The driver was a middle-aged hippie with long hair and a 1960s rock-star vibe. He stared at the massive hole in the roof, then at the blood-covered man lying in the aisle, and his jaw went slack.
"I knew I shouldn't have listened to my mom about getting a real job. The world outside is way too dangerous."
After the initial screams, the students fell silent. Dozens of eyes stared at Luke with a mix of shock and fear.
The driver finally found his voice and asked cautiously,
"Hey, man… you need an ambulance? Or… should I call the cops?"
A skinny kid with glasses suddenly jumped up, eyes wide with excitent.
"I know! He's from the center of the Earth! He must've been shot up through so secret underground tunnel! Everybody look outside—there's gotta be a hole to the hollow earth sowhere!"
Luke's wounds throbbed harder just listening to these kids.
"I ca from Miami. You students have so wild imaginations."
The boy's face turned red and he quickly sat back down.
The driver gathered his courage again and pointed at the roof.
"Sir, how exactly did you… get up there?"
"Just… dropped in."
Luke gestured at the hole and didn't bother making up so crazy story for a bunch of kids. He tried to push himself up using the seat, but his left leg buckled. White-hot pain shot through him and he nearly collapsed again.
Broken.
He leaned against the seat, breathing hard, and quickly assessed the damage.
Fractured left shin. Multiple cuts from flying tal. Still, compared to being carried through the sky by a monster, this was a massive improvent.
Luke looked at the driver.
"Hey, buddy. Where the hell are we?"
A blond kid wearing a baseball cap—the obvious leader of the troublemakers—stood up and looked Luke up and down with a cocky smirk.
"What's it to you? Who the fuck are you supposed to be?"
Luke was in no mood for teenage attitude.
He stared the kid down and pulled out his badge.
"I'm a cop. Adults are talking. Sit your ass down."
The blond's face flushed red. His pride had been challenged.
"Who knows if that badge is even real? You could be faking it to scare us."
He stepped forward and reached out like he was going to shove Luke.
"Still got a smart mouth, huh?"
Luke planted his good leg, shot his arm out, and flicked the kid hard on the forehead.
Thwack!
The sound was loud and sharp. The blond yelped and clutched his swelling forehead, tears instantly welling up. He didn't say another word.
The driver quickly tried to smooth things over.
"Sir, please don't mind the kids. We're just outside Greenville, Louisiana. This is the high school's bus—we were supposed to go camping by the lake. Looks like that's not happening now."
Louisiana? Luke's stomach dropped. That monster had carried him this far?
At the sa ti, a small suspicion ford in his mind.
Was this kid's brain broken? Luke had just crashed through the roof covered in blood and the first thing the blond did was start a fight. Were high schoolers in this world really this aggressive?
While thinking, Luke kept his guard up and glanced out the windows.
His panel still hadn't registered the monster's death. That thing was probably still nearby.
Its regeneration was too insane. Even a severed head might co crawling back.
Dense forest lined both sides of the highway—quiet, but definitely dangerous.
He couldn't just sit here and wait.
Luke gritted his teeth against the pain, reached up, and grabbed the torn edge of the roof. With a sharp rip, he tore off a long strip of tal.
The students gasped. Even the blond kid who had been so cocky ducked behind his seat.
Luke ignored them. He ripped off another piece, clamped both strips around his broken shin, and tied them tight with strips torn from his ruined shirt.
A crude splint.
The pain made cold sweat bead on his forehead, but he only grunted once before forcing himself upright.
The healing from the monster's energy was still working, but the leg injury was too severe for a quick fix.
Once he could stand without falling, Luke addressed the whole bus.
"Everyone stays inside the bus. No one leaves."
The driver and students, still stunned by his raw strength, nodded quickly.
At that exact mont, a strange energy wave swept through the back of the bus.
It was faint—different from anything Luke had felt before—but it gently tugged at people's emotions.
The voodoo doll at his waist ward slightly, creating an invisible shield that blocked the wave from affecting him.
He spun around and locked onto the source.
Last row. A girl sat with her head down, gripping her backpack straps tightly. Her body trembled.
She had beautiful golden hair, fair skin, and delicate features, but right now her face was full of fear and anxiety.
Her.
Luke could feel the strange energy radiating from her.
anwhile, everyone else on the bus was changing.
"Hey, look at that freak Carrie."
The blond kid suddenly pointed at the girl in the back, his voice dripping with malice.
"Every ti sothing bad happens, she's involved sohow."
His friends imdiately jumped in.
"Yeah! Last ti the lab caught fire, she was the last one to leave."
"And Susan's locker got painted with that nasty stuff the other day—I bet it was her!"
"Look at her face. So disgusting. Always acting all sad and pathetic."
What had been minor bullying and prejudice was suddenly amplified into raw, vicious hatred.
A few girls started hurling cruel, personal insults at the girl, their words getting uglier by the second.
The entire bus had turned toxic and twisted.
The panic from the crash was forgotten. Everyone was now fully invested in a spontaneous bullying session.
The girl—Carrie—buried her head even deeper. Her shoulders shook violently, like she was barely holding sothing back.
The air around her started to feel thick and heavy.
The driver looked completely lost. He shouted for everyone to calm down, but the students—drunk on amplified hatred—ignored him completely.
Luke leaned against the wall, watching the chaos with growing concern.
He could clearly sense it: the more hatred the students poured out, the stronger the energy wave coming from the girl beca.
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