I Start with a Mysterious Island

"Make way, make way! Watch out..."

A horse-drawn carriage, fully laden with goods, moved steadily along the blue brick road. The driver shouted at the pedestrians on the roadside as he steered the cart.

Lin Li watched the merchant caravan of more than twenty carriages, all loaded with goods, disappear into the distance, and couldn’t help but think.

’Just look how travel-worn they are. They must have had a tough journey. It can’t have been easy for these twenty-plus carriages to arrive safely in Dongwu City!

They travel long distances like this to deliver goods to various cities, and every trip must cost a fortune in manpower and resources.

My Mysterious Small Island is a thousand square meters now. If I used six hundred square meters for storage, it would be more than enough to hold the cargo of all twenty of these carriages...’

As he watched the distant caravan, Lin Li’s eyes grew brighter the more he thought about it. He felt he had just discovered a business opportunity to make a fortune in this world.

’Making money can wait. My top priority right now is to find that guy surnamed Zhou and teach him a lesson.’

Lin Li shook his head, pushing the thought of making money aside, and strode toward the station in the distance.

* * *

After a few minutes, Lin Li arrived at the bus station the old woman with the vegetable basket had mentioned.

The bus station before him was nowhere near as nice as the modern stations on Blue Star.

This bus station had no shelter from the wind and rain, just a signpost by the road listing the various bus routes that stopped there.

There weren’t many people waiting for the bus, only about twenty or so. Everyone stood under the hot sun by the road, with no desire to chat. The station was quiet.

Wearing a bamboo hat to hide his face, Lin Li took advantage of the wait to look around and observe the surrounding streetscape.

About ten minutes passed when someone suddenly shouted, "The 501 bus is here."

Lin Li, whose gaze had been fixed on a pastry shop, immediately looked up toward the far end of the street when he heard the announcement.

’This... so this is what the old woman meant by a bus?!!!’

Lin Li’s eyes widened as he stared at the wooden vehicle at the end of the street, pulled by three oxen. A hint of disappointment appeared in his eyes.

He had been looking forward to seeing what was so special about this world’s buses, but it turned out the "bus" the old woman mentioned was so ordinary.

However, the three oxen pulling the vehicle were anything but ordinary.

They were half a body taller than the cattle on Blue Star and were pulling a wooden vehicle that was about ten meters long, five meters wide, and two and a half meters high.

Although their running speed couldn’t match the electric buses on Blue Star, it was still about half as fast.

When this Otherworld version of a bus came to a stop at the station, Lin Li sensed a Spiritual Energy Wave from the three large oxen.

Mutant Beasts. All three of the cart-pulling oxen were Mutant Beasts, and they were all at the First Rank Initial Stage.

’So these three oxen are Mutant Beasts! No wonder they’re so huge and can run so fast while pulling the cart...’

After sensing the Spiritual Energy Wave emanating from the oxen, Lin Li muttered to himself before getting in line with the other waiting passengers to board this world’s bus.

The interior of the vehicle was very simple, just rows of seats and handrails.

After boarding, everyone found a seat, and then a dedicated staff member began collecting fares from the passengers.

"No small change?" the fare collector asked, looking at the Five Copper Coins bill Lin Li handed him.

"Sorry, I don’t have any small change on me," Lin Li said.

The staff member took the bill from Lin Li, then pulled two Two Copper Coins bills from a pouch on his waist and handed them to him.

’The bus fare is only One Copper Coin. That’s pretty cheap... Back on Blue Star, I haven’t used cash for the bus in ages, not since mobile QR code payments became popular,’ Lin Li thought, stuffing the money into his pocket.

Riding a vehicle pulled by Mutant Beasts for the first time felt quite novel to Lin Li.

However, the novelty quickly wore off. After all, a bus pulled by living creatures was nowhere near as stable as the mechanical buses on Blue Star.

The bus swayed and jolted, making Lin Li extremely uncomfortable. He had never gotten motion sickness before, but now he was starting to feel queasy.

The six-stop journey took about twenty minutes, so it wasn’t slow. However, since it was his first time on this kind of bus, Lin Li couldn’t get used to the constant swaying and couldn’t take it anymore.

"We’re at Willow Lane! Passengers who need to get off, please do so now," the fare collector shouted to everyone on board.

THUD, THUD, THUD...

The moment he heard he could get off, Lin Li, who was already feeling sick from the swaying vehicle, shot up from his seat and quickly ran off the doorless bus.

There was a large tree near the stop. After getting off, the nauseous Lin Li immediately ran over to it.

"BLECH..."

He took off his bamboo hat with his left hand, braced himself against the tree trunk with his right, and began to vomit.

Passersby who saw this scene all chose to give him a wide berth, staying far away from the person who was vomiting his guts out.

A few minutes later, after he was done, Lin Li let out a long breath and felt a sense of relief wash over him.

’Damn it. To think my first time getting motion sickness would be here.’

With a thought, a pack of tissues and a bottle of mineral water appeared in Lin Li’s hand.

He pulled out a tissue to wipe his mouth, then opened the mineral water and drank nearly half the bottle. GLUG, GLUG, GLUG.

’That bastard Zhou. This is all your fault. If I weren’t looking for you, I wouldn’t have had to suffer like this.’

Storing the remaining tissues and the half-empty bottle of water back in his Mysterious Small Island, Lin Li raised his right hand, clenched it into a fist, and blamed his entire ordeal on Zhou Tianci.

’Number Six, Willow Lane, East District. I’m coming. Are you ready, Zhou?’

Filled with anger, Lin Li put his bamboo hat back on and walked toward a signpost in the distance that pointed to Willow Lane.

After turning into Willow Lane, Lin Li found that the road grew wider the further he walked. The buildings on either side became more sparse, and the pedestrians grew fewer and fewer.

TAP, TAP, TAP...

As Lin Li walked down the sparsely populated street, looking at the large, orderly mansions lining both sides, his heart sank.

* * *