The city began to dissolve into a smear of weeping neon lights and grey concrete as the car surged northward. Inside the cabin, the atmosphere was thick with a silence that felt heavy, like the air inside a tomb that had remained sealed for decades.
The humming of the tires against the wet asphalt was the only sound, a rhythmic vibration that pulsed through the soles of Chen Ying's feet.
She leaned her head back against the headrest, her eyes half-closed. The medication the doctor had administered for her shoulder was working, but it brought with it a strange, floating sensation—as if her mind were untethered from her body.
The pain was no longer a sharp, biting thing; it was a dull, distant throb, a reminder of the "accident" that had nearly ended her journey before she could reach the truth.
