Chapter 037: Trapped in the Technology Park

As expected, by the time Lin Luyou finished entering the last line of data that night, it was already half past nine. She rubbed her eyes and stretched her stiff neck. Once again, she was the only one left in the entire conference room. In fact, she suspected that she was the only living soul on the whole floor.

After carefully organizing all the materials and sending them off to Chen Danling’s email, Lin Luyou finally rose to her feet at a leisurely pace, gathering her things in preparation to return to her dormitory. Since there were no more buses at this hour, it hardly mattered whether she left one minute later or half an hour later.

With that in mind, her movements grew even more unhurried.

A message chimed in: it was from Chen Danling.
[Got it. Be careful on your way back.]
[Don’t worry, Danling! I’ll be fine~] Lin Luyou replied, and only then did she switch off the lights in the conference room and step outside.

Tonight, she was an hour later than yesterday. Yet, somehow, that single hour seemed to change everything. For example: the streetlights downstairs, as if convinced the entire campus had emptied out, had already gone dark, plunging the surroundings into inky blackness.

Faced with such a scene, even the bravest of souls would feel their skin crawl, let alone someone as timid as Lin Luyou.

“Hello, sir?” Choosing between saving money and saving her own life, she decided without hesitation on the latter. She quickly dialed the number of the ride-hailing driver she’d just booked.

“Sir, would you mind driving a little further into the campus when you arrive? It’s not far, really—right turn at the entrance, then left at the second intersection, just go straight. Yes, that’s right, on Baoyuan Third Road. The Max Building.”

On the other end, the driver grumbled his annoyance, complaining that she hadn’t given an exact location at first and that it would cost him extra gas.

Lin Luyou knew she was at fault and apologized repeatedly. But just as she was about to hang up, she caught the sound of another voice on the line.

“Sir, do you have another passenger in your car?”

“That’s right. Since both of you are heading for the provincial road, I’ll take you together,” the driver replied without hesitation.

But Lin Luyou wasn’t so easily reassured.

Stories of women getting into trouble while taking ride-hailing cars at night flashed through her mind—stories her brother Lin Luming never tired of warning her about whenever he had the chance.

So, after hanging up, she promptly logged into the ride-hailing app and canceled the order.

But as if fate were playing a trick on her, after canceling, she simply couldn’t get another car. Five minutes passed, and her screen still showed “Searching for a ride.”

Could I really be this unlucky? Am I going to have to sleep here tonight?

She glanced back at the company building, suddenly remembering that Aliex had mentioned yesterday that there were sleep pods upstairs.

She eagerly opened the Max employee service portal on her phone and selected the sleep pod reservation option—only to find, to her surprise, that it required managerial approval.

Which meant, to catch a bit of sleep upstairs, she’d need not only Chen Xujia’s consent but also the signature of Wang Shi, a manager she’d never even met.

Forget it. I’ll just walk out to the main road. Maybe it’ll be easier to catch a ride there...

Thinking this, Lin Luyou shuffled forward, trying to bolster her courage by switching on her phone’s flashlight and playing some music.

Just then, a white car sped past her like a ghost, whirring by in the darkness.