Suddenly, his rearview mirror caught something. A black bus—identical to his own—was tailing him. It had no headlights, just two dim white glows where the destination sign should be. Every time Marek sped up, the phantom bus stayed exactly ten meters behind.

He launched the game. The splash screen for Fernbus Simulator appeared, but it looked... different. The colors were slightly desaturated, and the ambient engine noise in the menu sounded more like a low, rhythmic growl than a MAN Lion’s Coach. Marek selected a night route:

He tried to hit the brakes, but the pedal went soft under his foot. The speedometer climbed: 120... 140... 160. The bus began to rattle. The passengers behind him stood up in unison, their faces still blank, their eyes fixed on the back of his head.

The GPS began to flicker. Instead of showing the route to Hamburg, the map turned into a tangled web of red lines. Then, a message appeared on the dashboard's digital display: