Chapter 88
Chapter 88
Qingshui picked up a stone from beside her foot and tossed it down the slope.
The stone struck the crumbling wall of a house with a sharp crack, bounced onto the ground, and rolled several times before coming to rest beside a clump of dead grass.
Nothing reacted.
The two of them remained in the shadows behind the tree, holding their breath and watching intently for another two or three minutes.
There was nothing but the wind.
They exchanged a glance. Qingshui nodded, and only then did they emerge from their hiding place and slowly make their way down toward the village, one behind the other.
As they drew closer, the village came into clearer view.
Many of the houses were cracked and damaged, and the roads were uneven. Dark brown bloodstains were everywhere, splattered across the walls and ground.
Their target was the nearest building that was still relatively intact, a small two-story house.
It was made of concrete. Although the roof was damaged, most of it was still there.
Qingshui crouched beneath a window on the side of the house while Lin Hao stood guard nearby. Gripping the windowsill with both hands, she cautiously raised herself to peer inside.
It appeared to be a living room.
The interior was fairly tidy, complete with furniture and a table.
There was no blood. At least, none that she could see from this angle.
Qingshui gently slid the window open, braced her hands against the sill, and nimbly climbed inside. She immediately dropped into a crouch and quickly swept her gaze across the living room again. After confirming it was safe, she signaled to Lin Hao outside.
Lin Hao climbed in right behind her. Keeping low with their backs against the wall, they listened.
Aside from their own muffled breathing and the wind outside, there was only silence.
Their objective was clear: find dry clothes, then locate a relatively safe place to rest.
Beside the living room was a staircase leading to the second floor. They ascended one behind the other, moving as quietly as possible while keeping their eyes fixed on the turn in the stairs and the pitch-black opening above.
The second floor had a small landing connected to three rooms, all with their doors tightly shut.
They entered the room closest to the stairs first. Qingshui took hold of the doorknob and turned it gently. It was unlocked.
Lin Hao pressed himself sideways against the wall and raised his knife. Qingshui abruptly shoved the door open and stepped aside at the same time.
The room was empty.
There was a bed, an overturned nightstand, and a huge wedding portrait on the wall. In the photograph, the couple held each other close, their faces brimming with happiness.
Qingshui nodded, and she and Lin Hao began searching the room.
Several pieces of clothing hung in the wardrobe. Most were dark-colored autumn clothes. They were not particularly thick, but they would do.
Their eyes lit up. In the drawers, they also found several neatly folded sets of underwear and socks. They were old, but still wearable.
“We’ll change here,” Qingshui decided at once. The room had a door they could lock, and its window faced away from the village, making it relatively secluded.
Standing back-to-back, they stripped off their soaked clothes as quickly as possible. The moment their skin was exposed to the cold, damp air, goosebumps rose all over their bodies.
Changing into dry clothes brought an indescribable sense of relief. The dryness drove away some of the bone-piercing chill, as though part of them had finally been pulled free of the icy river.
“Search the entire house,” Qingshui said in a low voice. “Top to bottom, every corner. Make sure there aren’t any Madmen.”
Lin Hao nodded and tightened his grip on the knife.
Now that they were wearing relatively dry and comfortable clothes, their movements seemed quicker and more efficient.
They encountered no danger, but found nothing either, apart from a few carrots in the kitchen.
“Qingshui,” Lin Hao called softly from beside an inconspicuous little door beneath the stairs.
Behind it was a cramped toolshed.
A battered wooden rack and a crooked cabinet stood against the wall. Scattered across the rack were a rusty hoe, a machete, a screwdriver, some hemp rope, empty tin cans, and other odds and ends.
Qingshui picked up the sickle, tested its weight, and handed it to Lin Hao.
She then took a pointed shovel from the corner. The tip of its blade was sharp. It might not compare to a gun, but it was still a decent weapon under the circumstances.
After confirming that the toolshed was safe, they finally relaxed completely.
Taking the carrots and their two new weapons with them, they returned to the innermost room on the second floor. As soon as they were inside, they locked the door behind them.
With everything done, they leaned against the side of the bed and slid to the floor.
Qingshui wiped a carrot against a relatively clean part of her sleeve. When the dried mud refused to come off, she simply put it in her mouth and bit down hard.
Crunch.
The shriveled carrot had little moisture left. Its fibers were coarse, and it carried an earthy, raw smell.
The two ate in silence, mechanically chewing and swallowing.
The food entering their empty stomachs gave them a faint sense of fullness, but it could not dispel the cold or exhaustion from their bodies, much less fill the void steadily widening within them.
Her soul seemed to grow emptier with every numb, mechanical bite, becoming weightless and unmoored.
“Qingshui.”
Lin Hao’s voice suddenly broke the silence. It was quiet, trembling uncontrollably.
Qingshui did not turn around. She kept staring at the mottled water stains and cobwebs on the ceiling, though her chewing paused for a moment.
“Can I… hold you?”
His voice was filled with vulnerability and the desperate plea of a drowning man clutching at a piece of driftwood.
It had nothing to do with romance or desire. It was simply a human being at the end of his rope, yearning for the warmth of another person.
Qingshui was silent for a few seconds. Still without looking at him, she gave a faint nod.
“Okay.”
The moment the word left her lips, a trembling body cautiously leaned against her. His arms gently encircled her shoulders, then slowly tightened.
At first, the embrace was soft, tentative with disbelief. But the pressure soon increased, and his trembling grew more violent.
“Alive…” Lin Hao’s voice sounded beside her ear, his breath hot and ragged. “You’re alive… You’re still alive… This isn’t a dream… No, no, it has to be a dream… So many people died… Sister Shuyao… Brother Shaocheng… Pingping… Yuhui… They’re all… Maybe I’m already dead too. Maybe that’s why I’m having this dream…”
His words tumbled out incoherently as tears poured down his face. The scalding liquid quickly soaked through the fabric at Qingshui’s shoulder.
The heat was almost enough to burn her skin, and the weight of it was more than anyone should have had to bear.
“Please, let this all be a dream…” he begged through his sobs. “When I wake up… everyone will still be waiting for me at the dorm… They’ll all be complaining that I’m late again…”
Qingshui did not move or struggle. She did not even make a sound when his crushing embrace began to hurt.
She simply lowered her eyes and let his burning tears soak her shoulder and neck. She could feel Lin Hao’s body shaking violently. She could feel that his mind had already broken.
“This isn’t a dream,” she said calmly. “You’re alive, and so am I.”
The trembling in her arms stopped abruptly.
Then his embrace tightened further, nearly crushing her in two. It was as though Lin Hao were trying to pour all his fear, pain, and helplessness into that one embrace.
He buried his face in the hollow of her shoulder, hot tears streaming endlessly. A long time passed before his suffocating grip finally loosened a little.
Lin Hao slowly raised his head. His eyes were red and swollen, his gaze utterly hollow. He looked at her and tried to force a smile, but the stiff, twisted curve of his lips was more painful to see than tears.
“Qingshui,” he rasped, “do you think it’s because people did too many terrible things that God… decided to punish us like this?”
He stared at her blankly.
“What… is the point of us being alive?”
Qingshui froze. For a moment, the Lin Hao before her overlapped with the figure of another man.
A man who had lost his wife. Holding her cold body in his arms, he had raised his empty eyes to Qingshui in the same way. His face streaked with blood and tears, he had asked almost the exact same questions.
“Xiao Qingshui… is God punishing us because we did something wrong?”
“What is the point… of us being alive?”
She had been unable to answer him then.
She still could not answer now.
A sharp pain twisted through her heart.
For every soul who had struggled and died in this absurd apocalypse, asking the same questions and never receiving an answer.
She gazed into Lin Hao’s tear-filled, hollow eyes and finally moved.
She raised one hand and gently rested it on his damp, disheveled hair. Then, very slowly, she stroked his head.
“I don’t know,” she said.
She had never known. She did not know what God was, nor did she know… what the point of being alive truly was.
Her hand remained in Lin Hao’s hair as she felt his faint trembling gradually subside.
Then she looked him in the eyes and said, one word at a time,
“If you don’t know what you’re living for…”
“Then live for me.”
Her gaze was calm, yet the words shook him to his core.
“Don’t leave me alone again.”
At last, she revealed a trace of the most genuine fear and desperation buried beneath her shell.
She was not afraid of death. She was not afraid of pain or killing.
What she feared most was being left completely alone in an endless darkness.
That loneliness was more terrifying than death.
So live for me.
Even if all you can do is keep breathing, numb to everything else.
Anazu
💔