Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
Chatter broke out among the crowd, giving off the vibe of an impending quarrel.
Bai Youwei surreptitiously observed the man in glasses, noticing a visible mix of annoyance and contempt in his demeanor. No doubt he was also helpless, having to rely on this group of vulgar and selfish humans for survival.
Bai Youwei turned her face and gave Shen MO a look that seemed to say, “See, I told you this bunch can’t be trusted.”
Shen MO simply smiled in response, not offering any comments.
The so-called strategy discussion gradually devolved. It started as a discussion but eventually degenerated into mutual blame. If not for the man in glasses stepping in occasionally to defuse the tension, it probably would have escalated into a showdown.
Suddenly, the room plunged into darkness!
The most timid were the first to scream.
Then someone else cursed, “What are you screaming about! It’s just a power outage, don’t scare yourself!”
After a moment, when everyone’s eyes had adjusted to the dark, everyone scrambled to leave the restaurant. The man in glasses summoned a couple of people to go check the circuit breaker.
Without electricity, everyone idled outside, with nothing to do.
Bai Youwei stared upward, looking at the moon and stars. The vast expanse of the sky covered the earth, quiet and broad, making people seem particularly insignificant under the night sky.
The night seemed to contain a mysterious power—viewed for a long while, it always left one’s heart beating faster.
The crowd grew restless.
The man in glasses who had left returned and informed everyone that the circuit breaker was fine; the entire service area was out of power. Perhaps soon, even the water supply would be cut off.
The atmosphere turned gloomy and suffocating in an instant.
Bai Youwei thought, these people were really hopeless. Apart from the man in glasses, there wasn’t another with any initiative.
“I say…” An old man in the crowd hesitated to speak up, “Why don’t we, try to find a way out?”
A bystander responded, “Professor Cheng, haven’t we always been trying to get out? What you’re saying is basically pointless.”
The man called Professor Cheng, around sixty years of age with streaks of white hair at his temples, thin and wearing an old-fashioned coarse cloth shirt, slightly hunched over, seemed insignificant.
After being rebuked, Cheng’s face turned tomato-red with embarrassment, at a loss for words, “What I meant was… we could walk, not drive. Isn’t the reason we’re stranded here because the road is jammed, and we can’t drive past?”
The old man gestured with his hand, “We could go two at a time, leaving every 10 minutes. This way, we could avoid ending up as playthings to a large extent…”
“Professor Cheng, please don’t add to the confusion. Walk without cars? We have so many people, and luggage. Do you expect us to walk all the way to Yangzhou?”
“Exactly, your armchair stratagems simply won’t work.”
Everyone started to chime in, the resentment in their voices escalating, as if they were venting their frustration from the power outage on the old man.
The man in glasses remained silent amidst the crowd. Confronted with the old man’s pleas for help, he chose to ignore them. Perhaps he also thought there was some truth in the old man’s words, but at such a moment, did he have any obligation to help defuse the crowd’s anger?
Survival pressures had been accumulating for a while; someone had to serve as the scapegoat for the group’s venting.
Bai Youwei did not want to get involved. She mouthed silently to Shen MO, “Let’s go.”
Shen MO stood still.
She gently tugged at him again. To her surprise, he stepped forward and said to the complaining crowd, “Everyone, quiet down…” Bai Youwei immediately felt like rolling her eyes!
Everyone looked over in unison.
She and Shen MO suddenly became the center of attention, feeling like they were being stared at by a crowd of hungry ghosts. It was quite terrifying.
But Shen MO did not so much as raise an eyebrow.
He calmly said, “It seems a vehicle is arriving.”
The crowd fell silent.
Once the discussion ceased, various sounds in the air became especially clear.
The distant rumble came closer. At first, it was like the wind, but as it neared, the noise of the vehicle’s tires on the road became clear.
Finally, a large vehicle drove into the service area in the dead of the night, its bright headlights shining directly on everyone— Brakes.
Stopped.
A few spry young men jumped down from the vehicle, one of them whistled and said, “Hey, what’s going on? Why are you all standing outside?”