Fortunately, this embrace didn’t last long. After all, Huo Jingsi had never intended to stay in Sector 69 for very long in the first place; he had numerous important duties awaiting him, and making the arduous trip here was primarily for show—he would leave right after the photos were taken.
Li Mo, however, was different. For the past few days following the flood, he had genuinely stayed behind to live side-by-side with the disaster victims for several solid days.
After sending Huo Jingsi off, he returned straight to the shelter.
The makeshift shelter was crude and shabby. Compounded by the severe shortage of water resources, taking even a simple shower was nothing more than a pipe dream. In the sultry and humid weather, hundreds to thousands of people crammed together in the same space: body odor, foot odor, and moldy stenches blended into a messy concoction. Fermenting under the high temperatures, getting a decent night’s sleep was out of the question—even managing to stay inside for a mere ten minutes was a formidable challenge.
Yet Li Mo minded none of it. In this environment, even the unflavored, coarse-grain porridge mixed with grit tasted remarkably good to him.
Therefore, in the eyes of the people here, Li Mo completely lacked the airs of a Chairman’s wife.
To a certain extent, this seemed to narrow the psychological distance between them and the future Governor-General.
Little did they know, however, what troubled Li Mo as he ate here. He wasn’t a picky eater; the only thing that made him feel ill at ease was that, to maintain his outward elegant image, he couldn’t slurp his porridge in big, hearty mouthfuls. He could only spoon it into his mouth in tiny, delicate portions, which left him feeling quite stifled inside.
Still, such trivial matters were of no consequence. After all, he had spent several years cultivating and faking this gentle, elegant persona.
“Mr. Li, the Chairman has sent me to pick you up and take you back. There will be a dedicated vehicle to take you to tomorrow evening’s banquet, so please make your preparations ahead of time.”
While Li Mo was drinking his porridge, Huo Jingsi’s secretary suddenly appeared. The man subtly masked his nose with a gesture before instantly dropping his hand.
His stellar professional training kept him from vomiting the moment he stepped through the door. At this moment, Secretary Wen still wore a smile on his face, revealing no sign of discomfort or impatience. After delivering the message, he stood quietly in place, waiting for Li Mo to speak.
Setting everything else aside, Secretary Wen genuinely admired Li Mo just for his willingness to eat, sleep, and live alongside these refugees in such a place. After all, if he were asked to spend several days straight in an environment like this, he wouldn’t be able to do it if his life depended on it.
“Let’s go, then.”
Li Mo finished the very last bit of porridge in his bowl in one go, then stood up and led Secretary Wen toward the entrance. The surrounding people hadn’t heard their conversation and assumed Li Mo simply wanted to step outside for some fresh air, so they willingly parted ways to make a path for him.
However, just as he stepped out the door, a man with a limp hurried up after him, dragging his incapacitated leg and calling out for him to slow down.
The man had an aged face, dark yellowish skin, and hair that was completely graying across half his head. He looked to be in his mid-fifties, though without an explicit introduction, perhaps no one would ever realize he was only in his early forties.
This was the Administrator of Sector 69, Nian Airen.
Seeing him approach, Li Mo immediately walked forward to meet him by a few steps and reached out to steady him.
“Sir, are you leaving already?” Nian Airen was covered in a sheen of sweat. Stumbling over in a desperate dash, he hadn’t even caught his breath yet. But right now, he was holding his breath and calming his nerves, not daring to let out a single heavy sigh, his tone fraught with anxiety.
Others might not understand, but as the district administrator of Sector 69, he knew better than anyone the dispensable status and position of Sector 69 within the empire. Very often, those arrogant aristocrats treated Sector 69 as a dead weight upon the empire, constantly plotting to excise them altogether.
Even when ordinary civilians brought up Sector 69, their immediate impressions were almost universally poverty, backwardness, and being of the lower tier.
Lower-tier environment, lower-tier development, and lower-tier people.
Nian Airen knew all too well that no one had been willing to donate money during this flood—not even bothering to put on a superficial facade. To him, that was the equivalent of bluntly telling him that letting Sector 69 vanish from this world as a result of this disaster was the most cost-effective outcome, whereas keeping so many lower-tier plebeians alive was merely a wasteful drain of effort and resources.
And now, if even Li Mo abandoned them, there truly would be no one left in this world willing to lend them a hand.
“I have to return to Sector 1 to accompany my husband to a banquet.” Li Mo knew what he was worrying about fearful that once he left, he wouldn’t come back and would leave them here to fend for themselves and perish. Therefore, he flashed him a reassuring smile and added, “Until things stabilize here, I won’t leave. Rest assured.”
His gaze was resolute, genuinely offering Nian Airen a sudden sense of relief. The older man let out a long breath, his eye sockets abruptly turning red. A tear welled up in his weathered, desolate eyes, and his legs trembled as they began to buckle, dropping down right then and there to kneel and thank Li Mo for his grace.
Fortunately, Secretary Wen had quick reflexes and stepped forward ahead of everyone else to steady the man firmly.
Li Mo was somewhat startled by his reaction, but quickly recovered his composure: “What are you doing? Get up, quickly get up! Helping you is merely our bounden duty, and besides, you are my elder—how could I ever accept such a bow!”
Hearing this, Secretary Wen immediately chimed in: “That’s right, Administrator Nian. Our gentleman helps you all without seeking any reward. Your acting like this makes things feel overly formal and distant instead. Hurry and get up.”
The two of them helped Nian Airen back to his feet, noticing that the skin around his eyes was already dampened by moved tears.
“Mr. Li, on behalf of all the residents of Sector 69, I thank you.” Nian Airen wiped away a tear, then let go of the hand he had been holding on Li Mo, saying, “Mr. Li, I won’t delay you any longer. Please go ahead; don’t keep the Chairman waiting.”
Li Mo nodded, and then followed Secretary Wen toward the dedicated vehicle bound for the airstrip.
Nian Airen stood rooted to the spot, waiting until even the tail-lights of the car completely vanished from sight before turning back to re-enter the shelter.
Sector 69 held 0.5% of the voting ballots in the upcoming election for the Governor-General. Although minuscule, he knew very well that this was the most valuable asset Sector 69 currently possessed. Based solely on the kindness Li Mo had shown these past few days by eating and living alongside them, he already knew precisely where Sector 69’s ballots would be cast.
As for the rest of this profound grace…
It was truly beyond anything they could ever hope to repay.
Meanwhile, a few individuals hiding in the dark shadows amongst the crowd exchanged glances through silent signals, then tacitly and uniformly slipped away from the area. They were all operatives dispatched by Huo Jingsi to protect Li Mo in secret.
Possessing exceptional counter-surveillance experience, they had spent the past few days disguised as refugees mingling among the crowd without a single person finding anything amiss not even Li Mo had detected their presence.
“Secretary Wen, do you think an administrator like Nian Airen will ever have the chance to be transferred out of Sector 69 to manage another district?”
It wasn’t until the vehicle had driven several kilometers away from the shelter that Li Mo finally voiced the question weighing on his mind.
“Unlikely.” Secretary Wen pushed up his glasses, concise and to the point. “He was born a fifth-tier civilian.”
Though brief, that sentence carried a wealth of information. Hearing this, the corners of Li Mo’s mouth curled upward into a mocking smile. He nodded in sudden understanding, refraining from pressing further or speaking any more.
The empire maintained an intensely strict system of social stratification: aristocrats were divided into four tiers, and commoners into seven. Discrimination ran deep between the classes, and an almost insurmountable chasm existed between the aristocracy and the commoners, splitting everyone into two broad categories.
One part was noble by birth, while the other was base and lowly by nature.
Among them, the lowest four tiers of commoners existed as beings even lower and more humble than the base.
Though Nian Airen had managed to test out of the fifth-tier commoner bracket and become an administrator, managing a district whose economic development had fallen hopelessly behind, his capabilities were ultimately doomed to a fate of having nowhere to put them to use. Yet, even so, he was already exceptionally fortunate.
After all, his social origin had already dictated that walking up to this point was the absolute zenith of his lifetime.
Li Mo shook his head, sighing over the man’s misfortune, while simultaneously thinking that if Nian Airen had been born an aristocrat, perhaps the outcome today would have been vastly different.
Another dozen minutes passed. Through the car window, Li Mo suddenly caught sight of an aircraft parked not far away. Sector 69 had no airport; this was an abandoned runway temporarily cleared for use. A brand-new aircraft sat resting upon it—a striking visual contrast highlighting the prosperity of Sector 1 against the dilapidated ruin of Sector 69.
Stepping out of the dedicated car, the aircraft sent to fetch him had already been waiting in place for quite some time.
At that exact moment, a cool breeze drifted in from an unknown direction. It had been a long, long time since he had felt a breeze like this.
Li Mo stood in place as the wind lifted his strands of hair, a sensation that brought him a unique sense of comfort.
Yet he did not belong here; he needed to hurry back.
A muffled roll of thunder cracked across the horizon, and the rain that had been pent up for so long finally began to pour…
“Mr. Li, these are the relevant materials for tomorrow evening’s banquet.” After escorting Li Mo onto the aircraft, Secretary Wen pulled a stack of documents from his briefcase and laid them neatly before him. “If there is anything you don’t understand, you can call for me; I am at your disposal to explain at any time.”
“Alright.” Li Mo nodded.
Judging by Li Mo’s demeanor, Secretary Wen’s professional instincts as a secretary told him this was a signal that his presence was no longer required here. Before retreating, however, Secretary Wen couldn’t help himself and offered a tactful reminder: “Sir, the bathroom is directly opposite the washroom, and a change of clothes has already been prepared for you. Please feel free to use them if needed. I will bring your meal over shortly. If you need anything else, you can call me at any time.”
Hearing this, Li Mo froze for a moment, then nodded again to indicate he understood.
Following a tiny click of the closing door, Li Mo whipped his head around instantly. Making certain that Secretary Wen had genuinely departed, he raised his arms and sniffed himself left and right.
Mn, he was right, I really do stink.
Yet his first reaction wasn’t to head straight for a shower. Instead, upon realizing this fact, a heartfelt exclamation burst from the depths of his mind:
Oh god, so I’ve actually gotten this stinky over the past few days? And yet when Huo Jingsi came to see me yesterday, he was still willing to hug me… To take a photo, he really suffered quite a lot “sacrificing his body.”
Li Mo clicked his tongue a couple of times. Without rushing to look over the banquet documents, he walked straight toward the bathroom.
To be completely honest, even he couldn’t quite stand himself anymore.