RotA – Chapter 61

This was undoubtedly a crazy decision.

Two people who had just managed to settle down were preparing to cross the Fog Zone again, to head for that floating city in search of a truth that had been concealed for over fifty years.

There was a possibility that, over the past fifty-plus years, the truth had not been preserved. The original group of researchers might have passed away during this long stretch of time, and the successors who took over the project might not know what their predecessors had done to that sample.

But Chai Yuening knew that even if they went and didn’t get the truth, Chu Ci would surely regret not going. Even if there was only a one-in-ten-thousand chance, she had to accompany Chu Ci on this journey.

Because this was the first time Chu Ci had personally told her what her heart desired.

She couldn’t refuse; she even felt boundless joy because of it.

She had told her that people could make their own choices.

She had told her that joy, anger, sorrow, or pain were all things that could be expressed.

But someone long accustomed to silent endurance would still tend to suppress all their thoughts deep in their heart.

Heaven knew how precious Chu Ci’s honesty was to her.

From the moment she decided to take Chu Ci and leave, she had become a person who had lost her way, no longer caring where she was headed.

If she could, she was willing to let Chu Ci’s thoughts and desires become her own unerring compass from now on.

She stood up and, with Chu Ci, once again sought out the old gentleman.

It was getting late. The white-haired old man was still sitting in the laboratory, waiting for the complex electronic instruments to finish analyzing the sample’s components.

The light in the room was a cold white, and incomprehensible data scrolled across a massive electronic screen.

Shi Wenlin was using this brief lull to rest with his eyes closed.

The arrival of Chai Yuening and Chu Ci brought a small hint of surprise to his eyes. “Why have you come?”

“Sir, thank you and everyone for taking us in these past few days. We…” Chai Yuening hesitated for a moment, but her gaze immediately firmed up again. “We’ve decided to leave.”

“Leave?” Shi Wenlin’s eyes showed his confusion.

“We want to go back to the Floating City,” Chai Yuening said. “The truth of what happened back then, Chu Ci’s missing memories—we can’t just let it go. What those people did to Chu Ci… if you don’t know, we’ll go ask them.”

Shi Wenlin leaned back in his wheelchair, his weary eyes quietly gazing at the two young people before him.

The silence did not last long.

There was no great surprise in Shi Wenlin’s eyes, nor was there a trace of opposition in his tone.

He simply stated a helpless fact with great calm. “There is no way to send you back from here. You should know that we are also trapped.”

Chai Yuening said, “If we could come in with nothing, we can definitely get out.”

She spoke these seemingly absurd words with a resolute tone. Others might not understand, but she believed Chu Ci could do it.

If they could get in from outside the Fog Zone, they could surely return to that world outside.

“Sir, this path is not an easy one. Everyone is trapped here. Your years of research, and everyone’s methods of survival and combat, have all been cut off by the dense fog in this small world,” Chai Yuening said. “If you are willing, we hope to carry news of this place to the outside world, for the sake of everyone in the Fog Zone Base, and for the people still struggling to survive outside the Fog Zone.”

“I have been waiting, waiting for our own kind from outside the Fog Zone to find us, or for someone to gain the ability to fly through fusion and tell the outside world of our existence,” Shi Wenlin said softly, his deep-set eyes growing slightly red. “I saw Liu Ding go… A while back, during a routine check-up, he was still telling me that he dreamed of going back to see the Floating City.”

“I had thought that once he could fly, we would be able to contact the Floating City…” Shi Wenlin let out a soft sigh. “The transformation of an infected person from human to mutated beast is always so sudden. They often don’t even have time to inject the inhibitor before they complete the final mutation.”

Liu Ding, it seemed, was the name of that Uncle Liu.

The Fog Zone Base was only so big; the few hundred people there saw each other all the time. Chai Yuening had also seen him from a distance a few times.

He had a pair of dark brown, bird-like wings, and around his ankles, which had mutated into avian feet, was loosely tied a hand-woven red cord. It was a gift from An Li.

An Li had said that Uncle Liu would eventually learn to fly. With the fog so thick all around, when Uncle Liu was flying in the sky, people on the ground wouldn’t be able to see him clearly and could easily mistake him for a mutated beast. Wouldn’t it be terrible if he were accidentally injured?

Red was the most conspicuous color. With a red cord tied to his ankle, he would surely be spotted at a glance.

She would weave a red cord for Uncle Liu, so he wouldn’t be accidentally hurt in the future.

But alas, everything was just as Shi Wenlin had said: the transformation from human to mutated beast was always an extremely sudden event.

Everyone had undergone some degree of mutation, and their bodies could only achieve temporary stability. No one could predict when the remaining mutation would occur.

Often, people didn’t even have time to administer the inhibitor before the final mutation was complete.

“In just an instant, he took my last shred of hope with him… From last night until now, I can’t help but wonder if I’ll ever see that day in this lifetime.” As Shi Wenlin spoke, his gaze went vacant for a few seconds. When he came to, he sighed softly and asked, “How did you two get here?”

Chu Ci said, “On our way here, we encountered a giant flying beast. It brought us here.”

“I see.” Shi Wenlin nodded. “Migration is an instinct for most birds of the old world. Although the new ecological species are constantly fusing, many flying mutated beasts still retain this instinct. Their migration cycles and directions vary, and their speed is far greater than human vehicles…”

As he spoke, he looked up and asked, “So, to go back, will you use a similar method?”

Chai Yuening nodded. “I have a good memory. I know the general direction of the Floating City.”

Shi Wenlin added, “But you should know, this world is vast. The fact that the giant beast could bring you here was just a coincidence.”

“This world is so vast, yet countless coincidences are constantly happening.” Chai Yuening smiled. “Before we came here, we didn’t even have a direction. Now that we’re going back, we at least have one. With a direction, a person won’t get lost.”

“Yes, yes…” Shi Wenlin responded in a low voice, turning his wheelchair slightly. “Come with me.”

Shi Wenlin left the laboratory, and Chai Yuening and Chu Ci followed.

The wheelchair moved slowly ahead. Chai Yuening stepped forward to hold the handles on the back of the chair, and following the old gentleman’s directions, pushed him back to his residence.

It was the place where she and Chu Ci had first met the old man.

With hands as withered as tree bark, Shi Wenlin retrieved a silver-gray USB drive wrapped in a tissue from a small drawer under his wooden desk.

With the utmost solemnity, he placed it in the palm of Chai Yuening’s hand.

It was his life’s research. He had fantasized a thousand, ten thousand times about one day handing it over himself, watching an outsider carry it to a distant human base.

The people of the Fog Zone Base had always wanted to return to the fold of humanity, just as a river must eventually flow into the sea.

Chai Yuening gripped the small USB drive tightly, feeling an immense weight in her palm.

It was a sliver of hope that humanity had desperately clung to in the midst of despair.

They set off, carrying two small backpacks, and quietly left the place.

This time, Chai Yuening had packed a lightweight device for sterilizing meat and two spare batteries. This way, they at least wouldn’t starve to death on the way back.

Flying mutated beasts were, after all, a minority. When there was no choice, those that ran on the ground would have to do.

It was just that most ground-dwelling mutated beasts were territorial. Even if they occasionally found one heading in the right direction, it wouldn’t go very far before stopping. In the end, they still had to find something that flew in the sky.

Because they had a direction, they were no longer as carefree as they had been on their way there.

They switched rides along the way, carried by various mutated beasts on a winding path. Heading in a general direction, they left the mountains and forests and entered the desolate and unfamiliar ruined roads of the old world.

Along the way, they saw stampeding herds of beasts, large mutated beasts preying on one another, and giant black vine flowers blooming in the dense fog, gazing up at the “birds” that streaked across the sky.

It was hard to say if this unfamiliar return path had always been like this, or if the ground-level ecology had undergone another drastic change in just a few short days.

This world was becoming more and more incomprehensible to humans. Did that isolated island of humanity, struggling for survival amidst a sea of clouds, truly still exist?

Chai Yuening couldn’t help but wonder. She was afraid of straying off course, afraid she would miss that isolated island in the dense fog, and also afraid that the island had already fallen, turning into the giant mushroom clouds that had risen behind her on the day she left.

She carried this unease with her, guiding Chu Ci along a path that was not necessarily correct.

Chu Ci trusted her, as always, without change.

This trust, on the one hand, made her afraid of failing it, and on the other, gave her the strength to press on under the weight of her burden. No matter how lost she felt, she never stopped moving forward.

When another mutated beast veered off course, they took advantage of the time it spent hunting near the ground to return to the surface.

This was a long-abandoned agricultural area, which should have been a small village in the past. The old-world brick and tile houses were now extremely dilapidated. Black vines crawled everywhere, and an iguana-like reptilian mutated beast lay quietly in a puddle.

It was only medium-sized among mutated beasts, but to humans, it was already terrifyingly large, capable of swallowing a person whole with a casual opening of its mouth.

Chai Yuening subconsciously led Chu Ci away. Before they had taken more than a few steps, a “large bird” swooped down from the fog-filled sky, instantly engaging the “iguana” in a fierce battle.

Strictly speaking, it wasn’t a bird.

It was several meters long, with the body of a bird, a crocodile-like head, and a massive tail with a club at the end, like an ankylosaur’s.

It killed the medium-sized mutated beast. The victory came easily. It repeatedly struck the dead prey with its tail club, then lowered its head and began to eat.

Chai Yuening had seen mutated beasts preying on each other many times and wasn’t the least bit interested.

But her eyes were drawn to the large bird’s dark brown wings, and to the thin cord tied tightly around its avian foot, so caked with mud and water that its original color was almost unrecognizable.

This discovery left Chai Yuening momentarily speechless with shock.

It was hard to imagine that just over ten days ago, the people of the Fog Zone Base were seeing it off. Back then, it was only the size of two humans.

Today, a dozen or so days later, it had not only changed its appearance but had also become a large mutated beast.

“Uncle Liu.” Chu Ci recognized it too.

Why would they encounter it on their way back to the Floating City?

A question couldn’t help but rise in Chai Yuening’s heart—where was it going?

She found it somewhat unbelievable, yet she couldn’t help but reach for the answer in her heart.

—I saw Liu Ding go… A while back, during a routine check-up, he was still telling me that he dreamed of going back to see the Floating City.

Was it going home?

If, it still retained a sliver of memory.

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