RotA – Chapter 75

They embraced, they kissed, they bared their souls in the barren ruins, and loved each other at the end of a road no one would witness.

They were not born in a time of peace, and had no chance to meet before the world was destroyed.

The elderly doctor in the Underground City was right. Until humanity truly found its freedom, everyone was trapped in a cage.

If they couldn’t escape, then they wouldn’t.

The black vine flowers along the way guided them, their faint light tingeing the fog as they pointed toward the distance.

The cities of the Old World were vast, and this road was destined to be long, yet Chai Yuening wished it could be longer, so long that it had no end.

On either side, covered in dust, the words on the signs of the Old World’s small street-side shops were still faintly visible.

They walked amidst this ruin, yet it was as if they were traversing more than fifty years of time, strolling together through the brightly lit streets of the Old World.

If this place had never been covered by black vines, never been invaded by mutated beasts, it would surely have been a beautiful city.

However, Chai Yuening could feel countless pairs of eyes watching them from within the dense fog.

These gazes, hidden in the shadows, made the city that no longer belonged to humanity seem all the more desolate.

It had, in the end, become a piece of the past, a historical ruin.

The young people who grew up in this cruel era could only hear of this world’s beauty from the mouths of the older generation. And when those elders died, this beauty would vanish forever with their memories.

People would only be able to read about the world’s legacy in fragmented texts, a distant past as sparse as the morning stars.

Such a dilapidated and broken world always made one feel utterly lonely.

But this very loneliness gradually calmed Chai Yuening’s heart.

People always have attachments. She had many in this world, but she gradually came to understand something: the arrival of the apocalypse was like an invisible pair of hands, pushing everyone ever forward. Some would fall by the wayside, while others would chase despair to the end of the road.

Everyone she cared about had their own destiny; the path under their feet had to be walked by themselves.

She was not a savior. In the face of life and death, she might not even be able to save herself.

But she thought, at the very least, she could accompany Chu Ci.

On this final journey, the surviving humans would support one another, the scholars at the Base had the truth they desperately sought to sustain their faith, but Chu Ci had been alone her entire life, with no one to care for her joys or sorrows.

She couldn’t let Chu Ci sink into the great fog alone, like a drowning person sinking into the deep sea, with no one to save her.

What would become of humanity’s fate? And what of their own?

No one could give them an answer, but if this was truly the end of the road, at least they could face it together.

After that, life and death were up to fate. She no longer cared.

After all, she had saved a bullet for herself.

In the worst-case scenario, she could still die as a human.

…

“The Thirteenth Mercenary Team, I took it over from my father.”

“Uncle Xiang, Lao Xiang from the team, he was my father’s teammate before he died. After my father passed, everyone in the team scattered, only he remained. He taught me how to shoot, how to fight, he took me to the surface… Do you know why? He said he felt he had failed my father. Weren’t both my parents killed by a mutated brother from the team? Lao Xiang is a rather sensitive person. He had actually sensed something was off with that man, but he tricked himself into thinking it was just emotional instability after coming out of quarantine, nothing to worry about. He’s always believed that if he had been more vigilant back then, my parents wouldn’t have died at the hands of a mutated person. He feels he owes me a great deal…”

“But I’ve never blamed him. On the contrary, for all these years, I’ve always considered him family.”

“Everyone in this world has their own joys, angers, sorrows, and happiness. How can a living person always be mindful of others’ emotions and read dangerous signals from them? He has survivor’s guilt. It’s like when everyone fled the Sixth, Seventh, and Ninth Districts to the main city. They obviously hadn’t harmed anyone, but they couldn’t help but blame themselves, thinking that if only they had been strong enough, none of this would have happened.”

“For the sake of that one year of self-reproach, he actually acted like an old father, taking care of me for over a decade and helping me carry on my father’s mercenary team. He’s almost fifty, but he refuses to let himself rest. Every time there’s danger, he insists on dragging his old bones along…”

As Chai Yuening spoke, she couldn’t help but sigh. “Sometimes I really think, when I have money, I’ll definitely find a good place to settle him for the rest of his life. He shouldn’t be risking his life with me anymore. Mercenaries gamble with their lives. To live to his age is a blessing. Such a good person with so much good fortune shouldn’t die in the mouth of a mutated beast.”

Chu Ci said earnestly, “He will be fine.”

Chai Yuening nodded and continued her story.

“Du Xia doesn’t talk much, and Ren Dong has a quiet personality. As for me, when I’m not working, I just want to lie flat. Before Lu Qi joined the team, Lao Xiang was the one who loved to nag us the most, banking on his age. Then Lu Qi came along. That kid is incredibly noisy. From the day he joined, he was always bickering with Lao Xiang. This old man and this young boy, one with no patience for the young, the other with no respect for his elders, neither would give an inch. It actually made the team a lot livelier.”

“We all heard about his sister. We wanted to talk to him about it, but whenever it was mentioned, his face would darken and he wouldn’t listen to a word. He’s in his twenties, but he has the disposition of a child, unable to understand the difficulties of others, nor that some people have unavoidable responsibilities in life and are destined to do things beyond their control. Fortunately, he finally understood that the peaceful lives of the majority are bought with the sacrifice of a few. It’s just that the price of growth is often accompanied by loss.”

“Many times, that’s just how fate is. You don’t cherish people when they’re around, and only regret it when they’re truly gone.”

Chai Yuening said, “It’s like… like the day I first left the Floating City. I was in the vehicle, looking through the window, watching you slowly disappear from my sight… Thankfully, I found you again.”

Chu Ci replied in a low voice, “I thought you would come back, but I didn’t expect it to be so soon.”

Chai Yuening pressed her lips together. “I was afraid if I were any slower, I would miss you forever.”

As she spoke, she smiled and changed the subject again.

“Later on, a Boss You appeared in the Seventh District. Our personalities clashed, we couldn’t even hold a proper conversation, but I couldn’t avoid matters related to money forever. It was always Ren Dong who went to negotiate business with her.” Chai Yuening said, “The time I took you to the Seventh District was the first time I spoke with her alone. I thought she was a purely profit-driven person, but I still held onto a sliver of unrealistic hope and made some excessive demands. I never expected her to actually grant them.”

“After that, our relationship seemed to change… Before I got to know her, I never would have imagined that the untouchable Boss You of the Seventh District would be such a vivid person.”

As she spoke, Chai Yuening couldn’t help but remark, “The fate that brings people together is truly wondrous. I don’t think… I’ve ever told you how Du Xia and Ren Dong met, have I?”

Chu Ci shook her head. “You haven’t.”

“They were originally from two different mercenary teams. During a joint mission, they were attacked by a small beast pack. After a bitter fight, out of more than twenty people, they were the only ones who survived.”

“When Lao Xiang and I found them, both of Ren Dong’s legs were bloody. They had only been bandaged simply to stop the bleeding, but the blood couldn’t be stopped at all. Du Xia, also covered in blood, was carrying her. In the fog, before dawn, she left a bloody footprint with every step. She had walked all night. She wasn’t very strong, and every step was incredibly slow, but she just wouldn’t put down the burden on her back.”

“Later, I asked her, carrying a person like that, she would escape much slower herself. Wasn’t she afraid of dying?”

“Guess how Du Xia answered me?”

Chu Ci shook her head. Chai Yuening took a deep breath and said, “She said she didn’t think that much about it. Escaping slowly wasn’t scary. What was scary was abandoning her last comrade, abandoning her conscience, and still dying in that night fog. If that happened, when she died, she might not even be a person anymore.”

Chu Ci: “Like Luo Kun?”

“Perhaps. But I think, in that kind of situation, it’s not wrong to be a little selfish. Wanting to live is an instinct. Trying to protect others when you can’t even protect yourself is the act of a fool,” Chai Yuening said. “But you have to admit, sometimes heaven just favors the foolish kids. Fools have fool’s luck. They both survived. Two people who had lost almost everything in a disaster became each other’s best friends, their deepest support.”

As she spoke, Chai Yuening couldn’t help but smile. “Actually, we’re a lot like them. The night I met you, I also played the fool… But if I had been a little smarter that day and climbed up to the cockpit that was about to abandon us with Luo Kun, I would have died in that fog.”

Her gaze was fixed on Chu Ci. Chu Ci tilted her head, a hint of a smile appearing in her eyes.

“There are no ‘ifs.’ You are just that kind of person. No matter how many times you had to choose again, you would make the same choice.”

There were just people like that in this world. No matter how the world treated her, no matter how clearly she saw the selfishness and ugliness of human nature, she still maintained the greatest possible tolerance and understanding for humanity, always firmly believing that there were many others in this world who, like herself, had not lost their kindness.

It was because of this that Chai Yuening had never given up on her in any crisis.

It was because of this that they had walked together to this day, walking together in the vast fog where the distance could not be seen.

Just as when she first met Chu Ci, Chai Yuening kept recounting past memories, but it wasn’t because she was afraid of an awkward atmosphere, nor was it because she feared this was all a nightmare from which she couldn’t wake.

She just wanted to say more of the things she hadn’t had time to say before during this journey, to let Chu Ci understand her more, and to understand this world more.

After all, this might be the last long road they would walk together.

It was a pity her life wasn’t long. The things she had encountered, the words she wanted to say, could never be fully told in the limited time she had.

Deep within this seemingly boundless fog, hid the flower that had changed the entire world.

Chai Yuening saw it from afar, but she didn’t know how to describe its appearance.

This was the mother flower that nurtured the black vine ecosystem. It was unlike any black vine flower humans had ever seen.

Closer, and closer still.

They were able to glimpse its full form, and it, as if sentient, slowly bent its giant vines that were unmoved by the wind. Its petals swayed as if to part the dense fog and gaze upon the person beside her.

It grew in a way that was both bizarre and demonic, its pistil glowing with a purple halo. The fleshy petals bloomed outward, each one like the dark red tongue of a giant beast, covered in dense, fine hairs.

It was incomparably massive, so large that the biggest giant mutated beast she had ever seen seemed insignificant before it. The slowly flowing red light energy tinged the swirling fog around it.

Its roots stretched to unknown distances, but they must have spread far and wide, across thousands of miles of fertile land.

To it, humans were as insignificant as ants. The closer they got, the more they could feel the oppressive force washing over them.

This flower, born from a ten-thousand-meter abyss, bloomed with all its might in the ruins of this forgotten Old World, carrying the most powerful life force in this world.

It was as tall as a skyscraper, its body immense beyond compare. Its abnormally thick vines had even toppled the adjacent buildings. The main vine was like a coiled python, while countless branches extended in all directions, hooking onto anything they could cling to, like a radioactive virus, blooming disaster in this desolate land.

If one could stand beneath it, it would surely be an existence that could blot out the sky and cover the sun.

Chai Yuening stared at it in a daze, unconsciously tightening her grip on Chu Ci’s hand.

Even at this moment, she was still extremely reluctant, still selfishly feeling that it wasn’t worth it for Chu Ci.

Even if the human base was falling, the last pure land was about to be destroyed, and humanity’s fate was coming to an end, she still felt that none of it was worth it for Chu Ci.

But Chu Ci’s eyes were incomparably resolute.

Chu Ci was just that kind of person. Once she set her mind on something, she would do it without hesitation.

“I have to go back,” Chu Ci said softly. It was a farewell, without tears, but filled with reluctance. “The rest of the way, I really can only walk alone.”

Chu Ci was right. There was no road ahead.

Where the Ecological Mother Flower grew, the earth had collapsed into a cliff. Looking down, there was only the endless darkness of the abyss, a chasm that human feet could not cross.

Chai Yuening had brought Chu Ci here. The road she could walk had reached its end.

She gripped Chu Ci’s hands tightly, then slowly, slowly, let her go.

Under Chai Yuening’s gaze, Chu Ci walked step by step toward that abyss.

She had things she wanted to say, but she also felt that having come this far, it no longer made a difference whether many things were said or not.

She thought, Chai Yuening should understand. She didn’t hate this world.

One last time, she turned around for the last time, looking back at where Chai Yuening stood. She curved her eyes into a faint smile at Chai Yuening. The giant mother flower was behind her, like a god looking down upon the mortal world.

She slowly closed her eyes, her body leaning back, drifting down like a falling leaf.

This sky had been obscured by the dense fog for far too long.

In the final dusk, she could not see the evening glow.

In the distance, a wind blew open the fog, and a sliver of faint daylight shone into the barren ruins of the city.

It was like the moment the eternal night was about to end—

All the joys and sorrows of the human world heavily struck the morning bell that had been silent for more than half a century.