CH 113

Chapter 113 – Autumn Outing

Shi Yuan had heard that a long time ago, human cubs had a mysterious ceremony called “autumn outing”.

Probably just pick a place, led by the school teacher, they eat and play, screaming everywhere.

He had always been curious about this ceremony, but he didn’t have a chance to try it.

After thinking about it carefully, he and Lu Tinghan had never been out to play.

They had done a lot of things together that ordinary couples would do, walking, eating, chatting all night, sitting on a carousel, watching a movie together, and watching the stars… What ordinary couples couldn’t do, they also did it, driving to the wasteland full of monsters, walking side by side through the devastated battlefield, or going to faraway places, revealing the turbulent past of the Empire, seeing the lighthouse and legendary white dolphins…

However, every time they went out of the city, they had a purpose.

There had never been a pure outing.

Now, Lu Tinghan said he wanted to go out and play together.

Shi Yuan was excited all day and went around packing his things, putting binoculars, compasses, paper towels, compressed biscuits, and an old camera in his small backpack.

He also went to grab Professor Guan’s snacks.

When Professor Guan saw Shi Yuan walking into the office, he immediately became alert: “What do you want to do?”

Shi Yuan: “I won’t do anything!”

Fifteen minutes later, he took away Professor Guan’s treasured raisins and buns.

Professor Guan’s snacks were few, and there were only a few raisins and bread, and Shi Yuan carefully put them into his backpack.

That night, he and Lu Tinghan lay together, the tip of his tail shaking excitedly.

“When will we leave tomorrow?” he asked.

“Eight o’clock,” Lu Tinghan replied with his eyes closed.

“Oh!”

After another while, Shi Yuan asked, “It won’t rain, will it?”

Lu Tinghan: “The weather forecast says it won’t.”

“What if the forecast is wrong?”

“Dr. Guo is in charge of meteorology, you go and beat him up.”

Shi Yuan was a little dissatisfied: “Why don’t you fight with me?”

Lu Tinghan agreed: “Okay, I’ll go with you.”

Shi Yuan was satisfied.

After another while, he spoke again: “My alarm clock doesn’t seem to be set, I have to get up and take a look.”

Lu Tinghan: “You already did, I watched you set the alarm clock before going to bed.”

Shi Yuan said, “I’ll take another look.” He sat up and looked for a while in the dark, and the screen light lit up in the dark. He confirmed it repeatedly, then lay back and said, “You are right.”

Lu Tinghan: “Hmm.”

After another while, Shi Yuan said, “Lu Tinghan, shall we take the aircraft tomorrow?”

“Hmm.”

“Oh.”

After another while, Shi Yuan: “Go to Fengyang City first, right? How long can we stay?”

“It depends on you.”

“Oh.”

After another while, Shi Yuan said, “Lu Tinghan, I…”

“Sleep,” Lu Tinghan said.

“But—!”

Before Shi Yuan could finish speaking, Lu Tinghan pressed him into his arms and rubbed his head repeatedly.

Shi Yuan: “Purr, purr, purr…”

This move was all-powerful, he leaned on Lu Tinghan and fell asleep happily.

The next morning, they set off in an aircraft.

The earth swept beneath their feet, and two hours later, Feng Yang City appeared in front of them.

It had been too long since they had seen it, and although the butterfly and thunderstorm were gone, the city was overrun by monsters of all kinds.

The aircraft stopped outside the city, and the two entered the city on foot. The little monsters walked through the ruins. The golden-furred monkeys, with six claws and two tails, rushed up to the houses in groups and tilted their heads to look at the two visitors.

They saw energy towers and windmills.

Vigorous infected plants climbed up and blossomed with butterfly-like flowers, trembling in the wind.

The windmill no longer rotated, the vines hung from its leaves, lush; the energy tower no longer flashed, some kind of bright purple long grass covered it, engulfing the metal frame, when the wind blew, the purple grass sparkled, reminding people of the soft mane of horses, or a large group of dandelions.

A fallen city always had a different and strange beauty.

Shi Yuan and Lu Tinghan walked on the street.

Today’s autumn was high and dry, and the sky was blue. Shi Yuan identified the street as he walked: “Is that Fenglin Avenue over there?”

“It is.”

“I remember… opposite it is Linxi Street? It seems that there is a food distribution center there, I was transferred there.”

“Well, three blocks past Linxi Street, you can reach the northern district.”

When it came to the northern district, Shi Yuan thought of something: “I wonder if the carousel is still there.”

Lu Tinghan smiled and said, “It doesn’t have long feet and can’t run away.” He hugged Shi Yuan, “If you want to see it, let’s go over and have a look.”

“Okay.”

They continued walking.

Shi Yuan scared away a group of blue birds. When they flew, their wings were translucent in the sun.

When they arrived in the northern district, they crossed the layers of ruins to the amusement park.

The amusement park had been abandoned for many years, and now it was even more so. Several large monsters built their nests here, turning the ruins and rubble into a mess, piled up as high as a hill. The two had to climb over, Lu Tinghan walked in front, stepped up a few steps quickly, and then turned around and dragged…or carried Shi Yuan up.

It was obviously an amusement park, but they suddenly had the feeling of climbing a mountain.

They finally returned to the carousel.

The carousel was also occupied by vegetation, and dog tail grass was everywhere. The two red birds folded down the dog’s tail grass, carefully laid out a nest, and placed it on the back of a white horse – if it weren’t for them having too many eyes, this scene would be very warm.

Lu Tinghan found Shi Yuan’s favorite pumpkin cart, took out a short knife, and cleaned up the vegetation on it.

He was about to call Shi Yuan, but when he looked back, the boy was standing in front of the wooden horse, staring intently at the soft golden-green bird’s nest.

The sky was clear and blue, the clothes lining Shi Yuan were white and glowing, and the skin from the side of the face to the neck was delicate. He stretched out his hand and a red bird flapped its wings, flew around his hand two or three times, and landed on his hand, with its long tail feathers hanging down.

It tilted its head and looked at Shi Yuan with dark eyes.

Lu Tinghan watched in silence for a few seconds.

Shi Yuan noticed his gaze and looked back: “Ah! Pumpkin cart!”

The two red birds flew in shock in an instant, and went somewhere unknown.

Shi Yuan tilted his tail and leaned over to look at the pumpkin cart. Lu Tinghan asked him, “Are monsters not afraid of you anymore?”

Shi Yuan said: “It’s much better than before. I’m learning how to make friends with them.”

Lu Tinghan touched Shi Yuan’s head: “That’s good.”

Shi Yuan really liked pumpkin carts very much.

The two sat in the cart and had fried rice and mashed potatoes for lunch.

At noon, they returned to the Tower No.4 in the southern district.

Shi Yuan had worked here for a long time. Once upon a time, the spire of the tower was an old dream with hidden stars. There were endless calls and endless stories in the tower. At the bottom of the tower were computer rooms and servers, and a girl named Alice walked through the data.

Now the tower was empty.

They went to the psychological counseling center on the 8th floor and the Welfare Center for the mutants on the top floor. Nothing had changed. The phone, the front desk, the room, the desk, the glass windows… They were covered with dust and stayed where they were, but everything seemed to have changed.

Shi Yuan took Lu Tinghan to Lin Yeran’s office for a stroll, found his time attendance table, and found that he had deducted more than 30 people’s bonuses in a quarter.

They also climbed to Wu Zhengqing’s small attic and opened the creaking skylight to overlook the city.

Shi Yuan said: “I’ve done a lot of work.”

Lu Tinghan: “Hmm.”

“It’s a pity that the salary is not high.”

Lu Tinghan agreed: “Yeah.”

He couldn’t forget Shi Yuan’s hourly salary of 6 yuan.

Coming down from the tower, turning around, they went to see their home.

Their home was still intact, and thick dust covered everything. Shi Yuan ran to the window to look, the windmill outside the window was still there, covered with dark silver flowers.

They looked around to see if there was anything they could take away.

But before leaving Fengyang City, Shi Yuan cleaned up his things too cleanly, and they only pulled out a photo frame.

There was an old photo in the photo frame, which was a family photo of Lu Tinghan, Lu Zhun, and Yu Qingmei.

Like other photos, the three of them looked like polite strangers.

Shi Yuan said, “I wonder where the jellyfish and the Deer Outside the High Forest are now.”

“Who knows,” Lu Tinghan said with a smile, “The world is so big, they can go anywhere.”

He opened the photo frame, took out the old photo, and took it away.

The two of them just walked around the city like this and went to all the places they wanted to see.

Shi Yuan shared the raisins and buns with Lu Tinghan.

Lu Tinghan raised his eyebrows and said, “Professor Guan’s?”

Shi Yuan: “Of course.”

They finished the snacks together and returned to the aircraft.

When the aircraft left the ground, Shi Yuan saw the deep pit outside the city by the window, as well as the corpse of a giant snake winding like a mountain range – the “Heavy Hammer” fell here, killing the rock snake, and that day, he kissed Lu Tinghan in the blood and dust.

He also saw Iron City, and he also dimly saw the towering communication tower. He thought of Colonel Lu Zhun and the countless sacrificed soldiers, Yan Xin who passed the data of “Overlook” before he died, and Edward’s waltz. Thinking about it now, it was like a lifetime.

Fengyang City and Iron City were getting farther and farther away.

“Goodbye,” Shi Yuan said.

After a journey of more than half an hour, they arrived at Gleaning City.

When they got off the aircraft, they saw a sea of flowers all over the city, and brilliant flowers were blooming freely.

When the two came to the street, Shi Yuan walked ahead, wagging his tail and humming.

Lu Tinghan looked at his back with a smile in his eyes.

But soon, that smile was mixed with other emotions that were almost nostalgic and sad.

“…Shi Yuan.” He seemed to have finally made up his mind and said, “I have something to tell you.”

“What?” Shi Yuan turned his head and waited for him.

The flowers on the side of the road were blooming enthusiastically, light pink, rose red, light blue, and goose egg yolk.

The flowers were of different sizes, strange and bizarre, swaying happily in the wind.

Lu Tinghan talked about “Deep Dive”.

He said that this trip was dangerous. There were often turbulence and monsters in the abyss. The black fog was enough to destroy the hull. Even frigates must be extremely careful. He said that the best engineers and pilots had long passed away, and aviation technology had not been developed for many years. The Alliance put all its resources on the frigate, even so, it was still not enough; he said that even if they reached the bottom of the abyss safely and sent back the data, they were only mortal bodies.

Mortal bodies, flesh and blood, would eventually die there.

He also said that as difficult as it was to dive into the abyss, it was almost impossible to leave with the frigate. What’s more, collecting data was a long-term thing, and they had to stay in the abyss.

Shi Yuan listened silently.

Lu Tinghan said, “I promised you that next time, it will be a decent farewell.”

He paused: “When I was shot in the main city and lost consciousness, I heard the song of a human-faced bird and saw an illusion. I saw that both my parents were there. You and Yu Qingmei were cooking in the kitchen together. I just came home from work and sat on the sofa, reading a book. Then Lu Zhun came back. He had been fishing for a day and didn’t catch anything. We laughed at him… Then we had dinner together. Yu Qingmei and I were both putting vegetables in your bowl. You were so worried that you couldn’t finish them and your tail was knotted.”

“This trick didn’t work for me. I came out of the illusion and came back to you. But then I remembered it a few times, and I thought, this might be the life I imagined.” He smiled, “I don’t know why, I think you will get along well with my parents.”

“The illusion is an illusion after all, and it can’t be taken seriously. After so long, I’m still not good at saying goodbye.”

“But, Shi Yuan, I don’t want to lie to you, nor do I want to give you unrealistic hopes. This is my end.”

A few butterflies flew between the dilapidated houses, through the windows, and stopped on the black curtains.

Shi Yuan said, “I know. From the day I infected all the monsters, I knew you would join the “Deep Dive”.” He added, “Professor Guan told me everything.”

Lu Tinghan was speechless and whispered, “Shi Yuan…”

“Besides, from the beginning, I understood that you are a human being, have a limited life span, and will leave one day.” At this time, Shi Yuan actually bent his eyes with a smile, “You told me that “being here” is the most important thing. I have lived for a long, long time, but in the years I have been by your side, I feel wonderful and truly alive.”

So he thought that life couldn’t be measured by length, but by intensity.

People would remember a wonderful story.

He held Lu Tinghan’s hand: “So don’t feel guilty, I was ready to say goodbye the day I came to you.”

Lu Tinghan never knew that Shi Yuan saw the time of parting on the day they first met. His expression moved slightly, and he wanted to speak: “You…”

Shi Yuan interrupted him: “Let’s talk about it later – let’s have a good time first. We haven’t been back to Gleaning City for a long time. This is an autumn outing!”

“…okay.” Lu Tinghan smiled, “Where do you want to go?”

“Let’s go to the Garcia Grand Theater first!” Shi Yuan replied.

It was almost dusk, the sky was still so bright, and the clear sunlight fell around them.

A hundred flowers were blooming, and the vegetation was verdant. It was a crisp autumn day. Shi Yuan pulled Lu Tinghan, and the two walked briskly towards the lively streets surrounded by flowers and plants.