Full Circle

[Children of the future, has the world returned to normal? Though I won't live to see the day everything turns out well, I hope you will see it in my place. There is a safe under the bed in the master bedroom. The combination is my birthday, and my birthday is written in my diary... I have put everything I own of greatest value in there. Now I leave it to you, in the hope that you will use it for post-war reconstruction. This is my wish. —Cryst Ali] Perhaps hard work had paid off, or perhaps luck was on their side. After turning an unknown underground complex completely upside down without finding a single thing, Feng Qing and Gui Gui finally discovered the above message inside a shop that had been converted into a private shelter. The lines were written on an index card, resembling a letter addressed to the future. Yet when they finally located the fabled safe, exhausted every ounce of effort tracking down that Cryst-whatever's birthday from a diary, and popped the door open, both of them were simultaneously blinded by a dazzling golden gleam. "Holy shit! Gold—fuck! Why the hell is it gold?!!" Gui Gui's expression went from thrilled surprise to utter outrage the moment she remembered this wasn't reality, but the wasteland. She furiously kicked the folding cot next to her. Feng Qing wore an equally delicate expression. "Umm... Hard as it is to accept emotionally, it actually makes sense, doesn't it?" Rumor had it that during the Human Alliance era, the global population had numbered in the tens of billions. Paired with a booming aerospace industry, a flourishing electronics sector, and people's urge to preserve their wealth in a high-growth economy, gold back then had probably been worth quite a fortune. As for now... Every single industry, along with the population, had shrunk dramatically. Gold was still more expensive than silver or copper, of course—otherwise the Wilante wouldn't be using it as their currency. It was just that its scarcity wasn't anywhere near what it used to be. "About eight kilograms... Trading it for ten thousand dinars shouldn't be a problem." Crouched beside the briefcase, Gui Gui finished weighing the gold, sighed, and stowed it into her backpack. Ten thousand dinars could be exchanged for two to three thousand silver coins, which was hardly a small sum. It was just that the greater the expectation, the greater the disappointment. "...In any case, he left us what he believed was his most precious possession," Feng Qing said with a laugh, patting Gui Gui reassuringly on the shoulder. "At any rate, mission accomplished. No mutant nests found... We can head back and turn in the quest." The two retraced their steps. Just as they were about to step onto the escalator, however, a faint sound drifted out from the nearby shadows. It sounded like a shoe pressing down on a dust-coated floor. Though it was only a faint creak, it didn't escape their ears. Almost purely by reflex, Feng Qing chambered a round into her rifle and raised the muzzle, aiming in the direction of the noise. "Who's there?!" The air fell quiet for a moment. Just as both girls' hearts were pounding in their chests, an unkempt old man with a scruffy beard emerged from beneath a collapsed rebar frame with his hands raised high. He looked utterly disheveled, clad in multi-pocketed canvas trousers and a rumpled jacket, clutching a woven plastic sack and a small crossbow in his hands—the spitting image of a scavenger found anywhere on the wasteland. "Don't shoot..." Knowing full well he stood no chance, the old man set down both the sack and his weapon, watching the two girls by the escalator with wary eyes. Seeing him surrender his weapons of his own accord, Feng Qing lowered her muzzle and flashlight beam, asking in an inquiring tone, "Who are you?" The old man stared unblinkingly at her, eyeing the rifle in her hands, then glancing at her nose before rasping in a gravelly voice, "A survivor of Avent City. A demon named Julius took our home, so we fled underground from the surface... What about you two? Children of survivors? Or children of the demon?" Feng Qing and Gui Gui froze. They exchanged utterly bewildered glances, then looked back at the old man. "A survivor of Avent City... Which year's survivors are you talking about?" The old man furrowed his brows. "Which year? What do you mean?" Sensing that their conversation was already running on entirely different wavelengths, Feng Qing said with an awkward look, "The current year is Wasteland Era 215. That Julius you mentioned... shouldn't he have been dead for a century?" She hadn't memorized the exact number of years; after all, that was Wilante history. "A... a century?" The scruffy-bearded old man was stunned, staring blankly at the two young girls before him. Suddenly remembering something, he urgently pressed, "Are the Wilante still around?" Gui Gui nodded. "They're still around, but we beat them. The Legion is history now... By the way, after all this time, haven't you noticed anything at all?" The old man gaped at the 'enemy of his enemy,' at a complete loss for words. After a long silence, he gave a bitter smile. "Most of our people are asleep in hibernation pods—somewhere between ten and twenty thousand of us. Of course, this isn't an official shelter after all; we only have a few backup generators, so someone has to stand guard outside." Pausing, the old man continued, "Normally we leave around a hundred people awake, or at least fifty at our lowest. They handle facility maintenance, periodic checkups, and so on—making sure the others don't die in their sleep, while keeping an eye out to make sure the Wilante don't find us... The rotation shift is roughly once every five years." Gui Gui stared at him in shock. "Twenty thousand people?! Wait, this place can hide twenty thousand people?! What do you guys even eat?" Feng Qing was clearly dumbfounded as well, her mouth hanging slightly open, unable to speak. The old man cracked a smirk, looking entirely unbothered. "You don't need to eat when you're hibernating. Those who are awake grow a few mushrooms and make do with nutrient paste. Some of us are responsible for food, others for scavenging junk. As for electricity, we aren't short on that—commercial-grade nuclear batteries are more than enough." As he spoke, he cast his gaze toward the underground commercial complex beside them. "This is probably my second time waking up. I usually scavenge around this area... Honestly, I have no idea how long I've slept, or how much time has passed outside. Management down here is chaotic, life's a mess, and being awake feels like doing time in prison. The only thing to look forward to is finishing my five-year shift and going back to sleep. But the second I close my eyes and open them again, I'm already awake. "The brother who patted my shoulder told me fifty or forty years had passed outside. He wasn't too sure of the count himself—he couldn't even remember how many rotations we'd gone through. And as for me, I had zero concept of it. Back then, all that ran through my head was one giant 'fuck.' Forty or fifty years had passed for me in less than a second! "Still, I'm relieved. At least I outlived Julius, didn't I? Thank you. That's the best news I've heard in my whole life." As he spoke, the old man gave a self-deprecating chuckle. Perhaps he shouldn't have been so forthright, and had likely violated Avent City's regulations by doing so. To tell the truth, though, he was simply tired of his duty. At his age, how many more hibernations did he have left? Or put another way, was there even any point to continuing hibernation? Close your eyes, open them, and everything was still the exact same old shit—followed by another five years of grinding through life. Whether he hibernated or not, he probably only had about fifty years of life left to live anyway. And all for those fifty years, all to drag out this aimless voyage through time, they had cast aside family, love, friendship... every single thing that made someone human, and stopped reproducing entirely. It was like a collective, slow suicide. Rather than agonizing over whom to wake up next to live like rats in the dirt, it would be far better to grant everyone a release. More than once, he had entertained the urge to switch off the main power and become a true 'gravekeeper.' In fact, he was certain anyone who had awakened more than twice shared that exact thought. That was why he spoke of these things without any hesitation. Deep down, he even harbored a faint, unspoken hope that these outsiders might do what he couldn't bring himself to do—and put an end to everyone's suffering. Feng Qing was quiet for a moment. Looking at the old man, she asked in a gentle voice, "What is your name?" The old man shrugged. "Robin? If I remember right." Feng Qing nodded and patiently continued, "Avent City isn't just inhabited by Wilante now; the children of your former neighbors live there too... Times have changed, and they've changed many times over. "Even though the world might be on the brink of destruction again, we still intend to make the most of every day we have left. If you all want to come out, we'll find a way to help you. Of course... if you prefer to stay here, we won't stop you either." The old man stared blankly at Feng Qing. Only after a long silence did he speak slowly. "The world... destroyed?" "Just a possibility," Feng Qing nodded. "Strategic weapons in geosynchronous orbit have fallen into the hands of some bad people... It's complicated to explain, but that's the gist of it." "Well... that really is a disaster," the old man chuckled bitterly, scratching the back of his head. "I'm no aerospace engineer... Don't know much about that stuff. Maybe some of my folks will understand it." As for the end of the world, he didn't find it particularly hard to accept. After all, he had already lived through it once in his lifetime. Feng Qing and Gui Gui exchanged a look, then turned back to the old man. "So, will you consider coming out?" The old man hesitated. "I'll have to discuss it with the others... Though personally, I'd still like to see the surface." If what these two girls said was true and the world really was going to end soon, hiding down here like cowards truly made little sense. At the very least... he wanted to die somewhere a bit more spacious. As for the grudge against the Wilante, the hatred for Julius, or reclaiming Avent City... All of that could wait. His head was a mess right now, and he had no energy to dwell on such matters. Slinging her rifle back onto her backpack, Gui Gui volunteered eagerly, "We'll go with you." The old man didn't refuse, nodding his head. "Come along, then." ... [Mission Report: No mutant nest discovered beneath Street 17, Avent City. However, ruins of a pre-war commercial complex were located, housing over twenty thousand hibernators. According to one survivor, they are native inhabitants of Avent City who fled underground during the Julius era to escape the ravages of war. The locals have decided to return to the surface, and over twenty thousand hibernators are gradually being awakened, with some dating back to the Era of Prosperity. Reporters: Feng Qing, Gui Gui Mission Rating: S- Rewards: 200,000 silver coins, 2,000 contribution points, 50,000 regional reputation!] [Server Announcement: Avent City's population has increased by 21,771. New explorable area unlocked: 'Era of Prosperity Underground Commercial Complex Ruins'.] ... Though the world teetered on the brink of annihilation once again, the players' daily routines didn't grind to a halt. After all, this wasn't the first time the world of Wasteland OL had faced imminent doom. In this game, if a boss didn't trigger a world-class crisis, they were practically embarrassed to call themselves a boss. Even if a hundred thousand neutron torpedoes sounded terrifying, a careful count revealed that the Alliance held plenty of cards in its own hand. Besides, they already knew where the enemy was. There would always be a way. Avent City Prison No. 11, Room 101. Looking at Flynn strapped securely to the operating table, Jiang Xuezhou wore a deeply conflicted expression. The man's psyche had suffered catastrophic trauma; he would likely remain a vegetable for quite some time. And even if he did wake up, he would probably suffer from mental disorders for the foreseeable future. Though it was a matter of giving him a taste of his own medicine, she felt little satisfaction in avenging the fallen. She couldn't quite articulate why. Perhaps it was because, having viewed his memories, she had realized he was a pitiful soul as well. "This guy... what do you plan to do with him?" Hearing Jiang Xuezhou's voice, Ye Shi looked up, giving her a puzzled glance. "Us?" Not knowing what he found so strange, Jiang Xuezhou frowned. "Is there a problem?" "Not really..." Ye Shi scratched the back of his head. "It's just, he killed your people, didn't he? Naturally, we'd prefer to let you handle him." Jiang Xuezhou fell silent for a moment. Suddenly remembering something, she asked, "Right, you guys have captured Enlightenment Society members before, haven't you? How did you handle them?" Ye Shi shrugged. "How else? Prison sentences and labor reform. Put them to work rebuilding the wasteland, send them to teach at schools in Refugee Home, have them do community service... things like that." Jiang Xuezhou frowned. "Does that actually work?" "Who knows if it works? It's not like we can crack open their skulls just for that." Ye Shi chuckled and went on, "Some of them genuinely reform, helping us out a lot across various fields. Others realize discretion is the better part of valor, putting up with us for the time being because they can't beat us... And there are devout zealots who run right back into the Great Desert the second their sentence is served. Any of that can happen." Jiang Xuezhou was baffled. "You do this even knowing they might run?" Ye Shi shook his head. "Your phrasing is logically flawed. How could we know whether they'll run or not? To be exact, we don't care about the failed reforms; we care about the former." Jiang Xuezhou lowered her head, deep in thought. "The former..." Ye Shi shrugged. "There are always those who reform, right? We show them another possibility for the world—one where shelter dwellers and wastelanders no longer slaughter and prey on one another, but join hands to rebuild their home. There will always be people who resonate with our vision and join us. "Among those who joined, some became doctors, some engineers, some researchers, and some were flipped into informants for our intelligence network... For us, having those people is enough. "As for the rest, if they run, they run. They'd better just pray we don't catch them doing evil again." Jiang Xuezhou's eyes gradually brightened. She rubbed her chin with her forefinger, appearing to ponder something seriously. A moment later, she made up her mind. "I've decided." Ye Shi stared at her blankly. "Decided what?" Jiang Xuezhou said earnestly, "I... want to give him another chance. Hand him over to you, and let you reform him." Ye Shi didn't know whether to laugh or cry. "Uh... While we don't mind, is your side really fine with that?" Jiang Xuezhou shook her head. "The Academy has never cared about the life or death of any single individual. To us, this man no longer has any value... My mentor told me to handle it as I see fit." Seeing that Jiang Xuezhou wasn't joking, Ye Shi sighed and scratched the back of his head. "Though I think you're being a bit of a bleeding heart, suit yourself... In any case, if the day ever comes when you can't survive at the Academy, coming over to our side wouldn't be bad either." This time, it was Jiang Xuezhou's turn to freeze. Snapping back to reality, her brows shot up, and she shot Ye Shi a fierce glare. "What do you mean I can't survive there? I'm doing great! I've already made it to C-rank researcher, thank you very much! Hah, you'd better worry about yourself instead." "Me?" Ye Shi pointed at himself, dumbfounded, before breaking into a helpless chuckle. "Are you kidding? I'm the server's number one Perception user! How much better do I need to be doing?" Jiang Xuezhou frowned. "What server? Perception? Number one? What strange nonsense are you spouting now?" Realizing his slip of the tongue had nearly crossed a line, Ye Shi quickly bit back his words. "Forget it, forget it. You wouldn't get it even if I told you." Seeing Ye Shi make a move to flee, Jiang Xuezhou immediately gave chase, complaining relentlessly, "What do you mean I wouldn't get it?! Don't you dare stop halfway—hey, hey, stop right there!!" Out in the hallway, listening to the shouts echoing from the distance, Lao Bai couldn't help but smile like a fond father. "Looks like the kid can keep his mouth shut after all." Fang Chang, standing beside him, gave a faint smile. "You don't understand him. He might act frivolous most of the time, but deep down, he's a man of principle." A simple sense of justice and morality? Regardless of how others interpreted it, that was certainly how Fang Chang saw it. A long, long time ago, when Wasteland OL first popped up in the Cattle and Horses group chat, Ye Shi had been the very first to suspect a scam, pulling the other moderators together to brainstorm countermeasures out of concern for the members' safety. Had it been Fang Chang himself, he wouldn't even have bothered getting involved. He had zero patience for fools. Lao Bai glanced at Fang Chang, hesitated for a moment, and finally spoke. "Say, if it really is the end of the world—" Before he could finish, Fang Chang cut him off. "I won't let that happen." Uttering the words in an undeniable tone, Fang Chang rested a hand on Lao Bai's shoulder and added with absolute conviction, "Never." ... Meanwhile, Dawn City. The browsing room on floor B4 of Shelter 404. After listening to Chu Guang's briefing, Yin Fang couldn't help drawing in a sharp breath. "A hundred thousand neutron torpedoes?! Your Guards Corps... are they serious?" Chu Guang shook his head. "This intelligence wasn't uncovered by the Guards Corps. It was provided by your former employer, the Academy." Silence fell over the browsing room, broken only by the bubbling of the teapot. Yin Fang pressed his forefinger against his brow in silence for a moment, seemingly managing to steady his nerves, then looked up at the ceiling. "Activate the gravity well immediately, then establish an orbital defense system... No, wait, if we do that, we play right into their hands!" The space debris swirling violently across geosynchronous orbit formed a natural protective shell over Earth, like an eggshell. If neutron torpedoes detonated near low Earth orbit, the combined influence of Earth's magnetic field and other factors would render those high-energy rays virtually harmless to surface life! However, if the gravity well were activated to clear the orbital debris blockade, all bets would be off... Right now, the biggest question was: how much control did the Celestials actually possess over the missile cruiser Orion? Neither the Alliance, nor the Academy, nor the Enterprise possessed any inkling of the cruiser's internal state. Watching Yin Fang mutter to himself, Chu Guang nodded from the sofa. "...The Academy shares that view. Before we obtain further intelligence, not only must we refrain from activating the gravity well, but we must also guard against the Enlightenment Society activating it." He had already briefed the East Empire on the matter, and the latter treated it with great gravity, having already dispatched an army of five hundred thousand toward the Great Desert. The Alliance had acted similarly. Pioneer City had declared a state of emergency, and the Thorns Corps stationed in the eastern Great Desert had extended its patrol perimeter into the heart of the desert. Meanwhile, former colonies of the Southern Legion, such as Evernight Port and the Ravencourt Industrial Zone, had likewise initiated mobilizations, staying on high alert for any conflict that might erupt in the Great Desert. Yin Fang said with a bitter look, "Just losing a single research vessel... Who could have imagined such grave consequences?" "I don't think the research vessel is the real issue," Chu Guang mused, shaking his head. "Perhaps our adversary began preparing for a rainy day long ago. While we were dealing with the Church of the Torch, while we were bogged down in the quagmire of the Brahma Province and the Southern Legion, they were already preparing for today. That lost research vessel was merely the tip of the conspiratorial iceberg breaching the surface." Yin Fang stared at him intently. "Do you have a plan?" Chu Guang shook his head. "None." Yin Fang froze. "N-none?" Chu Guang went on, "It happened too suddenly. Aside from sending someone ahead to take a look, I have no better options." The Academy's representative had already agreed to lend a research vessel to the Alliance. That vessel was currently located on the outskirts of Avent City, and its pilot was Jiang Xuezhou. Yin Fang gave a wry smile. "Fair enough..." Seeing Yin Fang's anxiety, Chu Guang spoke in a measured tone. "Relevant deployments are already underway, including restarting the manufacturing base in Shelter 100 and preparing contingency shelter protocols. But to be frank, I don't yet have a concrete grasp of what one hundred thousand neutron torpedoes truly mean... If there were no orbital debris to protect us, what would happen if all one hundred thousand neutron torpedoes bombarded Earth in a single salvo?" "The result would probably be just as described in the Torch Project. It might not be as efficient as neutron annihilation, but the outcome wouldn't be much different." Burying the bridge of his nose in his hands, Yin Fang took a deep breath before continuing, "...Virtually nothing would remain on the surface, though that isn't entirely certain. The Aegis system should be able to hold up, and the colony ship Zhiyuan at the center of Ideal City should also have ways to shield against direct strikes." Chu Guang looked at him. "And the shelters?" Yin Fang nodded, though not a trace of optimism could be seen on his face. "Yes. But aside from those, nothing else will survive! Furthermore, I don't believe their attack will stop there. Even without being a military expert, I can tell that once the strategic bombardment ends, the next step will be a planetary landing." Whether orbital drop troopers rained down from above or the Orion made a full-ship descent like the colony ship Zhiyuan would depend entirely on the Celestials' whims. Neutron warheads only eliminated soft targets; surface factories and railways would likely remain intact. Those people would easily be able to seize control of surface production facilities and use them to achieve self-replication. A pensive expression settled onto Chu Guang's face. Having heard Yin Fang's assessment, he had formulated a general idea of the Celestials' intentions. Those people intended to use them as fuel. Or rather, usurp the hard-won fruits of victory achieved by tens of thousands of wasteland survivors. He would never allow them to succeed! Just then, footsteps sounded outside the browsing room. Having obtained permission, Lyu Bei walked in. "Reporting!" "Our branch in Pioneer City intercepted a radio signal originating from the central Great Desert!" "After analyzing the signal, we identified a set of coordinates and a signature... The signatory is suspected to be the sender herself. Her name is Zhuang Lan." Zhuang Lan? Hearing that name—both familiar and distant—Chu Guang's eyebrows rose slightly. He had nearly forgotten about her. Who would have thought she was still alive, and that she still remembered their wager? Noticing the intriguing look on Chu Guang's face, Yin Fang cast an inquiring glance at him. "An acquaintance?" "You could say that. We've known each other for quite some time," Chu Guang smiled faintly. "I didn't expect that lurking in the shadows and operating in secret was not just our enemy, but the enemy of our enemy." Looking at the smiling manager, Lyu Bei hesitated for a moment before offering a quiet warning. "Respected Manager... We cannot yet confirm whether this Zhuang Lan is an ally, and the information she provided is quite vague. It could very well be a trap." "Whether it's a trap or not, we'll know once we go see for ourselves." With that, Chu Guang looked toward the pen holder on his nearby desk and issued a command. "Xiao Qi, check for me which corps nearby is available." "Strength doesn't matter. Just make sure they aren't afraid of dying."