Chapter 114: Dawn’s Gleam

The inventory of the goods was not completed until the dead of the night. Nearly all of the Wild Truck Cargo Team had perished, and at that moment, clusters of black crystals were slowly forming from the corpses on the ground.
“Lost Thought Models.”
YangZicang took over two hundred of them, part of the Wild Truck Cargo Team’s share, while leaving the Lost Thought Models of the over sixty other fallen fighters for Shed Master Song to handle.
After a brief half-day of rest, Shed Master Song and his men helped escort the supplies back to Ning Yang’s Shed settlement.
“This time, it was a real narrow escape.”
A day and a half later, as Ning Yang saw the familiar buildings, he felt as if he had been reborn.
More men and women than expected came out to greet them.
“Weren’t they all said to have run away?” Ning Yang asked Team Leader Jia, who was running out to meet him.
“Well, it’s because they heard you wiped out the Wild Truck Cargo Team, so they’ve come back—except for those bastards who took over your residence.”
Ning Yang was furious.
“Spread the news about those people. Have all the Shed settlements in the area stay vigilant against them. Let’s see how long those beasts can survive!”
“Alright, I was waiting for you to say that.” Team Leader Jia said.
His eyes gleamed greedily as he looked at the carloads of goods, but then he caught sight of the familiar figure on the cart, and his body shuddered.
“Go apologize, and hurry up about it.”
Ning Yang scowled at his old buddy from Earth and said coldly.
“Wait, what about Aya? She’s not hurt or anything, is she?”
“No, no.”
Having said that, Captain Jia shuffled towards Yang Zicang and his group like a bashful little girl, followed by several others.
Shed Master Song watched the scene with a smile, having fully understood everything that had transpired here a few days ago. He found it both comical and helpless, yet was relieved that Jiazi wasn’t indifferent to life; otherwise, the destruction of this small settlement would have been inevitable.
That night, the shed area bustled with unprecedented activity. Ning Yang took out all the remaining and recovered food to entertain the guests. During the feast, words could hardly express how repeatedly they thanked Yang Zicang and his party for their help.
The lively commotion even caused a small ball of light to appear in the sky.
{Hmph.}
Seeing Yang Zicang look up at it, the little spirit inside the ball of light snorted and soared into the sky.
The young man chuckled, poured fresh juice into a clean small cup, and while the crowd, intoxicated on flavors they hadn’t tasted in ages alongside Luo Bin in their drunken stupor, stepped aside and whispered to the sky.
“Like to try some of our good stuff?”
{Are you trying to bribe me? Li-Li-Ya won’t fall for your trick. Well… but Li-Li-Ya might take a tiny sip.}
The ball of light descended, transformed into a fairy as long as a finger wearing a tiny skirt. She planted her two little hands on the cup edge, buried her face, and took a small sip.
{Blech, blech, the flavor’s too strong.}
With a whoosh, she shot back into the sky.
{Hmph, that’ll teach you, you big villain.}
Yang Zicang bared his teeth in a grin, shook his head, and walked over to the table.
{Hey, stingy guy, cat got your tongue? Alright, I admit it was actually pretty tasty. Farewell, you famous troublemaker with all your schemes.}
The ball of light rose slowly upward, gradually fading away.
Yang Zicang watched the direction it had disappeared, then took a small sip of the juice from his cup.
That evening—having not rested properly for two or three days—Yang Zicang decided against traveling and instead planned to sleep well to regain his strength. At least the stone house here was more comfortable than a tent.
After exchanging a few words with Xiaoyu, Liang Xi, and the others, Yang Zicang climbed onto the soft, spacious bed.
Thanks to the supplies contributed by the desert cargo caravan, Ning Yang and his people had prepared for him a rest area that rivaled those back on Earth.
Dozing off under a thick wool blanket, Yang Zicang suddenly realized he had become awake.
The sensation was all too familiar—he was now in a dream.
But the room remained the same, while Zuo Feixian sat silently at the open door, his expression bleak as he gazed outside.
Yang Zicang sat up: “Hello.”
“Mm, how have you been feeling lately?”
“What do you mean?”
Zuo Feixian turned his head, his face still the same, yet it showed a kind of distant, unfathomable, and unapproachable aloofness.
“The overall feeling, ever since you left your world.”
Yang Zicang thought for a moment and said, “Terrible, but… there’s also some unspeakable sort of meaning to it.”
Zuo Feixian smiled, but his smile was quite reserved.
“Indeed, the pursuit of power and immortality is etched into the very essence of humanity. This holds true regardless of time or place.”
Yang Zicang didn’t quite agree with this; for him, the pursuit of power came from external pressure.
But Zuo Feixian said, “You’re reluctant to admit it because you still see yourself as a normal… Earthman. That word sure is hard to pronounce.”
Hearing this, Yang Zicang realized the other was speaking his language, and that “Earthman” was a pronunciation obviously just newly adapted for him.
“You still hope to go back, but—”
That man turned his head to stare at him: “If you woke up one day and found yourself lying on the bed in your old home, and all of this was just a dream, wouldn’t you miss the power you once had?”
“I…”
Yang Zicang pondered deeply, imagining if he were truly back on Earth, in his own home, going to school daily, doing homework, playing basketball, then after graduation finding a job, commuting to and from work, running business deals or sorting through work documents.
He suddenly felt a reluctance to continue that train of thought.
“Have you been speaking my language all along?” Yang Zicang asked, changing the subject.
“I learned it a long time ago.”
“How long ago?”
Zuo Feixian thought for a moment: “I’ve forgotten. That belongs to the other half of my memories.”
Yang Zicang said, “If I manage to gather ten thousand temporal units, do you know where I’ll go?”
“To the place where new destinies are woven.”
Zuo Feixian looked at Yang Zicang approaching him: “Where there is the new, there is the old. And I belong to the old.”
Yang Zicang composed himself—regardless of whether he could go back or not, he had truly come to this world now.
The catastrophe that is currently happening to me is what should be dealt with.
“I encountered a moon shadow creature before; it seemed to know a lot, but you warned me not to let it speak. Why was that?”
He seized this rare opportunity to ask.
“Haven’t you already guessed something? Don’t ask me this question, because any answer I give belongs to the ‘old,’ not to the new. Certain information that adults understand is poison for someone as pure as a blank sheet of paper—do you understand?”
Yang Zicang felt a numb tingle crawl down his spine.
“If you hope to get more answers to your questions from me, I certainly can, and I’d be happy to tell you. Unfortunately, there’s more than one listener.”
Zuo Feixian clasped his hands together, pressed them against the back of his head, and lay down. As he moved, the house vanished, transforming into a platform.
Yang Zicang looked up at the sky. The eternal twilight-like midnight was gone, replaced by real stars, clearer and more beautiful than ever before—like nothing that could exist in reality.
“Is there something you need from me?”
After staring at the starry sky for a few seconds and abandoning his pile of questions, Yang Zicang turned to the person beside him.
“Stargazing.”
“Stargazing?”
“In my memories, a long, long time ago, I lay on the ground like this, watching the stars with someone just like you. I miss those days.”
“This starry sky is part of my few good memories.”
Yang Zicang looked at the stars too, then lay down, feeling the hard surface of the platform beneath him.
“At that time, I was stupid—I understood nothing.
“Of course, he was hardly much wiser than me, not even knowing a handful of characters. Ah, who would’ve thought that such a pair would end up making it this far in the end.”
There was a subtle hint of time acceleration, and after who knows how long, the sky grew chaotic.
“Then can you tell me your real name?”
“My name is Xingmiao.”
Yang Zicang felt the dream rapidly receding, himself on the verge of sinking into a dazed slumber, but that sentence was burned into his mind — such a pair, yet making it this far.
{You must set out for other shed zones to retrieve the rest of my body.}
In the haze, a voice resembling Zuo Feixian’s appeared in his heart.
Why? Yang Zicang subconsciously thought in his sleep.
{What I have been waiting for may soon arrive.}
Both sound and images faded away slowly. After an unknowable stretch of time, Yang Zicang opened his eyes.
Beside the pillow, the little male goblin lying prone shot up with a whoosh. It glanced at Yang Zicang’s face, made a ‘nyah nyah nyah’ face at him, and vanished through the ceiling.
“Damn reporter.”
Yang Zicang chuckled, joking about the little creature; the thing had startled him a bit just now.
After all, who wouldn’t be a little scared when a thing suddenly pops up right next to their face as they’re just waking up?
Then a contemplative look settled on his face.
After breakfast, the group almost worshipped Zuo Feixian, begging him to stay, but Zuo Feixian shook his head, unmoved by any temptation.
“There’s no future here.”
The disheveled man, now in a fresh set of clothes, stated bluntly.
In the past, Ning Yang would have been furious, but now he dared not say a word of objection.
Just yesterday, he clearly saw Master Zuo and Xu Xiuchuan both emitting a red glow, shielding Teacher Chen and the others behind them, like two mighty gods.
This made him sigh with regret—he had nearly become the greenhouse owner, but alas, it was not meant to be.
Taking advantage of the large supply of goods and materials, Yang Zicang did not return to his own base today but instead began crafting life-supply Forget-Me-Engines among the crowd as night fell.
“Brother Jiazi, come visit often.”
Ning Yang waved with genuine sincerity.
“Sure will.”
The train disappeared into the wind, taking with it piles of cargo.
In the blink of an eye, Ning Yang found himself broke again, with even the stored food completely consumed.
……
At dawn, Kuang Yuming sat in the small courtyard.
On the cement table before him were several small dishes, made from fresh vegetables collected from the interwoven region. Since accepting Li Mi’s arrangement, he had appeared quite at ease these days.
“I wonder if food can give birth to a nightmare,” Kuang Yuming thought, taking a sip of wine.
Suddenly, with a sense of awareness, he looked up at the sparse stars in the sky.
There seemed to be a new star being born.
“That kid moves pretty swiftly; he’s actually made Lü Bu take notice of me.”
The weathered man’s heart churned with intense emotion.
Kuang Yuming shook his head with a smile, sighed, and looked down at his wine glass, pouring himself the last cup.
It was as if an invisible gate in heaven and earth had cracked open.
A thread of light fell vertically, flickered, and vanished.