by N. Heller
“Since you put it that way…” Lin Sanjiu looked at both her companions hesitantly, “we will join temporarily.”
Chapter 36 - The Missing Walkie-Talkie
The word “temporarily” in Lin Sanjiu sentence did little to dampen Chen Jinfeng’s enthusiasm. He gave a loud clap and spoke zealously, “That’s the way! Everyone in Oasis will become part of human history in the future and will be remembered throughout the ages.”
Watching them, the members who have been loitering outside the entrance of the factory realized that they have decided to join; they all cheered and rushed toward Lin Sanjiu and the others. They all started clapping. Not even one of them did this half-heartedly; all of them clapped very enthusiastically and quickly attracted even more people with more applauses.
“Welcome! New members!”
Lin Sanjiu felt a little at a loss facing such a hearty crowd. She turned to look at Luther and Marcie, only to find that both her fair-skinned companions were blushing to the tip of their ears. When Luther spotted her gaze, he sheepishly whispered, “They’re so enthusiastic… I have never received such a warm welcome.”
Lin Sanjiu held back her laughter, having the same sentiments.
Chen Jinfeng only managed to get the crowd to stop after he had gestured a few times for the crowd to calm down.
“Dear comrades, the most important thing for our new members right now is that they familiarize themselves with this new environment. The sun is out now, so everyone, please go back to your beds and sleep. We can celebrate their arrival later, at night!”
His words stirred up another round of applauses.
“Xiao Yu, please inform the canteen staff that we have three new members today. Tell them not to forget to prepare their share!” Sister Li requested with a bright smile, and a girl with a ponytail quickly ran back into the factory. The rest of the people also left after some persuasion from Chen Jinfeng, smiling at Lin Sanjiu and the others.
Following which, Sister Li said to them, “The dormitories are too warm during the day, so we have partitioned two levels of the bas.e.m.e.nt and brought the beds downstairs… Follow me now, I will show you to your beds.”
“So where should we park our vehicles?” Unquestionably, this was asked by Lin Sanjiu who had already made her mind up not to be afraid of being offensive.
“Drive it into our compound, there is an empty space suitable for parking,” Sister Li answered warmly, she did not seem displeased this time.
The three of them agreed. They drove into the compound and parked their vehicles in a corner. Lin Sanjiu only realized how huge the compound was when she was inside. The boundary walls between four or five factories have been demolished, creating a vast open area. There was a total of over ten buildings in Oasis. Each of these buildings had two-floored bas.e.m.e.nts and were converted into sleeping quarters for the members. Reflective sheets covered the top of each of these buildings, and under the dangerous sun, white light was reflected everywhere. So, as they walked around, they could hardly open their eyes.
Through squinted eyes, Sister Li looked at all of them and said in a rather embarrassed manner, “We are reaching soon. Can you see that building with the ‘42’ sign? The other buildings are fully occupied, that’s the only building with available space.”
“If there is no one living upstairs, what is the purpose of those reflective sheets?” Lin Sanjiu asked out of curiosity.
“Professor Bai is doing an experiment on heat-insulation. He hopes to lower the interior temperature to within 50°C. If the temperature can be lowered, we will be able to live upstairs and even cultivate crops there with aeroponics…” while she explained this, she suddenly exclaimed, “In the past, 50°C would sound so intimidating! Thanks to the medicine that Professor Bai developed, everyone can resist the heat much better.”
“What?” The three of them turned to look at Sister Li what they heard this.
[Medicine? What is she talking about?]
“It’s not necessary. I trust you,” Sister Li replied and turned to the three of them, “You can follow Xiao Yu. She is in-charge of the accommodation matters in this building. Go ahead first, I have something to discuss with Xiao Yu.” The three of them nodded, smiling. It felt like they were entering a boarding school—they pushed out the door and entered the hallway.
When they entered the building, they sensed that the surrounding temperature was much lower. Their pores, which were tortured by the extreme heat, could finally start breathing again. Even though they could tell that it was not 50°C, it was close. Compared to the murderous heat outside, this Professor Bai’s heat-insulation experiment had produced quite an astounding result even at this point.
Lin Sanjiu was the last to enter. She had just fully stepped in when Xiao Yu opened the door. Seeing their rather astonished reaction, Xiao Yu quickly smiled and gestured for them to wait inside. Lin Sanjiu nodded and turned to walk away but stopped after she had thought of something. A white light flashed over the hands she hid behind her, and a walkie-talkie appeared. It was the one left behind by Voley.
She did not know why, but she was curious to hear what Oasis’ members would say in private when there were no outsiders with them. When Xiao Yu turned to walk away, she stealthily placed the walkie-talkie at the gap of the door before walking hastily into the main hall on the first floor. There weren’t any people around in the main hall, most likely because everyone went to sleep, so only Luther and Marcie noticed what she did.
Since they have been through a few life and death situations with her, they both didn’t say a word even though they were a little appalled. They quickly adjusted their expression to look natural while Lin Sanjiu took the walkie-talkie that hung on Marcie’s waist and switched it on secretively.
Amidst the crackling sounds, they heard Sister Li’s voice.
“Even though Executive Chen appeared… I was the first one who spotted them… I even brought them around…” a walkie-talkie was not a tapping device after all; furthermore, the sound came from behind a door so the sound quality was really bad. Just when the three of them were about to plastered their ears to the speaker, they heard a clear sentence: “These three people should be counted as mine, no matter what, right?”
The three of them were stunned. They looked at each other and gathered around the walkie-talkie again.
“Look for him...he is an executive…” Sister Li complained but quickly laughed and said cautiously to Xiao Yu, “Don’t say anything to the others. You know that I…”
Xiao Yu seemed to nod in agreement.
“Quick! Keep it!” Luther, who had been keeping a lookout for them, urged. “Their conversation is ending.”
Lin Sanjiu quickly switched off the walkie-talkie, and Marcie hung it at her waist again. The three of them quickly stood apart from each other. At the same time, Xiao Yu already bade farewell to Sister Li and opened the door. Lin Sanjiu looked cautiously in the direction of the location where she had hidden the walkie-talkie. Unfortunately, it was too late to retrieve it because Xiao Yu had already greeted them, “All of you, come with me. You can look around your living quarters. We spent a lot of time trying to make it comfortable!”
She had no choice but to find another opportunity to retrieve it. Lin Sanjiu dragged her feet so that she was at the back of the group. With a flash of white light, a card flew above the walkie-talkie, and a black cloth covered it.
Luckily, Xiao Yu was totally unaware. She was a round-faced girl who was not very tall, and the first impression she gave was that she was a friendly and direct person. But after conversing with her, one could sense an obsequiousness about her that came from her stepping into society too early. However, it was hidden behind her smile and was not irksome. Xiao Yu led them to bas.e.m.e.nt one and smiled a little apologetically, “The lower level is cooler, so it had been fully occupied. You’ll have to compromise and sleep here.”
After that, she opened the metal door in front of them. They could no longer recogniz
e what the bas.e.m.e.nt was used for in the past. The vast area that bas.e.m.e.nt one covered was filled with small little cubicles partitioned by white building planks. There was a rectangular opening for each cubicle and curtains with all sort of designs were hung as replacements for doors.
The rooms segmented the space into a few large divisions, and the corridors were all very narrow. Even though there were fluorescent lights in the bas.e.m.e.nt, the electricity was turned off, so the cramped corridors were extremely dark. The soft snoring sounds from some of the rooms and the presence of other humans created an oddly sleep-inducing atmosphere.
“Come. Miss Lin, you can stay here.” She opened a door and walked about seven to eight minutes. Xiao Yu finally stopped at a cubicle and pulled open the curtain. Lin Sanjiu looked up and saw her cubicle number: 1629. She looked inside. The metal bedframe was not big, and there was only a thin mattress. There were a flat pillow and a bed sheet that probably acted as a blanket. If this was before the apocalypse, it could have been considered a slum, but to Lin Sanjiu, it was really not bad since she had slept on the floor for almost a month.
“You can go ahead, I will just make myself comfortable here,” Lin Sanjiu said to Xiao Yu quickly—she wanted to retrieve that walkie-talkie as soon as possible, and this was a good opportunity.
Xiao Yu agreed and gave her some advice before walking away with Luther and Marcie. They had barely left when Lin Sanjiu immediately rushed back to the main hall on the first floor. She pushed open the door and looked around. Just as before, there was nobody around. She rushed to the door at the entrance. Unexpectedly, she found no trace of the walkie-talkie.
She was shocked. “Huh?” she could not help exclaiming softly as she scanned the area around her. Just then, she felt a tap on her shoulder.
“What are you looking for?”
Chapter 37 - I'm Just Taking a Walk
This was no small matter—shocked, Lin Sanjiu quickly turned to look behind her.
A bespectacled stranger was standing behind her. He looked like an intellectual, but he had a habitual frown which gave him a stern look, “Did you lose something?”
[It should be okay if I give him a generic reply.] Lin Sanjiu composed herself and gave an apologetic smile. “Yes, I dropped something accidentally, but I can’t find it now…”
Her words sounded normal, but the bespectacled man frowned deeper. Suddenly, he drew his face close to her with a solemn expression. Lin Sanjiu could not tell what was wrong with the man, so she took two steps back quickly and looked back at him uneasily.
Unexpectedly, the man snorted and said, “You’re not being totally honest—I’ve never met a woman that doesn’t lie.”
[Huh?] Lin Sanjiu’s eyes widened.
“But it doesn’t matter. The item does belong to you, you weren’t lying about that…” regardless of what the man said, he kept his solemn expression. “Fine. Since you are the owner, I’ll tell you this. A short man took away that item a few minutes ago.”
[Short man…] She had just arrived at Oasis and basically knew no one here. But if Sister Li and Xiao Yu didn’t discover it, even if some random person took it away, she could just treat as if she’d lost the item! Anyway, Voley gave them more than one set of walkie-talkies from his car.
However, Lin Sanjiu’s focus was no longer on that walkie-talkie. Instead, she scrutinized the bespectacled man from head to toe to the extent that the other party felt uncomfortable. Then, she smiled and offered a handshake, “Hi, I am Lin Sanjiu. Thanks for your information. What’s your name?”
From behind his glasses, the man looked at the hand that she extended and showed no attempt to reciprocate, “My name is Hu Changzai. If a young lady like you suddenly shows affection, you must have an ulterior motive.”
Even though Lin Sanjiu thought of herself as a reasonable person, her smile froze.
Lin Sanjiu criticized silently as she suppressed her anger and drew back her hand. Hu Changzai did not feel that he said anything wrong. “I’m leaving,” he said with a long face, turning to leave.
“That’s your ability, right?”
Hu Changzai paused when he heard that question.
“You can tell if someone is lying?” Lin Sanjiu walked slowly to his side, she couldn’t help feeling unsatisfied if she didn’t say these words: “It’s quite impressive and rather useful. But if you expose a lie in such an obvious manner, wouldn’t that defeat its purpose?”
Surprisingly, Hu Changzai appeared startled by her words—his spectacles even glided down his nose. He quickly readjusted it and stared at Lin Sanjiu, asking, “Why do you know about these abilities?”
Lin Sanjiu was a little stunned, “Days have passed since the apocalypse… this is just common knowledge, right?”
“Oh, I’ve got it. You must be from the outside world.” Hu Changzai took off his spectacles and wiped it with the corner of his shirt as this dawned on him. He wore his spectacles again and took a good look at Lin Sanjiu. “How long have you been here? How long were you out there? From what you said, I presume that you have abilities too?”
[Why should I be interrogated by you?] Lin Sanjiu found it ludicrous, so she countered with her own questions, “Isn’t everyone from Oasis from the outside world? Do you mean that some people here haven’t developed abilities?”
Just when she asked these questions, she remembered that Sister Li mentioned something about a medicine. [What is the connection between that medicine and people’s abilities?]
Lin Sanjiu found it infuriating to hold a conversation with this person, so she frowned and decided to leave. Even though she knew that there was something strange going on with the people here in Oasis and their abilities, it was not necessary for her to get the answers from him. Out of the 1800 people here, she could easily ask anyone else!
She didn’t anticipate hearing Hu Changzai’s footsteps behind her as she left. He chased her and shouted, “Why are you so hot tempered? Hey, slow down. I still have unanswered questions… Slow down, please. Alright, alright! I will answer your questions. Please stop!”
Lin Sanjiu finally stopped. Despite her above-average physical capabilities, she didn’t even reach 10% of her speed, yet Hu Changzai could not really catch up with her. Her brows knitted as she asked, “You haven’t experienced any physical enhancement?”
Behind Hu Changzai’s gold-rimmed spectacles, his blank expression answered her question.
“What’s going on? All posthumans should experience some form of physical enhancement.” Lin Sanjiu was puzzled.
“What?” Hu Changzai looked bewildered as he panted heavily. “Let me ask you a question first. You must answer me. When did you arrive at Oasis?”
“Just about 30 minutes ago,” Lin Sanjiu thought for a moment and replied. Afraid that he would ask would ask too much, she quickly shot back with a question, “Didn’t the people here develop any abilities?”
Hu Changzai shook his head with a serious expression on his face, “Most of the people in Oasis are just normal people. Logically speaking, they might not have even survived the early stages when temperatures were rising and would have died like the others outside… However, Professor Bai developed a type of medicine which could artificially induce the necessary Heat Resistance Adaptation even in normal humans. But that was as far as it went, and since normal people have zero Potential Growth Value, they don’t gain any new abilities even if they consume more medicine. This is not a secret. If you stay a little longer, you’ll naturally come to know about it.”
[This Professor Bai… must be a super genius!]
“I joined Oasis on the 7th day of the New World.” Hu Changzai gave an uncharacteristic sigh despite his stoic face. “At that time, I had already developed my ‘Lie Detection’ ability, but I didn’t experience any sort of physical enhancement. All these time, I rarely met another posthuman like me, so when you made a remark about my ability, I was really a little excited.”
Lin Sanjiu nodded to his explanation. Suddenly,
she realized something and asked urgently, “Wait. If you already developed your ability then… what did they say about that? Do they know about your ability?”
“I don’t think so, not at that point in time.” Hu Changzai pondered about the underlying meaning of her question since she seemed rather anxious. “Oasis provides the same narrative to every new member. This place protects the spark of humanity; it has a great, noble cause. So, what do you mean by that?”
Lin Sanjiu remained silent, she didn’t know why she acted that way either.
“You are making things too complex… I used my ‘Sift Falsehoods from Truth’ ability, and they’re telling the truth. I’ve been here so long and discovered that the people here in Oasis really do not have any hidden agenda. They honestly want to save the humanity.”
[No hidden agenda?] Lin Sanjiu remembered Sister Li’s words: “These three people should be counted as mine...”
[If they were so selfless and dedicated, why do they sound like multi-level marketing salesmen?]
“But…” Hu Changzai suddenly started to stammer a little, “I've got an advice for you—”
“Why aren’t you asleep! What are you doing?”
Before Lin Sanjiu could react, Hu Changzai quietly exclaimed “Sh*t!” and immediately ran toward the exit. This time, his movements were considerably quick. He pushed open the door and ran out outside into the blazing sun.
“Hu Changzai! I know it’s you! You just wait! I will definitely report this to Executive Chen!” Xiao Yu shouted, chasing after him unforgivingly. When she saw that he was out of sight, she turned to face Lin Sanjiu and said stiffly, “Miss Lin, go to bed!”
She did not understand why Xiao Yu’s attitude could become sour so quickly. Lin Sanjiu followed Xiao Yu to the stairway, and after considering about it for a moment, she mildly explained, “I met him coincidentally, so we exchanged some words. I just wanted to get to know this place a little better…”