510: How do you plan to write Chapter 510?

It was early morning in Muchuan Town, and the mist had yet to disperse.

Lin Que had just tightened the faucet when a knock sounded at the door.

He pulled the door open to find Old Zhao standing outside, holding a dented aluminum lunchbox, the pungent smell of pickled vegetables rushing straight into his nostrils.

"Try this."

He handed over the lunchbox.

"Old Liu's specialty, thick noodle soup. It's rustic fare you can't get in the city. See if you can get used to it."

Lin Que didn't say much, taking the hot lunchbox and lifting the lid.

The noodles were as wide as fingers, and the thick soup base was floating with chopped, dark pickled vegetables.

There was no sesame oil, no scallions.

He broke apart his chopsticks and bowed his head to eat in large mouthfuls.

The noodles were tough, and the pickled vegetables were over-fermented, carrying a hint of astringency.

But as the hot soup went down, the dampness that had accumulated all night was forced out from his very bones.

He didn't leave even the thick soup at the bottom, finishing it all in one go.

Old Zhao leaned against the doorframe, watching him put down the clean lunchbox, a glimmer of approval flashing in his eyes.

He walked over to snap the lunchbox shut, habitually feeling for the half-smoked cigarette behind his ear that had been shriveled by the rain.

"Full? Want me to take you around?"

Lin Que wiped his mouth: "Where to?"

Old Zhao had already turned and started walking downstairs.

His liberation shoes thudded heavily against the concrete steps.

"Keep up."

Lin Que smiled faintly, grabbed his notebook, shoved it into his pocket, and followed quickly.

Stepping out of the hostel, the town streets were filled with standing water.

The smell of rust in the air seemed to have been steeped out of the ground by the rain.

The two walked one after the other; Old Zhao walked extremely fast, without saying a word.

Lin Que noticed that Old Zhao wasn't taking his usual route.

After passing through a narrow alley overgrown with weeds and piled with scrap iron pipes, his field of vision suddenly widened.

That high wall slammed into his line of sight without warning.

A concrete wall with barbed wire strung along the top.

Red and white warning posts stood in the mud, the yellow warning signs washed bright by the rain.

For the past seven days, every time Lin Que walked here, he would consciously stop outside the warning posts.

But today, Old Zhao didn't stop.

He walked straight past the warning posts to a metal door beneath the high wall.

Old Zhao fished the ring of old keys from his pocket, skillfully picking out the smallest, brightest one, and inserted it into the rusted keyhole.

Click.

The sound of the lock cylinder engaging was extremely crisp.

The heavy iron door was pushed open, the hinges emitting a harsh, grating sound that startled the wild birds on the wall into flight.

"Come on in."

Old Zhao said to Lin Que behind him.

Lin Que stepped over the threshold. The iron door closed behind him.

Inside the door was a field of overgrown grass.

Inside and outside the wall were two completely different worlds.

Although the factory area outside was abandoned, it at least still had the vitality of the town.

But in here, there was absolute silence.

Huge machine wrecks lay among the weeds, rusted pipes broken in mid-air, their dark openings facing the sky.

The smell of rust in the air was so thick it tasted bitter.

Old Zhao walked in front, his steps steady.

He was very familiar with the path around those steel corpses.

"It's been twenty years."

Old Zhao spoke, his voice much deeper than usual.

"I haven't let any outsiders through this door."

Lin Que listened quietly.

"Those who come to gather material, taking a camera and circling the outside twice, just want me to open the door."

Old Zhao sneered.

"What do they want to see? Rotten iron? The names of the dead?"

He stopped, turned around abruptly, and stared fixedly at Lin Que.

"You kid are different."

Old Zhao raised a hand and pointed to his chest.

"You can sit still, and you treat the people of Muchuan Town as human beings."

Lin Que's fingers touched the old notebook in his pocket through the fabric.

"Last night, you said someone at the east wall doesn't like the smell of smoke."

Old Zhao swallowed, his voice trembling.

"How did you know that?"

Lin Que met his gaze calmly.

"I noticed that every time you walk to the east wall, you take your cigarette down."

"The way you look at the wall—it's not like you're looking at a wall, but like you're looking at a person."

Old Zhao stared at him for a full half-minute.

Then, he turned around and strode deeper inside.

"Come on, I'll take you to meet him."

The weeds grew deeper and deeper.

They passed through a ruin of collapsed factory buildings.

The mist ahead slowly dispersed, revealing a remaining brick wall.

A stone tablet stood at the base of the wall. It wasn't tall, eroded and mottled by wind and rain.

Old Zhao walked to the stone tablet and stopped.

He didn't wipe the water stains off the tablet. He just stood there, as if he had stood through countless mornings and evenings just like this.

Lin Que stepped forward.

There were rows of deeply carved names; although the edges were worn, they were still clear.

Liang Shoushan.

Zhou Haisheng.

Li Quanfu.

Zhang Xiaojun.

"Old Liang."

Old Zhao spoke to the stone tablet, without preamble, just like chatting with an old friend.

"I brought this kid here."

He pointed to Lin Que.

"He knows the rules, didn't ask foolish questions, and didn't write nonsense."

Old Zhao fished the half-smoked, shriveled cigarette from his pocket and carefully placed it on the muddy ground in front of the tablet.

"Not smoking today."

He straightened up, looking at the name at the very top.

"The winter of '96."

His voice was flat. No fluctuations.

"The factory was rushing an urgent order. Equipment was aging, we were short-handed, and the workshop ran non-stop for eleven days."

Lin Que stood a step away, his breathing light.

"On the twelfth day, the cooling pipe couldn't hold on."

Old Zhao spoke very slowly.

"When the pressure gauge needle jumped into the red zone and the alarm sounded, I was right next to Operation Console No. 3."

Lin Que's fingers touched the cover of his notebook in his pocket.

He didn't take it out.

"My legs went weak."

There was no concealment in Old Zhao's voice.

"The alarm had been sounding for over ten seconds, and I was clinging to the console, but I just couldn't stand up."

Wind poured in from above the broken wall, the weeds pressed down and then springing back up.

"Old Liang ran over from the other end of the workshop."

Old Zhao's fingertips pressed against the three characters "Liang Shoushan", his knuckles turning white.

"He kicked me out of the inspection hatch in one go."

"The cooling pipe was connected to the main reactor; once it exploded, the toxic gas and sea of fire could have leveled half of Muchuan Town down the mountain."

"He didn't run; he turned and rushed toward the operation console to pull the manual cooling valve."

The voice cut off. A very short silence.

"When the pipe exploded, I was lying outside the threshold."

Old Zhao's jaw tightened.

"The blast wave slammed the door shut; he used his life to keep that fire contained within the workshop."

The water stains on the stone tablet were slowly dried by the wind.

The four names, under the gray-white daylight, were as quiet as if they had been waiting for someone to read them all along.

Old Zhao squatted down, his palm covering the top of the tablet.

"Old Liang was from the same village as me."

"We grew up together from when we were kids running around naked. We were recruited together, entered the factory together."

"He became the workshop director, and I became the security section chief."

"After work, we'd drink together. He disliked the smell of my cigarettes, and every time, he'd snatch them from me and snuff them out."

He raised his head and looked toward the east wall.

"His wife passed away early, he had no children, he was all alone."

"At that time, the factory had just been restructured and contracted to a private owner, and the boss ran away overnight. He didn't even have family, and there was no one to ask for even a cent of compensation."

"This factory was his home, and it became his grave."

Old Zhao's Adam's apple bobbed.

"After the factory moved away, this area was designated a restricted zone."

"Because of the terrain, no one developed it further."

"Those who moved away were busy finding new ways to make a living; those who stayed were busy just trying to survive."

"Slowly, even the kids in town didn't know who was buried behind this wall."

He stood up.

His knees popped, but he didn't frown.

"But I didn't leave."

"I stayed behind to guard this wall."

"I've guarded it for twenty years."

In the distance, a bird call fell into the ruins and immediately vanished.

Old Zhao looked at Lin Que.

His eyes weren't red, but there was something in them heavier than red-rimmed eyes.

"You asked me why I wouldn't let people in—"

He swallowed.

"I'm afraid."

These two words, coming from Old Zhao's mouth, were heavier than any harsh words.

"I'm afraid they'll come in and write this place up as a story."

"Include two photos, send it to mobile phones, put it on TV."

"It'll be a buzz for two days, and then they'll turn around and forget."

"Old Liang and the others will become stories in other people's mouths, looked at once and then flipped past."

Old Zhao's hand clenched into a fist, then slowly relaxed.

"But if I don't let people in... these few names will truly only be read by me."

He looked at the row of characters on the tablet.

"When one day I, too, lie down—"

He didn't finish his sentence.

The wind poured over the broken wall, blowing a large patch of weeds flat.

Old Zhao took a deep breath, swallowing the second half of his sentence.

He turned around to face Lin Que directly. His gaze was as heavy as iron.

"You said you came to write about Muchuan Town, and now you've seen it."

"These names. This wall. And this old man who has guarded it for twenty years."

Old Zhao said, word by word.

"How do you intend to write it?"