Two or Three Events in the Last Days 013
Chapter 13: An Earthquake Strikes
Although he had not read any books about formations for many years, Jing Lin’s exceptional aptitude and understanding, cultivated since childhood, allowed him to quickly memorize the steps of the spirit gathering array.
He felt that perhaps Old Zhang had been right all along—he truly possessed extraordinary talent in this field. When drawing talismans, he encountered no hesitation or resistance whatsoever. Likewise, when performing the array steps, everything flowed naturally. With remarkable ease, he completed the array.
After pacing out the dimensions of the vegetable garden behind the house, including several fruit trees, he calculated the locations of the six formation nodes and buried the corresponding talismans. Finally, he buried the last talisman at the location of the formation core.
In an instant, the previously ordinary backyard seemed to come alive.
It was a strange sensation. Though invisible to the naked eye, it could be clearly felt.
Standing there, Jing Lin “saw” spiritual qi from outside the formation being drawn toward the backyard. It brushed against his clothes, swept past his brow, flowed slowly through the six formation nodes, passed through the formation core, and eventually settled into stillness.
Turning around, he noticed Le Le gazing upward as well. “Le Le, do you see something?”
Le Le shook his head blankly.
Jing Lin asked no further questions. Instead, he fetched water and washed the dirt from his hands after burying the talismans.
Taking the little cash he had left, he rode his bicycle to Zhao Zhiwen’s house.
Le Le wanted to come along, but it was inconvenient to take him. Jing Lin coaxed him into staying with Zhou Yu instead. Although Le Le was unhappy about it, he was not the sort of child who threw tantrums. He simply pouted and watched them leave with a deeply wounded expression.
That day, they planned to visit a privately owned clothing workshop in neighboring Yuming Village to see whether they could buy the clothes they needed.
The workshop was very small, employing only around a dozen workers, most of whom were local acquaintances.
Two or Three Events in the Last Days (TELD) is translated by Betwixted Translations. The site you’re reading this chapter on stole our translation.
A few years earlier, Zhou Yu had worked there operating sewing machines. Later, however, she suffered an appendicitis attack while at work. Because the workshop frequently required overtime to meet orders, the workload was extremely demanding. After her surgery, she resigned and never returned.
In their area, houses were usually built with spacious first floors. Many homes had nothing on the ground floor except a few load-bearing columns. The workshop occupied the first floor of the owner’s own building and followed a similar design.
When Jing Lin and the others arrived, all three roll-up doors facing the street were open. The owner’s family was moving sewing machines into a single corner. Green plastic crates were scattered around the open floor space, nearly all of them filled with unfinished garments. Another corner held stacks of fully packaged clothing.
For the past two years, the workshop had specialized in parent-child casual shirts and padded winter clothing.
Years ago, Zhou Yu had brought home a set of their clothes as a gift for Jing Lin’s sister’s family. Jing Lin had seen them and judged the quality to be average, which was reflected in the low prices.
A shirt purchased directly from the factory cost less than five yuan, while winter clothing sold for roughly thirty to forty yuan. Under current circumstances, the prices could likely be negotiated even lower.
Their timing was fortunate. The workshop had just completed an order for parent-child shirts when the power outage struck before shipment. The entire batch was now sitting unsold. Meanwhile, despite it only being July, the workshop had already begun producing winter orders. Both orders happened to come from the same long-term business partner.
Previously, the owner never sold products locally. At most, leftover inventory would occasionally be offered to workshop employees at cost or given away to relatives and friends. However, he had already concluded that the workshop likely had no future. Since Zhao Chenghuai was an acquaintance, when asked whether he was willing to sell clothes, he immediately nodded.
“Yes.”
The workshop carried all common sizes. Considering that Le Le was only five years old and children outgrew clothes quickly, Jing Lin selected various colors and sizes.
For summer, he purchased twenty sets total for himself and Le Le, with Le Le receiving two additional sets. For winter clothing, he deliberately bought one size larger and purchased ten sets, again giving Le Le two extra.
Since Zhao Zhiwen’s family had no children, they only purchased the adult pieces from the parent-child sets. Each adult took fifteen summer garments and eight winter garments in larger sizes.
After purchasing the clothes, they returned home, unloaded their bicycles, and headed back to the county seat.
Two or Three Events in the Last Days (TELD) is translated by Betwixted Translations. The site you’re reading this chapter on stole our translation.
The county felt even more desolate than the previous day. At least yesterday, there had still been sanitation workers on the streets. Today, not a single one could be seen, and several uniformed police officers patrolled with batons in hand.
Even fewer shops were open. The store where they had bought toothpaste the day before was already closed. After searching for quite some time, Jing Lin finally found a yarn shop whose roll-up door remained slightly open.
The previous night, after hearing about their plans to buy clothes, Zhou Yu had suggested they purchase extra yarn. She knew how to knit sweaters, scarves, gloves, socks, and hats.
Jing Lin immediately saw the value in that.
After negotiating with the owner, he bought more than twenty jin* of yarn at a heavily discounted price. On top of that, both he and Zhao Zhiwen received complimentary crochet hooks, knitting tools, basic instructional books, and multiple sets of knitting needles in various sizes.
*jin = catty
Zhao Zhiwen’s family purchased even more. After all, there were three adults in his household, and a single sweater required over a jin of yarn.
Finally, Jing Lin felt the last two hundred yuan in his pocket and decided to buy underwear. After searching unsuccessfully for an open underwear shop, he settled for a supermarket that remained open. There, he purchased dozens of pairs of underwear for both himself and Le Le. When he finished, not a single yuan remained.
On the ride home, Zhao Zhiwen glanced at the bags of underwear in the bicycle basket and burst out laughing. Seeing the puzzled looks from Jing Lin and his father, he explained his train of thought.
“Just thinking about what it looks like we’re doing right now. Imagine if the power comes back as soon as we get home, and the cars start working again. Won’t all this stuff we bought be a waste?”
“It’s just for peace of mind,” Jing Lin replied.
Even if nothing happened, watching everyone else stockpile supplies every day would make anyone restless. And if disaster did come, these supplies might only be a drop in the bucket. Still, they would help for a while and prevent them from immediately facing shortages of everything.
Jing Lin had completely run out of money, so his own stockpiling efforts were finished. However, Zhao Zhiwen’s family still had over twenty thousand yuan remaining.
Jing Lin wanted to continue helping them haul supplies home, but Zhao Zhiwen refused. The two families had already bought enormous amounts of fruit. If they did not process it soon, it would spoil. He told Jing Lin to stay home with Le Le and help Zhou Yu make jam instead.
Zhou Yu had always maintained a habit of preserving jam. Jing Lin handled washing and chopping apples while she tended the fire and supervised the cooking. Because the village had no natural gas service, and because his grandfather had only used gas cylinders during New Year celebrations, most elderly villagers preferred traditional fuel. They considered gas stoves wasteful and believed food cooked over firewood tasted better. As a result, few people used gas cylinders during ordinary times. Only now did Jing Lin discover that Zhou Yu still had a gas cylinder in her kitchen.
He asked Zhou Yu, “Is the gas still working?”
Two or Three Events in the Last Days (TELD) is translated by Betwixted Translations. The site you’re reading this chapter on stole our translation.
Zhou Yu glanced at it and frowned. “It doesn’t. Honestly, I never thought much about it. When it wouldn’t ignite, I assumed the gas had run out.”
Jing Lin lifted the cylinder slightly and shook his head. “There’s still gas inside. It’s just broken.”
By then, Zhou Yu had already cleaned the large iron pot on the wood stove and filled it with water.
“Tsk,” she muttered. “What on earth is going on? Nobody from the village committee has come to explain anything.” By village committee, she was referring to the Chashanling village committee.
It would probably happen soon, Jing Lin thought. Though all it would accomplish was make the villagers even more anxious and hasten their efforts of stockpiling.
By noon, when Zhao Zhiwen and his father returned, less than half the fruit had been processed into jam, and their sugar supply was running low. Zhou Yu immediately instructed Zhao Zhiwen to buy as much more sugar as possible.
That evening, Jing Lin felt fine.
The next morning, however, both arms were sore and weak. He barely had enough strength to grip a knife. By late afternoon, after all the jam had finally been cooked and sealed, he felt as though his hands no longer belonged to him.
That night, while sleeping in a haze from exhaustion and aching muscles, Jing Lin suddenly felt the bed shaking violently. A thunderous rumble echoed in his ears.
And then—Le Le’s crying.
Earthquake!
Jing Lin instantly snapped awake. In the darkness, he grabbed the sobbing Le Le beside him. There was no time to put on shoes. He rushed out of the house in just a few strides, threw open the gate, and ran into the road. His legs trembled beneath him as he stood on the village’s concrete roadway. Under the moonlight, the houses and surrounding mountains swayed from side to side like enormous, ferocious monsters. His chest tightened.
By now, the entire village had awakened. Panicked shouts, anxious cries, and frightened wailing echoed throughout the night.
Holding Le Le, who was already crying so hard he had begun hiccuping, Jing Lin hurried toward Zhao Zhiwen’s house.
Words from the Translation Crew
Miiya: 1 of two for the week.
Translator: Miiya
Editor: MushroomKnight73
Proofreader: Yume
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