Two or Three Events in the Last Days 015
Chapter 15: White Fog
When Yan Fei was shaken awake by Jing Lin, the first thing he saw upon opening his eyes was a sea of white. Looking more closely, he realized they were completely surrounded by white mist. It resembled the dense fog of midwinter, except it carried neither chill nor moisture. The fog severely limited visibility; at best, they could only see a few people nearby, and sight extended no more than three meters.
Sensing that something was wrong, Yan Fei did not have time to ask questions. He quickly nudged Yan Ruifeng, who had been sleeping beside him on the same mat.
Still groggy, Yan Ruifeng woke up and stared blankly at the whiteness around him for a moment before asking, “Is it foggy?”
It was foggy indeed. But this was not a remote mountain region, nor had it rained. The air was still warm against their skin. How could such dense fog appear out of nowhere, with visibility reduced this drastically?
By then, Jing Lin had also awakened Zhao Zhiwen’s family. Le Le rubbed his eyes in Jing Lin’s arms. More and more villagers were waking up around them, and one surprised exclamation after another rang out. In their area, seeing such dense white fog in July was an extremely unusual sight.
Holding Le Le, Jing Lin stood up. He had barely taken a step when Yan Fei grabbed his arm. Jing Lin turned back to look at him.
Yan Fei released his grip and said, “Better not to wander around in fog this thick.”
“I won’t.” After a moment’s thought, Jing Lin added, “You shouldn’t either.”
Although the white fog blocked the distant view, everyone could tell that daylight had already arrived. As the villagers packed up their belongings, they discussed the strange phenomenon. Most attributed it to unusual weather caused by the earthquake, but a sense of unease lingered in their hearts.
Even while walking home, people stayed in groups. Under normal circumstances, no one would think much of walking alone in fog. But now, everyone worried that something might suddenly emerge from the mist.
Before they parted ways, Yan Fei deliberately came over to speak with Jing Lin. Although Jing Lin found Yan Fei’s attitude toward him somewhat strange, he did not dwell on it. He simply responded politely and reminded him to stay safe.
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 was reluctant to let Jing Lin and Le Le return home by themselves and suggested they stay with her family temporarily.
However, Jing Lin declined. After last night’s earthquake, he still did not know the condition of his house and wanted to inspect it. Besides, their homes were so close together that they could hear each other if anyone shouted. Seeing this, Zhou Yu could only walk them to the gate before returning to her own home.
When they arrived back, the courtyard inside the walls was also filled with white fog. Fortunately, the doors and windows had been shut, so the interior remained bright, though chaotic.
The sofa, coffee table, and other furniture had all shifted from their original positions. Several glass cups that had been sitting on the coffee table had fallen and shattered. Half of the television hung precariously off the TV stand, while decorative vases on the cabinet had crashed to the floor and broken.
The bedrooms were in better condition. Only the beds and wardrobes had moved. The full-length mirror in Jing Lin’s room, however, had shattered.
Looking at the mess, Jing Lin decided breakfast should come first, and cleaning could wait.
He turned toward the kitchen in the backyard. The moment he stepped inside, he felt something was off. After carefully looking around, he realized the problem lay near the vegetable garden. Amid the white fog was an intense patch of green.
Jing Lin gestured for Le Le to stay back and slowly approached by himself. When he finally got close enough to see clearly, he sucked in a sharp breath.
Only three days had passed since he had set up the array. As recently as yesterday, the empty garden plot had contained nothing but a few short weeds.
Yet overnight, the entire plot had become overgrown with weeds reaching nearly half his height. Some vines had climbed the nearby walnut tree and already stretched beyond the top of the courtyard wall.
Jing Lin figured that the spiritual qi within the array certainly played a role. But no matter how powerful the array was, such dramatic changes should not have occurred in a single night. Aside from the strange white fog, he could think of no other explanation.
Jing Lin paced back and forth outside the array before finally stepping inside.
The instant he entered, he felt as though he might be blown away by the rapidly surging spiritual qi. From outside, the weeds had seemed to sway gently in the wind. Inside, however, they whipped about wildly. Jing Lin reacted quickly and grabbed several stalks of grass beside him to steady himself.
The sensation was like standing in the middle of a raging river. He could actually feel the fierce force of spiritual qi crashing past him. His body even ached from the impact. Not daring to remain inside any longer, he hurried back out. After thinking it over, he dug up the talisman buried at the formation’s core and put it away.
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.
He intended to grow vegetables there, but unless he released the spiritual qi trapped inside, he would not dare enter again. His body simply could not withstand being battered by such powerful currents for an extended period.
Still, as he looked at that eye-catching sea of green, a thought occurred to him. Using this method, perhaps vegetables could be grown and harvested much sooner.
With the formation core removed, the spiritual qi that had been gathered quickly dispersed in all directions and blended into the white mist. The small backyard returned to seeming completely ordinary, though the dense overgrowth of weeds made it look even more neglected and untidy.
Jing Lin turned and went back into the kitchen. He gave it a quick cleanup, then heated some milk for Le Le, steamed a bowl of egg custard, and cooked himself a bowl of noodles.
After breakfast, Jing Lin thoroughly cleaned the house. He moved the furniture back into place, swept up and disposed of the broken debris, and mopped all the floors. By the time he finished, most of the fog outside had dispersed.
It seemed as though the whole thing had been a false alarm.
After tidying the house, Jing Lin took Le Le to Zhao Zhiwen’s home. As he approached the house, he noticed a television with a shattered screen sitting beneath the eaves. It had come from Zhao Zhiwen’s bedroom.
The family of three was eating breakfast.
Today was the final day that Zhao Chenghuai and Zhao Zhiwen planned to go out and purchase supplies. Meanwhile, Jing Lin and Zhou Yu were heading to the vegetable fields. Their family had planted a large number of yardlong beans, and today they intended to harvest all the mature ones and dry them for storage.
In the village, families who grew large amounts of vegetables usually had their plots clustered together in a slightly elevated area near the mountain. When Jing Lin arrived carrying a basket on his back alongside Zhou Yu, he happened to see Yan Fei’s family talking with an older woman from the village.
Jing Lin was already familiar with Yan Fei’s family. The woman was named Liao Shufen, and as a fellow villager, he knew her well too—perhaps a little too well.
She was the same woman whose family had spread rumors when he was a child, claiming that he brought misfortune to his relatives. The accusation had led Jing Lin’s grandfather and sister to confront her family in a fierce argument. After that quarrel, the two families had never spoken again. In the past, Jing Lin’s grandfather would deliver a live fish to every household in the village during the New Year, except theirs. The relationship between the families had completely broken down.
Whenever Jing Lin happened to encounter anyone from her family on the road, they would glare at him for no reason. Her two children were only a few years younger than him and were equally hostile. Every encounter was unpleasant.
As Zhao Zhiwen liked to put it, the entire family was weirdly unpleasant.
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.
At the moment, everyone in Yan Fei’s family was smiling. Liao Shufen, however, looked anything but pleased. Her displeasure was written plainly across her face.
“It’s been planted by our family for so many years,” she said irritably. “You city people wouldn’t even know how to farm if you took the fields back. Look at all of you—soft hands and delicate skin. You can’t handle farm work. Why not keep things the way they’ve always been? We’ll just continue paying rent every year.”
Ever since Yan Ruifeng had brought his elderly father to live in the city, the family’s farmland had been cultivated by Liao Shufen’s family. The so-called rent amounted to two hundred jin of grain per mu each year, more of a symbolic payment than anything else, mainly to keep the fields from sitting idle. In the past, Liao Shufen would convert the grain’s value into cash and deposit it into the old man’s bank account.
What made her current argument particularly shameless was that after Yan Ruifeng’s father passed away, she had seemingly forgotten all about the rent. For years, she had not deposited a single payment into the account.
The Yan family had not noticed at first. It was only when they decided to move back to the village and were sorting through old belongings that they found the bank card. When Yan Ruifeng checked the account, he discovered that the last deposit made had been from before his father died.
Liao Shufen was unhappy, but although the Yan family remained polite and cordial, they were firm.
Farmland in the village was redistributed every five years, but regardless of how the divisions changed, the plots had always been farmed by Liao Shufen’s family. Failing to pay rent for years was bad enough. Now that the rightful owners had returned, she still wanted to keep occupying the land.
There was no justification for that.
Even if the Yan family ultimately decided not to farm the fields themselves, they could let someone else use them. Why should they continue giving them to her?
By the time Jing Lin and the others approached, Liao Shufen was still arguing with the Yan family and looked ready to make a major scene.
But causing trouble would not help her. Once the matter reached the village leader, she would still have to return what was owed.
When Yan Lu spotted Jing Lin, she greeted him with a sweet smile.
“Hi!” Then she elbowed her brother hard enough to make him stumble.
Internally complaining about his overly strong younger sister, Yan Fei awkwardly greeted Jing Lin.
“Heading to the fields?”
Truthfully, good looks were good looks. Even carrying a dirt-stained basket on his back did nothing to diminish Jing Lin’s attractiveness. In Yan Fei’s eyes, the normally quiet and refined Jing Lin somehow looked even more down-to-earth and approachable in this setting.
Jing Lin answered, “I’m going to pick vegetables.”
They were standing on a narrow field ridge, barely wide enough for one person to walk along. When two people passed each other, both had to turn sideways.
As Jing Lin approached, Yan Fei turned sideways to face him. Jing Lin did the same as he carefully edged past. For a brief moment while they passed each other, the distance between them was extremely small.
Jing Lin was slightly shorter than Yan Fei. As he passed by, Yan Fei realized that all he would have had to do was lower his head a little, and his chin could have brushed against Jing Lin’s hair.
He was tempted to lean closer. But that would have looked far too much like a creep.
Still, he did learn one important thing. Jing Lin used mint-scented shampoo.
Even after Jing Lin had walked far away, Yan Fei continued staring after him. Yan Lu laughed and teased, “Come back to reality already.”
Only then did Yan Fei turn around and look at his sister.
With complete seriousness, he said, “Stop elbowing me like that in the future. You know how strong you are. If I hadn’t been standing firmly just now, you would’ve knocked me straight into the field. How embarrassing would that have been in front of other people?”
Yan Lu had been unusually strong since childhood. When girls from other families became shy and gave someone a little push, it barely had any force behind it.
When Yan Lu got shy and pushed someone, she could practically send them sprawling. Things like splitting a watermelon with her bare hands were completely ordinary for her.
Grinning mischievously, Yan Lu lowered her voice. “I was just excited to see my future sister-in-law.”
Then she suddenly remembered that Jing Lin was a man, making the title technically incorrect.
She quickly asked, “When you finally win him over someday, what am I supposed to call him?”
Yan Fei briefly imagined a future where he and Jing Lin were together. The thought instantly brightened his mood.
“Call him Second Brother.”
Yan Fei’s expression was usually calm and composed. But as his younger sister, Yan Lu knew perfectly well that inside, her brother’s heart was already soaring.
Words from the Translation Crew
Miiya: One of two for the week.
Translator: Miiya
Editor: MushroomKnight73
Proofreader: Yume
Avid BL reader, editor, and translator with 1 story completed (CLWP) and 1 story in progress (TELD). Support this translation with a Ko-fi. Three Ko-fis will add an extra chapter from the stockpile to the next weekly release.
