{"id":18169,"date":"2026-06-27T09:00:01","date_gmt":"2026-06-27T13:00:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/betwixtedbutterfly.com\/translations\/?p=18169"},"modified":"2026-06-22T17:08:14","modified_gmt":"2026-06-22T21:08:14","slug":"teld006","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/betwixtedbutterfly.com\/translations\/teld006\/","title":{"rendered":"Two or Three Events in the Last Days 006"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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Chapter 6: Elderly Couple<\/span><\/h1>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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On the way to Zhao Zhiwen’s house, Jing Lin had to pass by the family’s fish ponds. Wearing his contact lenses, he spotted a small boat out on the water from quite a distance away. The person aboard was scattering feed into a designated area of the pond. Jing Lin called out tentatively, “Zhao Zhiwen!”\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

Upon hearing the call, the person on the boat turned around. As soon as he recognized Jing Lin, he waved enthusiastically from the boat, “Ah Lin!”<\/span><\/p>

Jing Lin waited on the bank for a little while.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

Zhao Zhiwen stood about six feet tall, just slightly taller than Jing Lin. In southern China, where most men were only a little over five foot seven, both of them were considered tall. Zhao Zhiwen’s skin was somewhat tanned. After finishing with the fish feed, he brought the boat ashore and immediately greeted Jing Lin like an old buddy, lightly punching him in the chest with a clenched fist. “Weren\u2019t you only due to come back at the end of the month?”<\/span><\/p>

Jing Lin replied, “Things outside didn’t feel very safe, so I came back early.”\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

The moment Zhao Zhiwen heard that, he slapped his thigh and exclaimed loudly, “Don’t tell me you’ve lost power and water over there too, and cars don’t work anymore? Then how did you get back?”\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

Jing Lin nodded. “I rode a tricycle back yesterday. From the city. It took more than ten hours. It was already past midnight when I got home.”\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

“No wonder I heard the dogs barking in the middle of the night yesterday! You must be exhausted!” Zhao Zhiwen said, grabbing Jing Lin by the arm and leading him toward his house. He then asked, \u201cHow come I don\u2019t see Le Le? Where\u2019s he at?\u201d<\/span><\/p>

At the mention of Le Le, Jing Lin frowned with concern. “I think something might be wrong with him. He’s been sleeping continuously since yesterday. He won’t eat anything, only drink water. When Grandpa Li gets back, I need to have him take a look at Le Le.”<\/span><\/p>

“Yeah, that definitely needs checking,” Zhao Zhiwen said. “Did you know? Our whole village has gone crazy these past couple of days. Somebody went into town, saw people stockpiling salt, and came back talking about it. Now, everyone in the village has rushed into town buying supplies. My mom came home with an entire case of salt and even bought a huge amount of toilet paper from the paper mill. My dad’s been arguing with her for two straight days because of it.” <\/span><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Two or Three Events in the Last Days (TELD)\u00a0 is translated by Betwixted Translations. The site you’re reading this chapter on stole our translation.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Jing Lin said, “Tell Uncle Zhao not to be upset. Everything Aunt Zhou bought can be stored for a long time. It’ll get used eventually.”\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

Zhao Zhiwen replied, “I think so too. Ah Lin, do you think there really could be an apocalypse?”\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

Jing Lin paused before answering. “Cars suddenly stopped working for no reason. As for what comes next… who knows.”<\/span><\/p>

Zhao Zhiwen scratched his head, looking troubled. “Then shouldn’t we buy more supplies and stockpile them?”<\/span><\/p>

Jing Lin: “I actually came to talk to you about that.”<\/span><\/p>

He explained his current penniless situation to Zhao Zhiwen and asked whether this year’s lease payment could be settled early, preferably in grain instead of cash.<\/span><\/p>

Zhao Zhiwen immediately agreed. His family had harvested wheat in May and sold only half of it, leaving more than three thousand jin still stored at home. They also had over five hundred jin of rapeseed oil that had been pressed from their harvest and not yet sold. In addition, there were more than a thousand jin of rice from the previous year still sitting in storage. The original plan had been to sell everything within the next few days. But after the power outages and water shortages began, his mother absolutely refused to sell any of it. That was the main source of the arguments with his father. Keeping so much grain and oil at home took up a tremendous amount of space.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

That was how things often worked in the countryside. Unless an entire family worked elsewhere, most households that farmed their own land produced their own rice, grain, and cooking oil. Families like Zhao Zhiwen’s, who leased large amounts of land, were the exception. Ordinary farming families generally sold only a small portion of each year’s harvest and kept the rest for themselves. They ate that grain until the following year’s harvest, then sold whatever old grain remained before storing the new crop.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

Zhao Zhiwen’s house stood near the center of the village. Like Jing Lin’s, it was a two-story home with front and back courtyards. Unlike Jing Lin’s property, which still had vegetable gardens in front, Zhao Zhiwen’s front yard had been completely paved with concrete. Along one side of the wall stood a shed made from blue corrugated steel, used for parking electric tricycles and storing farm tools.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

Both Zhao Chenghuai and Zhou Yu were home. The front gate stood open. Zhao Chenghuai sat near the entrance snapping long beans into pieces, while Zhou Yu lounged in a reclining chair nearby, lazily fanning herself. They looked completely at ease.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

Unlike many of the villagers, Zhao Chenghuai and Zhou Yu had never treated Jing Lin with avoidance or superstition. They genuinely liked him. Part of the reason was that he had always been a handsome child. He had been adorable when he was young, and as an adult he had grown into a polite, good-looking man who had graduated from a prestigious university. The other reason was gratitude. During the difficult years when Zhao Chenghuai and Zhou Yu were struggling to get by, Jing Lin’s grandfather had helped them many times. Even now, they were still leasing the family’s two ponds at the original contract price. Considering how much pond lease rates had increased over the years, that arrangement was far more generous than what they could have obtained elsewhere.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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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.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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When the couple saw that Jing Lin had returned, one hurried to bring him a stool while the other cut up a watermelon for him. One moment, they were asking why Le Le had not come with him, and the next, they were heading out to pick vegetables, insisting that he stay for dinner. Watching them bustle about, Jing Lin felt a warmth spread through his heart. In many ways, Zhao Chenghuai and Zhou Yu had filled a large part of the emotional void left by the loss of his parents.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

Watching from the side and munching on watermelon, Zhao Zhiwen remarked in a mock-jealous tone, “How come I never see you two this enthusiastic when I come back after being away for months?”\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

Of course, he was grinning as he said it. He had understood Jing Lin’s attachment to his parents since they were in middle school. Since he and Jing Lin were such close friends, he was not genuinely jealous at all.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

When Jing Lin explained why he had come, Zhao Chenghuai immediately went to the kitchen and filled a sack with more than twenty pounds of rice. He also brought out a bundle of flour weighing about ten pounds. Then he sent Zhao Zhiwen to the storage room in the back yard to carry out five twenty-liter containers of cooking oil. It was hard to imagine a more straightforward and generous response.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

Zhao Chenghuai said, “Xiao Lin, it’s hot right now, and rice doesn’t keep well in this weather. It attracts insects easily, so I’m only giving you twenty pounds for now. Eat that first. I’ll also give you a hundred pounds of unhusked rice. We’ll harvest fresh rice in September, and when that happens, I’ll give you several hundred more pounds. After that, you can mill as much as you need whenever you want. I’ll also give you five hundred pounds of wheat. Whether you grind it into flour or have noodles made from it is up to you.”<\/span><\/p>

Then he added with a smile, “Besides, even if there weren’t any lease payments involved, Uncle Zhao’s family would never let you go hungry.”\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

Jing Lin was deeply grateful. The reason he had chosen to return home despite being completely penniless was because Zhao Chenghuai’s family was here. They had watched him grow up and had practically treated him like their own son.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

Since there was no electricity, they needed to move everything to Jing Lin’s house before dark. With Zhao Zhiwen’s help, Jing Lin filled sacks with rice and wheat. Using Zhao Zhiwen’s flatbed tricycle, they made several trips back and forth until all the supplies had been transported to Jing Lin’s home and stored in the storeroom.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

Afterward, Jing Lin carried Le Le back to Zhao Zhiwen’s house for dinner.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

Everyone in Zhao Zhiwen’s family adored Le Le, especially the two elders. In the village, most people around Jing Lin’s age were already married and had children. Many were even fathers of two. Zhou Yu and Zhao Chenghuai had been urging Zhao Zhiwen to get married for years, but he had yet to even find a girlfriend. He had gone on several matchmaking dates, but each time either he found fault in the woman or they found fault in him. In the end, none of the matches worked out.<\/span><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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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.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Watching their peers become grandparents and spend their days doting on grandchildren had made the couple incredibly envious. Ever since Le Le had come under Jing Lin’s care, they had finally gotten a chance to indulge their grandparental instincts. Every time Le Le came back to the village with Jing Lin, they would stuff his hands full of snacks.<\/span><\/p>

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So when they saw Le Le now, fast asleep and clearly not in a normal condition, both of them became very worried.<\/span><\/p>

During dinner, Zhou Yu kept asking about the situation in the city. She complained that the electricity still had not been restored. Without power, she could not ride her electric scooter into town, and the buses were no longer running either. She said she planned to go into town the next day and buy more supplies to stock up.<\/span><\/p>

In some ways, they had been luckier than Jing Lin. A few days earlier, Zhao Chenghuai had been planning to purchase fertilizer for the fields, fish feed for the ponds, and materials for another metal shed in the yard. Because of those plans, he had withdrawn nearly fifty thousand yuan from the bank all at once.<\/span><\/p>

The next day, however, he discovered that no vehicles worked anymore. As a result, the fifty thousand yuan remained safely stored at home.<\/span><\/p>

Jing Lin had not been so fortunate. Living in the city, he had always been close to banks and ATMs, so he rarely carried much cash. When the crisis struck, years of hard work and savings had effectively become inaccessible overnight.<\/span><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Words from the Translation Crew<\/strong><\/h3>

Miiya: Two of two for the week. I’d be doomed as well. Maybe I should start keeping cash on hand…<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Translator: Miiya<\/em>
Editor:\u00a0<\/em>MushroomKnight73
<\/em>Proofreader:\u00a0<\/em>Yume<\/em><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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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.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":146,"featured_media":15070,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[94],"tags":[92,35,93],"class_list":["post-18169","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-teld","tag-apocalypse","tag-bl","tag-farming"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/betwixtedbutterfly.com\/translations\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/07\/clwp.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/betwixtedbutterfly.com\/translations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18169","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/betwixtedbutterfly.com\/translations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/betwixtedbutterfly.com\/translations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/betwixtedbutterfly.com\/translations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/146"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/betwixtedbutterfly.com\/translations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18169"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/betwixtedbutterfly.com\/translations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18169\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18173,"href":"https:\/\/betwixtedbutterfly.com\/translations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18169\/revisions\/18173"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/betwixtedbutterfly.com\/translations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15070"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/betwixtedbutterfly.com\/translations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18169"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/betwixtedbutterfly.com\/translations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18169"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/betwixtedbutterfly.com\/translations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18169"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}