Wen Jiuzhe originally went to that children’s martial arts training class to work part-time purely by accident.
His school and major choices had been altered, and he was forced to study in Yu City. When he had just arrived in Yu City, Wen Jiuzhe was full of hostility; when he smiled, it was more frightening than when he did not, and just walking down the street would make people keep their distance.
Lin Guosheng, the buzz-cut kid, was someone with a serious lack of tact. He could not read other people’s expressions, nor could he read the atmosphere. Holding a stack of flyers, he stopped the irritable Wen Jiuzhe on the street.
Wen Jiuzhe was absent-minded, and Lin Guosheng was speaking in a thick local Yu accent. Wen Jiuzhe only caught the two words “martial arts,” interrupted him, and asked, “You know martial arts? There’s a martial arts hall here?”
Lin Guosheng thought for a moment, then grinned. “Yes!”
Wen Jiuzhe was so annoyed that he wanted to find someone to have a proper fight with to vent the anger in his heart, so he lifted his foot and followed him. The two crossed a street and went up to the third floor.
Through the glass door, seeing a group of little radish heads inside chanting and punching, Wen Jiuzhe looked up and saw the signboard here—Rainbow Sunshine Children’s Martial Arts Training Center.
What kind of thing was this?
Lin Guosheng had already walked inside and shouted, “Brother Chai, there’s a customer who wants to learn about the courses!”
Wen Jiuzhe turned around to leave, and Lin Guosheng hurriedly grabbed him when he saw this. “Hey, don’t go!”
Wen Jiuzhe twisted his arm back in one motion.
When Brother Chai, who had come to receive the guest, saw this, he stepped forward to rescue the buzz-cut kid… and they immediately got into a fight right there at the doorway.
Wen Jiuzhe also did not know why there were more and more people around them. A group of children were watching, and several men at the side were even cheering.
After the fight, a middle-aged man wearing a wristwatch and with a refined demeanor stepped forward, grabbed his hand, shook it enthusiastically, and said:
“I’m the boss here, my surname is Huang. Young brother, your skills are very good—are you interested in working here with us?”
“Come, come, let’s go inside and talk!”
Boss Huang was the type of person suited to doing pyramid schemes. After chatting with him, Wen Jiuzhe became a part-time teacher at this children’s martial arts training class.
Not for the wages, but because several of the teachers here had decent skills, and Boss Huang said he could let them spar with him for free.
This place had indeed formerly been a martial arts hall, but martial arts halls had long since declined in this era.
After the old hall master passed away, Huang Sheng, who had not inherited his hall-master father’s good skills and was more like a refined businessman, seized on the contemporary child-rearing craze. Amid the mushrooming variety of training classes everywhere, he radically transformed the martial arts hall into a children’s martial arts training center, and it opened with great success.
Therefore, the several teachers at the training center were all former disciples of the martial arts hall, each of them having real skills.
Wen Jiuzhe only wanted to find a place where he could spar with people, venting his energy and emotions. Persuaded by Huang Sheng, he agreed, neither here nor there.
Including Huang Sheng, the boss, there were seven teachers at the training center, with Wen Jiuzhe counting as an unofficial member.
He was only one year older than the youngest, Lin Guosheng, and younger than everyone else, but as people kept calling him that, everyone followed Lin Guosheng in calling him Ninth Brother.
Although at first those older than him called him Ninth Brother deliberately in jest, after he fought his way through the martial arts hall and beat everyone into submission, that “Ninth Brother” gradually took on sincere admiration and closeness.
Getting along with this group of people was simple and relaxed. Wen Jiuzhe had a good relationship with them—at least better than with his classmates and his so-called family members.
So sometimes when his nose was bruised and his body covered in welts, it was not all done by Wen Xuan; it was purely from soaking in the martial arts hall and sparring with people, getting injured because no one held back.
However, Xue Ling counted all of this on Wen Xuan’s head, and he was happy to let it be so, never explaining at all.
When he hurriedly left Yu City back then, Wen Jiuzhe only made a simple phone call to Boss Huang to resign, and did not get the chance to say goodbye to this group of people.
Seeing him again, several big men whose faces were clearly more weathered grabbed his shoulders and complained, saying he had no sense of loyalty, that he left just like that.
Brother Chai even shoved him playfully. “You little brat, once you left there was no news at all. You don’t know how worried your big brothers were!”
His strength was great—if Wen Jiuzhe’s lower body hadn’t been steady, that shove could have pushed him back two meters.
Wen Jiuzhe shook off all their hands, somewhat unable to handle the enthusiasm of these rough brothers—when he reunited with his partner, she hadn’t been anywhere near this excited.
“Let’s go! We finally caught you here, come with us, everyone get together properly!”
“Or we can just tie your car to ours—Ninth Brother, you sit in my car, we’ll chat on the way!” the buzz-cut kid suggested.
Wen Jiuzhe was almost carried off by them seven hands eight feet at once, and refused outright. “No need. I still have my girlfriend in my car, it’s not convenient.”
For some reason, several of them suddenly fell silent. The buzz-cut kid glanced at his dark car windows and asked in a low voice, “Your girlfriend—is she still the same one from before?”
Wen Jiuzhe said, “Who else would it be?”
The few people who had been afraid of accidentally poking at his sore spot all relaxed and smiled again.
Brother Chai made the decision. “It’s getting dark already, you’re definitely going to the camp up ahead to rest anyway. Let’s go there first and talk!”
Wen Jiuzhe got back into the car and wanted to ask Xue Ling’s opinion. As soon as he went in, he saw her holding up a writing board, filled with “hahahahaha.”
The people outside couldn’t see what was happening inside the car, but Xue Ling could see everything clearly from within.
This cool guy being surrounded by burly men, getting tugged left and right, looking a bit impatient yet helplessly dealing with them—it was really funny.
Just earlier someone had grabbed his arm excitedly, and when he pulled back, it turned into something like a tug-of-war. She even saw him secretly exerting force.
Watching just now, Xue Ling had really been a little worried that he might be carried away by several people working together.
These big brothers all looked very good at fighting; it felt like Wen Jiuzhe wouldn’t be able to beat them alone.
Wen Jiuzhe started the car and shot her a glance that was half-smile, half-not. “Laughing at me?”
Xue Ling nodded, accidentally letting out two low “ao” sounds, then hurriedly covered her mouth with her hand, afraid of being discovered.
Wen Jiuzhe reached out and grabbed the back of her head. “I’ll go talk to them in a bit. Tomorrow we’ll split up and go separately from them.”
As he spoke, their car slowly followed the convoy ahead.
Xue Ling was stunned for a moment by his words.
Seeing Wen Jiuzhe meet these people and look quite happy, she had thought he would want to spend more time with them—it was even possible he would just go with them directly.
Humans are social animals. If one can get along well with others, how could one like living in isolation?
About an hour later, the convoy arrived at a brightly lit camp.
Tall railings wrapped with iron barbs surrounded the outside. Inside, several cars were already parked, and people were making fires and cooking.
Once the large convoy entered, it took up most of the empty space. Wen Jiuzhe parked the car at the spot closest to the entrance, leaving some distance from the main convoy.
Xue Ling observed the camp and discovered that different-sized convoys were spending the night here to rest, with a kind of peaceful coexistence where well water did not infringe upon river water.
So camps like this were places you could just enter freely to rest.
But along this entire journey, Wen Jiuzhe had never brought her into such a camp. He had always just found some wilderness and rested there.
In the wilderness where zombies could appear at any time, it was definitely not as good as this kind of safer camp.
Then why had he never come?
The answer was obvious—because of her.
As soon as the buzz-cut kid from the convoy parked his car, he came over to call him. Wen Jiuzhe unbuckled his seat belt and said, “I’ll go chat with them. You stay in the car…”
Xue Ling had already picked up the tablet and opened it, starting to watch the TV drama she hadn’t finished last time, casually waving at him.
Wen Jiuzhe pushed open the car door and got out. The buzz-cut kid glanced toward his car, but because Wen Jiuzhe closed the door too quickly, he only caught a glimpse of a silhouette.
“Why isn’t she getting out? Come eat together! Brother Rong said we’ll cook hotpot together! Brother Rong handles the food—he’s usually really frugal. It’s only because we ran into you today that he’s willing to let us eat hotpot!”
Wen Jiuzhe locked the car door. “She’s sick, can’t catch a draft. She’ll rest early in the car.”
In the night, the hotpot bubbled and steamed, the rolling red broth filled with lots of dried noodles and sliced steamed buns, plus a small amount of vegetables and meat.
There weren’t as many varieties as before, but the portions were big and filling. A few people crowded together grabbing food, and it still made the appetite surge.
Others in the convoy who didn’t know Wen Jiuzhe smelled the fragrant aroma and came over with bowls to mooch some food, only to be chased away by Brother Rong.
Only a few familiar faces from the old training center were seated here.
Brother Rong took out his treasured stash of cola and poured a cup for everyone.
Cola was expensive now, hard to come by. The buzz-cut kid hurriedly drank two cups and got scolded by Brother Rong.
Wen Jiuzhe sat there watching the bubbles rise in the cola, listening to their noisy chatter, the corner of his mouth lifting slightly, then unconsciously turning his head to glance at his own car.
Brother Rong noticed and asked, “Want me to bring a cup of cola over to your girlfriend too?”
“No need, she can’t drink it right now.” Wen Jiuzhe didn’t explain further.
After eating and drinking their fill, they talked about their experiences over the past two years.
These few had originally been unattached, with nowhere to go after the martial arts hall closed, so they stayed behind. Before, they had treated the martial arts hall as home; later, the training center became home; after the apocalypse, they followed Boss Huang.
Boss Huang really was a capable person. He had led them early on to move to a reliable base and even set up a transportation company.
“It’s right inside the Anhua Base. Boss Huang is stationed there now. We’ve got a whole building there, everyone lives together. Brother Nine, you should come with us too!”
“I still need to go to Yu City. I’ve got something to do.” Wen Jiuzhe refused.
As they talked, the topic shifted to Wen Jiuzhe.
The buzz-cut kid sighed. “Didn’t expect it’s been over three years and you’re still with your girlfriend—pretty good. Back then, didn’t you leave? Your girlfriend even came looking for you at our place.”
Wen Jiuzhe looked at him. “Looking for me? When?”
“It was right when things first got chaotic three years ago. They said there were zombies—lots of people were running away, lots of people stayed home too scared to go out. She came to us asking if we could contact you. I said we couldn’t, and she looked really disappointed.”
“Later things got completely out of hand. We were getting ready to leave and even said we’d go to her place to see if you’d come back. But when we got to your neighborhood, half the buildings were already burned down. We didn’t find anyone.”
The buzz-cut kid was all smiles. “Good thing you’re okay. She must’ve found you eventually, right?”
Wen Jiuzhe didn’t speak. He suddenly really wanted to smoke a cigarette.
He didn’t have a smoking habit; it was just that sometimes when he was tired, his forehead would throb, and he’d smoke one to perk himself up and ease the headache.
After finding Xue Ling, he had basically stopped smoking. There was still more than half a pack left, tossed in the car, and he couldn’t even remember where he had stuffed it.
Rubbing his fingers together, Wen Jiuzhe pressed hard on his temples, which were throbbing a little.
“I’m going to the car for a bit.”
When he opened the car door, Xue Ling wasn’t watching her drama like she had been before he got out. She was lying alone against the car window, looking toward another small convoy over there.
That small convoy was also quite lively. Several people were sitting under the lights playing cards.
Wen Jiuzhe fell silent for a moment. He wanted to ask—do you envy their liveliness, do you also want to sit among people again?
He reached out and pulled Xue Ling into his arms. Who knew Xue Ling would struggle hard, shove his head away without even turning back, and then throw herself back against the car window to look outside.
Wen Jiuzhe: “…What are you looking at?”
Xue Ling had missed the crucial part and hadn’t managed to see it clearly. Annoyed, she punched the car window lightly, then withdrew her gaze, grabbed the writing board, and began writing and drawing on it, telling him what she had just seen.
In that small convoy, the woman in red and the man in blue were a couple. When they were eating, they were even hugging while they ate.
Another woman in dark green and a man in black were also a married couple.
But just now, that man in blue said he was going to the bathroom, and behind the car next to them, he hugged the woman in dark green and kissed her.
The woman in red and the man in black were still there playing cards with others, not noticing at all!
Wen Jiuzhe had parked his car in a very good spot—everything happening over there was seen clearly by Xue Ling inside the car.
Wen Jiuzhe: “……”
Xue Ling’s eyes were shining as she rapidly wrote: “They even started taking off their clothes behind the car and sneakily went over to the empty room over there!”
It was all Wen Jiuzhe’s fault for suddenly coming over and interrupting—she hadn’t even seen clearly which room they went into.
After finishing the gossip, she noticed Wen Jiuzhe’s expression was off. Xue Ling finally remembered to show some concern for him and wrote: “Are you done talking?”
Wen Jiuzhe said, “No, I came to the car to grab something.”
He had wanted to come find a cigarette earlier, but now he didn’t feel like smoking anymore.
“That ham—can I take it over and let them try it?” Wen Jiuzhe remembered the ham they hadn’t had the chance to eat yet.
Xue Ling very generously indicated that he should take it and share it with his buddies.
She leaned back against the window again, wanting to see if there would be any follow-up over there.
Wen Jiuzhe got out of the car holding the white-haired ham.
Not sure whether it could be eaten, he’d let the brothers help him taste it first.
