Chapter 81—Past experiences

by Bocchan13

WARNING: Mentions of suicide

It was the calm before the storm.

The only ones who weren’t freaking out were Lan Zhou and Xiao Zi who had a hunch before. Since it was confirmed now, Xiao Zi silently sighed in relief, the giant weight on his shoulders he didn’t know he was carrying, suddenly lift.

He was always anxious in his previous life about the cure. There was no end to human greed, and with greed came suffering. He did not remember the many instances where his division was shut down in favor of a faster, quicker and cheaper way. Humans were uniquely the only ones who targeted their own kind. At the best of times, there was a singular solidarity, but at the worse…well…Xiao Zi had seen that worse.

In the labs of B City when the human experimentalists begged to be kept alive, rather than acknowledging the murder of many ability users.

The Military Base with the doctors and healers who kept getting greedier and greedier, until they idled away their talent, only working for the top dogs of the pyramid.

The horrendous scientists responsible for making a cure, making a vaccine, making people live…just continue their arrogant ways of manipulating genes in order to satisfy the big bosses.

And even when Xiao Zi died at the hands of Paradise Base. He witnessed on the large walls surrounding the base, a figure in black with oozing yellow eyes look down at him and Lan Zhou like they were ants in his path. A wave of his hands and a collective force of dead-eyed people took out their weapons and aimed it at them like they were zombies.

This feeling of helplessness…devoid of hope or sanctuary... was now being extinguished by Song Yu’s confession.

Xiao Zi’s hope in humanity was resurfacing after being stagnant for almost 10 years.

Yu Ci was the first to react, his eyes blinked in confusion and then acceptance before he stood up and saluted. He thought their mission was over, and that all he had left was to live in this wonderful heaven. But now, with this piece of information…the hope of humanity came once more.

Lu Jingxiu had mixed feelings. He knew that Song Yu did this to protect himself, but the lingering feeling of their previous life; how Xiao Zi died, and how they suffered…it was hard to swallow. His deep thoughts would never be brought to the surface though despite him wanting to yell at Song Yu.

Wang Cheng was the most shocked and the one who loudly spoke out,

“Holy hell! You’re the pure ability user!?” Wang Cheng confusedly looked at everyone’s stiff faces before smiling brightly,

“Holy shit! We found him! We fucking found him!” Wang Cheng’s happy face subverted the serious mood. Wang Cheng ran up to Song Yu and hugged him. Squeezing him tight, Song Yu could see the wonderful expression of relief, happiness and excitement.

“My god! We’ve been looking everywhere for you! Do you know what this mean? Do you? We’re gonna save the world!”

Song Yu wanted to cry. Tears pooled out of Song Yu’s eyes as he looked at those innocent ones. He turned to see the faces of his comrades, who looked at him with acceptance and hope.

Lan Zhou gently grabbed Song Yu from Wang Cheng and discreetly wiped his tears.

“Yep, Song Yu is gonna save the world.”

…

The conversation went deep into the night. Song Yu relayed his time in the previous timeline, sometimes going over bits and pieces of the hard parts, but the way he skipped over these periods were left to their imaginations making them come up with even weirder conclusions. Everyone listened in rapture and the very different life Song Yu lived from theirs.

Song Yu started from the very beginning, when he was just a young university student studying agriculture. Relaying this made Song Yu miss those youthful experiences in a way, reminding him of his past.

“My father never really liked me. I didn’t meet his expectations in any way. Neither getting exemplary scores nor making strong social connections. That made me go more and more into my shell and made my both my mother and father want to ‘delete’ myself from their existence.

They wanted me to experience living ‘a life without money’, so they cut me off for two years. I studied as well as had a small part-time job. It wasn’t the best, but it also wasn’t the worst either.”

Lan Zhou patted Song Yu’s hands, his own trembling with rage. Song Yu had already told Lan Zhou this and more, but he was still just as angry. So cute.

Song Yu went into how he was sold to the B Base experimentalist group. It was advertised as a ‘study’, so Song Yu who felt like he was important, gladly endured the pain. But day after day of such torture, and the extreme way it escalated, the noble pursuit of a cure long passed, leaving Song Yu in a pit filled with ravenous extremists, eagerly chewing on ‘education’ and ‘research’.

“I didn’t really meet Wu Ding, but vaguely saw him. I was almost delirious from the experiments that I was hauled off on Ye Zhou’s back. I thought you had also escaped,” Song Yu bowed deeply to Wu Ding.

“I’m sorry. The person you were probably in contact with was my former friend Ye Zhou.”

Wu Ding felt complicated for a bit. He was naïve to trust that man in the first place, but he had no choice at the time. Song Yu was unintentionally involved in the escape, and Wu Ding did his part in opening up the building. Facts were facts. Wu Ding shouldn’t be mad at Song Yu. He should be mad at himself and the situation.

Song Yu continued to tell them how his group of friends travelled to different areas, before finally going up north and established Paradise Base. At first, it was difficult. There were around 12 of them in the beginning. They had left in the midst of fall, and the first winter of the apocalypse was approaching.

Song Yu was still in a dead-like state and had just stayed there, hoping to die. A warm cup of water entered his vision as Ye Zhou sat down next to him. They had just found this abandoned town and killed off the straggler zombies. Song Yu was taken to a cottage room with a dirty sleeping bag. A fire ability user had found broken tree branches and built a small fire pit inside.

Although Song Yu was still dazed, he had heard the complaints from the other ability users.

“He was dead weight there, and he’s dead weight now! Let’s just sell him off!” This was a water ability user who had only been in the B Base experiments building for a week. He had almost no connections to the rest of the team.

An earth ability user shook his head, “You’re too naïve. Song Yu has been in that place for a very long time. The ability users before him had all died, and he’s the only one left besides Ye Zhou.”

“Ye Zhou, c’mon man. We all followed you so you could make us have a better life. Song Yu is dead weight.”

Lu Jingxiu remembered when he first met Song Yu. Song Yu came across as unfeeling, stiff, and cold. His careless voice when confronted with the injured Lan Zhou and Xiao Zi,

“They’re just dead weight.”    

Lu Jingxiu at the time was enraged, but now he could see that Song Yu was really testing if Lu Jingxiu was trustworthy.

Song Yu had just escaped from the extremists with colleagues who experienced torture, death, and defilement. Now, listening to these people who also experienced this…be so cruel. It made Song Yu want to kill himself.

Song Yu got out of his sleeping bag, the small burning fire looking quite good right now. His hands were still trembling from being confined, his wrists looking wretched. He was about to put his entire hand in the flames when he heard a loud thud and someone falling to the floor.

“You don’t get to say that about him! Do you KNOW what he’s been through?”

Ye Zhou had punched the ability user who slandered Song Yu. Song Yu listened carefully a bit more as Ye Zhou’s voice amplified.

“He is not just dead weight. If he wasn’t there, many of us would have been dead by now. Do you know that every time we came back wounded, it was Song Yu who took care of you? Yu Hong, who was it that held your hand after every experiment? How about you Liam? Who gave you extra food and snacks?”

Song Yu could imagine Ye Zhou’s passionate gaze on them as his voice became hoarse with emotion. “It was Song Yu. It has always been Song Yu.”

The group quieted down, the silence eerie. Song Yu’s hand was still outstretched to the fire. He was eavesdropping so much that his hand accidentally went in.

“Hsss…” Song Yu retrieved his hand and saw it reddening. The pain radiated all over, but it wasn’t as painful as Song Yu thought. He was still looking at his burned hand when the door opened and Ye Zhou saw him holding it.

“Song Yu! What are you doing??”

Ye Zhou’s shout made everyone come look inside. Song Yu’s eyes were sunken deep, scar marks marring his wrists, arms and ankles. He was still garbed in a hospital gown with pants they fished out from somewhere. To everyone, Song Yu already looked dead.

Song Yu gazed at these people, tears dripping down his face.

“I…don’t…want…to live.” Through watery eyes, Song Yu beseeched Ye Zhou, ignoring his burned hands and clutching on Ye Zhou’s shirt.

“Please…just kill me. Please.”

Ye Zhou’s eyes reddened as he dropped down on the floor and hugged Song Yu tight, anxiety written on his face.

“No no no no no no. Song Yu. Please don’t go away. We need you. I need you so much. We can get through this together. I’ll take care of you! I won’t let what happened, ever happen again! I promise!”

Ye Zhou glared at the members, his yellow eyes burning with impact, “If I hear anything bad about Song Yu come out of your mouths one more time, it will be the last time you speak.”

A week later, they found a small vacant town and settled there. Two weeks after that and Ye Zhou proposed to Song Yu about becoming the leader of the base.

Song Yu who had just been lying around like a salted fish refused profusely.

“You’re the one who staged the escape, you’re the one who found this place, and you’re the one who put everything in order. I’m not leader material.”

Song Yu refused for three days, being worn down day and night by Ye Zhou to the point where he threw the newly acquired spatial blades at him. Ye Zhou was relentless though.

“The Base leader is just someone who makes the final decision on things. I will help you in any way I can! Please! We need you. Your ability is far too precious to not use! Instead of dying, live for us!”

Eventually, Song Yu agreed.