Chapter 22 22. The End of the World (Grey Smoke)

As the old man said, the smoke continues every day.Gray smoke rose from the area around the apple grove and merged directly into the dark, thick clouds above.While watching quietly, I couldn't help having an illusion, thinking that all the clouds came from the apple grove.The smoke starts at 3:00 pm sharp and the duration depends on the number of dead animals.If it is the day after a night of snowstorm or sudden drop in temperature, the thick smoke column reminiscent of a wildfire will last for several hours in a row. Why don't people try to save them from death?Really puzzling. "Why don't you find a place to build shelters for them?" I asked the old man while playing chess, "Why don't you protect the beasts from the wind, snow and severe cold? In fact, it doesn't take much trouble, as long as there is a little wall, You don’t know how many lives you can save with a roof.”

"It doesn't help." The old man said without raising his head. "Even if they build a shelter, the beasts will not enter. They have been sleeping in the open since ancient times. Even if they lose their lives, they will not change their original intention. They would rather brave the wind, snow and cold currents." body." The colonel placed the monk in front of the king, reinforced the corners of the formation densely, buried the line of fire with double horns on both sides, and waited quietly for me to wave my troops to attack. "Sounds like the beasts are willing to die," I said.

"In a sense, probably. But it's natural to them, cold or pain. Perhaps it's a relief to them." Seeing that the old man didn't speak any more, I stuffed the monkey next to the wall to induce the wall to move away.The colonel fell into the trick at first, then woke up violently, and took the knight back a step, shrinking the defensive range to one place like a mountain of needles. "You seem to be gradually becoming cunning!" The old man laughed. "It's far from your opponent." I also said with a smile, "But what do you mean by liberation?"

"It means that they may be saved by dying. Yes, they die, but they come back in the spring and are born again." "Newborns grow up and die in agony again, right? Why should they torture themselves like this?" "Destined." The old man said, "It's your turn to go. If you don't destroy my monk, you will lose!" It snowed intermittently for three days and three nights, and then it cleared up like magic.The sun cast its long-lost light on the frozen and snow-covered town, so the snow melted, the sound of water was everywhere, and the silver light shone, dazzling and dazzling.The sound of snowballs falling from tree branches can be heard everywhere.In order to avoid the light, I closed the curtains and curled up in the room without moving.I could hide my body behind thick, drawn curtains, but I couldn't escape the light.The silver-covered town is like a huge gemstone cut just right, reflecting the sun from all angles, subtly throwing unstoppable light into the house, stimulating my eyes.

On afternoons like this, I just lay face down on the bed, put my eyes on the pillow, and listen to the birdsong.Birds with various songs sometimes flew to my window, and sometimes flew to other windows. They knew that the old people who lived in the official house had bread crumbs on the window sills. You can also hear the voices of the old people sitting in the sunny part of the official building, and I am the only one who is far away from the warm caress of the sun. At sunset, I got up from the bed, washed my swollen eyes with cold water, put on my sunglasses, and walked down the snow-covered hillside to the library.On this day when the bright sun hurts my eyes, I don't read as many dreams as usual.After dealing with one or two skulls, the light from Gu Meng pierced the eyes like needles.The slim space inside the eyeballs also became heavy, as if filled with sand.The fingertips also lose their usual delicate feeling.

At this time, the girl rubbed my eyes lightly with a wet towel, and warmed some clear soup or milk for me to drink.However, clear soup or milk seemed to be abnormally stagnant, the tongue felt uncomfortable, and the taste was not soft enough.But if you drink a lot, you will gradually get used to it and taste its unique fragrance. When I said this, the girl smiled with relief. "It shows that you're getting used to this place," she said. "The food here is a little bit different from other places. We use very few ingredients to make a lot of things. It looks like meat instead of meat. It looks like eggs. Instead of eggs, it looks like coffee instead of coffee, everything is made ambiguously and speciously, this soup is very good for the body. How about it, the body feels better after being warmed up, right?"

"Indeed." I said. Thanks to the effect of the soup, the body has indeed recovered its warmth, and the feeling of head-heavy is much less than before.I closed my eyes in thanks, relaxed my limbs and rested my head. "Are you afraid you need anything now?" the girl asked. "Me? Except you?" "I can't explain it, it's just a sudden feeling. If there is still a need, maybe your closed heart will be opened a little bit because of winter." "What I need is sunlight." I took off my sunglasses, wiped the lenses with a cloth, and put them back on.

"But I can't get it, my eyes can't bear the sun." "It must be insignificant. It must be trivial things that can open your heart. Just like I massaged your eyes with my fingers just now, there should be some way to open your heart. Can't remember? In the place where I lived in the past, when my heart hardened and closed tightly What are you doing?" I patiently searched for the few remaining memory fragments one by one, but unfortunately found nothing. "No, I can't remember anything. The original memory has been lost." "No matter how small it is, just blurt it out when you think of it. Think about it together, and I really want to help you a little bit."

I nodded, refocusing my nerves to unearth the memories buried in the world of the past.But the rock plate is too hard, no matter how hard I try, I can't help it.My head started hurting again.Presumably my self was irretrievably lost when it was separated from the shadow, and what was left was only a false and disordered heart.And this kind of heart is also tightly closed because of the cold of winter. She put her palm on my temple and said: "Forget it, think about it later, maybe you suddenly think of something unintentionally." "Read another ancient dream at the end." I said.

"You seem very tired, let's continue tomorrow, eh? Don't force it, Gu Meng will wait for you anyway." "No, it's better than being idle. At least you can think about nothing during dream time." The girl looked at my face, nodded slightly, got up from the table, and disappeared into the library. I rested my chin on the table, closed my eyes, and immersed myself in the darkness.How long will winter last?The old man said that winter was long and hard.And now winter has just begun.Can my shadow survive this long winter?Not only the shadow, but also whether I myself can spend the winter in such a complicated and restless state of mind is doubtful.

She put the skull on the table, wiped the dust with a damp cloth as usual, and then rubbed it with a dry cloth.I was still sitting with my chin propped up, watching her finger movements intently. "Can I do something for you?" She raised her face suddenly. "You've done a good job," I said. She stopped wiping her skull, sat on a chair, and looked at me: "I'm not talking about this, but something else, like sleeping in your bed." I shook my head and said: "No, not to sleep with you. I'm glad you say that..." "Why? Don't you need me?" "Of course I need it. But at least I can't sleep with you right now. It's not the same thing as needing or not needing." She pondered for a moment, then began to rub her skull slowly again.During this time, I looked up at the high ceilings and yellow chandeliers.No matter how closed my heart is, no matter how much winter hurts me, I cannot sleep here with her now.If so, my heart will definitely be much more confused than now, and the sense of loss will be even deeper.I figured maybe the town wanted me to sleep with her.This was the easiest way for them to get hold of my heart. She placed the ground skull in front of me.I didn't move, just looked at her fingers on the table.I tried to read some meaning from those fingers, but it was impossible, it was just ten slender fingers. "I want to hear about your mother." I said. "what's the situation?" "whatever." "Yeah—" she said, touching the skull on the table, "I don't feel the same way about my mother as I do about other people. Of course it was so long ago that it's hard to remember exactly, but I always have This feeling. That kind of mood seems to be different from my feelings towards my father and my sister. As for why, I don’t know.” "The so-called heart is such a thing. It will never be treated equally. Just like a river, the flow varies with the terrain." She smiled lightly. "That doesn't seem fair." "Exactly," I said. "You still like your mother, don't you?" "have no idea." She kept changing the angle of the skull on the table, watching intently. "Is that too general a question?" "Well, maybe, maybe yes." "Well, let's talk about other things." I said, "Do you remember what your mother likes?" "Well, I remember it all: the sun, walking, swimming in the summer, and the company of animals. We used to go for walks in warm weather. People in town don't usually take walks. You like walks, don't you?" "I like it." I said, "I also like the sun and swimming. Do you think of anything else?" "By the way, my mother often talks to herself at home. I don't know if she likes it. Anyway, she often talks to herself." "About what?" "I don't remember. But it's not a soliloquy in the ordinary sense. I can't explain it well. It seems to be a special thing for mother anyway." "special?" "Hmm. It seems that the tone of voice is very strange. The words are stretched and shortened for a while, as if being blown up and down by the wind..." I looked at the skull in her hand and searched through my vague memory again.Something tugged at my heartstrings this time. "It's a song!" I said. "You'll say that too?" "Songs are not spoken, but sung." "Sing and watch." I took a deep breath and wanted to sing something.However, I can't remember any of them.All the songs are gone from me. I closed my eyes and sighed. "No, I can't remember." "Why can't I remember?" "If only there were records and a record player. Ah, I'm afraid this is not realistic. Even if there are musical instruments. Between playing the musical instruments, I might think of some songs." "What shape is the instrument?" "There are hundreds of kinds of musical instruments, which cannot be summed up in one or two sentences. Because of the different types, the ways of using them are also different, and the sounds are also different. There are not only four people who can barely lift them, but also those that can be placed in the palm of your hand. The size and shape vary widely. " Having said that, I can feel the threads of memory loosening—albeit a little.Maybe things are looking good. "Maybe there is something like that in the reference room at the end of this building. It is said to be a reference room. Now it is full of junk from the past. I just glanced at it. Why don't you look for it?" "Look for it." I said, "Anyway, it seems that I can't read Gumeng today." We passed through rows of large library stacks filled with skulls, entered another corridor, and opened a door paneled with the same opaque glass as the library door.The round brass handle of the door was thinly covered with dust, but it did not lock.The girl pressed the light switch, and the dim yellow light illuminated the long and thin room, casting the shadows of various objects piled on the floor on the white wall. Most of the things on the ground are suitcases and handbags, and there are also typewriters with casings and tennis rackets, but these are isolated. Most of the space in the room is piled up with leather bags of various sizes, about 100 one.And the purse was fated to collect a lot of dust.I don't know how these purses came here, I'm afraid it would be quite a laborious task to open them one by one. I knelt down and opened the case of a typewriter.Bai Hui suddenly shot up like snow smoke from an avalanche.The typewriter was the size of a cash register, with round keys and old walls.It looks like it has been used for a long time, and the black paint is peeling off. "Do you know what this is?" "I don't know." The girl stood beside me and folded her arms and said, "I haven't seen it before, is it a musical instrument?" "Where, the typewriter, used for printing, is very old." I closed the case of the typewriter and put it back in place.This time, he opened a rattan basket next to him.There was a whole picnic set in the basket.Knives and forks, cups and saucers, and a set of old yellowed and faded napkins are neatly stacked inside.It is also quite old.After the advent of aluminum plates and paper cups, no one would take this set for a picnic. The dolphin leather suitcase is mainly filled with clothes.Suits, shirts, ties, socks, underwear - mostly horribly worm-eaten.There are dental kits and flasks for whiskey.The toothpaste and shaving cream had long since hardened and clumped.There is no smell of wine even when the lid is opened.Nothing else.No books, no notebooks, no manuals. I opened several suitcases and handbags in a row, and the contents were similar.Nothing more than clothes and the bare minimum of daily necessities, as if hastily stuffed in before going on a trip.Every traveler lacks a certain accessory that is usually required, giving the impression that it is not normal.Nobody travels with just clothes and dental kit.In short, there is nothing in the bag that makes people feel the personality and life of the holder. Relatively speaking, the suits are all very ordinary things.Neither particularly high-end, nor too humble.Types and styles certainly vary with age, season, men and women, and their ages.But none of them made a special impression.Even the smells are hard to tell apart.Nine times out of ten the clothes were moth-eaten and unmarked, as if someone had scrupulously stripped each piece of clothing of names and personalities one by one, leaving nothing but nameless relics that each age inevitably produces. After opening five or six suitcases and handbags, I lose interest.Firstly, the dust was overwhelming, and secondly, it seemed absolutely impossible for any of them to have musical instruments.If there were instruments somewhere in town, it wouldn't be here, but in a very different place, I think. "Come on," I said, "the dust is so bad it hurts your eyes." "Can't find the instrument, disappointed?" "That's true. Look elsewhere!" I said. After breaking up with the girl, I climbed the West Mountain alone.The bitter seasonal wind blows from behind as if trying to sweep me away, making a shrill whistling sound in the woods like tearing apart the sky.Looking back, I saw the cold moon almost missing half of it, floating alone above the clock tower, surrounded by thick clouds.Under the moonlight, the surface of the river was as black as flowing tar. Suddenly, I remembered the warm scarf I found in the suitcase in the reference room. Although it was eaten by insects and had a few big holes, it was still enough to keep out the cold if I wrapped it in a few layers.I think you might as well ask the gatekeeper, so many things can be clear.Including who is the owner of those goods, and whether I can use the things inside.Standing in the cold wind with the scarf unwrapped, my ear hurts like a knife. I will go to see the gatekeeper tomorrow, and I also need to know about my shadow. I turned again and walked up the frozen hillside toward the mansion, leaving the town behind.