One#
Yesterday evening, when the continuous rain finally stopped, Gan Yong realized for the first time how deeply a woman could cry. That woman was his mother, and he sobbed along with her. Early this morning, his grandmother, who died from the hail, was just buried.
Today's weather has warmed up considerably, but the sun is still behind the clouds. Gan Yong sat alone on the street curb, thinking about his grandmother, grandfather, mother, and that father who had contracted AIDS, of course, also about himself. Hei Er lay at his feet; after this upheaval, this three-year-old gray soil dog had also become much quieter. It understood its owner's emotions and knew that the village was still shrouded in the losses and sadness brought by the natural disaster.
Seven days ago, a sudden strong wind struck this area, wreaking havoc for more than an hour, followed by an unprecedented hailstorm. News reports said the wind reached a force of level 13—this is rare in eastern Sichuan. Coupled with the subsequent hail, this disaster resulted in 7 deaths and 37 serious injuries, and Gan Yong's grandmother was one of them.
Gan Yong patted Hei Er's head. He planned to take a walk up the mountain, to find a quiet place to relax his mind.
The strong wind knocked down many crops, and the heavy rain that followed the hail dealt the final fatal blow to the fallen rice. This year was destined to yield nothing. Unripe pears on the ridges also fell to the ground, and Hei Er followed behind as Gan Yong walked along the still muddy ridge towards the mountains on the west side of the village.
The continuous rain had made the air much fresher, but it was also mixed with the smell of rotting plants. Gan Yong had spent 14 years in this small village, and he was all too familiar with this smell; every summer after the rain, this scent filled the air.
On the hillside was an orange grove. The strong wind did not have much impact on the orange trees; although some trees were knocked down, the evergreen orange trees were still vibrant and lush overall. At least compared to the bamboo forest on the north side of the village, this place was indeed much better.
Hei Er's mood also improved due to this walk. It ran back and forth around its owner, occasionally stopping to sniff the scents of the grass and trees. It chased grasshoppers, and those it managed to catch were tossed around and eaten, probably because the spikes on the grasshoppers' legs made it uncomfortable. At the top of the orange grove on the hillside was a ditch that connected to the Hongxing Reservoir five kilometers away. When farming lacked water, the reservoir could open the sluice gates to release water, sending it through these ditches to the surrounding villages.
The ditch now had about 20 centimeters of water accumulated. Gan Yong did not intend to continue climbing the mountain; instead, he walked slowly along the stone path beside the ditch. This path had lost many stones due to years of neglect, but it was still quite solid because it had been walked on for years, and Gan Yong's thoughts returned to last night.
Last night, while the Taoists chanted scriptures and incantations in the main room, his mother, whom he saw only once every couple of years, told him the reason his father had not returned in his room. She cried bitterly as she told Gan Yong that his father had been caught soliciting prostitution and was subsequently found to be HIV positive. His mother said she had not been infected, but from her words and expressions that she could not hide, Gan Yong could see that she intended to leave his father and this home.
His mother sobbed, "I raised you to prevent old age; you must always remember your mother."
Although Gan Yong also cried, he did not have particularly strong feelings for his mother. Since he was less than a year old, he had been living with his grandparents and had become accustomed to life without his parents. He was already 14 years old and began to feel that he could live well without anyone, and perhaps even better.
Gan Yong did not understand why his mother told him these things; to him, this woman was just his mother. They rarely even called each other, and even in the few calls they had, he often felt there was nothing to say. Since his mother left Sichuan for Guangdong to work before he could remember, their only stable connection had been the money she sent back every month, allowing him to continue his education. He was doing well in school; although not at the top, he received a certificate for "Excellent Student" every semester—his grandparents were very proud of this and hung the certificates on the wall of the main room so that anyone who came to their home could see them. Gradually, as he grew older, Gan Yong began to feel embarrassed by the certificates on the wall. When others casually praised him, he felt as if they could see right through him, as if his entire past was reduced to those few orange-red certificates pasted on the wall with rice or glue.
There was a fallen eucalyptus tree lying across the ditch. That eucalyptus tree belonged to the Zhu family at the village entrance, and the old woman from that family did not have a good relationship with Gan Yong's grandmother. When Gan Yong was still in elementary school, the two old women would argue from time to time, and their battles were usually filled with unseemly insults, many of which Gan Yong could not even understand at the time. Of course, he never asked anyone about it; he knew these were dirty words, very nasty ones. Every argument between the two old women would disturb the village. But in the past two years, although Gan Yong could still occasionally hear his grandmother's nagging curses, the public confrontations had long ceased.
Gan Yong did not know when this started, what had happened, or if time had taken away that passion. Now he thought perhaps the whole village had aged. The elderly were dying, the young were fleeing, and even Gan Yong himself knew he would inevitably leave in a few years, just like all the other young people.
Gan Yong stepped over the tree trunk with Hei Er. His sneakers were already covered in mud, and he rubbed some off on the trunk, making his shoes much lighter.
Further ahead, the ditch connected to a tunnel, an artificial tunnel dug through the mountain, serving the same purpose as the ditch—a water transport channel. But for the village children, this was also a great place for adventure. This tunnel was only about a hundred meters long, but because it had a 120-degree turn in the middle, visibility was very low. Additionally, there were some stones inside, and occasionally one could catch crabs no bigger than a thumb under the stones.
Gan Yong stood in front of the tunnel. Now, this seemingly dark tunnel no longer frightened him as it once did. He knew that the other side of the tunnel connected to another ditch, and beyond that was a forest. Vines of several kinds climbed the tree trunks in the forest, and the dense shrubs and weeds almost obscured the only path in the woods. Whenever he came here to play, Gan Yong always worried that a snake might suddenly dart out from the grass.
This place had a relatively open view, allowing one to overlook the entire village from a high vantage point. At the eastern village entrance, several two-story houses had already been built, but two of them were completely abandoned because the elderly residents had passed away; the others were occupied by elderly people and students who stayed home to study. Among them, in the house next to a grape trellis, there was a girl. Her name was Wang Xiaomin, and she was a little over a year younger than Gan Yong. The tiles on her house had blue stripes. In elementary school, he often went on adventures around the village with her and Zhu Laotai's grandson, Huang Hu. They played martial arts games, dug up wild vegetables, and carved their names into the exposed stones on the mountain with nails or wires, and they had also nervously crossed the aforementioned tunnel with flashlights.
However, over the past year, Gan Yong had begun to distance himself from Wang Xiaomin. This was intentional because every time he saw her, he felt a bit strange, and being alone with her made him nervous. He liked looking at her; he even noticed the slight bulge of her chest, and he liked that look. Wang Xiaomin had a younger brother, but he lived with their parents in Guangdong.
Thinking of Wang Xiaomin's appearance, his mood improved a little. He stared blankly at her house, while Hei Er ran around, then let out a mournful cry.
Gan Yong hurriedly crouched down, but Hei Er had already leaped into the air. Another gust of wind, mixed with leaves and weeds, hit the mountainside and suddenly disappeared, and Hei Er was gone. Gan Yong saw it being swept into the tunnel by the wind.
Hei Er was the dog Gan Yong had brought home. At that time, he was in fifth grade, and in the morning, he walked to school with Wang Xiaomin, who was in fourth grade, and Huang Hu. As they passed the small road behind the Guanyin Temple, Wang Xiaomin heard the whimpering of a puppy coming from under a pile of dry straw. This soil dog was most likely abandoned by its owner because the rural population had decreased while the number of dog owners had increased, perhaps due to theft prevention or loneliness. Naturally, these extra dogs would give birth to more puppies, and the unwanted puppies would be discarded, so many families would take the puppies to places where the mother dog could not find them and abandon them.
Gan Yong had heard of others abandoning puppies before; he had even heard of someone drowning a puppy in a river, just as he had heard of someone throwing a newborn girl into a river to drown; it was said that they were all put into nylon bags with some stones to ensure the bags sank to the bottom of the river. He had also heard the mournful cries of mother dogs in the village.
But that time was the first time Gan Yong saw an abandoned puppy, and he could not just ignore it.
Although his grandparents were unwilling to adopt the puppy, Gan Yong insisted on keeping it and named it "Hei Er" based on its fur color. However, as the dog grew, its fur turned gray.
When Gan Yong was at home, Hei Er was mostly by his side. Sometimes he felt that Hei Er was his best friend, but at other times, Hei Er's clinginess would infuriate him.
Gan Yong figured that there would not be any more wind, so he took off his shoes and rolled up his pants to go in and look for Hei Er, as he thought he could still vaguely hear Hei Er's barking. He hoped it would be okay because he knew his grandparents would not spend money to treat a dog, and Gan Yong was well aware of this.
The water in the ditch could cover half of his calf, and the temperature was quite low, but after all, it was summer.
"Hei Er." Gan Yong called its name as he stepped inside, and the echo of his call created a chilling effect. Gan Yong began to feel cold, but he did not stop moving forward.
"Aw..." This time, Gan Yong indeed heard Hei Er's whimpering, which should be not far ahead. At this point, Gan Yong had reached the middle of the tunnel, where the light was very dim, but fortunately, his eyes had adapted to the environment, and he could still make out some vague outlines.
He groped his way forward, the uneven stone walls extending as he felt along. His feet moved through the increasingly cold water. Suddenly, Hei Er's voice disappeared, and Gan Yong tensed up, feeling as if he had just received the news of his grandmother's death. That was the afternoon after the strong wind and hail when Gan Yong returned from school to see the body laid out in the main room, with some neighbors present, even Zhu Laotai. From their words, Gan Yong learned what had happened. As they suggested, he did not look at his grandmother's face one last time under the white cloth, never again.
At that time, he felt not so much sadness as shock and confusion: how could a person suddenly die? This was the first time Gan Yong had lost someone close to him. That day, he stayed in his room for two hours, ultimately overwhelmed by grief.
After passing the turn in the tunnel, a beam of light suddenly shone from the exit on the other side, but Gan Yong lost his vision. It was like what he had seen in a ghost story: when you stay in the dark for too long, when the light comes, you think the world has fallen into darkness, but once you get used to the light, you realize how terrible the place you were in was.
Gan Yong wrote this sentence on the title page of his Chinese textbook; he felt it was a true reflection of his life, only he had not yet found his light, and he needed to be prepared for it.
In those brief seconds, Gan Yong recalled this sentence, and when his vision regained meaning, he saw Hei Er a few steps away, floating motionless on the water's surface.
Gan Yong's heart tightened, followed by a rumbling sound coming from behind him. Gan Yong turned around, and the darkness, with a crushing force, knocked him down...
The water level of the Hongxing Reservoir had exceeded the warning line, and the decision to release water had been made this morning. Relevant notifications would be sent to the village branches within two to three days after this decision was reached. However, documents were not a pressing matter. This was just a routine emergency control operation that had never caused problems before and should not cause any now.
Two#
Gan Yong stumbled to his feet, hitting his head against the stone wall, and a bump had already formed on his left forehead. However, in this cold tunnel, he had lost track of Hei Er.
He was unclear about what had just happened; he even thought he might be hallucinating, but subconsciously he began to feel that he might have encountered a ghost. He even started to think that it might be his grandmother, who had already been buried, coming back. However, he had always received atheistic education, so he did not fall into uncontrollable panic about the unknown.
"Hei Er!" He mustered his courage to shout, and the echo in the tunnel became quite terrifying. He suddenly felt a suffocating sensation; the exit was right ahead, and he quickened his pace to escape.
It was raining outside again, and the temperature had dropped significantly. Gan Yong's already soaked body began to shiver slightly. He stood at the entrance of the tunnel, calling inside: Hei Er! Hei Er!...
Besides his own echo, the only sound entering his ears was the rain hitting the world.
Gan Yong no longer had the courage to enter the tunnel. He was tired of shouting and sat down on a stone at the entrance.
He felt very cold; both Hei Er and his grandmother were gone. He felt sadness and inexplicable anger. He felt it was unfair, and suddenly had an impulse to harm himself.
But in the end, he did nothing. He just sat quietly until he started to sneeze and realized that the rain probably wouldn't stop, just like yesterday.
He walked into the rain and suddenly felt much calmer.
He did not plan to go back through the tunnel to get home; there was another road halfway up the mountain. He walked quickly in the rain, occasionally wiping the rain from his face. As he circled back to the side of the tunnel from the mountainside, he did not find his shoes and soon gave up searching for them. He felt increasingly cold and decided it was better to go home first.
After passing through the orange grove, he was almost home.
Turning a corner, he saw the street curb of his home, where there were actually a dozen people standing and sitting. The reason Gan Yong hid behind a nearby tree was that the person standing on the curb was himself.
Of course, he recognized himself; he was wearing the black long pants and gray long-sleeved shirt he had worn yesterday. The people standing on the curb were neighbors and some relatives from the village. There were also several flower wreaths lined up against the front wall, which Gan Yong recognized, but now they should be placed on his grandmother's grave, right?
Various possibilities flashed through Gan Yong's mind, and in the end, he believed he had traveled back to yesterday. He had seen some movies on TV about time travel; he knew how it worked, but he had never planned for such a thing to happen to him. So he was completely unprepared for the current situation.
If this was yesterday, it would keep raining, there would always be people in the house, and after the guests finished eating, the Taoists would beat gongs and drums, and he himself would stay awake all night. Then, at around five o'clock the next morning, it would be time for the funeral.
So where should this extra version of himself go now?
Gan Yong felt that he had finally been completely abandoned by everyone and the entire world, but he saw Hei Er lying in the corner of the street. He realized that Hei Er, or perhaps Hei Er's corpse, might still be left in tomorrow.
Gan Yong did not go home; he ultimately decided to return to the tunnel to wait. The rain would not stop until tomorrow, and it seemed he had no other place to go. He thought perhaps he could wait in the tunnel until tomorrow, intercepting his future self on the way before he reached the tunnel, so that Hei Er would not be swept away by the wind.
The walls of the tunnel were not smooth, allowing Gan Yong to find a recessed spot to shelter from the wind. He had a fever, and his head hurt badly.
In the midst of hunger and cold, he even felt he was about to die, and he dozed off in a daze.
As his consciousness faded, he suddenly felt a wave of comfort, and then he saw a beam of light.
It felt like he had been walking in the dark tunnel for a long time, and this beam of light piercing through the darkness seemed to come from an infinitely distant place. He did not even know how long he had been walking or how far; he did not know how much longer he had to walk or how far he had to go.
Finally, it gradually approached...
Gan Yong walked towards the beam of light, and the light was also coming towards him. He finally bathed in a realm of brightness. He felt joy and relief, a feeling he had been able to obtain less and less lately, and in these past few days, he even thought he would never experience it again.
A white plane spread out beneath his feet, then expanded to become the entire world, bringing Gan Yong an illusion about his own existence. In this isotropic space, even movement and stillness could not be distinguished. Gan Yong tried to take a step, and he found that his feet could remain at any height in any direction, but he did not feel weightlessness; it seemed that the arrow of gravity only acted on him. After taking two steps, he began to feel a bit dizzy. This abnormal space exceeded Gan Yong's previous understanding. In his dizziness, he could not even tell whether he was infinitely small within this space or if he was the entire space itself.
This feeling did not last long.
A fully reflective spherical surface suddenly appeared in front of him. Although this object appeared very suddenly, Gan Yong surprisingly did not feel fear or panic, as if he had taken a strong sedative, but he still felt confused.
Of course, the sphere itself was also isotropic, but its appearance broke the isotropy of the entire space, giving this space a reference point; this also successfully suppressed Gan Yong's dizziness. The sphere was positioned directly in front of Gan Yong, with its lateral center plane exactly at the height of his nose, allowing him to see his shadow distorted into an exaggerated big-headed image on the sphere—his enormous nose looked very comical, but he did not find it funny.
"Gan Yong, hello." Suddenly, the self on the sphere no longer followed Gan Yong's movements like a compliant shadow; its exaggerated lips beneath the nose began to open and close on their own. It was speaking! And it seemed to be using Gan Yong's voice.
"Who are you?" Gan Yong's calmness even surprised himself.
"I am the information center of this universe, but I prefer to be called the Grim Reaper," the self on the sphere said, and the distorted image made Gan Yong feel somewhat embarrassed.
Gan Yong paused for a moment, suddenly recalling the cold rain and his grandmother's death, and he thought of that bizarre time travel. "Am I dead? Where are you taking me?"
"You are not dead yet, but you are about to die. And I will not take you anywhere."
"Then I won't die?"
"In the end, everything will die, including myself. And for now, your death is your choice."
Gan Yong felt confused; at this age of adolescence, he had begun to feel that people had no real choices. From birth to death, wasn't a long string of decisions already predetermined? Just like people say about karma or fate. "Then if I die, where will you take my soul?" Gan Yong still did not believe he could choose.
"Soul? Haha." The distorted image on the sphere laughed comically, "What soul is there? There is only information, all information that exists in time."
Speaking of time, Gan Yong felt it necessary to raise his question: "I yesterday... I returned to yesterday today. I don't know what happened, and my dog is also missing. What exactly happened?" Gan Yong even began to feel agitated, thinking of the gray-furred Hei Er, who might already be dead.
"What exactly happened... an interesting question. I wish I could explain it clearly to you. First of all, all information in the universe exists within time, but... you have also heard of Einstein's theory of relativity; time is not uniform throughout the universe. Any event in the universe will affect the equilibrium of time, but it will not affect the continuity of time." The distorted image on the sphere paused, "It seems you do not understand." It continued, "But that's okay; you do not need to understand. In short, you should know that the continuity of time is not unbreakable. Specific events can interfere with the continuity of time, which is quite common at the quantum level, but it can also occur on a macroscopic scale—though very rarely. Alright, you are more confused now. To put it simply, a specific event at a specific time has allowed you to have two information states at the same time at a single time node, and the structure of the universe does not allow this situation to occur; otherwise, the universe would lose its stability. So before the universe collapses, time has stopped, and you must choose to collapse into one of the information states, a choice that transcends any observer and must be decided by you alone."
Gan Yong tried to understand everything it said; it sounded like a scene from a science fiction movie, even though such movies usually did not have a "being" like the Grim Reaper. Although he ultimately did not understand what the Grim Reaper said, he knew he indeed had a choice, but what were the options? "What do you want me to choose?"
"Haha." The distorted spherical image chuckled dryly, "I did not expect you to understand, but one thing you should know is that any choice you make will affect the future of the universe, and this influence cannot be observed until the choice is made."
Gan Yong could not believe that he could actually influence the universe. He had dreamed of this before and occasionally fantasized about being an important person. Sometimes he wanted to be a hero who stepped on flying swords, traveling the world with Wang Xiaomin; sometimes he dreamed of being a great person in history, liberating all oppressed people; sometimes he hoped to be one of those heroes on TV, unbeatable across the land; sometimes he imagined himself gaining superpowers, traversing the universe until the end of the world... but those were just dreams, and he was beginning to wake up. And now, his decision could influence the entire universe! This was something he had never envisioned.
"You have two choices: one is to return to tomorrow, be swept away by the water, but you will survive, while your dog will die. The other is to return to seven days ago; your grandmother will survive, but you will die from the hail." The self on the sphere still wore a cheerful expression, as if discussing whether to choose the red spicy strips or the brown spicy strips.
Gan Yong did not expect these to be the two options. The thought of "returning... returning..." flashed through his mind; he had experienced the past and tomorrow, both of which were "returning," not "going to." But why must someone die? And what was the connection between these two events? "I don't understand. Why does it have to be like this?" Gan Yong asked.
"This is time; it gives you choices, but the decision is still up to you."
"What if I don't choose?"
"That's fine; there is plenty of time here; you will eventually choose."
"But where is here?"
"This is a temporal pivot point; everything that happens here will not be recorded; and the time of the universe itself has stopped, waiting for your decision."
"I don't understand."
"You do not need to understand. You just need to make a choice."
"But if I don't understand, how can I make a choice?"
"For this choice, the information you need is already sufficient—you know all the options." The distorted spherical image finally looked a bit serious; its enlarged nose even seemed to shine.
In summary, all the options boiled down to the life of his grandmother and Hei Er or his own life. Of course, Gan Yong wanted his grandmother and Hei Er to live; they both died unexpectedly, but if he died, would all of this still matter to him? His grandparents would spend their old age in sorrow. But what if he lived? Would he be happy living? Life had already been terrible; why continue?
Gan Yong felt himself floating in the air, even though nothing had changed in this space, and even his relative position to the sphere had not changed.
Once, during the summer after graduating from elementary school, Gan Yong was about a month away from turning 12. He went to town to play with Huang Hu. Recently, a new arcade had opened in town, and the second floor had an internet café with a huge monitor; it was the largest monitor Gan Yong had ever seen. However, they did not have much pocket money to play games; they were just watching others play. At that time, the boys cared little about the games played by the kids a few years younger than them in the internet café. He just found it interesting, like reading a storybook.
That day, they were also watching others play games, and a classmate was playing "League of Legends." This game had been popular in the internet café for several months, and the repetitive battles had made Gan Yong somewhat bored, so he wandered around the café to see if anyone was playing something more interesting. Someone was playing "Crossfire," which was even more boring than "League of Legends." In a corner of the second row near the air conditioning, he saw a man in glasses watching a movie. He looked to be around twenty, thin, and with an oily face. On the monitor in front of him were the backs of two middle-aged white men, and the subtitles read: "Old buddy, you have to live for yourself."
Gan Yong did not know why he recalled this meaningless scene, and then he thought of blocks and lines. He always saw these shapes when he had a cold and fever; the sense of unreality they brought felt very calming, just like the current scene. Gan Yong's thoughts slid. He recalled trivial matters, those small things that happened in his life that made him feel disgusted, but sometimes he was also moved by himself. He liked Wang Xiaomin; he now felt this was certain.
The pears must be ripening soon, right? Although the wind had blown many down, there were still some left, he thought.
"I choose to live." Gan Yong said, feeling very calm inside, but he knew that no matter how he chose, he would hate himself. However, he had to choose.
Three#
In the hospital ward, Gan Yong finally woke up. He had been swept away by the water released from the Hongxing Reservoir in the tunnel, and fortunately, a group of people passing by to offer incense at the Guanyin Temple saved his life.
He had been in a coma for two days, and his mother was sitting by his bed, looking haggard. When she saw him wake up, tears rolled down the corners of her swollen eyes.
The dream faded, leaving only soreness and dizziness in his body, and he coughed lightly.
"Son." His mother placed her hand on his wrist, "Are you feeling better?"
Gan Yong nodded. In the buzzing sound in his ears, his mother's voice sounded very distant.
His mother sobbed and said to him, "I only have you as my son; what will I do if you leave me!"
Gan Yong did not respond at all. This seemed to be a continuation of his mother's long-standing emphasis on the concept of "raising children to prevent old age." His head hurt, and he did not want to think about these issues.
His mother released his hand, "Wait here; I will call the doctor."
His mother wiped her eyes with a handkerchief, stood up, and left. Gan Yong heard her say, "Who will I rely on when I grow old?"
Gan Yong looked at a gray spot on the ceiling, and the light from the nearby fluorescent tube caused some stinging in his eyes. He still did not understand what had happened; he only vaguely felt that Hei Er should be dead.