Infinite Nightmares

"The past... A world of the past?" Zhang Wenda was stunned. ’What is this new nonsense? I don’t understand a word he’s saying.’

"Wait, sir, I don’t quite get it. What do you mean, ’a world of the past’? The past is just the past, isn’t it? How can a world of the past still exist?"

The old man shook his head. "Who told you it doesn’t exist? Sigh, what are schools even teaching these days? This younger generation is really lacking."

With that, he planted his hoe in the ground and began to explain to Zhang Wenda. "Time is a tool we humans invented. It follows living beings. Without people, there is no time."

"The ’river of time’ is actually a ’river of people.’ Even though the river of time flows on, the old riverbed remains. The world we’re in now is the riverbed of time. It *is* the past."

’Time... Is that really how it works? Could everything I learned before be wrong?’ The thought had barely formed in Zhang Wenda’s mind when he felt that something wasn’t quite right.

"Come on, don’t just stand there like a post. Come with me, and I’ll get you bandaged up."

While his wound was being treated, Zhang Wenda asked a series of careful questions and finally understood the problem. It wasn’t that he was wrong, but that this bizarre world’s very definition of time was wrong.

It wasn’t just that the Youth Palace was strange, or that the library was strange—in this place, time itself had undergone a profoundly bizarre transformation!

If, in the world he came from, time carried both people and the world forward together, that wasn’t the case here. Here, time only advanced with people, while any environment devoid of them was frozen in place, like a series of photographs!

And if someone wanted to look at one of these photographs, they could pull it out and do so at any time.

And as for him and the others, due to a paradox that arose in ’network time,’ they had become unmoored from the river of time and ended up in this photographic world of the past.

’So that’s why,’ he thought. ’That explains why my Yellow Core shows no sign of decreasing at all.’

Zhang Wenda glanced at his watch. The yellow numbers on its face were still frozen in their original position, completely unchanged.

With no time passing here, his Yellow Core could be maintained indefinitely without depleting. Under the current circumstances, however, that wasn’t necessarily a good thing.

Just then, the old man cut open Zhang Wenda’s clothing with a pair of scissors, retrieved a packet of white powder from a decrepit cabinet, and with a soft PUFF, dumped it directly onto the wound.

The sting of the medicinal powder made Zhang Wenda’s face twitch. He immediately forgot all about the nature of time, his focus snapping back to his own body.

"Just hang in there. This powder’s got a bit of a sting," the old man said, picking up a roll of gauze from nearby and beginning to wrap the wound.

"Sir, are there many people like you who prefer to stay in the past?" Zhang Wenda asked, his mind flashing back to the person who had shot at him.

"Plenty. Mostly old folks, men and women."

The old man spoke as he worked. "Sure, modern society has advanced technology. The food is better, too. But it just isn’t a comfortable way to live. That’s why a lot of folks figure the past was better. People like me."

He thought for a moment before adding, "Lately, though, it seems some young people have started thinking the past is better than modern society, too. I’ve no idea what’s gotten into them. They never had to be sent down to the countryside, so they don’t have that sentimental attachment. What on earth are they really after?"

Zhang Wenda didn’t know what they were after. All he wanted was to go back. As for this empty world of the past... anyone who wanted to come was welcome to it. He certainly didn’t.

"Sir, may I ask your name?" Zhang Wenda ventured.

"It’s not a very good name. I’m Wang Daniu. In the old days, people just picked whatever names came to mind."

After Wang Daniu finished bandaging the wound, he pulled out a thimble and thread and began to mend Zhang Wenda’s jacket.

"Um, Uncle Niu," Zhang Wenda asked eagerly, "I only ended up here by accident. Do you know how I can get back to the modern world?"

"What? You want to go back? Oh, that’s not going to be easy."

The man’s words sent Zhang Wenda’s heart, which had just begun to settle, leaping back into his throat. He managed a strained smile. "You can’t be serious, sir. A little taste of the rustic life is one thing, but surely you want to return to the modern world, too?"

Wang Daniu bit the thread clean with his teeth and continued, "Who’s joking? An old man like me can’t use a smartphone or get on the internet. I don’t know the first thing about all your newfangled gadgets. What would I even go back for? I’m better off staying in the past."

"I used to be able to watch a little TV, but now even that requires some kind of ’network.’ You have to navigate all these damn menus... it’s a huge pain. Now I can’t even watch TV anymore."

"I told them before I came here: don’t come get me. I’m not going back. When the day comes that I can’t work anymore, I’ll just let the good earth cover me and stay in the past for good."

A sliver of despair crept into Zhang Wenda’s heart. ’So they have to come get us? Is there really no other way for us to get back on our own?’

"And how would we do that? Do I look like some kind of scholar who can figure out time travel? I never even finished grade school."

"Sigh, if I had known this would happen—" Zhang Wenda started, but then fell silent. He couldn’t lie to himself. Even if he could go back to yesterday, he knew he would make the same choice.

Zhang Wenda knew regret was useless. He had to find another way.

"By the way, young man, how did you get this wound? Snag it on something?" Wang Daniu asked, handing the jacket, now sporting a large patch, back to Zhang Wenda.

"Someone shot me."

’They just opened fire out of the blue. If that shot had been on target, I’d be dead.’ He wasn’t going to forget this.

"What? A gun? You mean there are other people here besides you?" Wang Daniu’s eyes went wide. He looked even more shocked than Zhang Wenda.

"Yeah, over by Mountain City, not far from here. At least five of them. Aren’t they the ones who came back to the past with you? I’ll tell you what, though, they’re not nearly as good-natured as you are. They started shooting the moment they saw me."

Wang Daniu slapped his thighs in agitation. "How’s that possible?! This is a sent-down youth farm! All the other youths who were with me are long dead! How could anyone else be back here?"

As he spoke, he pulled a small, green, plastic-covered notebook from a drawer and showed it to Zhang Wenda. He pointed to page after page of phone numbers he had personally crossed out. "Look, see? This one died of a stroke, this one from diabetes, this one had a brain hemorrhage..."

It was clear Wang Daniu felt deeply for this group of old friends; he could recount the time and cause of each death as if listing off precious family heirlooms.

Zhang Wenda first had the old man put away his morbid little black book, then said, "Sir, I don’t think they’re your friends. They weren’t as old as you. They were a ways off, but I could tell they weren’t old men. They ran after me for a long time."

"Hmm? That’s strange, then," Wang Daniu mused, stroking his white chin stubble with a deeply furrowed brow. "What would they be doing here? And with a gun?"