Chapter 269: Embers and Breath

Xu Xiaochuan sat down against the opposite wall, not a single part of him intact, his wounds burning with pain, his school uniform hanging on him like a rag. The position of the receiver on his back was now only a faint mark on his skin, dead silent.

He looked down at his hands, covered in mud and dried blood clots.

The rain outside gradually quieted, and in the direction of the distant ruins, dull explosions could occasionally be heard.

Lin Yu walked to the window, lifting a corner of the tattered curtain, scanning the outside vigilantly.

"What will the higher-ups say about this?" Xu Xiaochuan asked dully.

"Cover it up." Lin Yu let go of the curtain, his voice carrying a sense of exhaustion. "Same as thirty years ago. Either the waste processing plant exploded, or some chemical leaked; what other tricks could they have?"

Xu Xiaochuan lay on the dusty floor, his fingers unconsciously scratching at the ground.

That cry for help, intermittent, rang in his brain again.

Xiao Ya's voice.

"Lin Shu, that signal... the one that came out..."

"Xiaochuan." Lin Yu turned around, his bloodshot eyes filled with exhaustion and impatience. "The core exploded, Zhou Weihong is dead, and the Zero Machine is completely finished. It's all in the past."

"But I heard it!" Xu Xiaochuan slammed the floor, kicking up a small cloud of dust. "I heard it damn clearly, it was Xiao Ya!"

Xuanyuan Qing raised her head, her breathing somewhat rapid, clearly affecting her wounds. "Could be data residue... or, a signal echo before the system collapsed."

"What do you mean?"

"Before a large-scale data system collapses completely, it produces chaotic signal pulses, like... a final struggle." Xuanyuan Qing's voice remained weak. "Your receiver had a connection with the core, it's normal to capture the final signal fragments."

Xu Xiaochuan lowered his head, his right hand clenching and unclenching, his palms covered in sticky cold sweat.

But the feeling... it didn't feel like a struggle, it felt more like... a cry for help. A living person crying for help.

"We have to go find her..."

Lin Yu strode over, his palm pressing heavily on Xu Xiaochuan's shoulder, the force making Xu Xiaochuan wince: "Wake the fuck up! Xiao Chengzhou's people must be searching this area, and the officials will be here soon! The three of us are half-dead, what are we going to use to find a signal that god knows if it even exists!"

Xu Xiaochuan wanted to argue, but Xuanyuan Qing suddenly fished a small object from her pocket.

A chip the size of a fingernail, with scorched edges, clearly forcibly stripped from something.

"Took it off a node of the Zero Machine before the explosion." She adjusted her posture to lean more comfortably. "If Xiao Ya really has any... information residue, maybe we can find clues from this."

Lin Yu took the chip, weighing it in his palm. "The data is probably mostly destroyed, but this is indeed the core storage component of the Zero Machine."

The atmosphere in the room loosened slightly.

Xu Xiaochuan braced himself, supporting himself against the cold, damp wall, and stood up. He walked to the window and pushed open the swaying window, letting the cool wind from outside blow in, trying to make himself sober up.

"We need tools. Computers, decoders, and electricity..." he gritted his teeth, his voice hoarse.

"And a safe place." Lin Yu checked his tattered tactical suit pockets; his equipment was nearly all destroyed. "This damn place can't stay for long."

Xu Xiaochuan turned around abruptly: "Lin Shu, Dad... did he leave you anything? A letter? A key? Or something else?"

Lin Yu frowned, seemingly recalling. "There's a letter, always carried it." He took out a sealed plastic bag soaked in sweat from his inner pocket, inside which was a yellowed letter, the edges nearly crumbling.

Xu Xiaochuan's hands trembled slightly as he took it, carefully unfolding it.

The handwriting on the paper was blurry, but he could still barely make out an address and a few strange symbols. At the very bottom, a small stove was drawn—the logo of the donkey meat burger shop.

"The old man really left a backup plan!" Xu Xiaochuan's voice changed pitch. "This is an address in the western suburbs! It must be his safe house!"

Xuanyuan Qing leaned against the wall, also struggling to stand up, adjusting the makeshift splint on her arm. "How to get there? We're like this, I'm afraid we can't even get on the subway."

Lin Yu took out a few crumpled bills from his pocket: "Enough for a taxi to the edge of the city. The rest of the way... walk."

The rain had stopped completely.

The sky remained leaden, and distant sirens could be heard, growing denser.

The three of them didn't delay, tidying up simply, supporting each other, stumbling downstairs.

The abandoned industrial zone was dead silent, only the puddles on the ground reflecting the gray sky.

Under an abandoned overpass, the three of them flagged down a taxi that looked like it was about to fall apart.

"Western suburbs, Huari Road." Lin Yu handed the money to the driver, his voice low and hoarse.

The driver was an old man with gray hair, glancing at the three disheveled, blood-covered young people in the back through the rearview mirror, his eyes flickering, but he asked nothing, just nodded and started the car.

The car cabin was filled with a strange smell of cheap tobacco and sweat.

Xu Xiaochuan closed his eyes, leaning back against the seat in exhaustion. The skin on his back ached, but the receiver remained completely silent.

That cry for help signal seemed to have disappeared completely. No matter how he concentrated to "listen," only buzzing tinnitus and a blank space remained in his brain.

"Hey, the weather's changed." The old driver suddenly said something nonsensical, reaching out to twist the radio, which only emitted a burst of static noise.

"What's changed?" Xuanyuan Qing was immediately alert.

"This feeling, this atmosphere." The old man smacked his lips. "For years, always felt like this Beijing was covered by a net, choking people. Woke up this morning, strange, that tension suddenly loosened, clear!"

The three of them exchanged glances, saying nothing.

Outside the window, the city's outline gradually became clear. Beijing's familiar skyline appeared in the dark twilight, high-rises still standing, lights beginning to flicker.

But unlike usual, the flow of people on the street carried a kind of... excitement?

People were arguing loudly, some laughing heartily without regard for others, and even a group of young people were surrounding a street corner, singing and dancing, their movements exaggerated.

"People are weird today," the old driver marveled, "like they've eaten gunpowder, that emotion, can't hide it, all written on their faces."

Xu Xiaochuan and Xuanyuan Qing exchanged a look.

The Zero Machine is gone...

The emotions people had suppressed for years were exploding uncontrollably.

The car drove slowly into the western suburbs, where the houses were clearly much lower and more dilapidated, and the shops on both sides of the street were mostly closed.

The driver stopped at a narrow alley entrance: "Huari Road, here. Find it yourself inside."

The three of them paid, watching the taxi disappear into the street corner with black smoke, before turning to look at this dim, damp alley. ===== CHAPTER 270 =====