Fan Xia had thought that before officially entering high school, he could still enjoy one last joyful summer and give his middle school life a perfect ending.
But he quickly realized he was wrong.
If the No. 1 High School’s high school section was hard mode with daily extra classes, then the affiliated school was straight-up hell mode.
Along with the admission letters came notices for military training and early reporting.
Shanghai high schools had a particular tradition called the ⟦Three Studies⟧ — military, work, and agriculture. Military study meant military training at the start of school.
The notice was crystal clear: report to school on August 5, military training starts on August 8. After training, a three-day break. From August 18, first-year courses begin. Except on weekends and official holidays, students were not allowed to leave campus; violators would be treated as skipping school.
“School starts in August? Who’s this trying to roast alive?”
The joy of receiving the admission letter lasted less than five minutes before Fan Xia’s face fell.
“Do the classrooms at X University Affiliated High School have air conditioning? What about the dorms?”
Fan Xia asked anxiously.
This year, not only did summer arrive especially early in Shanghai, but the weather was also unusually stifling. Days of relentless heat had baked the entire city like a sheet of iron.
Just thinking about standing at attention under the blazing sun on the training field, marching in step, made Fan Xia feel like he would soon turn into a limp rice cake and melt away completely.
“Are you dreaming? Even X University’s dorms don’t have that, what makes you think the affiliated high school would?”
Ning Xiaobei, who had studied at X University for four years, laughed at his wishful thinking.
At least up until the year he graduated, their boys’ dorm still hadn’t gotten air conditioning.
“Ahh, No. 1 High School is better!”
Fan Xia shouted, flopping onto the sofa. At least at No. 1 High School, even with military training, he could still go home to sleep at night.
Whether he liked it or not, the day to report to school finally arrived. Saying goodbye to his air conditioner, electric fan, game console, and DVD player, Fan Xia dragged his suitcase down to the small square below the apartment building.
Ning Xiaobei and Chang Leyun were already waiting there with their own luggage.
“Hurry up, you’re the slowest. A lazy donkey makes more fuss when it’s time to work.”
As soon as Zhao Jingwen saw him come down, he called everyone to get in the car.
To send the kids off, he had specially rented a seven-seater Iveco van. His newly bought Toyota Sedan couldn’t fit everyone. But the three kids’ luggage took up so much space that Chang Leyun’s new dad, Xiao Zhao from Nanhui, couldn’t come along.
After making sure everything was packed, Zhao Jingwen stepped on the gas, and the minibus drove out of the Workers’ New Village toward the west.
The affiliated high school was right next to the new campus of the prestigious X University. About three years ago, the school had moved there entirely from the old city. Compared to the cramped old campus, the suburban campus was naturally much larger and more impressive. But the downside was obvious. As Fan Xia would later put it, it felt like being shut away in the mountains to study for three years.
Of course, the school wasn’t actually deep in the mountains. It just felt remote. The subway wouldn’t reach this area for another seven or eight years. Looking out from the school gates, there was nothing but farmland, fish ponds, and the occasional high-voltage power lines —pure countryside scenery.
If locals wanted to go into the city, they either had to drive or take a long-distance bus. There were only two buses a day, one in the morning and one in the evening, and a one-way trip took about two and a half hours. So the locals simply referred to going into the city as going to Shanghai, as if they themselves weren’t really part of it.
The affiliated high school did have school buses, but they wouldn’t start running until September when the term officially began. For now, students had to make their own way there.
The farther west the car drove, the more desolate the scenery became. First came rows of old factory buildings, and then even those disappeared, leaving only fields.
Fan Xia even spotted a cow…an actual, living cow!
Pressed against the car window, his eyes wide, Fan Xia locked gazes with the brown old cow outside in a split second.
“Oh heavens… Boss, how did you end up choosing a place like this to study?”
In the back row, Wang Yihong and her daughter were talking quietly.
It was also Chang Leyun’s first time going so far from home to live on her own. Girls, after all, tend to be a bit more delicate. As soon as the car reached the toll station at the bridge, tears began to fall, pat pat, from her eyes. Wang Yihong held her hand, giving her one reminder after another, talking the whole way.
Meanwhile, Ning Xiaobei and his dad had started dozing off as soon as they got into the car. With the vehicle swaying along, the two of them were soon fast asleep.
It wasn’t that they were carefree. The night before, Ning Jianguo had already gone through all the usual reminders — telling him to take care of his health, not to study too hard, and to look after Fan Xia and the other kids.
He had talked until well past midnight. Only when Ning Xiaobei started yawning did Ning Jianguo finally close the already overstuffed suitcase, pull his son close, and head to bed.
After making a big fuss for quite a while, Fan Xia turned around and realized no one was paying him any attention. He immediately felt a little embarrassed.
“Silly kid. Didn’t you say you wanted to go to the mountains to learn martial arts before? Did you think there’d be air conditioning and game consoles in the mountains?”
Seeing his dumbfounded look, Zhao Jingwen took advantage of the red light to pat him on the head.
“We’ll take a stroll around a nearby ancient town at noon, have lunch together, and then head to the school in the afternoon to register.”
There are quite a few well-preserved Jiangnan ancient towns in the outskirts of Shanghai — famous ones like Zhujiajiao, the food-famous Qibao Old Street, as well as Shaojialou and Xinchang Old Town.
Not far from the affiliated high school, there was also an old street that had preserved its appearance from a hundred years ago. Film crews often came there to shoot scenes.
The car turned into a temporary parking lot filled with gravel. After a bumpy ride, Ning Xiaobei and his dad were finally jolted awake.
Ning Xiaobei wiped his mouth, still not quite out of the layered dream where his dad had come back to life, when he saw Fan Xia shooting him a resentful look from across the seat.
“What?”
“Boss, you lied to me.”
Fan Xia wrinkled his nose.
By now, he had grown quite tall, with long arms and legs, like a tree bursting into growth in summer. During the graduation physical exam, he had already reached 1.75 m15’7″ ft. From the back, he looked completely like an adult.
Some time ago, when he and Ning Xiaobei were wandering around downtown, a couple of women in their early twenties actually came up to ask for his phone number. Fan Xia blinked innocently and said, “Big sisters, our teacher said middle school students aren’t allowed to date.” The two girls were so embarrassed they ran off immediately.
And yet his behavior was still very childish. He loved making exaggerated faces and would occasionally let out strange yelps, looking every bit like an ignorant kid. To Ning Xiaobei, it was rather comical.
“What did I lie to you about?”
Ning Xiaobei got out of the car wearing a straw sun hat. Today, he was unusually dressed in a floral shirt, paired with sunglasses and ventilated leather sandals. At a glance, he looked like an overseas Chinese who had just returned from Southeast Asia.
He rubbed his temples, feeling a slight prickling pain, probably from the car’s air conditioning being too strong.
“You said the affiliated high school was a great place, that it had everything No. 1 High School didn’t.”
“Yeah. Look how quiet it is here. Hardly anyone in town, nowhere to go for fun; perfect for studying.”
No. 1 High School was located in a bustling area, and what it lacked most was peace and quiet. Sometimes, when traffic outside got jammed, the impatient honking would even drift into the classrooms.
Although it was close to noon, the entire ancient town was still quiet. The households by the water, resting along the riverbanks, lived at an unhurried, leisurely pace. Time here seemed to flow more slowly.
Chang Leyun curiously watched a woman squat by the riverbank, holding a wooden basin full of clothes, beating them with a washing bat, just like something you’d only see in costume dramas.
Not far away, steam from the laohuzao2Laohuzao (老虎灶): a traditional stove used in Jiangnan teahouses to boil large quantities of water for tea in a teahouse kept billowing out of a soot-blackened chimney. Along with the rising steam came the opening tune of a storytelling performance, sung by a tanci3Tanci (弹词): A traditional storytelling art that mixes spoken narration with melodic singing, often accompanied by simple instruments performer— lingering and melodic, repeated with gentle variation, all in the soft Wu dialect, as tender and flowing as the river at their feet.
Shanghai locals also enjoy Suzhou pingtan4Suzhou Pingtan (苏州评弹): A refined form of tanci from Suzhou, performed in the soft Wu dialect, combining storytelling, singing, and instrumental music (like the pipa and sanxian). In this era, when traditional dockside performers had not yet completely vanished, these scattered ancient towns around Shanghai and Suzhou were the last strongholds they held onto.
In a few more years, this town would be commercially developed, filled with cookie-cutter internet-famous shops, selling the same souvenirs and postcards found all over the country. Gradually, it would lose its distinct face, until it became bland or even unpleasant.
Since it wasn’t the weekend, there were few tourists. For just twenty yuan, they rented an entire small boat and planned to first take a look around nearby before heading to a waterside restaurant across the river for lunch.
The boatwoman rowed while singing a boat song, ferrying them first to a temple.
Ning Xiaobei didn’t believe in gods or spirits, but since the adults insisted on offering incense and even wanted to pray for protective charms for the three kids, he had no choice but to follow them in.
As he walked, he rubbed his head, feeling that not only his temples but even the back of his head had started to ache.
This was bad. After registration, military training would start tomorrow. What if his body couldn’t handle it and he collapsed?
Ning Xiaobei thought about finding a pharmacy in town later to buy some fever medicine and anti-diarrheal pills. When his dad packed his luggage yesterday, it seemed he had only put in asthma spray.
Before entering the temple, Ning Xiaobei glanced at the stone stele standing at the entrance. This modest temple seemed to be an old, historic one.
The three kids wandered around the empty front hall of the temple a few times. Finding it boring, Chang Leyun went off to the reception room to find Wang Yihong, who was donating incense money. Fan Xia, that little rascal, couldn’t stay still for a second and had no idea where he had run off to.
Stepping into the Mahavira Hall5Mahavira Hall (大雄宝殿, Dàxióng Bǎodiàn): The main hall of a Chinese Buddhist temple, the temple’s distinctive sandalwood incense mixed with the smell of burning joss sticks and aged wood, making one feel slightly drowsy. Although there were no monks in the main hall, incense offerings were still maintained. Every few steps, there were coil-shaped incense spirals hanging down from the beams.
From a side hall came the sound of monks chanting scriptures, buzzing like a chorus of a hundred mosquitoes and flies together, making his headache even worse. Pale smoke curled and lingered in the hall, staining the ceiling a dark yellow over the years.
Tilting his head back, Ning Xiaobei began counting the statues of the Eighteen Arhats lined up on both sides.
These golden-bodied figures, some sat upright in meditation, deep in thought; some raised their hands in celebration, as if ascending to bliss; some glared fiercely, holding alms bowls; others wore teasing smiles, hunched over with bent backs. Though there were only eighteen, they seemed to encompass all kinds of human expressions and states, and Ning Xiaobei found himself momentarily absorbed in them.
He looked at the statues one by one, focused only on what was in front of him and paying no attention to what was behind. Without realizing it, he bumped into someone.
Ning Xiaobei quickly turned around to apologize, only to find that the person behind him wasn’t a tourist, but a monk dressed in dark brown robes.
The monk was thin and gaunt, carrying an air of otherworldly grace. His eyes were strikingly bright. He seemed startled upon seeing Ning Xiaobei as well. Bringing his palms together, he softly recited a Buddhist phrase, then asked where he had come from.
“I’m from Shanghai,” Ning Xiaobei replied.
Ning Xiaobei answered matter-of-factly.
Seeing the monk frown with a puzzled expression, he had no choice but to clarify, saying he was from the city.
The monk shook his head and, without even responding, simply walked straight out.
Ning Xiaobei thought to himself that this person was quite rude. It seemed this temple wasn’t very authentic after all, probably just a tourist spot.
Who would have thought that when the monk reached the doorway, he suddenly turned back, pointed at a large hanging sea lamp on the beam, and asked, “What do you think this is?”
Ning Xiaobei glanced at it and answered, puzzled, “A sea lamp6海灯 (sea lamp): A type of long-burning lamp offered before Buddhist statues, symbolizing eternal light and enlightenment.”
Although he hadn’t visited many temples and didn’t know much about their layout, he had read about it in books. There was a line: “Do not say this life sinks into a dark sea; within one’s nature there is great light,” referring to the eternal sea lamp before the Buddha, burning endlessly, illuminating the mind, and preserving inner peace.
The monk smiled slightly, said nothing more, and turned to disappear behind the wooden doors.
Ning Xiaobei felt he was just being deliberately mysterious and let out a quiet snort.
Then he felt a hand rest on his shoulder. Turning around, he saw it was Fan Xia.
“When did you get here? You scared me.”
Ning Xiaobei took half a step back.
Fan Xia looked even more shocked than he did. “I’ve been right behind you the whole time! I was even talking to you.”
“Don’t talk nonsense.”
Ning Xiaobei pointed at the carved wooden door. “I was talking to that monk. Let’s go tell my dad and Aunt Wang, this temple isn’t legit. They shouldn’t bother buying any protective charms. They’re probably just wholesale goods from some market.”
“Boss, are you having heatstroke or something?”
Fan Xia looked horrified. “What monk? And didn’t I just hang those prayer beads on your wrist earlier? My uncle said they were blessed by the temple abbot, super effective.”
As he spoke, he patted his chest, a little pleased. “This one’s mine. My uncle said, ‘Men wear Guanyin7Men wear Guanyin: They were seen as more yang (active, aggressive). Guanyan soften aggression and cultivate a calm and compassionate temperament, women wear Buddha8Women wear Buddha: to promote openness, joy, and a tolerant, easygoing nature,’ so he got me a Guanyin pendant.”
Ning Xiaobei looked closely. A small white jade Guanyin pendant hung from Fan Xia’s neck on a red cord. The jade was smooth and lustrous, and the carving was finely done; it was probably quite expensive.
Fan Xia had no real sense of religion. His understanding of Guanyin Bodhisattva came entirely from the TV series 《Journey to the West.》 Since Guanyin could even subdue the mighty Sun Wukong, her powers had to be boundless. From a battle strength perspective, she was obviously awesome, and that’s why he admired her: for her fighting ability.
Ning Xiaobei looked down and noticed that, somehow, a string of sandalwood prayer beads had appeared on his right wrist. Each bead was about the size of a thumb, brand-new and unpolished, giving off a faint fragrance. These must have been the protective charms Uncle Zhao and Dad had separately obtained for them.
“No way… I was just talking to him a moment ago.”
He lifted his head and pointed toward the sea lamp, intending to say the man had asked him what it was. But in the next second, he froze completely.
It wasn’t a traditional temple oil lamp at all, but an electric light. More precisely, a ceiling-mounted LED, casting a cold, harsh white glow. Sniffing more closely, all he could smell was the antiseptic typical of a hospital; there was no trace of sandalwood incense.
The ground shook violently. Ning Xiaobei staggered back two steps in terror as the blue stone tiles cracked beneath him. All around, the statues wobbled— the Arhats, the Guanyins, the Shakyamunis. Gold leaf rained down from the countless deities as if a storm had struck.
He thought it was an earthquake and instinctively reached for Fan Xia’s hand, but there was nothing to grab. Looking again, his hands were covered in blood.
Not just his hands; his vision was a blur of crimson. Blood trickled from his forehead, blurring his eyelashes.
Screams, ambulance sirens, and the beeping of hospital machines replaced the chants and temple music he had imagined. Ning Xiaobei looked around, dazed.
The ancient town and the temple are all gone.
He was standing outside a hospital emergency room.
Turning his head, he saw a bloodied person being wheeled into surgery by nurses.
The world of dreams had collapsed.
………………
Author’s Note:
This connects back to the bar incident~~ Xiaobei’s headache isn’t from a cold; it’s from injuries he got at the bar. It hurt so much he even felt it in his dream.
====================
![The Return of The Lord God[quick wear]](https://i2.wp.com/knoxt.space/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/007S8ZIlly1ghl04hyuxyj30hs0owwgu.jpg?resize=85,105 "The Return of The Lord God[quick wear]")
Seris On AYM Chapter 106
Saeri On TCPUAAV Chapter 36