Doomsday Wonderland

Chapter 1330: A Day Without Much Happening

At noon the next day, several drivers who often gathered for lunch happened to be busy with their taxi runs. That’s how it was with taxi driving—there was never a fixed schedule. Guan Hailian had never gone to Hongyan’s Snack Bar by himself, and he was also afraid that Chen Hongyan would insist on repaying him for yesterday’s meal. But considering the heavy crates of drinks behind the house, he gritted his teeth and went anyway.

Before he even reached the entrance, voices from inside floated out to him.

This was unusual. Business was slowest at lunchtime because the young people in the neighborhood were all at work, leaving only retired elders who wouldn’t spend money eating out. Guan Hailian had been here many times, but it was the first time he saw outsiders at this hour.

“What’s wrong with the community?” said a man sitting facing Chen Hongyan at a table, his back to the door. “Do you know how much it costs to rent a two-bedroom apartment here? Over six thousand! Just for living, not for running a business like yours. With all the grease and smoke, my ceiling has been blackened.”

If there was one intuition that Guan Hailian had developed in this world, it was a sense of impending trouble. He took a few steps forward and said, “Sister-in-law, I’m here.”

“Oh, it’s Old Guan,” Chen Hongyan said, glancing briefly, then looking up again as if steadying her emotions. “Please have a seat. I’ll be with you in a moment.”

“No rush, no rush, you go ahead.” As expected, it was the landlord.

The man glanced at Guan Hailian before returning to Chen Hongyan, saying, “With the current property prices, you should know my shop is quite large, and I rent out several sections to those who sell breakfast and handle deliveries. Their rent can be twice as much as yours. I considered that you’ve been renting for so long, so I thought I’d raise it slightly.”

“But if you raise it, it’s an additional two thousand five hundred. I can’t afford that.” Chen Hongyan’s face showed a rare expression as if she hadn’t slept for several days and nights, her usual vitality extinguished. She lowered her voice and said, “This restaurant doesn’t make much money, just enough to get by.”

“Why don’t you sell breakfast then?” the landlord suggested.

Chen Hongyan was silent for a few seconds. She glanced in Guan Hailian’s direction, seeing him pretending to be engrossed in his phone, before whispering, “If I sell breakfast, I have to get up at four in the morning, but this restaurant is busy at night… Sometimes, we don’t close until eleven or twelve at night. I can’t rest during the day. My child is only three years old and not yet of school age.”

Guan Hailian suddenly realized that she had considered selling breakfast before.

“Then, you can raise your prices. I don’t care,” the landlord interrupted her. “I also have a family to support, and the rent is increasing.”

Chen Hongyan sat still for a moment, seeming to soften. When the landlord started to leave, she suddenly exclaimed, “But we have a contract! It’s not due yet. Why raise the rent?”

“Contract?” The landlord stopped in his tracks, his voice sharpening. “If you want to follow the contract, fine, then move out in a month. I’m giving you one month’s notice according to the contract. If you don’t leave by then, the deposit won’t be refunded.”

“But how can you do this?” Chen Hongyan’s face flushed red and then pale. Softening her tone, she said, “If I move out, how can I live? Can’t you raise it a little less?”

“I’m not heartless. I don’t want to kick you out, but you need to live, and I need to live, too,” the landlord said, taking a step back. “How about this? Let’s make it two thousand two hundred, starting next month.”

After saying this, he turned and left without another glance at Guan Hailian. Chen Hongyan sat there dazed, and Guan Hailian felt he should comfort her. He cleared his throat and awkwardly asked, “Sister-in-law, is there anything I can help with?”

Chen Hongyan glanced at him but didn’t say anything. She was clearly preoccupied and not paying attention to anything around her.

“He’s insisting on charging you more. When the time comes, you can print out the transfer records and use them to sue him.” Guan Hailian felt sorry for her and approached her to advise, “The records show that he actually charged you more rent, which violates the contract.”

Chen Hongyan suddenly grabbed a cloth from the table and vigorously wiped the clean surface, seemingly trying to suppress her frustration. After wiping the table, she finally sighed and threw the cloth aside, saying, “Old Guan, just drop it. This won’t work.”

Guan Hailian fell silent—why wouldn’t it work? It seemed he still didn’t understand enough about this world; this touched on his blind spot.

He hoped Chen Hongyan could explain it so he wouldn’t reveal his ignorance later. Besides, if he knew why it wouldn’t work, he could think of a solution for her.

“If he says I offered to pay more voluntarily, how can I prove otherwise?” Chen Hongyan walked to the kitchen before explaining, “Forget about suing him. Even if we win the lawsuit, what then? Who will enforce the payment of this extra two thousand? Once we make a fuss, it will be even harder to deal with in the future.”

Guan Hailian paused, feeling that just understanding this sentence might require him to read a lot of newspapers and materials about this world.

‘It seems unreasonable,’ he thought, but if you didn’t back down and acknowledge the unreasonable, you wouldn’t be able to live.

He couldn’t think of any other way. Even in Twelve Worlds, contracts were taken very seriously.

“You can watch TV,” Chen Hongyan said, turning on the TV before entering the kitchen. “The usual two dishes? It’ll be ready soon.”

By the time she came out, Guan Hailian had already turned off the TV—the advertisement looking for posthumans was everywhere, and he couldn’t stand to see it repeatedly. When Chen Hongyan came out, she absentmindedly put down the plates without realizing the TV was off.

The atmosphere at lunch was very heavy; he didn’t even finish half of his meal before hastily paying and leaving, forgetting once again about the drinks. The afternoon went smoothly; he didn’t encounter any posthumans and even got a big job at the airport, with no empty cars on the way there or back.

After finishing his shift, Guan Hailian went to the market to buy ingredients for dinner and walked home with his bags. As soon as he entered the neighborhood, he saw a familiar face sitting on the bench in front of his building, smoking.

Guan Hailian’s heart sank slowly as he approached the man step by step. The man looked up, exhaled smoke, and smiled at him, “Just got back? Didn’t you get off work early?”

“Yeah.” He habitually raised the plastic bag to show the man the eggplant and green beans inside. “I went to buy groceries.”

“You’re doing fine.” The thin man, leaning on the bench, smiled and said, “You can still have a peaceful dinner. I haven’t eaten yet.”

Guan Hailian nodded silently and walked towards the building where he lived. After a few steps, he turned back and asked, “Haven’t you all withdrawn? It’s been so long, and I’ve proven I’m not a problem. Why…”

“You’re not a problem. Why worry?” The thin man flicked his cigarette ash and said, “Oh, someone will come up to register for you later.”

Knowing he shouldn’t ask, he still did, “Register for what? Haven’t I already registered?”

The thin man’s smile disappeared. “You think you’ve registered just because you said so? You’re pretty familiar with our regulations, aren’t you?”

Guan Hailian paused and said, “I understand,” then turned and walked home.

It must all be because of that advertisement. Blame it on that person named Lin Sanjiu for making such a big fuss, resulting in tighter restrictions for those who just wanted to live a good life. ‘It should be better after this period passes,’ he thought. That thin man couldn’t possibly sit downstairs forever.

That Lin Sanjiu person was also pitiful. She relentlessly pursued a return to Twelve Worlds, ultimately making a wrong move and losing her place of refuge. No matter her glorious past, coming here meant accepting her fate.

After he finished cooking dinner and set it on the table, the doorbell rang. When he opened the door, he saw a stranger holding a registration book.

“Population registration. Where’s your ID?”

Guan Hailian hurriedly complied and went to get his ID. When he came out, he found the person had already pushed the door open and was standing in the living room looking at his dinner. “Aren’t you living alone?” she asked. “Why are there two bowls on the table?”

Guan Hailian explained, “I live alone, but when I eat, I like to use an extra bowl to mix condiments. You see, there’s only one pair of chopsticks.”

The woman looked at him without comment and said, “I’ll just check.” Then she went around the rooms and, seeing no one else, left. Guan Hailian sat down, staring at his steaming dinner for a while, remembering the days when he couldn’t eat for a week or two in the doomsday world.

Wasn’t it much better now?

Back then, there was no one to question whether he was eating alone, but now, no one would attack him just to steal his food. Survival, of course, took precedence over everything else.

As he ate, he glanced out the window and saw the thin man still sitting at the entrance of the building, playing with his phone and eating a banana.

After dinner, he didn’t watch TV but read a book for a while. Understanding the written texts of this world was still a bit difficult for him, so he read slowly. As drowsiness gradually overtook him, he once again felt the tranquility that only existed in a stable world. Before falling asleep, he checked his phone and found a message from Chang Fan.

“I don’t even remember your birthday, but Sister-in-law remembers. You’ve been single for so long. Don’t you have any thoughts?”

He replied, “Stop talking nonsense, it’s impossible.”

Before falling asleep, he suddenly realized that, with his regression to an ordinary person, he should be in his early forties. An ordinary person’s lifespan could reach seventy or eighty, so he had thirty or forty years left.

He didn’t know whether thirty or forty years was too long or too short.