Chapter 305: Area R
Translator: Pluto Editor: Vermillion
When Lin Sanjiu stepped through the doors of A-17 berth’s lounge, she saw a long walkway made of many small pebbles and painted yellow. The walkway felt bumpy and it made people worried if they would just slip on one of those pebbles and fall from a few hundred meters. After all, there wasn’t any sort of safety handrail on the two sides of the walkway. Looking down from the walkway, Lin Sanjiu could see the pedestrians on the ground. They looked like black ants walking slowly.
At this height, one could see the mid-section of the skyscrapers which loomed over the Cyber District. Light streamed out from the windows of the grayish-black buildings which seemed to reach into the night sky… as if they would just continue upward without an end. Lin Sanjiu couldn’t help wondering what sort of people would actually live at the top of these buildings.
There were two rows of small guiding light at both sides of the walkway. The small white light only lit the walkway and disappeared after a few hundred meters as if they were swallowed by the darkness at the end of the walkway. A large floating monstrous vehicle was the airship she was going to board. Lin Sanjiu stopped and took a few steps backward. She tilted her head and observed the “airship”.
As a person from Earth, the appearance of this airship, as well as the various man-made infrastructures in Red Nautilus, was beyond her imagination. If she didn’t know what this thing was beforehand, there was no way Lin Sanjiu would even associate it with a transportation vehicle.
Looking from a distance, the steel upper deck of the airship was at least a several hectares wide. It was as if someone had plucked up a town square and planted it in mid-air. Just as she thought of this, she suddenly heard soft footsteps behind her. Before the person behind hurried her to move, she picked up her pace and walked toward the airship.
The walkway was too narrow for two passengers to stand shoulder-to-shoulder. It was almost like walking a balancing beam at high altitude. Lin Sanjiu stopped looking and quickly entered the area below the steel deck.
Lin Sanjiu had no idea where the main body of the airship was or what it looked like. Other than the large upper deck, she could only see this extremely large “container” which hung from the belly of the airship. It was a metallic container sealed with layers of steel. Up close, she couldn’t even see the edges of the container. White light seeped from the gap between one of the steel layers. Just as she reached the entrance, an exhausted-looking young man in a work uniform shouted at her without even looking up, “Area R is on your left. It is just an empty space. The door is opened so just find a spot and sit down.”
Lin Sanjiu wanted to pretend as though she was an experienced traveler. She entered the airship without saying a word. But, inevitably, she got into a bit of a trouble with her skeletal wings. When she bent forward, she did not control the sharp spines at the tip of her wings properly so she nearly sliced the young man’s face in half. Thankfully, she managed to board the airship without hurting anyone.
The young man stared at her from behind, and his face was pale. Then, he suddenly shouted as if he had forgotten something, “Be careful! If you damage our goods, you’ll have to pay for them!”
By then, Lin Sanjiu had already walked to the door of Area R. When she heard his warning, she sighed silently.
“No one told you to buy the cheapest ticket,” Mrs. Manas mumbled.
After quietly cursing her skeletal wings another time, she tucked them tightly behind her back and squeezed through the door of Area R cautiously. Area R was filled with steel good containers. They were arranged so that they occupied every inch of space all the way to the ceiling. Area R was dimly lit as there were only fluorescent lights hanging above the corridors.
Sometimes, after all the cargo had been moved into the airship, there would be some empty space in Area R. The tickets for a spot in Area R were half the price of a normal ticket. However, no food and drinks were provided onboard with this ticket and there weren’t any proper seats. Sometimes, these passengers couldn’t even stretch their legs so they can also lean against the goods container. When Lin Sanjiu spotted this ticket, she was pleasantly surprised but now she couldn’t help feeling some regret.
At most, Area R was only about 30 square meters. It was extremely small compared to the size of the entire airship. Yet, the transportation provider wouldn’t even miss out on earning money from this small space. Lin Sanjiu didn’t know if she should consider herself lucky. When she entered the space, she saw around five people sitting in a corner. When they spotted her wings, almost all of them showed an unwelcoming expression.
Despite that, Lin Sanjiu shamelessly found a spot. She stood with her arms crossed. Even though she took up quite a large space, no one said anything in the end. Perhaps, it was because she looked very fierce when she showed a stoic, expressionless face.
The person who had been walking behind her entered Area R with footsteps of the same frequency and volume. A young woman stepped through the entrance head first. When Lin Sanjiu looked up subconsciously, she was shocked. Before she let out a gasp, she quickly stopped herself. Shocked, she watched as the woman walked in, looked around, and finally sat down in front of her.
At first glance, Lin Sanjiu almost mistook that woman for Sajee. However, when she looked carefully, the woman’s appearance was completely different from Sajee. It was apparent from the woman’s hair color, features, height, and frame that they were two very different people. Lin Sanjiu nearly mistook that woman as Sajee only because that woman had similar eyes. It was as if her pupils were going to consume her whole eyes and she was wearing a thick scarf around her neck.
The stranger’s lip curled slightly as though she had noticed Lin Sanjiu’s gaze. Despite her astonishment, Lin Sanjiu did not show any hints of her emotions on her face. She maintained the same expressionless face.
Since it was just a 30 square meters space, the transport provider couldn’t sell that many tickets anyway. When the tenth person walked into Area R, the young exhausted ship crew also walked to the entrance of Area R.
“Hey everybody. Listen up. This portion of the journey will last five days. You will have to alight when we reach the harbor and board another airship,” he said absent-mindedly as he supported himself against the door frame with one hand, “If you follow the corridor to the end, you will find the toilet. Before we fly, the entrance where you had entered from would be locked. You can move around along the corridors but you better stay within Area R. Oh, it doesn’t really matter, but you guys won’t be able to access the cargo area. Don’t touch our things and don’t fight. Otherwise, we have people who will throw you off our ship.”
He didn’t even bother to look at the passengers’ reaction. After he uttered the last word, he turned and walked away. Not long after, they heard a click sound of a metal mechanism as the entrance into the airship was shut.
The ten strangers stuck in a small space tried to maintain the same distance between each other. Area R fell silent. This silence was quickly drowned by the rumbling from the airship’s engine. Though the metallic airship looked sturdy, it didn’t seem very stable when it was taking off. The entire body of the airship vibrated for quite a while. When the airship finally stabilized and started gliding smoothly, the passengers shifted and tried to look for a more comfortable spot. Some of them sat cross-legged and others sat with their legs outstretched. A middle-aged brunette walked past Lin Sanjiu and entered the corridor, leaving Area R.
Lin Sanjiu finally found some time to speak with Mrs. Manas and raise her doubts.
“Was I dreaming then? Or is that just an illusion?” Lin Sanjiu still felt a little confused when she recalled that realistic world she was in. “It’s too realistic. If it weren’t for those suspicious signs, it would seem like a completely different reality… In comparison, this strange airship, Red Nautilus or whatever is more like a dream.”
“I’m not sure either…” Mrs. Manas replied, “This is my first time encountering such a situation too. But, when you saw Zhu Mei’s eyes and those blue banknotes… They were all done by me. I couldn’t wake you up so I created some imagery within their dream… If I didn’t do that, I guess you’d be back in your hometown leading a normal, average life.”
Shocked by this revelation, Lin Sanjiu shuddered. “So that’s the reason! The others must be entrapped by their illusions so they just won’t wake up…”
If she didn’t have Mrs. Manas, Lin Sanjiu knew that she would end up in the same fate as the others in a few months’ time, lying with the others in a near-death state.
“How did you discover that something was wrong?” she asked in her mind. Lin Sanjiu’s expression was as unchanging as ever. She looked as though she was just resting rather than conversing with someone.
“You can consider yourself lucky,” Mrs. Manas’s tone relaxed a little. “The white vapor made you think of your old hometown and past life so it was normal for you. In the beginning, I was confused so I thought I was you. After staying in your body for so many days… But, quickly, I realized that we had two separate consciousness. You seemed oblivious to my presence. That’s why I woke up first and discovered my own existence. This was how I realized that something was wrong.”
Although it was a little difficult to comprehend, Lin Sanjiu did experience the same frightening alternate reality so she quickly understood. At the same time, she couldn’t help feeling a little scared, thinking about it in retrospect.
“You’re right. If I didn’t dream about my previous life, but about the apocalyptic worlds… Fighting, surviving and finding visas… neither of us would even notice anything wrong. If that was the case, I would just continue sleeping…”
Her own words stunned her. A fleeting thought struck her like a lightning bolt and her face slowly turned pale.
“You mean…” Mrs. Manas stammered.
“Was I really awake before I dreamed about my hometown and my past life?” Lin Sanjiu questioned herself inwardly—almost as if she was trying to force herself to find that answer.
