This cloak—or cape, perhaps—was very light.
Yu Feichen reached out, grabbing the edge of the wool fabric. The texture was fine and thick, a luxurious component of the uniform for senior officers to keep out the cold.
However, even the finest uniform cape was no match for a blanket. In the past two nights, even with the cape, the senior officer still kept coughing from the cold.
But to Yu Feichen, the thickness of this material sufficed… though it wasn’t as if the cold affected his body much.
He didn’t like touching others’ stuff, but this cape wasn’t beyond his tolerance level. He drew it around himself and the damp chill soon receded. Anfield had an upright and elegant manner of speaking, also giving orders as natural as can be. It gave people the impression of the ancient nobility who lived in clover, and every time he stepped out the door, there would be a maidservant spraying his cloak with the scent of pine wood.
However, there was none of that in actuality. The cloak only carried the glacial chill of a winter night breeze, characteristic of falling snow.
Anfield accepted his blanket as well. No one spoke in the cell.
Even if time for rest should be treasured, Yu Feichen still awoke two minutes before five. The sky was faintly aglow. Bai Song was sleeping deeply, and soft snores carried over from the brawny blonde. On the other hand, the rhythm of the big-nosed man’s breathing revealed that he didn’t sleep, nor did Anfield.
He removed the black silk ribbon that was over his eyes, passing it to Anfield.
Anfield retrieved the ribbon without a word.
At 5:01 a.m., Yu Feichen closed his eyes. He went back to sleep before the chief warden opened the door, calling them all awake.
“This is already your second night in the Koroshan mongrel’s doghouse already, esteemed sir.” The chief warden’s voice was shrill. He smiled, saying, “Have you made any progress on their secret underground tunnel?”
“There’s no secret tunnel.” Anfield brushed past the chief warden’s shoulder as he walked out of the door—well, not quite brushing shoulders, for the chief warden’s shoulder only reached his elbows.
“Maybe we can only attribute it to Koroshan witchcraft.” The chief warden kept up with him. “However, you can set your mind at ease, Sr. Colonel has already drafted up a new management system overnight. We won’t be seeing any more people breaking out of the camp over here in Oak Valley.”
Anfield’s voice rang out coldly, but it didn’t pay any heed to what the chief warden was speaking of. “Bear in mind my words from yesterday.”
The chief warden’s lips involuntarily twitched at Anfield’s back as the man walked off. He viciously flicked the whip to the ground with a crisp pop, then cleared his throat. This was a tell that he was about to deliver a summary or a speech.
“Yesterday, several of our glorious soldiers were transferred to advance the sacred cause. At the same time, Sr. Colonel believes that your discipline is too lax compared to ours. We have to expend a lot of energy just to manage you. This shouldn’t be the case. Oak Valley is your home, accordingly, you should keep it in good order.”
He clapped his hands together. A guard walked up, with dozens with black leather whips in his hands.
“A shepherd don’t herd sheep himself, because he has sheepdogs.” He walked to the nearest cell. He gave one of them a whip and patted the back of the man’s hand. “You can now enjoy a double meal every day, sheepdog.”
Following this, the chief warden walked up to every cell and gave a random person in each cell a whip, proclaiming this new regulation:
Every man who was given a whip was assigned as the ‘inspector’ of the cell, responsible for monitoring the actions of the other people in the cell and enforcing Oak Valley’s rules. If there was any misconduct, the inspector would have to punish them and enforce correct behaviour. If this wasn’t achieved, the inspector would be the one receiving punishment then.
If anyone developed a wish to break out of the camp, the inspector had to report it to above and he would be rewarded. Otherwise, the entire cell would be put to death.
“Of course, if anyone really escapes,” the chief warden said sinisterly, “each and every one of you can greet your beloved Yuryllia.”
When he came to this point, he came to the cell where Yu Feichen and the others were. His gaze swivelled across the four men.
“The swindler lawyer, the young brat, the stupid bull—” He grinned. “Big-nose, I remember your big nose. Eight of ten buggers among the mongrels have noses as big as yours.”
Laughing uproariously, he placed the leather whip in the big-nosed man’s hand. The big-nosed man lowered his head in alarm.
When this was done, the chief warden didn’t let them go out in turn as he had previously, but got everyone to leave the cell together.
Four trucks were waiting outside.
“Your assignment has changed,” said the chief warden. “Our respected, noble, motherfucking Anfield has decided that the coals in his office aren’t burning hot enough. Today, all of you are to get the hell out of here to go lumbering on the northern mountains.
“Inspectors, stay back for five minutes. Everyone else, get in the three trucks. The captain will check the fruits of your labour at seven o’clock tonight. If the quantity does not meet his standards, you can stay there chopping trees all night, you goddamn mongrels.”
The group of them erupted in whispering. Several turned their gazes towards Yu Feichen, and even Bai Song was frozen. “This…”
There was no other reason than that this wasn’t in the escape plan they had agreed on. That escape plan started from the brick kiln.
Yu Feichen inclined his head marginally, gazing at the leaden grey sky.
A northern wind; it was about to snow.
Once the ground was blanketed by a layer of snow, the footprints they leave in their escape would be visible for all to see, and the probability of being caught would skyrocket.
In his plan, snow was also a necessary element to take into account.
The wind and timing as well.
He had considered how to counter it if it snowed—he knew what to do.
But when gazing at the empty expanse of sky, he still felt a sort of… hollowness.
Over the past day, he had arranged and planned for all the possible people who could make a hash of things, as well as all the possible elements for failure. But he didn’t expect that one order from Anfield would invalidate all of his calculations.
He had considered essentially every situation; the only thing he didn’t take into account was Anfield. Or, put another way, he didn’t expect Anfield to move faster than he did.
—And there wasn’t much he could do about it.
When he finally shifted his gaze from the sky, he met Bai Song’s enquiring gaze.
“Are you okay?” Bai Song asked.
“Yes,” replied Yu Feichen.
“You look like a man…” Bai Song organised his words, “…betrayed by his wife.”
Expressionless, Yu Feichen looked at Bai Song, wondering where on earth this boy got his strange sense of humour.
“Get on,” he said.
Birds of a feather flocked together. The men of the brick kiln spontaneously got onto the same truck. Three local drivers each drove one truck. They also doubled as foremen, and each of the three trucks had a guard with a fake gun and a soldier with a real gun seated in the driving compartment.
This also meant to say that there were a total of three guards with live ammunition, six foremen, as well as ten ‘inspectors’ monitoring their lumbering for the day. For now, the foremen and the inspectors could be disregarded.
“The situation’s screwed, what should we do?” Bai Song quietly asked him in the truck.
Yu Feichen said, “It isn’t screwed.”
The men went from being scattered across three locations to being congregated on the northern mountains, and the weapons in their hands had transformed from bricks into lumbering axes. The situation wasn’t screwed; it was, in fact, even better than before.
It was simply that he had to arrange the groupings all over again.
The night before, they had deduced the truth behind the time anomaly in the cell with Anfield. The conclusion was that at midnight on the 22nd, the timelines would fracture and realign, but it was impossible to predict what horrific future awaited them.
Anfield had said that he would do his best to move them out before then. However, it was clear that the senior colonel wouldn’t allow the prisoners to be shifted elsewhere for the long term. Making sure that the prisoners wouldn’t be in the concentration camp at midnight was already the greatest kindness Anfield could bestow them.
But this wouldn’t solve the root of the problem. Time in the concentration camp had warped out of shape. In a sense, the eight days between 23rd and the 30th didn’t exist. By their hypothesis, the most likely scenario was that at the stroke of midnight, the future of the 31st would descend directly on the concentration camp, replacing the original concentration camp.
However, what the future of the 31st would be like hinged on what they did.
When they had first arrived at the shelter, they didn’t do anything. What they got was the future of the 28th, where everyone died from the toxic gas and was incinerated.
The next day, Gerold moved to the chemical plant. What they got was the future of the 29th, where everyone died from the toxic gas leak.
Another day later, they and several others communicated an escape plan. What they got was the future of the 30th, where someone snitched, putting all of them to death.
So, before midnight, he had to create a new scenario.
A scenario that would leave them unharmed no matter what was foretold.
Bai Song asked again, “How should we deal with the snitching that was shown in last night’s prophecy? There are even inspectors now, do we not tell them? We can’t, no?”
This was a plan that involved everyone. When the time came, everyone would know.
Next to them, the brawny blonde muttered, “If no one snitches, we might succeed or fail. If we succeed, all of us would be free; if we fail, all of us would die.
“If someone snitches, they might put us all to death,” he continued. “It’s also possible that it might just be us who die and others still live, and the Black Badge Army would slowly torture them to death.”
Precisely.
Only two fates lay ahead of them.
Everyone lives, or everyone dies—what they witnessed last night was evidence of this.
“Yeah, no matter what, we’d all die,” Bai Song said. “No one will snitch.”
“Unless it’s Captain Anfield.”
“But the captain is a good man.”
“Shut up,” said Yu Feichen.
Almost everyone was used to attributing their failures to others. The success of their escape had never hinged on snitching, because someone snitching was also a form of slip-up, which he had accounted for in his calculations.
A brief spell of silence came upon the two of them, allowing Yu Feichen some respite.
However, as the truck shuddered, driving towards the northern mountains, they started talking again.
“There are no good men in Tin Cloud.”
“If that’s so, who among the Koroshans would snitch?”
Fortunately, at this moment, the truck stopped shuddering.
They had arrived at the northern mountains.
This cloak—or cape, perhaps—was very light.
Yu Feichen reached out, grabbing the edge of the wool fabric. The texture was fine and thick, a luxurious component of the uniform for senior officers to keep out the cold.
However, even the finest uniform cape was no match for a blanket. In the past two nights, even with the cape, the senior officer still kept coughing from the cold.
But to Yu Feichen, the thickness of this material sufficed… though it wasn’t as if the cold affected his body much.
He didn’t like touching others’ stuff, but this cape wasn’t beyond his tolerance level. He drew it around himself and the damp chill soon receded. Anfield had an upright and elegant manner of speaking, also giving orders as natural as can be. It gave people the impression of the ancient nobility who lived in clover, and every time he stepped out the door, there would be a maidservant spraying his cloak with the scent of pine wood.
However, there was none of that in actuality. The cloak only carried the glacial chill of a winter night breeze, characteristic of falling snow.
Anfield accepted his blanket as well. No one spoke in the cell.
Even if time for rest should be treasured, Yu Feichen still awoke two minutes before five. The sky was faintly aglow. Bai Song was sleeping deeply, and soft snores carried over from the brawny blonde. On the other hand, the rhythm of the big-nosed man’s breathing revealed that he didn’t sleep, nor did Anfield.
He removed the black silk ribbon that was over his eyes, passing it to Anfield.
Anfield retrieved the ribbon without a word.
At 5:01 a.m., Yu Feichen closed his eyes. He went back to sleep before the chief warden opened the door, calling them all awake.
“This is already your second night in the Koroshan mongrel’s doghouse already, esteemed sir.” The chief warden’s voice was shrill. He smiled, saying, “Have you made any progress on their secret underground tunnel?”
“There’s no secret tunnel.” Anfield brushed past the chief warden’s shoulder as he walked out of the door—well, not quite brushing shoulders, for the chief warden’s shoulder only reached his elbows.
“Maybe we can only attribute it to Koroshan witchcraft.” The chief warden kept up with him. “However, you can set your mind at ease, Sr. Colonel has already drafted up a new management system overnight. We won’t be seeing any more people breaking out of the camp over here in Oak Valley.”
Anfield’s voice rang out coldly, but it didn’t pay any heed to what the chief warden was speaking of. “Bear in mind my words from yesterday.”
The chief warden’s lips involuntarily twitched at Anfield’s back as the man walked off. He viciously flicked the whip to the ground with a crisp pop, then cleared his throat. This was a tell that he was about to deliver a summary or a speech.
“Yesterday, several of our glorious soldiers were transferred to advance the sacred cause. At the same time, Sr. Colonel believes that your discipline is too lax compared to ours. We have to expend a lot of energy just to manage you. This shouldn’t be the case. Oak Valley is your home, accordingly, you should keep it in good order.”
He clapped his hands together. A guard walked up, with dozens with black leather whips in his hands.
“A shepherd don’t herd sheep himself, because he has sheepdogs.” He walked to the nearest cell. He gave one of them a whip and patted the back of the man’s hand. “You can now enjoy a double meal every day, sheepdog.”
Following this, the chief warden walked up to every cell and gave a random person in each cell a whip, proclaiming this new regulation:
Every man who was given a whip was assigned as the ‘inspector’ of the cell, responsible for monitoring the actions of the other people in the cell and enforcing Oak Valley’s rules. If there was any misconduct, the inspector would have to punish them and enforce correct behaviour. If this wasn’t achieved, the inspector would be the one receiving punishment then.
If anyone developed a wish to break out of the camp, the inspector had to report it to above and he would be rewarded. Otherwise, the entire cell would be put to death.
“Of course, if anyone really escapes,” the chief warden said sinisterly, “each and every one of you can greet your beloved Yuryllia.”
When he came to this point, he came to the cell where Yu Feichen and the others were. His gaze swivelled across the four men.
“The swindler lawyer, the young brat, the stupid bull—” He grinned. “Big-nose, I remember your big nose. Eight of ten buggers among the mongrels have noses as big as yours.”
Laughing uproariously, he placed the leather whip in the big-nosed man’s hand. The big-nosed man lowered his head in alarm.
When this was done, the chief warden didn’t let them go out in turn as he had previously, but got everyone to leave the cell together.
Four trucks were waiting outside.
“Your assignment has changed,” said the chief warden. “Our respected, noble, motherfucking Anfield has decided that the coals in his office aren’t burning hot enough. Today, all of you are to get the hell out of here to go lumbering on the northern mountains.
“Inspectors, stay back for five minutes. Everyone else, get in the three trucks. The captain will check the fruits of your labour at seven o’clock tonight. If the quantity does not meet his standards, you can stay there chopping trees all night, you goddamn mongrels.”
The group of them erupted in whispering. Several turned their gazes towards Yu Feichen, and even Bai Song was frozen. “This…”
There was no other reason than that this wasn’t in the escape plan they had agreed on. That escape plan started from the brick kiln.
Yu Feichen inclined his head marginally, gazing at the leaden grey sky.
A northern wind; it was about to snow.
Once the ground was blanketed by a layer of snow, the footprints they leave in their escape would be visible for all to see, and the probability of being caught would skyrocket.
In his plan, snow was also a necessary element to take into account.
The wind and timing as well.
He had considered how to counter it if it snowed—he knew what to do.
But when gazing at the empty expanse of sky, he still felt a sort of… hollowness.
Over the past day, he had arranged and planned for all the possible people who could make a hash of things, as well as all the possible elements for failure. But he didn’t expect that one order from Anfield would invalidate all of his calculations.
He had considered essentially every situation; the only thing he didn’t take into account was Anfield. Or, put another way, he didn’t expect Anfield to move faster than he did.
—And there wasn’t much he could do about it.
When he finally shifted his gaze from the sky, he met Bai Song’s enquiring gaze.
“Are you okay?” Bai Song asked.
“Yes,” replied Yu Feichen.
“You look like a man…” Bai Song organised his words, “…betrayed by his wife.”
Expressionless, Yu Feichen looked at Bai Song, wondering where on earth this boy got his strange sense of humour.
“Get on,” he said.
Birds of a feather flocked together. The men of the brick kiln spontaneously got onto the same truck. Three local drivers each drove one truck. They also doubled as foremen, and each of the three trucks had a guard with a fake gun and a soldier with a real gun seated in the driving compartment.
This also meant to say that there were a total of three guards with live ammunition, six foremen, as well as ten ‘inspectors’ monitoring their lumbering for the day. For now, the foremen and the inspectors could be disregarded.
“The situation’s screwed, what should we do?” Bai Song quietly asked him in the truck.
Yu Feichen said, “It isn’t screwed.”
The men went from being scattered across three locations to being congregated on the northern mountains, and the weapons in their hands had transformed from bricks into lumbering axes. The situation wasn’t screwed; it was, in fact, even better than before.
It was simply that he had to arrange the groupings all over again.
The night before, they had deduced the truth behind the time anomaly in the cell with Anfield. The conclusion was that at midnight on the 22nd, the timelines would fracture and realign, but it was impossible to predict what horrific future awaited them.
Anfield had said that he would do his best to move them out before then. However, it was clear that the senior colonel wouldn’t allow the prisoners to be shifted elsewhere for the long term. Making sure that the prisoners wouldn’t be in the concentration camp at midnight was already the greatest kindness Anfield could bestow them.
But this wouldn’t solve the root of the problem. Time in the concentration camp had warped out of shape. In a sense, the eight days between 23rd and the 30th didn’t exist. By their hypothesis, the most likely scenario was that at the stroke of midnight, the future of the 31st would descend directly on the concentration camp, replacing the original concentration camp.
However, what the future of the 31st would be like hinged on what they did.
When they had first arrived at the shelter, they didn’t do anything. What they got was the future of the 28th, where everyone died from the toxic gas and was incinerated.
The next day, Gerold moved to the chemical plant. What they got was the future of the 29th, where everyone died from the toxic gas leak.
Another day later, they and several others communicated an escape plan. What they got was the future of the 30th, where someone snitched, putting all of them to death.
So, before midnight, he had to create a new scenario.
A scenario that would leave them unharmed no matter what was foretold.
Bai Song asked again, “How should we deal with the snitching that was shown in last night’s prophecy? There are even inspectors now, do we not tell them? We can’t, no?”
This was a plan that involved everyone. When the time came, everyone would know.
Next to them, the brawny blonde muttered, “If no one snitches, we might succeed or fail. If we succeed, all of us would be free; if we fail, all of us would die.
“If someone snitches, they might put us all to death,” he continued. “It’s also possible that it might just be us who die and others still live, and the Black Badge Army would slowly torture them to death.”
Precisely.
Only two fates lay ahead of them.
Everyone lives, or everyone dies—what they witnessed last night was evidence of this.
“Yeah, no matter what, we’d all die,” Bai Song said. “No one will snitch.”
“Unless it’s Captain Anfield.”
“But the captain is a good man.”
“Shut up,” said Yu Feichen.
Almost everyone was used to attributing their failures to others. The success of their escape had never hinged on snitching, because someone snitching was also a form of slip-up, which he had accounted for in his calculations.
A brief spell of silence came upon the two of them, allowing Yu Feichen some respite.
However, as the truck shuddered, driving towards the northern mountains, they started talking again.
“There are no good men in Tin Cloud.”
“If that’s so, who among the Koroshans would snitch?”
Fortunately, at this moment, the truck stopped shuddering.
They had arrived at the northern mountains.
