Dreaming for 10,000 years

Chapter 317 Crying
The cost of living in Goff City is stiflingly high, as can be seen from the smuggled daily necessities that are everywhere on the black market.

Many people have to overdraw their future and rely on credit cards and loans to make ends meet. But all it takes is a little bit of an accident, a disease, a job loss, or even an unexpected expense.

They may face bankruptcy, be unable to pay their rent, and eventually fall to the bottom of society.

It’s not that people in Goff City don’t like to save money, but that they can’t save money.

Abandoned subway platforms are one of the last refuges for these people who have fallen. Some people do not want to become homeless and still have the hope of working illegally to make a living, so they choose to live temporarily on subway platforms.

Although it is dark and damp here, at least it can shelter from the wind and rain, and avoid the cold gazes on the ground.

Once upon a time, some people walked out of these abandoned subway stations and stood in the sun again, but that was 23 years ago. In recent years, no one who entered the abandoned subway stations has been able to leave.

They could only hang around here, living with garbage and rats, and eventually disappear silently into the darkness.

No one knows how many people have disappeared in these abandoned subway platforms. If this were the world of Cthulhu, I'm afraid the SAN value here would have already dropped to an explosion.

But this is not the world of Cthulhu. Even so, the silent graffiti, dim lights, and the dark subway passage in the distance still exude an indescribable atmosphere, as if something is stirring in the depths of the darkness.

Seeing this, Shi Fei sighed. It was indeed the land where Cthulhu culture was born.

Fantasy comes from reality, but also transcends reality.

Following the crazy laughter, Shi Fei finally saw the source of the sound.

A man was sitting on a chair on the dilapidated platform, laughing loudly. The laughter was crazy and empty, as if it came from the depths of the soul, with an unsettling sense of tearing.

When he got closer, Shi Fei realized that the man was not laughing, but crying loudly. However, his crying sounded very much like laughter.

It was a distorted, painful sound, as if his throat had been torn apart by despair and loneliness and he could no longer make a normal cry.

He was probably in his fifties, and his body was so thin that he was almost shapeless. He was wearing a thin piece of clothing whose color had long been unrecognizable.

His gray hair was stuck to his forehead in a messy manner, and the wrinkles on his face were deeply engraved into his skin, making him look much older than his actual age.

At this moment, tears as big as beans were flowing from his eyes. The tears slid down his cheeks and dripped onto his tattered clothes, soaking them all.

A strange power was emanating from his body, as if an invisible mountain was pressing down on his shoulders, making it hard for him to breathe.

In this city, despair and loneliness are the forces that drive people crazy, but they are also power!

"Why are you crying?" Shi Fei asked softly, his eyes falling on the dirty chair beside him.

He waved his hand gently, and the dirt on the chair disappeared instantly. It became much cleaner, at least there was no more disgusting sediment.

"I'm laughing! Sir, I'm laughing!" The man turned his head and said to Shi Fei. His voice was hoarse and broken, but there was a strange smile on his face.

On that pale face, the lips were wide open, as if he was smiling, but also as if he was screaming silently.

"No! You are crying!" Shi Fei "No, you are crying." Shi Fei looked at him calmly and said, "Men don't cry easily, but they are not too sad." "..." The man was silent for a while, and the tears in his eyes became more violent. He whispered, "You are a kind-hearted person, a compassionate person."

Shi Fei nodded as a matter of course: "People should have compassion."

"Should have?" The man suddenly started crying again when he heard this word. Although his crying still sounded like crazy laughter, to Shi Fei, it was indeed crying, a heart-wrenching cry.

"I have never felt 'should have' in this city." He cried and said, as if he wanted to release all the grievances that had been accumulated in his heart for many years.

"My name is Jack White." The man finally stopped crying and whispered.

"Good name!" Shi Fei nodded and said.

"I used to be a firefighter," Jack said again.

"Good job!" Shi Fei nodded again.

"More than 20 years ago, a terrible attack occurred in Goff City." Jack's voice gradually became low, as if he was lost in some painful memories: "It was a disaster caused by terrorists, and the whole city fell into chaos."

"I was working at the Goff City Fire Department. I was the youngest and most energetic at the time. Everyone in the fire department was very nice, and we were like brothers!" His voice was filled with endless warmth.

Memories have become his way of keeping warm.

"But..." He changed the subject, speaking with regret and pain: "In order to fight against that disaster and chaos, many of our brothers died in the fire."

Firefighters are a high-risk profession, and dying in disaster relief is sad, but not uncommon.

"Are they all heroes, sir?" Jack suddenly looked up and asked Shi Fei.

"Of course!" Shi Fei said solemnly: "Anyone who sacrifices his own life to save others is a hero!"

After hearing this, Jack chuckled softly. The laughter was strange, more like a "woohoo" cry, as if his throat had been torn apart by pain and he could no longer make a normal sound.

"Sir! You are such a good man!" Jack continued, with a hint of gratitude in his voice: "They all became heroes, and I survived. No, I am also injured."

"You may not know that we inhaled a lot of poisonous gases during the fire. I am the youngest and have the best physical condition, but my brothers who survived fell ill in the years after the disaster."

"They are very ill, some with sudden illnesses, some with chronic cancers."

"But Goff City... abandoned us!" Jack said this and suddenly burst into tears again. His laughter was full of mockery, "We are like a used pawn! They didn't get anything!"

"The rare cancers and diseases they had were simply not included in the list, and there was 'no way to prove a direct link', so the insurance company simply refused to pay!"

"The fire department's pensions were also misappropriated. The entire fire department doesn't have much money. Instead, some people pretended to be the family members of deceased firefighters to defraud crowdfunding donations."

"And we..." At this point, his crying became more and more crazy: "My good brothers, they sacrificed their lives for this city, but they got nothing. Neither honor nor pension."

(End of this chapter)