A cry for help. They left the restaurant, turned the corner, and heard a woman’s voice coming from a sewer pipe.
The pipe was about a meter in diameter, just wide enough for a person to crawl through. One end had been snapped off by a steel beam, the broken edge thick with rust.
The other end plunged into the collapsed factory foundation, its depths invisible, the inner walls pitch-black without a hint of light.
Little Frost crouched about a meter from the opening, not getting any closer.
From inside the pipe, the woman’s cry for help came again.
Her voice was hoarse—the kind of hoarseness that comes from shouting too long, her throat ruined.
But it still carried a clear will to live, repeating over and over that she had no water or food, had been trapped for days, begging whoever was outside to save her.
Little Frost turned to look at White Peace. White Peace stood on the other side of the opening, glanced into the pipe, and spoke calmly.
“She was a factory worker before the end of the world. On the day the apocalypse happened, she jumped into this pipe to kill herself. The moment she jumped, the factory collapsed. She was trapped inside, struggling for three days, and finally died of thirst. Even as she died, she was still screaming for help. That cry has been echoing in this pipe for years.”
“She doesn’t know she’s dead?”
“No,” White Peace said.
“She thinks she’s still trapped in those three days. She believes that if she keeps calling out long enough, someone will come to save her. What we’re hearing is the cry she made when she thought she was still alive.”
Mu Yingying crouched beside Little Frost and peered into the dark pipe.
She couldn’t see anything, only heard that raspy voice continuing, saying her mother was waiting for her at home, begging the people outside not to leave.
White Peace said, “Her obsession is to be rescued. Only when she crawls out of this pipe and sees the light of day will she realize she’s already dead. At that moment, she’ll either accept reality or instantly turn into a resentment ghost and attack the nearest living person… which would be whoever is standing at the mouth of the pipe.”
“What if we don’t save her?”
“If we don’t, she’ll keep shouting from inside the pipe. Her resentment will grow heavier year by year. In a few more years, even without being rescued, she’ll transform into an even more vicious Weirdness. It’ll be much harder to deal with then.”
The voice from inside the pipe continued, thinking the people outside had already left.
Little Frost took a deep breath and spoke into the pipe. “I’m still here. I haven’t left.”
For a second, the pipe fell silent.
Then came the woman’s hoarse, desperate voice, rambling incoherently as she begged for her life, saying she was trapped, no water, no food, couldn’t hold on much longer.
Little Frost steadied her voice and comforted her. “Don’t panic. First, tell me where you are inside the pipe. Can you see any light?”
The woman hesitated, then spoke haltingly. She said she had jumped down from a manhole cover, and the cover had collapsed as she fell.
She had been crawling through the pipe for days. In one direction, it got narrower and narrower. In the other, it opened up but was completely dark—not a single speck of light.
“Crawl toward the open direction,” Little Frost said. “I’ll wait for you here. I won’t leave. Rest when you’re tired, then keep crawling. You’ll make it out. Your mother is still waiting for you. You have to get out.”
The pipe was quiet for a moment. Then the woman choked out a thank-you and asked what her name was.
Little Frost paused. “My name is Little Frost.”
A second later, the sound of crawling came from the pipe—the slow, scraping noise of torn fingernails clawing along the inner walls. Little Frost sat to the side of the opening, occasionally calling out to reassure her, telling her to take it slow, no rush.
During the pauses in crawling, the woman spoke in fragments. She said she used to work in a dye workshop, coming home every day with clothes stained in all colors.
Her mother always complained about the laundry. She had told her mother that once she saved enough money, she and a friend would head south and open a small restaurant.
Her voice faltered. She went on to say that the friend had backed out in the end and had gotten together with the boyfriend she’d been with for three years.
From the very beginning, she had just been a placeholder.
That was why she had jumped into the pipe.
When she jumped, she hadn’t wanted to live. But when she was truly trapped, thirsty and hungry, she suddenly didn’t want to die anymore.
She just wanted to go home and see her mother, to say she was sorry.
Little Frost listened quietly, her eyes reddening, but she kept her voice steady.
“Your mother knows you miss her. Crawl slowly. Once you get out, you can go see her.”
The crawling sound started again, growing closer and closer.
After about fifteen minutes, the woman’s tearful voice came from the pipe. “Miss Su! I see light! Am I almost there?”
“Yes, come out,” Little Frost said.
The next moment, a pale, withered hand gripped the broken edge of the pipe. Its nails were all gone, and the skin was waxy yellow from water damage.
Then came the second hand, followed by a head. The woman’s hair was matted, black streaked with the gray-white of years spent soaking in water.
Her face was bloated and gray, but her eyes still held the light of a living person.
Wang Xiuying struggled to crawl out of the pipe, wearing a blue factory uniform that had rotted away. She collapsed onto the ground, making heavy gasping motions.
She had been dead for years and had no need for air, but she repeated the action out of sheer survival instinct.
Wang Xiuying looked up and saw Little Frost. She burst into tears, crawling toward her while sobbing out thanks, saying she had made it out and was going to see her mother.
Little Frost didn’t move. She let Wang Xiuying crawl up to her and reached out to take her cold, water-bloated hand.
The woman’s hand was icy, but she gripped tightly, her whole body trembling with sobs.
Little Frost held back her tears and spoke softly. “Xiuying, look at yourself.”
Wang Xiuying froze. Slowly, she lowered her head and saw her own hands—fingerless, bloated beyond recognition. She saw her uniform, rotting into shreds.
She saw her own skin, lifeless and dead for years.
She stared for a long time, then lifted her head and asked in a soft voice, “Miss Su, am I dead?”
“Yes.”
“How long?”
“Several years.”
Wang Xiuying was silent for a long time. Then she suddenly smiled, a relieved smile. As she smiled, tears fell.
She asked, “That man who tricked me… is he dead too?”
“In this apocalypse, everyone died.”
“Good,” Wang Xiuying said. “That’s good.”
She said that when she was lucid inside the pipe, she hated that man. Then she hated herself for not dying cleanly. Most of the time, she was in a daze, just shouting for help.
Now that she was out, the hatred was suddenly gone. Hating a dead person was meaningless.
Wang Xiuying looked up at the ruined sky. The blood-red canopy looked the same to her as it had before the end of the world.
Her voice choked again.
“My mother… she’s dead too, isn’t she?”
Little Frost was silent for a moment.
“Yes.”
Wang Xiuying lowered her head and was quiet for a long time. When she looked up again, her eyes were no longer lost.
She said, “Then I’ll go find her. She must be waiting for me somewhere.”
Wang Xiuying let go of Little Frost’s hand, stood up slowly, and bowed deeply to Little Frost, Mu Yingying, and White Peace, who was standing farther away.
“Miss Su, thank you for saving me. You didn’t save me by pulling me out of the pipe. You saved me by letting me know I don’t have to crawl anymore.”
As her words faded, Wang Xiuying turned into fine blue ash, the same color as the uniform she had worn. It settled gently on the ground at the pipe’s opening.
From the ash, a Ghost Crystal formed, its surface damp, as if still carrying the water from the pipe.
Little Frost reached out and picked up the Ghost Crystal. Its cold moisture wet her palm. She placed it into her Eerie Crystal Pouch.
White Peace had stood by the side of the pipe the whole time. Only after Wang Xiuying turned to ash did she look inside.
The cry for help was gone. The pipe was left in utter silence.
The group walked two blocks. The ruins on both sides gave way to a dense cluster of residential buildings.
As they walked, they heard a very soft voice—a middle-aged man’s voice, coming from the third floor of an apartment building by the roadside.
The entire street was empty. That voice was the only sound, starkly clear in the silent ruins.
“It’s raining again today. There’s still some leftover rice in the fridge. I can have one more meal.”
“Xiaohong, how was school today?”
A long silence. Then the man’s voice came again, carrying an indescribable loneliness. “No one. I forgot again. No one.”
“I’ll go buy some groceries tomorrow.”
Little Frost stopped the cart and looked up.
On the third floor of that building, through a window of one unit, a warm yellow desk lamp was shining—the only light on this street.
“Peace.”
White Peace stood beside Little Frost, looked up at that lit window, and said calmly, “This is an Echo. The man who lives here is talking to an empty room.”