The sky was just beginning to brighten when the family of three settled into the car.
Good morning.
The fastest route has been planned for you.
Total distance is 144 kilometers.
Estimated travel time is 1 hour and 55 minutes.
We wish you a pleasant journey.
“Honey, it’s going to be hard on you driving the whole way.”
Ya Xinyao turned her head toward the driver’s seat, her voice carrying an unmistakable trace of concern.
“It’s not hard,” Gao Hongzhi said with a smile, his tone sounding quite relaxed.
“On the contrary, I actually enjoy driving.”
“But you barely slept last night.”
Ya Xinyao’s brow remained slightly furrowed.
“Hey, I’m not sleepy.”
Gao Hongzhi puffed out his chest, speaking boisterously as if afraid his wife and daughter would worry.
“Just think of it as pulling an all-nighter for a major project. Besides, I’ve already had four cups of coffee this morning.”
As he spoke, he added another comment.
“And anyway, a Volvo’s safety performance is something you can trust.”
Click.
Gao Hongzhi buckled his seatbelt and fixed his gaze on the road ahead.
“Alright, let’s go.”
He started the car, his voice gentle and certain.
“It’s only 2 hours. Hongyi, try to get some sleep on the way. It really was hard on you, having to wake up this early.”
“It’s okay, Dad. I’m not sleepy,” Gao Hongyi replied.
However, her eyes were somewhat dazed, clearly showing it wasn’t as easy as she claimed.
In truth, it wasn’t just the couple who had been up; Gao Hongyi had also stayed awake all night.
The serialized word count of the novel [Walking Alone in the White Night] was already approaching 1,000,000.
Last night, she had started from chapter 1 and read it all over again.
It wasn’t a casual glance-over.
She read every word and sentence, like a stubborn detective repeatedly comparing and scrutinizing the spaces between the lines.
She tried to reverse-engineer the author’s real growth trajectory from the rhythm of the writing, word preferences, and even certain inconsequential descriptions of daily life.
‘Could the Gu Yebai from Linchuan County really be the author of [Walking Alone in the White Night]?’
Gu Yebai was the same age as her.
Yet, the novel contained too many details of a life she had never experienced or even imagined.
The depth of emotion and the observations of the world always gave her a faint feeling that it wasn’t something a 16-year-old could easily fabricate.
Therefore, at this moment, Gao Hongyi leaned toward the belief that Gu Yebai was one person and the author was another — that they were two entirely separate and independent individuals.
That being said, Gao Hongyi had still put extra effort into her appearance today.
She wore only light makeup, which highlighted her clean, bright features.
Her off-white cashmere coat had soft lines that made her skin look even fairer, and a red scarf was wrapped around her neck, its color restrained yet striking.
Below, she wore a slim-fitting skirt paired with brown boots that reached just past her knees.
Her look sat somewhere between the purity of a young girl and the cool composure of a mature woman.
Gao Hongyi pulled out her phone.
[Yi]: Uncle Bai, my family is heading to Linchuan.
However, he didn’t reply.
At a time like this, she really hoped he would say something, anything at all.
Her parents chatted in low voices in the front row.
Gao Hongyi shifted her gaze to the window.
The distant mountain line appeared faintly through the morning mist, while cars occasionally sped past nearby.
The traffic was sparse, and the weather wasn’t exactly bright.
Under the gray sky, several billboards swallowed by rust stood by the road.
Behind them were old factories abandoned for years, their empty window frames looking like a set for a horror movie.
Living in Donghai, Gao Hongyi was used to standing before floor-to-ceiling windows and watching the heavy flow of traffic on the overpasses.
Even a car like a Maybach wasn’t considered a rare sight there.
Neon lights reflected off glass curtain walls in the night, and the city’s breath never ceased.
The price of a single bottle of red wine in any restaurant in Donghai was higher than the annual income of an average resident of Linchuan County.
She lived in the heavens.
And he, it seemed, lived in the dirt.
“…Gu Yebai.”
She whispered the name.
What kind of person would someone living in a place like this be?
And what kind of people would his parents be?
In an environment so lacking in resources, education was already scarce.
Once the opportunity for education was stripped away, many precious qualities were often worn down and twisted bit by bit through a long, harsh life.
If even the most basic standard of living was difficult to maintain, where would the energy come from to pursue spiritual fulfillment?
She couldn’t help but begin to sketch their outlines in her mind.
A middle-aged woman who would fly into a rage in the street because she couldn’t haggle a few dollars off her groceries; a father who spent all year soaking in mahjong parlors, indifferent to his family; and a son who dropped out of school early in such an environment, wandering the streets all day…
Those images pieced themselves together in her mind, becoming more and more specific.
She suddenly thought that perhaps when they saw her, they would greet her with nothing but blatant, lecherous gazes.
“Don’t be afraid, Hongyi.”
“Dad is right here.”
Having noticed his daughter’s anxiety through the rearview mirror, Gao Hongzhi spoke immediately, his tone deep and certain.
“Mom is here, too,” Ya Xinyao added quickly, her voice tender.
Blood didn’t represent everything.
She knew that these parents, who shared no biological relation to her, would give everything for her, even their lives.
You have arrived in Linchuan County.
The journey has ended.
We look forward to seeing you next time.
The navigation prompt sounded.
The car exited the highway, passed through the toll station, and drove a few kilometers along the national highway.
The silhouette of the county seat gradually appeared in their vision.
The streets weren’t wide, and there weren’t many pedestrians.
It had snowed two days ago, and the roads were covered in a layer of black slush that had been repeatedly crushed by tires.
It looked filthy and greasy.
Every city has something to be proud of.
Linchuan County was no exception.
Near Wanda Plaza, a few office buildings stood scattered about.
This small county was working hard to mimic the appearance of a big city.
Newly opened business hotels, internet cafes, and milk tea shops were lined up.
A few young people were walking haphazardly down the street, laughing and talking, appearing quite happy.
But as they drove further in, the thin “prosperous shell” that Linchuan County had painstakingly built quickly peeled away.
Old residential compounds, old factories, old schools, old hospitals…
It was as if someone had pressed the pause button on this city in a certain year of the last century, and it had never truly moved forward since.
Everything was just a matter of patching things up to last another three years; if they could make do, they would.
Peeling wall paint, rusted window frames.
Old people with numb expressions and dull eyes sat by the roadside.
When the car passed a group of abandoned old factories, Gao Hongyi even saw two groups of delinquents in a standoff.
Some held steel pipes, some brandished controlled knives, and others gripped empty glass bottles.
The two sides cursed at each other from a few steps away, inching forward tentatively as they shouted.
Gao Hongyi had never heard such filthy and crude insults in her life.
She instinctively gripped the edge of her scarf, her fingertips turning slightly cold.
“Dad…” she couldn’t help but say.
“Where exactly are we going?”
“To the police station first.”
Gao Hongzhi looked straight ahead, his voice calm and clear.
“Then to the Civil Affairs Bureau and the Education Bureau. Finally, to the boy’s school. Before we officially meet, we should get the full story first.”
Before coming, Gao Hongzhi had already arranged everything in an orderly fashion.
The Volvo turned into the courtyard of the police station.
As soon as the car stopped, a middle-aged police officer with a ruddy face quickly walked out to meet them.
“Hello, you must be Mr. Gao, right?”
He spoke quickly, his attitude warm.
“I’m the chief of the Linchuan County Police Station. You’ve had a long trip! My superiors already briefed me on your situation; we are taking this very seriously!”
As he spoke, he turned to bark an order.
“Zhang, what are you standing there for? Hurry up and get tea for Mr. Gao’s family! Wang, go pull the files!”
“Thank you,” Gao Hongzhi said with a nod.
“Don’t mention it, we’re serving the people,” the chief said, waving his hand with a smile before suddenly remembering something.
“By the way, you brought your ID cards, household registration, and the hospital birth certificate records, right?”
“Of course,” Gao Hongzhi answered curtly.
The chief was a man who worked efficiently.
Before long, the relevant information on Gu Yebai had been organized and placed neatly in front of Gao Hongzhi.
A clerk sat at a computer, constantly switching pages, doing their best to retrieve all searchable information.
“The boy, Gu Yebai, was indeed born in Donghai,” the clerk reported, looking up.
“The birth hospital and the medical certificate number all match. Here is the photo.”