My hometown is far away in Moscow.

Chapter 233 Hometown of Heroes

This seemed to be the safest option at the moment; they each lowered their heads and played with their phones, trying their best not to look out the window.

Suddenly, whistles and shrill laughter erupted all around. Everyone couldn't help but look up, only to see the young Andrei brazenly unzip his pants and, in full view of everyone, urinate on the hood of the train. As he urinated, he swayed and waved, laughing loudly, "Come on! Give those cowards some gifts! Let them take them back to Moscow!"

"Me too!"

"I'll send one too!"

Several teenagers rushed to the left side of the car and urinated with unrestrained laughter, making the car door hiss and rattle. A damp, pungent smell immediately filled the car.

"You little brat!" Hu Yi was still seething with anger when Yabalov suddenly nudged him: "Look, there's a girl."

Hu Yi followed his gaze and looked down, only to see two drunk girls squatting on the right side of the car, urinating as if no one else was around, while giggling incessantly.

"Damn it! They're all fucking drunk! Not a single one of them is sober!" Hu Yi cursed angrily, then turned and slapped the back of the head of the dazed Yabalov: "Stop looking! What can you see in the dark!"

The two girls casually pulled up their pants, helped each other up, and swayed away. Yabalov turned around and chuckled, "This, this... this is so exciting! I've never seen a woman pee in the street before."

After relieving themselves, the teenage drunks didn't leave. Instead, they scattered around, sitting or standing, continuing their slurred and loud chatter, no longer caring about the people in the car, as if they had forgotten about them.

Hu Yi was secretly anxious. Just as he was about to try contacting Andrei again, he suddenly saw several figures approaching from ahead and called out from a distance, "Children! What are you doing here?"

"A bunch of cowards from Moscow! Cowards!" several teenagers shouted. "They're hiding in the car and won't get out!"

"From Moscow? Who are you?" The figures quickly approached; they all appeared to be middle-aged or elderly men. A round-faced man glanced into the car, his voice wary: "It's late. What are you doing here?"

Hu Yi quickly signaled the driver to lower the window: "Hello, we're here to find someone."

"Looking for someone?" The round-faced man scrutinized them, then waved for the surrounding children to step back. "Get out and talk. Your car stinks, it's full of urine!"

The round-faced man spoke with a hint of alcohol in his voice, but he was clearly still quite sober. The men behind him didn't seem like villains either; they were probably just ordinary residents of the town. Hu Yi realized that this stalemate couldn't continue, so he nudged Yabalov: "Get out of the car."

Yabalov hesitated for a moment, then got out of the car first, and told the others to shield Hu Yi and the driver behind them, leaving only a half-person-wide gap for him to speak.

"Hey, five burly men, they all look really strong." The round-faced man smiled slightly, his eyes glazed with drunkenness, but his expression remained wary. "So, who are you looking for?"

"I'm looking for a man named Andrei," Hu Yi replied, then added, "He shouldn't be young; he's quite old."

"Andrei?" The round-faced man paused, then asked, "That's my name. Were you looking for me?"

"You? You're also called Andrei?" Hu Yi was stunned. "I spoke to you on the phone today, was it... was it you?"

"Then it's not that." Round-faced Andrei spread his hands, then pointed to an elderly man nearing sixty behind him: "He's also called Andrei. There are many people named Andrei in our town. Who are you looking for?"

"I...I'm also called Andrei." The boy Andrei, who had been sitting crookedly by the car, raised his hand. He was now sitting in his own urine, completely unaware of it.

"My name is Andrei too!" "Me too, Andrei!" Several more boys shouted from afar, "This is Andrei's hometown! Which Andrei are you looking for?"

"You...you...what are you saying..." Hu Yi laughed awkwardly, "You seem to...really like the name Andrei?"

"Of course!" The round-faced man said with solemn respect, "Andrei is a great hero of Abaryansk, and we are all proud to have his name on our names."

"Hero? Wh...what hero?"

"Andrei Andreyevich Ivanov, a lieutenant tank driver in the Soviet Red Army!" The round-faced man snapped to attention, his impassioned expression temporarily masking his drunkenness: "The only combat hero from Abalensk in the Great Patriotic War! He heroically sacrificed his life in the Battle of Moscow in October 1941! He rests in peace in Nikolayavets, only fifty kilometers from his hometown! He was only twenty-six years old! He is the eternal pride of our entire town!"

The noise from the town center in the distance seemed even louder. Hu Yi snapped out of his daze and realized that it was because everything around him had suddenly become completely silent.

He turned around in surprise and found that almost everyone around him was standing silently with their heads bowed, even those who were too drunk to stand were struggling to keep themselves from swaying. Even the completely drunk boy, Andrei, was clinging to a urine-soaked car tire, desperately trying to stand up, muttering repeatedly, "Hero! Andrei! Hero!"

In this situation, even though Hu Yi and the others knew nothing about the combat heroes they were talking about, they were still deeply shocked and stood there in a dark and solemn atmosphere.

Someone started it, and the crowd began to hum a majestic yet sorrowful song in low voices. The lyrics and melody were very simple, expressing the feelings of later generations for the hero Andrei. Dozens of young men and women and several middle-aged people spoke in different tones and pitches, but it was clear that everyone knew the song by heart.

They sang louder and louder, their voices rising higher and higher, their chests puffed out and heads held high. They exchanged intoxicated yet unwavering glances with the villagers around them, until the song ended, at which point they suddenly erupted in a thunderous cheer.

The young people around him resumed their drunken state, and Hu Yi was startled by their sudden cheers, his mood completely out of sync with his fellow villagers.

"So, there are many people in our town named Andrei now. I don't know which one you're looking for." The round-faced man, probably a little tipsy from his earlier impassioned speech, smiled dizzily at Hu Yi: "What's his last name?"

"I don't know his surname," Hu Yi said, shaking his head in frustration.

"His father's surname? You don't know? Then... does he have any distinctive features?"

Hu Yi hesitated for a moment. Although Andrei on the phone had said not to let anyone else know about Xiao Linzi, he probably only meant these drunken, unruly teenagers. The round-faced guy and the others seemed quite easy to talk to. So he cleared his throat and tentatively asked, "I haven't met that Andrei, but... do you know a fat guy?"

(End of this chapter)