Apocalyptic Hoarding Diary

The road ahead widened, and the tracks left by trampling became more and more obvious.

The muddy ground was covered with countless footprints of varying depths, some with the teeth of rain boots, others with the mesh pattern of sneakers, all haphazardly intertwined.

As she crossed a small hill, she saw the tail end of the group.

At first, there were just a few blurry figures, appearing and disappearing in the rain. Only when you got closer could you see that they were a few people walking very slowly.

An elderly man with a hunched back, draped in a plastic sheet, was using a tree branch he had picked up from somewhere as a cane.

He walked cautiously, as if testing the ground with his feet.

A middle-aged woman was holding a child, who was wrapped in an adult's coat, with only a small patch of dark hair showing.

The middle-aged woman bent over, carrying the child's entire weight on her body, and had to stop to catch her breath every few steps.

There was also a lame man with his left foot wrapped in bandages, the original color of which was no longer visible, having been stained yellowish-brown by mud.

He walked with a limp, his face twitching with each step.

Most of the people in front have already left, and those left behind are mostly the elderly, the weak, the sick, and the disabled.

Xu Xiaoyan slowed her pace and walked past them, her gaze sweeping across their faces. No one looked up at her, no one spoke, and everyone walked in silence.

As a result, after only a few minutes of walking in the crowd, someone grabbed his right arm.

The hand reached out from behind her right side. She didn't even hear the footsteps; the rain was so loud that it swallowed up all the footsteps.

His fingers gripped her right arm tightly. Even through the sleeve of her windproof suit, she could feel the strength; it wasn't a light touch, but a firm, real grip.

The hand wasn't particularly strong, but the undisguised offense sent a rush of blood to her head.

She turned around and saw a short, middle-aged man with yellow teeth, about 1.6 meters tall, half a head shorter than Xu Xiaoyan who was wearing rain boots.

He was very thin and wore a drab old cotton-padded jacket. Two buttons were missing, revealing the blackened cotton wadding inside.

His face was the kind of face that someone who had struggled at the bottom of society for many years had: rough, dark skin, deep-set eyes, prominent cheekbones, and several deep forehead wrinkles.

What's most striking is his teeth; they're so yellow they're almost black, and he's missing a front tooth, which is very noticeable when he smiles.

He stared at Xu Xiaoyan lecherously, his gaze sliding from her face to her chest, from her chest to her waist, and from her waist to the backpack on her back.

Finally, the gaze returned to her face, her mouth twisted to one side, revealing a row of uneven, yellow teeth.

He immediately started with vulgar language: "Hey, woman... all alone? Carrying so much stuff, aren't you tired? Want your brother to help you carry it?"

His hand didn't loosen; instead, it tightened, and his fingers moved slightly across her arm, as if testing her reaction.

He didn't have a raincoat, and rainwater streamed down his hair and into his collar.

He was completely oblivious, staring at her with a gaze that, in a way that was neither scrutiny nor appraising, contained a base and undisguised possessiveness.

Xu Xiaoyan didn't speak. With a flick of her right hand, the fruit knife slid out of her side pocket, the blade flashing a cold white light in the rain.

The blade is not long; it fits perfectly in the palm of your hand, with the tip peeking out from between your fingers.

She didn't swing the knife; she simply turned around to face the man, holding the knife in her right hand with the tip pressed against his chest.

It neither pushed forward nor pulled back, but simply pointed steadily at his heart.

The tip of the knife was less than two centimeters from his cotton-padded coat; she could even see the distorted, yellowish shadow of that person reflected on the blade.

She looked into his eyes without saying a word.

The man thought she was all show and no substance. He glanced down at the fruit knife pressed against his chest, then looked up at Xu Xiaoyan's face.

His lips curled into a grin again. "Wow, that's pretty bold..."

He reached out his left hand, actually trying to push the knife away, while his other hand, gripping her arm, not loosened its hold but tightened even more. "Little sister, what are you doing...?"

Before he could finish speaking, Xu Xiaoyan made two cuts on his right and left arms in a few quick movements.

The first cut was made on the back of his right hand, with the blade moving from the radial side to the ulnar side.

Make a shallow cut from the base of the index finger to the base of the little finger, just deep enough to cut through the skin and subcutaneous fat, revealing the pink, slightly trembling small muscle group underneath.

Blood seeped from the cut, starting as a few small, round red dots, then coalescing into a thin line of blood.

It flowed down the back of his hand, dripped onto his trouser leg, and onto the muddy ground, where it was washed away by the rain into a small, pale red stain.

The second cut was made on his left arm, along his forearm, from the wrist towards the elbow.

The knife tip grazed the sleeve of the cotton-padded jacket, past the small section of wrist exposed at the cuff, slicing through the bluish veins and light-colored tendons.

The rain lashed against the wound, and only then did the man realize what was happening. A pig-like scream erupted from his throat: "Ah—! My hand—!"

The man released his grip on Xu Xiaoyan's hand, took two steps back, stepped into a muddy puddle, and nearly fell backward.

He looked down at his left hand, where the cut on the back of his hand had been opened up by the rain, revealing pink muscle tissue underneath. Blood and rainwater mixed together, covering his hand.

He raised his right arm again, looked at the knife mark that stretched from his wrist to his elbow, and cried out with his mouth open, his voice so shrill it almost pierced the eardrums.

The people around seemed to be used to this kind of scene.

No one stopped or turned around to look. The people at the front of the line continued walking, their pace neither quickening nor slowing down because of the shout.

Their eyes remained fixed on the road ahead.

Some of the elderly, weak, sick, and disabled who were lagging behind looked up briefly, then quickly looked down again, their expressions unchanged.

This means that this has happened so many times that no one wants to even glance at it anymore.

Seeing that no one was making a fuss or paying attention, Xu Xiaoyan washed the fruit knife in the puddle, removed the blood droplets and scraps of cloth from the blade, and then put it back in the side pocket of her backpack.

She didn't look at the man again, but turned around and continued walking forward.

It's as if what happened in those last few seconds was just a trivial interlude in the rain, not worth mentioning.

She walked a little further and gradually moved from the back of the line into the middle. The number of people increased, and they were no longer just a few scattered individuals, but rather crowded together in groups.