Two Realms: A cartload of rice arrived at the end of the Ming Dynasty

"There will be light rain in some parts of Vancouver from tonight to tomorrow night."

"During the early morning, there is heavy rain and fog, resulting in poor visibility. Drivers are advised to exercise caution while driving."

On the winding and steep mountain road, a silver pickup truck with a Zhejiang C license plate and a dark green tarpaulin covering the cargo bed is speeding along at more than 60 kilometers per hour.

The radio in the carriage was playing a morning program, and a young man wearing an oversized blue work uniform was sitting in the driver's seat.

This young man is named Zhu Shiting. He is 29 years old, unmarried, and a native of Ruixian County, Wenzhou City. His main job is as a full-time delivery driver for Lalamove, a social idler.

Last night I received a big order from the city's farmers' market to deliver a truckload of over 200 bags of Wuchang rice, each weighing 10 kilograms, to Wuling Temple in Jiyun Mountain in the suburbs. It is said that the masters in the temple prepared the rice for a feast for believers during their fast.

A round trip can earn more than 150 yuan in freight, so Zhu Shiting gets up before 5 a.m. to set off.

However, because the rice he was carrying was quite heavy, his 1.5-liter Changan Kuayue King was a bit underpowered, and no matter how he shifted gears and revved the engine after entering the mountains, the speed could not be increased.

If he were driving an empty car, he would have to speed at least 80 kilometers per hour on this mountain road that he had driven countless times to live up to his nickname "Red Star Village Car God".

"It's really foggy?"

As Zhu Shiting listened to the local radio station 100.3, he noticed that the fog on the mountain road directly in front of his car window was getting thicker and thicker, so he skillfully turned on the car's hazard lights and fog lights.

At this moment, a lucky charm hanging on the rearview mirror was swinging wildly with the vehicle.

However, an accident still occurred when they were going around a sharp bend!

With a loud bang, the right rear tire, which had just been patched a few days ago, suddenly blew out without warning.

The immense inertia from the turn, combined with the weight of the truckload of rice, caused the silver pickup truck to overturn and plunge into the thick fog beside the mountain road.

What's worse, because few vehicles pass through this bend, there are no guardrails, only a conspicuous warning sign that reads "Slow down on sharp turns".

After a series of loud crashes and thuds, the silver pickup truck rolled down a slope with a drop of more than ten meters and landed in a raised, abandoned farmland.

A few minutes later, Zhu Shiting, who was dazed and confused from the fall, miraculously climbed out of the broken driver's side window.

"Holy crap! Thank goodness I was wearing my seatbelt!"

"Otherwise, we're really in trouble this time."

Zhu Shiting trembled as he checked his injuries. His face and clothes were covered in blood, and even the ancestral jade pendant on his chest was soaked with blood.

Fortunately, it was all just minor scrapes and bruises; he could still move normally. Looking terrified, Zhu Shiting started muttering to himself, "So lucky! So lucky!"

He had actually been in several accidents while driving for Lalamove before. The most dangerous one was when he was sandwiched between two red semi-trailers. Luckily, the accident happened in the city.

If this happened on the highway, both the people and the car would be crushed into a pancake.

……

After a few minutes, Zhu Shiting, who had survived the ordeal, found his phone, which had fallen out of the driver's seat, and planned to call the police for help.

In this episode, Yunshan's mountain road is rarely visited, and the place where he had the car accident was too remote, with no villages nearby. Calling the police was the right choice.

Zhu Shiting was stunned as soon as he turned on the phone with its cracked screen.

"Out of service area?"

"Why is there not a single bar of signal?"

"Mine is a dual-SIM, dual-standby device!"

Zhu Shiting held up his Oppo phone and spun around in place a few times.

To make it easier to take orders, he has both China Telecom and China Mobile numbers installed, so even when he's in the remote mountains and forests of Wencheng, he can barely get a few bars of signal.

This episode of Yunshan is just in the suburbs of the county. In his memory, he had made several trips there before and the 5G signal was full, so he could watch Douyin (TikTok) smoothly without any lag.

"Did you break your phone?"

Zhu Shiting checked his phone and found that all functions worked except for the lack of signal, which left him speechless.

If he had known this would happen, he would have gritted his teeth and bought a higher-end Huawei phone that could make satellite calls.

It's a bit expensive, but at least if something happens, you can ask for help and save your life!

After fiddling around in place for a while and still not receiving a signal, Zhu Shiting thought he would climb up the mountain road to see if he could get lucky and flag down a passing vehicle for help.

The thick fog in the mountains began to dissipate slowly, and the visibility gradually improved. Zhu Shiting looked up at the slope he had fallen down and stood there dumbfounded.

The roadbed, originally built with cement and rocks, had vanished, and the two-lane mountain road leading into the mountains had been transformed into a muddy, overgrown, narrow path.

"What... what's going on?"

Zhu Shiting stared wide-eyed, searching for modern facilities.

All the utility poles, power towers, signal stations, and even the warning sign that reminded people to slow down when making sharp turns, have vanished without a trace.

Sensing something was wrong, he crawled back into the truck's cab and pulled out a stun gun for self-defense from the armrest box.

Ten out of ten drivers who drive cars will carry some self-defense equipment in their vehicles, such as folding batons, stun guns, tiger knuckles, pepper spray, and so on.

Although the public security is very good these days, if you're on the road all the time, you might encounter unexpected situations like road rage.

Therefore, these kinds of self-defense tools sell quite well on Taobao, and most of the buyers are drivers like Zhu Shiting.

Holding the stun gun in his hand, Zhu Shiting pressed it a few times, and looking at the flickering arcs of electricity on the stun gun, he felt a strange sense of confidence.

Slowly climbing up the slope, Zhu Shiting looked out towards the outside of the mountain after reaching the top of the mountain path.

Jiyun Mountain is the highest mountain on the outskirts of Ruixian County. On weekends, many tourists like to climb the mountain to enjoy the panoramic view of the city.

Through the thin mist, Zhu Shiting could see the Feiyun River, winding its way through Rui County and into the sea, but...

"Where the hell am I supposed to go with my huge town of Ruixian?"

"What the hell is this place?!"

Zhu Shiting's pupils dilated in shock, and a nameless panic rose in his heart.

Just then, a commotion came from the mountain road in the distance.

"Young Miss, it's just around the corner at the mouth of the valley ahead."

"I saw a lump of iron made of silver suddenly roll down the mountain!"

"There was a demonic monk dressed in blue inside that iron lump. I was too scared to go near it, so I went back to the village and called everyone to come and take a look together."

A group of farmers, with their hair tied up in buns, dressed in rags and looking pale, carrying various tools such as carrying poles, hoes, and spears, escorted a woman in a red dress carrying a knife and a bow down from the mountain path.

The group probably numbered twenty or thirty, including men, women, and children. The little old man leading the way pointed and gestured towards the bend in the road ahead.

Upon seeing Zhu Shiting standing there in a daze, the old man exclaimed in surprise, "It's him! It's that evil monk!"