Chapter 32: Not Even a Dog Would Stay

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“Science knows no borders, but scientists have a homeland.

My work belongs in China, my achievements belong in China, and my final resting place is in China…”

…An excerpt from the famous words spoken by Qian, one of the greatest scientists after the founding of the nation, a man once said to be worth at least five divisions, as he prepared to return home…

As Hu Biao strode through the rare winter sunshine over the capital, there was one thing he did not know.

Aside from him, who had safely returned to the modern world, the other four members of the unlucky five-man group that had crossed over with him to the Battle of Shanghai had also come back after being resurrected.

Though they had not witnessed it themselves, the four men who had died in battle—Zhou Kun, Zhang Wei, Gao Yi, and Wang Peng—had all returned to the modern world as well.

And after experiencing that extraordinary chapter of their lives, each of them had undergone a profound transformation in outlook.

For instance, at the same time Hu Biao was leaving home to eat hand-pulled noodles covered in hot oil and stuffed meat buns, in a city in the northeast that people had affectionately nicknamed “Erbin” over the past two years…

Inside an ordinary residential compound, in an apartment building that was no longer particularly new—

“Pengzi, have you been possessed or something? You didn’t even eat breakfast after getting up, and you’ve been rummaging around here ever since. What on earth are you looking for? Tell me. I might know where it is.”

A rosy-cheeked, energetic old woman spoke to her son, who was bent over with his backside raised as he searched through a pile of boxes.

The “Pengzi” in her mouth was naturally Wang Peng, the veteran of the People’s Liberation Army who had been one of the five-man group transported to the Battle of Shanghai.

After setting off the explosive charge, he had thought he had died for good. Yet when he awoke, he found himself back in his room at his family home in Erbin.

At first, just like Hu Biao, he thought he had merely experienced an unbelievably vivid dream.

But then, quite by accident, he found the black-and-white group photograph of the entire Special Forces Company in his pocket. From that moment on, everything was different.

With his thoughts in turmoil, the veteran sat motionless on his bed until dawn.

He only snapped out of it when the noises of his family waking stirred him from his trance. Wang Peng immediately got up and began rummaging through the room where the household odds and ends were kept.

What was he looking for? Naturally, the plaque bearing the words “A Glorious Family.”

It was a small plaque symbolizing his honorable service during the finest years of his life—a distinction he had once considered an immense honor.

Yet after everything he had witnessed on the Battle of Shanghai, he understood one thing: this country and this nation would never lack traitors, collaborators, scoundrels, or sons of bitches.

But that was no reason to do nothing when this land needed to be defended.

Young Master Feng, the Old Company Commander, Bucktooth, the Little Bride—those forebears who remained so vividly alive in his memories had already set the finest example for him.

The reason for defending the country was absolutely not to protect that handful of rotten people and spineless cowards. It was to protect the land on which his ancestors had lived and multiplied for ten thousand years.

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And so that, for many more years to come, his descendants could continue to live upon it.

After a thorough search, he finally unearthed the plaque bearing the words “A Glorious Family.” Never before had Wang Peng felt such a small plaque weigh so heavily.

Ten minutes later, Wang Peng turned around and solemnly asked his mother once more:

“Mom, is the plaque hanging straight?”

“Straight as can be—just like our Pengzi, upright and honorable. All right! Come eat. I made your favorite breakfast today: pickled-cabbage and pork pot stickers.”

“All right! I’m coming. I’ll be sure to eat plenty,” Wang Peng replied loudly.

But before he began eating at the table, he took out his phone and changed his profile signature on WeChat back to a single sentence:

When war comes, answer the call; when summoned, return…

******

At the same time, though the location was now Huadu District in the city of Guangzhou, inside an old residential building—

After patting her son on the head, Zhang’s mother said in astonishment, “You little rascal, you don’t have a fever today. What’s gotten into you?”

Hearing that, Zhang Wei felt speechless—and strangely ashamed.

Ashamed of what? Naturally, of the fact that, despite being in the prime of youth and full of energy, he had spent his days sleeping until two or three in the afternoon.

After grabbing something quick to eat at home, he would go out and fool around with the other young men in society.

He would never return before two or three in the morning.

The worst part was that he had accomplished nothing. Usually, he merely idled away his time in billiard halls and arcades, mixing with young girls sporting wildly exaggerated hairstyles.

Back then, he had thought he was impressive and formidable.

But now that he thought about it carefully, he had really been an idiot.

As breakfast was nearly over, Zhang Wei said to his father, “Dad, didn’t you say last time that Uncle Third’s second son could teach me to operate an excavator at the construction site?

“When you have time, could you ask him whether he still needs an apprentice? I promise I’ll study hard once I get there.”

Though he had no idea what had caused his troublesome son to change so dramatically, Zhang’s father readily agreed again and again.

“All right, all right, I’ll call him later.

“And you, you little rascal—are you feeling unwell somewhere? Should we go to the hospital and get you checked out?”

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Faced with this unprecedented concern and nervousness from the father who usually looked at him with the same disgust one reserved for dog droppings, Zhang Wei was momentarily at a loss.

“Grandpa, please don’t be angry. You’ll only damage your health. I know I was wrong! I’ll fly back in a few days and go to work. I’ll help build our motherland.”

Holding the phone, Zhou Kun solemnly reassured his grandfather, Zhou Zhiguo, who was ten thousand miles away.

He did not know what had happened after he disconnected. He did not know which of the three men—Hu Biao, Gao Yi, or Zhang Wei—had survived.

In any case, the thing he had feared most had not happened after he awoke.

That was to say, there had been no time paradox in which his grandfather, having never been adopted, caused everyone connected to him to disappear.

Once he had composed himself, he called his grandfather to apologize.

He did not mention that, on the other end of the line, the old man had already been weeping with joy while repeatedly saying, “Good, good, good.”

After ending the call, Zhou Kun felt an indescribable clarity in his heart. He called several friends to say goodbye and booked a flight home.

Then something astonishing happened.

There was a research topic he had been studying with his academic adviser for a long time, yet had never been able to make any progress on.

It concerned room-temperature superconducting materials.

All at once, an endless stream of inspiration began pouring into his mind.

Knowing that inspiration often vanished in the blink of an eye, Zhou Kun did not dare waste a moment. He immediately bent over the table in his apartment and began writing and calculating.

By the time he finally put down his pen, twelve hours had passed.

Yet every moment of that effort had been worthwhile. He had developed what he considered an exceptionally reliable theory and framework—in other words, a complete direction for future research.

Moreover, he possessed astonishing confidence in the validity of that direction.

He believed that, by following it and carrying out a series of laboratory verifications, preliminary results could be produced before long.

After that would come the research required to refine the process and bring it into industrial production.

Thinking of that miraculous, utterly inexplicable flash of genius, Zhou Kun drew upon his own experiences and began to sense something faintly.

He murmured, “Let this material be the gift I present to our great motherland after I return.”

Then a fierce hunger swept over him, and Zhou Kun felt as though he could devour an entire cow.

As he ate bread and drank milk, he grumbled, “In this lousy place, you can’t even get a proper bowl of noodles covered in hot oil or a stuffed meat bun. It’s the kind of place not even a dog would stay in…”

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