Feng Yu was a middle-aged man. In his own words, he was mature, steady, dependable, dashingly handsome, with just the right touch of weary melancholy—enough to make hearts flutter across the world, especially those of young girls.
It wasn't entirely an exaggeration. If he bothered to shower more often, shave, fix his rotten teeth, and dress in something other than stained coveralls—and maybe shave a few years off his age—he might actually pull it off.
But life doesn't work on hypotheticals. So Feng Yu remained what he was: a single, childless, unremarkable middle-aged man who spent his Mondays through Thursdays zoning out behind the counter of an old electronics repair shop on Fourth Street, Langxiang Avenue, occasionally drooling at the sight of passing policewomen in uniform.
The shop itself did surprisingly good business, largely because Feng Yu was talented. Whether it was the latest scroll-glass display, some relic of a liquid crystal screen, an overclocked room regulator, or a kid's busted hoverboard—if it had wires or circuits, he could fix it.
Good business meant steady income, which in turn allowed Feng Yu to close up shop during the three state-mandated rest days each week and make his rounds through the various rehab centers of Hexi Prefecture. He met many women there, spent quite a bit of silver, and earned himself a local reputation as a man with a rather indulgent appetite for the opposite sex.
But what no one knew was that, in recent years, he hadn't been spending every weekend on pleasure. Some weekends, he'd disappear to a remote, abandoned mine far beyond city limits. The place had been shut down for years—ever since a catastrophic collapse a decade ago bankrupted the United Consortium. No one had set foot there since. The old miners' lounge had quietly become Feng Yu's private workshop, and nobody had noticed.
Xu Le shot a glance at the man slumped on the couch, sighed, and pulled a steaming tray from the stove. He set it down on the table and said, "Dinner's ready." Then, with practiced care, he fetched a hot towel and began wiping the older man's face.
No matter how irritated Xu Le might feel, his innate softness always got the better of him. Seeing this wreck of a man sprawled out like that made him want to help, no matter how much he grumbled about it.
Feng Yu sat at the table and started chewing noisily on a hunk of stringy meat. "Why does the buffalo meat keep getting tougher?"
"Any meat tastes awful after six months in a freezer," Xu Le replied flatly, ladling a bowl of rice for himself and sitting down. Their eating habits had grown strange over the past two years—strange, and by Donglin District standards, ridiculously extravagant.
"You never answered my question," Xu Le said suddenly, setting his chopsticks down. "I know you used to be a military tech, and that you went AWOL after pissing off someone upstairs. But the shock baton you taught me to build—come on, it's way too advanced. Look at this—I made it days ago, and Baolongtao's still too scared to even ask who Li Wei is."
"I told you two years ago—I'm a man with a story," Feng Yu said smugly, clearly unfazed by the nausea his words tended to induce. "Back when I was in the army, I had access to tech so classified, even talking about it now feels like treason. A shock baton? Kid, if you gave me the parts, I could build you a standard-issue coil cannon."
Xu Le had heard this kind of talk too many times to react. He just shook his head and muttered, "Yeah, right. Last time I brought you a mech's control core from the junkyard, you stared at it for five days and didn't even dare to touch it."
Feng Yu's face twitched. He coughed, then snapped, "That thing was a Fourth Military Zone antique! Nobody's touched that model in centuries. Of course I had to appreciate it first."
"But seriously, what else do you know how to make besides that baton?" Xu Le asked, frustration creeping into his voice. "It's been two years. All I've learned from you is how to fix TVs, freezers, toys, and cars. The defense recruitment test is in two years, and I've never even touched a mech or a warship. How the hell am I supposed to pass?"
Feng Yu chewed in silence for a moment before growling, "You didn't even finish twelve years of compulsory education, and you're not from a military tech academy. What exactly do you expect to pass? The Defense Ministry's always recruiting cannon fodder—you want to sign up? Every marine unit would love you."
Xu Le blinked, then said earnestly, "If I pass the exam, I can enlist as a mechanical technician. That's a real position."
Feng Yu looked up at the boy he knew so well and sighed. "You still haven't given up on that ridiculous dream?"
"What's ridiculous about it?" Xu Le's eyes shone with quiet determination. "My first dream is to serve on a battleship as an assistant engineer. My second is to get into one of the capital ring's big corporate R&D departments and finally live a decent life."
"There's still a war going on in the Xilin region," Feng Yu said, voice suddenly level. "Forget about the battleship. As for the second one… it's not impossible."
They ate quickly, like always. Xu Le was already clearing the dishes when he replied, "That war's been going on for sixty years. Nobody in Donglin's even seen an Imperial in person—just footage of diplomats on TV. What's there to be afraid of?"
He paused, then added quietly, "I know I'm not some kind of genius. It took me two years just to make a shock baton. But I really enjoy working with machines. I want to try for the exam."
Feng Yu didn't say anything. He slumped back on the couch and turned on the TV, but his eyes stayed on Xu Le's back.
After the dishes were done, Xu Le slipped into the workshop and began methodically repairing the pile of broken appliances with the calm precision of someone who knew each tool like an extension of his own hand.
Most of the repairs weren't complicated, but Xu Le worked as though he were handling cutting-edge federal tech. Maybe he didn't even realize it, but every time he immersed himself in the work, a quiet brilliance lit up his young face.
From the other side of the glass, Feng Yu lit a cigarette and squinted through the haze at the boy's focused figure. He made a mental note to lower the dust index in the workshop another notch. Then he remembered what Xu Le had said earlier, and couldn't help but smile. He exhaled a smoke ring.
The smoke drifted up and disappeared into his graying hair. Feng Yu thought to himself: Everyone always said he was the genius—but in some ways, the kid might just be even more of one.