Once We Lived in Nanjing

Rat poison?

Bai Yang immediately started searching.

Nowadays, it's hard to find an old man selling rat poison at a roadside stall, with a circle of dead rats laid out on the ground, quite ceremonial and intimidating. To the rats, this must undoubtedly look like a terrifying sacrificial ritual to an evil deity.

Bai Yang could only turn to the Internet for solutions.

These days, the names of rat poisons are all about fantasy. Bai Yang looked up and spotted a shop named "Rat Exterminator," and before he could even be impressed, another "Rat Extermination Emperor" popped up.

There was also "Death Upon Sight."

Rat poison strong.

Rat King Killer.

Rat Sweeping Ridge.

Wait, it seems like something odd has snuck in.

To ensure long-term preservation, Bai Yang tried to pick inorganic chemical rat poisons, avoiding organic poisons or biological agents like botulinum toxin.

After some consideration, Bai Yang felt zinc phosphide was the most suitable, a simple concoction of red phosphorus and zinc powder, stable and not prone to spoilage.

Place the order!

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The next day.

Wang Ning and Zhao Bowen buried the time capsule; they placed ten stainless steel capsules underground. Wang Ning vehemently assured that there would be absolutely no problems, stomping firmly on the leveled soil, he told Zhao Bowen, "Buried this deep, ten capsules, guaranteed twenty years no issues."

They called for a mini-excavator and dug two pits, one meter deep and half a meter square, burying five time capsules in each. The reason why the property management didn't cause trouble was that the community's property manager was the nephew of a close friend of Zhao Bowen's classmate's mother—a relationship that could be traced through all sorts of connections. Zhao Bowen brought certification from the Physics Department of Nanjing University to the property management, claiming that Nanjing University had a minor physics experiment and hoped for the community's cooperation.

The experiment was about digging a hole in the ground and burying something. Zhao Bowen said it was a shallow ground temperature monitoring experiment, where the "thermometers" buried would record temperature changes every hour of every day for a full year, profoundly significant for research on plant root systems and urban gardening planning. As for choosing Meihua Villa, it was because the place was believed to have good Feng Shui.

The property management happily agreed, ready to sacrifice even their lives for scientific research.

Wang Ning gained a new appreciation for Zhao Bowen's ability to spin tales.

"You so sure about this?" asked Zhao Bowen.

"We've played with time capsules before," Wang Ning replied. "A few years back when I just started working, my workplace organized an event where each person had to write a letter to their future self to be opened in a decade or so. We made a time capsule, sealed everyone's letters, and buried it underground."

"What happened later?" inquired Zhao Bowen, "Did you dig it up when the time came?"

"It was dug up," Wang Ning answered, "All went smoothly, everyone's letters were intact. Don't listen to Yangyang babbling on, talking about this interference and that interference. In reality, there's not that much interference. Who would be bothered with this stuff all day long, old Zhao, let me tell you. Once you bury a time capsule, if it remains untouched for a week or two, nobody touches it anymore."

"Why?"

"Because everyone pretty much forgot about it." Wang Ning slipped his hands into his trouser pockets, "Busy with work, going home to be with the wife, and if you encounter something like an evaluation for a civilized workplace, you have to work overtime. Who spends their days worrying about a capsule?"

"What did you write in your letter?"

"I wrote that ten years on, I would be the head of the Provincial Industry and Information Department, so I started it with 'Dear Director Wang'," Wang Ning chuckled, "Young and naive, a calf unafraid of tigers."

"It's okay, there will be a chance," Zhao Bowen said. "Director Wang, you are only four levels away from Minister Wang."

"I don't see that happening in this life; I reckon the highest I'll get is a division chief before I retire," Wang Ning shook his head, "But Xiao Yang said the world is going to end in a few years anyway. Everyone on earth will die, so whether you're a division chief or a minister doesn't matter. I should just resign tomorrow and spend the last of my days doing everything I've wanted to do."

"Run naked at Xinjiekou?" Zhao Bowen asked, "You've always wanted to do that, huh?"

"Get out of here, you're such a jokester." Wang Ning lifted his foot to kick at him. "Look at you, a associate professor, aren't you afraid of setting a bad example for your students?"

"I really do want to run naked at Xinjiekou," Zhao Bowen said. "What place is Xinjiekou? It's the busiest commercial street in the whole world. Running naked there would definitely be meaningful."

"What meaning could there be besides disrupting public decency?"

"You don't get it; this is called performance art," Zhao Bowen said.

"I can't understand you intellectuals," Wang Ning shook his head, "Let's get back to the serious topic. Old Zhao, what do you make of what Xiao Yang said?"

"It's hard to say," Zhao Bowen pursed his lips, looked up and scanned the apartment buildings around him. He stood under the shade of a camphor tree, dressed in a white POLO shirt. "To be honest, I'm as confused as anyone. Subjectively, I don't believe in time travel; there's no theory supporting such phenomenon. But we can't explain that muddleheaded machine of ours, right?"

"Did you manage to borrow the electromagnetic wave darkroom?"

"I'm on it, I'm on it," Zhao Bowen said. "I flipped through files all of last night, hadn't stayed up that late since I was promoted to associate professor. From my limited understanding, humanity currently has no solid theoretical basis to explain this phenomenon. In theory, it shouldn't exist at all. We are like blind men riding a blind horse; without a theory, we can only advance through experiments."

Wang Ning looked down at the ground, stomping it with his shoe sole, creating several footprints in the dirt.

"Relying on this?"

"Relying on this for now," Zhao Bowen said.

"As a modern physics experiment, isn't this too rudimentary?" Wang Ning asked.

"There are even more rudimentary experiments out there," Zhao Bowen laughed, "As long as it helps us achieve our goal, who cares if it looks crude."

He patted Old Wang on the shoulder.

"If the experiment succeeds and confirms what Yangyang said is true, then our troubles will really begin... Come on, the sun's about to hit us, let's go get a drink."

Wang Ning sighed and followed him back.

It's hard to say whether they were lucky or unlucky.

Because Wang Ning's experiment did not validate what Bai Yang said. This doesn't mean Bai Yang was lying or deceiving everyone. Instead, the experiment failed. If the experiment would have revealed a frightening, even devastating truth, then the failure undoubtedly granted everyone a reprieve and a space for self-comfort – as long as the lid isn't lifted, no one can see whether there's a death sentence under it.

That night, Bai Yang got in touch with BG4MSR and, as planned, had her go to the burial site to dig up the time capsule.

As Bai Yang expected, she could not find any of the ten stainless steel capsules.

(Author's idle talk: Tonight I've updated over five thousand words in one go, making up for yesterday's shortfall.

Also, it's time for a friendly recommendation:

I recommend two books, one is 'End of Transformed People' by Li Qi.

The other is 'Cross-dressing is a disease' by Jiannan Shaohun.)