The summer sun blazed mercilessly in the afternoon. The asphalt had grown soft under the heat,...
It was just past midnight on the duty room’s digital clock. The lights were pale and dim....
Silent and reserved, Ning Xiaoshuai endured the strange looks from others and the teasing...
Ning Xiaoshuai had come to work at an electronics factory in Shenzhen, a city in southern China....
It was cool on the late summer night. Ning Xiaoshuai straightened the collar of his uniform,...
The rain pattered softly, rustling against the pine trees in the cemetery. Ning Xiaoshuai pulled...
Chen Guo was born into a working-class family on an old street. His father, Chen Guang, was quiet...
Chen Guo stood before the floor-to-ceiling windows of his 28th-floor office in Jinding...
That night, Chen Guo lay on an Italian leather sofa—cream-white, top-grain calfskin. When he...
The rain came again, fine threads drifting through the night, thick with the damp smell of wet...
The plane touched down in the small border town as the sunset dyed the sky red. Ning Xiaoshuai...
After leaving the factory, Xiaoshuai searched everywhere for a job, but found nothing for more...
Another unfamiliar city. Xiaoshuai dragged his heavy feet out of the station, and a wave of...
Deep in the void, nebulae drift like silk ribbons torn apart by time, flowing slowly through...
The 34th Year of the Jiajing Reign, December. By the time Yan Shifan’s sedan chair stopped in...
As the faint glow of the ionosphere washed over Yan Shifan’s soul, he still clung to the rage and...
God first noticed the problem thirty-five billion years after Creation. Or rather, not...
It was another five hundred million years before God truly remembered Mars. “Remembered”...
One day, God called for his servant. He had never intended to do so. In four and a half...
God buried his face in his arms, breathing evenly. Then he dreamed.The scene in the dream was...
The forty-fourth year of the Jiajing reign, late autumn. The glazed tiles of the Forbidden...
After Mars was written off, God staked all his hopes on Earth. But even after he tweaked...
At some moment in cosmic time, a breathtaking sight unfolded. Earth tore itself open...
God sat motionless before the crystal ball for a long time, his fingers brushing the smooth...
Yan Xiaofan could crawl when he was only six months old. Liu E’zi thought to herself: this...
Yan Xiaofan’s name was given to him by his father, Yan Gaoshan. According to village...
Earth was finally calm. The Moon’s tides continued to slow its rotation. A day stretched...
The Sun and the Earth would never claim this child as their own. Not for lack of love, but out of...
Humankind first noticed the Moon when they still lived in caves. They had no writing, no...
Filled with doubt, Ning Xiaoshuai returned to the duty room. The moment he pushed open the door,...