Chapter 77: Old Man, Are You Visiting Familiar Grounds Again?
The cold moonlight shone on the Bai Ge Zhuang Demolition Area, making it look like ruins that had been bombed by missiles several times.
It was the collapsed small building where Jiang Tao had previously rescued Sun Xiao Bao.
It was the same floor slab, the same person.
Sun Xiao Bao was once again pinned down by the same floor slab that had pinned him down once before.
Last time, Jiang Tao had rescued him and left in a hurry.
Sun Xiao Bao hadn’t even had time to take the ten-odd jin of steel rebar ends he had scavenged.
After returning home and recovering, the more he thought about it, the more regretful he felt.
Ten-odd jin of steel rebar, at the current scrap iron price, could sell for over ten yuan, it was such a waste to lose it!
So, Sun Xiao Bao revisited the place.
Fortunately, hardly anyone came here, and he easily found the ten-odd jin of steel rebar ends he had lost last time.
Then, he impulsively poked at the steel rebar ends that he hadn’t managed to get before.
Then…
The familiar thing happened again.
With a clang, Sun Xiao Bao was pinned down again!
His position was even almost the same as before!
For the past two days, suffering from hunger and cold, he was so hungry that he was a bit delirious.
He could barely distinguish whether the time Jiang Tao rescued him a few days ago was a hallucination.
Perhaps, no one had ever come to save him.
Was it just an illusion before his death?
How could a person be crushed by the same floor slab twice in the same place!
The more Sun Xiao Bao pondered, the more he felt it was likely his own delusion, that no one would come to save a lonely old man like him.
Enduring the intense hunger in his stomach, Sun Xiao Bao thought to himself that his life was probably going to end here.
As the saying goes, at sixty-six, one doesn’t lose a limb.
It seemed this was a tribulation destined by fate, and he was fated not to pass the age of sixty-six.
Recalling the past sixty-six years, Sun Xiao Bao felt his whole life had been filled with hardship, and he had lived too miserably.
His mother died during childbirth when he was born, so he never knew his mother.
His father raised him with great care.
When he was 15, his father died in a traffic accident.
At 26, he got married through the introduction of an elder in his clan, and took a wife.
As a result, his wife also died during childbirth.
He raised his son alone and even helped his son get married.
As a result, his son lost over a million yuan in stock trading and directly jumped from the building.
His daughter-in-law left behind a 3-year-old grandson and ran away.
Sun Xiao Bao supported his grandson’s education for 20 years, and finally saw his grandson graduate from university.
As a result, on graduation day, his eldest grandson sacrificed himself while rescuing someone who had fallen into the water.
In sixty-six years, Sun Xiao Bao had seen off his mother, father, wife, son, and grandson.
The successive deaths of his loved ones also made him lose the courage to live, and he became disheartened and dejected.
Sun Xiao Bao drowned his sorrows in alcohol every day, becoming a notorious drunkard in Bai Ge Zhuang.
Before Bai Ge Zhuang was demolished, although he didn’t have much money, the family of the girl his grandson had bravely saved was wealthy.
The girl’s father would send him a case of Moutai, a pack of tea, and three cartons of good cigarettes every month.
This continued for over ten years, and he still receives them monthly.
For the first few years, Sun Xiao Bao drank and smoked all the tobacco and alcohol himself.
It was only in the last three or four years, after a sudden awakening, that he started to quit smoking and drinking, and accumulated quite some inventory at home.
At his age, he didn’t know how to do anything new and didn’t want to be a security guard and be managed like a grandson.
So he resumed his father’s old trade and started scavenging.
And indeed, although this job was not dignified, it was free and unrestrained.
He could earn four or five thousand a month, which was more than being a security guard!
In recent years, Bai Ge Zhuang also underwent demolition.
Sun Xiao Bao’s old house was quite large, and he was allocated 5 apartments and tens of thousands of cash.
In a sense, Sun Xiao Bao had already achieved the financial freedom that many young people pursue.
His assets were enough for him to live out his remaining years comfortably.
However, Sun Xiao Bao was born with a destiny for hard work and couldn’t rest.
When he was idle, he would either have a headache or a fever, or he would miss his deceased relatives.
Therefore, even though his life was worry-free, he insisted on continuing his own business.
Don’t look at him going out early and returning late every day, without rest in any season; his health was actually getting better and better.
See, after being pinned down by a floor slab weighing two to three hundred jin for more than two days, he not only wasn’t stiff but even had the energy to think about such things.
“Sigh… it’s all fate!”
“Old man, I’ve finally finished all the suffering in this life.”
“I hope in the next life I’ll be reborn into a good family and suffer less!”
Just as Sun Xiao Bao despaired, closed his eyes, and prepared to wait for death.
He suddenly heard the sound of footsteps approaching from a distance.
A hallucination, it must be starting again.
It was so late at night, who would come to such a godforsaken place?
Even though Sun Xiao Bao heard the sound, he was too lazy to call for help, thinking he would just die.
Suddenly, a strong beam of flashlight shone on Sun Xiao Bao’s face.
“Oh my, Grandpa Sun, it’s you again! Are you revisiting the old place?”
Seeing Sun Xiao Bao pinned under the floor slab, Jiang Tao knew it was impolite to laugh out loud at this moment, but he really couldn’t hold it in.
The place looked more and more familiar to him; wasn’t this where he had rescued Grandpa Sun last time?
He was starting to suspect if Grandpa Sun was trying to commit suicide and deliberately moved a stone to crush himself.
“Huh? You are…”
Upon hearing Jiang Tao’s voice, Sun Xiao Bao felt it was familiar, and only then did he open his eyes to look at him.
“Grandpa Sun, it’s me! Jiang Tao! We met a couple of days ago.”
While speaking, Jiang Tao quickly walked to Sun Xiao Bao’s side.
For Sun Xiao Bao, this old man, the floor slab was as heavy as the Five Finger Mountain.
For Jiang Tao, a man in his prime who often did manual labor, it was nothing.
Bending down and using his strength, Jiang Tao lifted the floor slab that was pressing on Sun Xiao Bao’s upper body and leaned it against a broken wall nearby.
“Quick, get up and see if you’re injured, if you can stand, if you can walk.”
With Sun Xiao Bao still looking somewhat bewildered, Jiang Tao helped him up from the ground.
After an inspection, Sun Xiao Bao was only weak in the legs due to hunger, but otherwise, there were no major injuries.
Jiang Tao didn’t know if Grandpa Sun was lucky or unlucky.
If you say he was lucky.
He fell in the same place twice, was pinned by the same floor slab, and almost lost his life both times.
But if you say he was unlucky.
He triggered intelligence related to him twice, and succeeded in rescuing him twice.
“Oh my, it really is you, Xiao Jiang, how does it feel like a dream!”
Sun Xiao Bao finally confirmed that he was not dreaming and that he had been rescued!
Jiang Tao jokingly said, “I don’t think it’s a dream, you’re probably having hallucinations from hunger!”
“Oh, now that you mention it, it really is, Xiao Jiang, do you have anything to eat on you?”
“My stomach is about to be burned through by stomach acid!”
After the excitement subsided, the intense hunger struck again, and Sun Xiao Bao felt a burning pain in his stomach.
Six meals unfed for two days, anyone who has experienced that sour feeling knows.
“Yes, yes, yes, have some water first, I have a ham sausage here, you can have it to fill your stomach.”
Jiang Tao said, handing Sun Xiao Bao the thermos cup in his hand and a ham sausage he took out of his pocket.
