The lines and symbols that originally represented subway tunnels and stations gradually twisted and deformed in the light.
Zhong Hua was surprised to find that the red "main tunnel" line—the Weizhou Island volcanic rock fault line and the Namtso Lake shoreline—was turning into a glowing star trail! The markings that were originally station markers had transformed into bright stars, arranged according to a constellation he was familiar with.
The blue auxiliary line, however, became a different trajectory, like... like the migratory route of birds, or like a route on some ancient nautical chart.
"This is... a star map?" the engineer murmured, his eyes filled with shock and fear.
Zhong Hua's heart pounded. He recognized it—the arrangement of those stars was exactly the same starry sky he and Ayu had seen at Namtso Lake that night! The Big Dipper, Orion, the direction of the Milky Way… were all precisely drawn on this map, only in a way he had never seen before, overlapping with geographical and geological lines.
Chapter 4: Resonance, Mirror Image, and Unfinished Loops
The underground rumbling reached its peak, accompanied by intense vibrations that seemed to shake the entire construction site. The blue light grew brighter and brighter, almost blinding.
Zhong Hua felt a powerful pull from the blueprint, from the glowing lines and stars on it. He involuntarily reached out, wanting to touch the oil stain shaped like the shore of Namtso Lake.
Just as his fingertips were about to touch the blueprint, a sudden change occurred!
Suddenly, the light on the blueprint burst forth, forming a massive pillar of light that shot straight into the sky. At the same time, the concrete cavity that had been excavated in the ground also emitted light of the same color, connecting with the pillar of light on the blueprint to form a huge, shimmering blue pillar of light.
Inside the beam of light, images begin to emerge and rotate.
Zhong Hua saw the black volcanic rocks of Weizhou Island, with magma seemingly surging within; he saw hot air balloons floating in the air above Dunhuang, their smoke rings curling upwards; he saw the shimmering waters of Namtso Lake, its shoreline shifting in the light and shadow; he even saw the old hospital where he was born, becoming clearer in the passage of time…
Then, he saw Ayu.
Ayu stood at the other end of the pillar of light, seemingly drawn to the strange sight as well. Her face held surprise and doubt, but even more so, a quiet curiosity. She seemed to be holding something in her hand; Zhong Hua looked closely and saw it was a postcard—a postcard they had bought in Dunhuang but had never sent.
"Ayu!" Zhong Hua couldn't help but shout.
As if hearing his call, Ayu raised her head, her gaze passing through the bizarre images, and met Zhong Hua's gaze in the air.
At that very moment, the images within the beam of light began to merge and overlap.
The volcanic fault line on Weizhou Island coincides with the red line on the subway planning map; the smoke rings from the hot air balloons in Dunhuang coincide with the smoke rings from the Crayon Train; the shoreline of Namtso Lake coincides with the outline of oil stains; the coordinates of the hospital where Zhong Hua was born coincide with the marker for "Moon Street Station"...
Even more amazingly, the image on the postcard in Ayu's hand—a copy of a Dunhuang mural—coincided with the blurry silhouette of the person who drew the 1978 planning map, which appeared in the beam of light!
The figure, dressed in simple work clothes, was intently drawing blueprints, holding red and blue pencils and crayons. His posture bore a striking resemblance to Zhong Hua's grandfather when he drew nautical charts in his logbook!
The buzzing gradually subsided, and the blue light began to recede. The beam of light disappeared, and the construction site returned to its original light, though a faint, lingering scent of the high-altitude lake seemed to remain in the air.
That subway planning map from 1978 lies quietly on the wooden board.
It is no longer a yellowed old blueprint.
The marks of the red and blue pencils have disappeared, replaced by faint star trails and lake shoreline imprints that seem to blend into the paper itself. The crayon-drawn locomotive is still there, but the smoke rings have become transparent, like a distant symbol. The coordinates of "Moon Street Station" are still there, but next to it seems to have a tiny, barely noticeable constellation mark.
The oil stain that had stained the shoreline of Namtso Lake had completely dried, leaving a clear, watermark-like mark that shimmered faintly in the sunlight, like a drop of frozen lake water.
The construction team was stunned; what had just happened was like a bizarre dream. Someone tried to touch the blueprints, but the foreman stopped them.
"Don't touch it!" The captain's voice trembled slightly. "Wrap it up carefully and hand it over to the higher-ups. This thing... is not simple."
Zhong Hua didn't look at them; his gaze remained fixed on the blueprints, his mind replaying the scene from the beam of light.
He recalled the moments he shared with Ayu during their travels: the scenery, the old objects, the chance discoveries, and the wonderful coincidences.
He remembered the peony embroidery his mother had embroidered that Ayu found in the old wooden box, the boat ticket that had fallen out of Zhonghua's grandfather's clock, and the similar patterns and resonant frequencies they had seen and heard in various places.
Is all of this really just a coincidence?
Or is it that, beyond the dimensions of time and space, there exists some mysterious connection that weaves together the past, present, and future, this place and that place, memory and reality in a way that humanity has yet to comprehend?
Who drew the 1978 planning map? Was he a prophet, or a traveler from time? Or was he just an ordinary person who inadvertently touched upon some kind of cosmic rhythm and recorded those time-traveling scenes on this map with a childlike doodle and an engineer's rigor?
This chapter is not finished yet. Please click on the next page to continue reading the exciting content!
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
