"Wait," Shao Lan said. "Let's take another route."
Qin Ning glanced at him and chose to listen.
They went out onto the second-floor terrace, climbed over the railing, and jumped to the ground.
Shao Lan found Qin Ning strange. Her words kept everyone at arm's length, making it clear she wouldn't cooperate, and she seemed like an ice-cold, hardened lone wolf. Yet so far, she had never refused anything he asked of her.
There were bushes below the balcony, and the two crept along, keeping low.
"Where did everyone go?" The Village Chief pushed open the door to an empty room. "We scheduled a song and dance performance for this afternoon. Looks like we'll have to cancel it."
There was plenty of vegetation in the village. Using it for cover, Shao Lan and Qin Ning soon left the Guesthouse far behind.
The sea lay on one side of the Guesthouse, and the villagers' houses on the other.
From a distance, Shao Lan and Qin Ning heard a little boy sobbing loudly.
A thin, middle-aged man who looked like the boy's father was beating him with a switch. "Skipping work again! I'll teach you to skip work! Your sister's already in this state, there's nothing left to eat at home, and you're still skipping work!"
The little boy wailed, but because he had no eyes, there were only cries, no tears.
Eventually, the man threw down the switch, covered his face, and began to cry. He looked as though life had driven him to the end of his rope.
Wiping his face, the man said, "I'm going out to borrow some grain. Make dinner, and go fishing tonight. No more running off, understand?"
"Yes," the little boy said.
The man left with his back hunched. Before Qin Ning could stop him, Shao Lan quietly slipped over.
"Hey, little guy," Shao Lan said. "Hungry? Here, you can have this."
He took out a piece of chocolate.
Its sweet scent immediately drew the little boy in. He snatched it eagerly and licked it until his mouth was smeared with chocolate.
"Slow down, slow down. There's more." Shao Lan looked at Qin Ning, signaling with his eyes.
Qin Ning silently took some compressed biscuits out of her pocket.
The little boy ate two packets of compressed biscuits and drank a bowl of water. His belly bulged, and he finally stopped looking like a starving ghost reborn.
Hunger was probably why they had crowded around the car to snatch food earlier, too.
Shao Lan patted his head. "Who was that just now?"
The little boy licked the biscuit crumbs from around his mouth. "Papa."
"Why did Papa hit you?"
The little boy lowered his head. "Because everyone went fishing together last night, but I didn't go. I skipped work."
Shao Lan remembered seeing the lights of fishing boats out at sea from inside the house yesterday, but they had been too far away for him to make out what was happening aboard.
This little boy looked only six or seven, and he had no eyes and couldn't see. Why force him to go fishing?
"The weather's been bad this year, and all the crops Papa planted died. We can only live off fishing now," the little boy said. "My big sister turns eighteen next month. She still hasn't gotten any eyes, so she's going to die. I'm the only one in the family who can go fishing."
There was a lot to unpack in that statement. Shao Lan and Qin Ning exchanged a glance.
What did he mean by waiting for eyes?
What did he mean by dying if you hadn't gotten eyes by eighteen?
And why was the little boy the only one in the family who could go out to sea? His father might be thin, but he was a grown man with working arms and legs. If he could farm, why couldn't he fish?
Suddenly, a thought surfaced in Shao Lan's mind.
It connected all the clues, lighting up his mind like a flash of lightning.
"Your papa... can't go near the sea?"
The little boy hesitated.
He was old enough to know better. His father had probably warned him not to tell outsiders.
Shao Lan rummaged in his pocket and took out two fruit candies and a few pieces of beef jerky.
"You can have all of these," Shao Lan said. "Don't worry. We won't tell your papa."
The little boy had never faced such an enormous temptation in his life. He nodded. "That's right. Papa has eyes, so he can't go out to sea."
Shao Lan gave the little boy a fruit candy.
"Then what does waiting for eyes mean?" Shao Lan asked.
The little boy seemed to think Shao Lan didn't understand even the simplest things. "You're born without eyes. You have to wait. Once there are eyes, they'll give you some."
"What if you never get any?" Shao Lan gave the little boy another fruit candy.
For the sake of these delicious treats he never normally got to eat, the little boy became a little more patient. "Without eyes, your body gets weaker and weaker. Then you die when you're eighteen."
"Then where do the eyes come from?"
"The Village Chief hands them out to us."
"Then where does the Village Chief get the eyes?"
The little boy was stumped. He didn't know.
Expressionless, Shao Lan pressed all the food in his hands into the little boy's arms.
There was no need to ask any more. He had a pretty good idea now.
As they walked through the village earlier, he had already felt that something was wrong.
Now he understood exactly what it was.
The population.
There were many children on the island, but very few adults.
Now he knew why.
None of the children here had eyes. Only the adults did.
Only children who received eyes could grow up and grow old. Those who didn't would die before they turned eighteen.
That meant the mortality rate was extremely high. Most children never reached middle age or old age, making the island's population distribution look very strange.
Qin Ning watched the little boy wolf down the food. She seemed unable to bear it and searched her backpack again, finding several packets of compressed biscuits and two pouches of milk.
The little boy felt the milk pouches and was delighted. He ran into the inner room and pulled back a curtain, revealing a girl lying unconscious on a bed.
She had to be the little boy's sister.
According to the little boy, she should have been almost eighteen, but perhaps because of malnutrition, she looked younger. Her body was small and thin, too.
The little boy felt the girl's face, bit open a milk pouch, and fed her a little at a time.
Suddenly, the little boy stopped.
"Go, quickly," he said. "My papa's back."
Just like Su Xia in the previous Instance, the blind child had exceptionally sharp hearing.
Sure enough, just after Shao Lan and Qin Ning hid themselves and the little boy hid the food, the middle-aged man returned.
The Village Chief came back with him.
The Village Chief glanced at the unconscious girl on the bed. "Xu Gao, your family has done me a great kindness. I can't bear to let Xiao Cai die like this, either. But as you know, there are many children in the village waiting for eyes..."
Xu Gao pleaded, his eyes red. "Village Chief, if it were just for me, I'd be too ashamed to ask. But for the sake of the children's mother..."
The Village Chief paused, then sighed. "As I said, Xiao Cai's mother did me a kindness, and I haven't forgotten it. But Xiao Cai is this weak because your family stayed away too long instead of coming back to the village. That's what brought her to this state!
"In her current condition, she can't possibly enter the sea on her own, and we can't take her," the Village Chief said. "Even if I give her eyes, she won't be able to get them."
"Village Chief, I'll take my sister into the sea!" the little boy cried.
"Xiao Hong? But aren't you afraid of the water? You even run away from fishing."
"I won't run away this time! Village Chief, please, save my sister!"
Xu Gao and his son, Xu Xiao Hong, knelt together and kowtowed to the Village Chief.
Before you continue