What is civilization?

Zhang Ming clutched the radio and tent tightly, tears welling in his eyes despite himself. "Whoever you were, brother or sister, I owe you in this life. I'll repay you in the next."

He opened the remaining packages one by one. None contained particularly useful survival supplies, but each yielded something: instant noodles, cola, biscuits, pickled-pepper chicken feet, and other food, along with Chinese condiments such as Lao Gan Ma, fermented bean curd, and hot pot soup base.

There were also basic tools, including scissors and small knives.

Yet the tension gripping Zhang Ming's heart refused to ease.

It felt as though a weight of anguish had lodged in his chest, pressing down until he could barely breathe. If he did nothing, it would remain there forever.

These pieces of luggage were lives that had ended, one by one, and become his possessions.

The last suitcase held more clothes, a folder containing contracts written in English, and five thousand dollars in cash.

He had opened every mystery box.

"Not counting the ham, the food should last ten days."

"The water should last about ten days too."

"Two hundred and seventy thousand dollars in cash altogether... sigh."

After a moment of silence, Zhang Ming dug a small pit and placed a few articles of clothing inside, making a little cenotaph.

Then he moved a large coconut onto the pit to serve as a headstone.

With a marker, he wrote a few small lines on the coconut's surface: "Grave of those lost in the Flight DS898 crash."

"An offering from the sole survivor, Zhang Ming."

"//20**."

Once he had finished, the anguish lodged in his chest slowly dissipated.

He raised his head and gazed at the sea of clouds, their crimson stretching and winding for thousands of miles. At the edge of the heavens, that touch of maple red faded into deep, black nothingness.

Rituals endured not because they had any inherent meaning, but because of the meaning they gave humanity.

What, ultimately, was the meaning of life?

Perhaps it was what people called carrying on a legacy...

Thank you for your gifts.

I'll live on, carrying your hopes with me.

I promise.

"A serious internal conflict broke out aboard the ship in Mirage No. 7, and they locked up a small group of people!"

"Too bad nobody got killed."

After all, this was only their second day trapped in the Mysterious Zone. The habits of civilized society still held sway, leaving a crowd of netizens eager for juicy drama sorely disappointed.

People could hardly wait to see rivers of blood, never considering that this was merely a glimpse of what happened during a disaster.

When disaster truly struck, it was the same whether there were hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands, or hundreds of millions of people.

Soon, someone turned their attention to Mirage No. 16.

The man surviving alone on the island had set up a coconut by the sea and written a few lines on it.

When they saw the writing on the coconut, a large crowd on overseas sites was immediately baffled and gleefully mocking.

"Look, he's already gone crazy!"

"He thinks the coconut is a person! Hahaha!"

"Idiot, he just made a grave to pay his respects to his dead companions."

"Too bad the mirage is so blurry. We can't make out what he wrote."

Amid disaster and desperation, while crowds fought among themselves and scrambled for survival resources, a scene of someone honoring the dead suddenly appeared, creating a subtle sense of incongruity.

In the end, the sneering commenters ran out of things to say and could only spit out, "What a poser. He's all alone, with no companions, so all he can do is honor the dead. If he had companions, he'd be fighting with them too."

"It's nothing special. You could even call it psychological compensation for taking the dead people's belongings."

"You'll even criticize this? Fuck your psychological compensation."

All history was human history. From the grasslands of East Africa to the Bering Strait, from the Paleolithic to the Information Age, the sun remained the same sun, and the world had always been the same world.

But human hearts had changed many times.

At nine that evening, Washington time, Harvard University parapsychology professor Peter Greer posted on Bluebird: "What is a human being? What is civilization? If the principles someone reveres in their heart are destroyed by reality, if someone collapses inwardly amid disaster, then what remains of humanity's great dreams?"

"Gods, heroes, and poets exist to give our human fellowship the measure of hope and illusion it needs to survive."

"When the world is no longer generous, where should we go? Where is our pride? When the humans in the Mysterious Zone die, what punishment will the world bring upon us?"

He seemed to be hinting at something without stating it outright.

That stirred up a hornet's nest, drawing fire from a swarm of trolls. "Who do you think you are? Trying to act like some high-and-mighty morality police? Are you a god, a hero, a poet, or a priest?"

".dren a tsuj er'uoy ,pu ekaW"

Of course, there were also rational voices earnestly discussing the issue.

"Professor, I have a major question. What exactly does the appearance of the mirages mean? The comments online aren't really that different from how the groups in the mirages behave, are they?"

"So humanity is nothing but a mob."

"God's revelation means nothing."

Others reveled in the apocalypse. "Faster, hurry up and make it happen faster! I want to see rivers of blood!"

But no matter how many questions the netizens posted, the parapsychology professor made no further comments.

The sky was growing dark. By the time he had sorted all the luggage, it was already evening.

Towering trees stood with thick, straight trunks, their vast canopy of palm leaves spreading overhead like dark clouds descending upon the island.

Among the towering jungle trees, Zhang Ming found a dead one without a single leaf on it. He would not have to worry about something suddenly falling from above and smashing him into pulp.

The dead tree was more than twenty meters in diameter, with a small hollow recessed into its trunk.

"I'll pitch the tent here and listen to the radio while I'm at it. It's past six in the evening. There might be a satellite broadcast."

He tuned the radio, and static crackled from it.

He adjusted it carefully.

A voice came through!

"Good evening, listeners... I'm your announcer, Li Xianfeng. Today, I'll be bringing you firsthand news."

"Dramatic changes are taking place around the world. Earthquakes and volcanic eruptions continue worldwide (electrical static)... the economy has ground to a halt..."

"Most regions of our country lie outside seismic zones...

...and have suffered relatively limited damage..."

"As the industrial nation with the most complete supply chain, we have sufficient capacity... to ensure that all our people... stand united... (static)..."

Listening to the broadcast gave him more energy to work.

Humans really were social animals.

This Li Xianfeng might be the only human he could have any contact with for some time to come. Zhang Ming wished the man would keep talking a little longer.

"...because the global production disaster was related to previous temporary investigations."

"...seiroeht tnereffid lareves desoporp evah sralohcS..."