From Robinson Crusoe

Chapter 2: First Day: Robinson's Death

In a corner of the South Pacific, the storm is weakening.

Thick dark clouds still pressed down on the sky, blocking out the sunlight.

There were bursts of thunder, and lightning flashed across the dark blue sea from time to time. A rainfall was brewing.

Looking down from the sky, the waves continuously hit the shore. On the dim beach, a figure could be vaguely seen struggling to drag something, leaving a long trail on the sand behind him.

Chen Zhou was breathing heavily and used one hand to wipe the sweat from his forehead.

He hadn't done any heavy physical work for a long time, and his pampered body was protesting against him.

My heart was beating violently and my lungs were feeling a slight stinging pain. Every breath of air I took seemed extremely thin and was not enough to supply the various organs.

Chen Zhou almost wanted to give up, so he turned his head and looked at the surging sea.

The waves were approaching step by step with a deafening sound. The gathered waves were more than three meters high, like a hungry beast, ready to devour anyone at any time.

The horrifying scene seemed to give Chen Zhou a shot of stimulant. He took a deep breath, gritted his teeth, and walked forward some distance on the wet sand. Finally, he let go and sat down on the ground.

Next to him, at the end of the dragging marks, was a pale corpse soaked in sea water.

The deceased was a Westerner with a bloody forehead and a short beard. He wore a brown coat and linen shorts. His shoes were missing and only a pair of socks covered in mud and sand were left on his feet. He was not tall and was about thirty years old.

This unfortunate guy who drowned in the sea and was pushed to the shore by the waves had no ID on him, but Chen Zhou knew clearly who he was.

"Robinson Crusoe."

The protagonist of "Robinson Crusoe", a well-known desert island survivor, sea adventurer, and one of the most famous fictional characters in literary works.

Now, he lay on his back on the beach, and like countless sailors who died in a shipwreck in 1659, he stopped breathing quietly.

Chen Zhou stared at Robinson's body for a long time, then shifted his gaze to the sea.

The waters of the Pacific Ocean responded to the hurricane, surging vigorously, with waves rising one after another, one higher than the other.

Then, the power that had accumulated to the peak suddenly burst out, the waves crashed into the rocks, and a circle of white splashes exploded.

The strong sea breeze hit my face, moist, fishy, and slightly salty, with perhaps a hint of the ferocity of the storm still lingering in it.

This is a wind that does not exist in the inland, and it is also a scene that Chen Zhou has never seen before.

Nature is showing off its savage and angry side.

Under such terrifying and majestic power from heaven, any living creature would feel its own insignificance and fragility, and even be filled with awe.

Chen Zhou is no exception.

More than two hours ago, he woke up on this strange beach with a dazed look on his face.

After a brief moment of fear and panic, he finally understood that after passing the so-called "audit" in his dream, the challenge called "Challenge Robinson Crusoe: Survival on a Deserted Island for 10,000 Days" had begun.

All of this was as absurd as a bizarre plot in a novel. Chen Zhou found it hard to accept the fact that his life was decided in such a hasty way.

Compared with the risks involved in the challenge, the suffocating cement factory did not seem so unacceptable. At least he could still enjoy the welfare of the 21st century and lead a monotonous but stable life instead of eating raw meat and drinking blood like a primitive man.

However, this was indeed his own choice, and those voices did come from his heart.

It’s just that people are fickle. Disappointment in life and courage ignited by impulse are like the promises made by leaders after drinking, which will vanish into thin air after a hangover.

The little white mouse that is gradually devoured by the system will increasingly miss the prison that confines it, the never-stopping running wheel and the abundant food.

Faced with the cruel reality, Chen Zhou began to regret saying those four words, but found that there was no turning back.

He had thought about begging or cursing the poster who claimed to be the manager of the Space-Time Administration, and even thought about pretending to be crazy and stupid to make the poster pity him and bring him back to the modern era.

But reason told Chen Zhou that such behavior was futile and would have no effect other than turning him into a clown who could not afford to be played with.

Either way, the challenge has already begun.

In this gamble, the loser loses everything and the winner takes everything.

He has been forced to the edge of the cliff, and there is only one way ahead of him - fight!

If you fight for your life and the 72 yuan, you can fight for the opportunity to change your destiny and the hope of a happy life.

Trying to maintain his calm on the surface and forcing himself to accept the current situation, Chen Zhou quickly left the shore where the sea was surging. Then, as the rules said, he found a special paper copy of "Robinson Crusoe" on his body.

Knowing that this book was his hope for survival, Chen Zhou carefully flipped through the pages in the dim light, but his heart was beating fast and he couldn't concentrate. After flipping through a few pages, he suddenly noticed someone struggling in the waves not far from the shore.

As soon as he read about Robinson Crusoe and the sailors lowering their boat and the capsizing, Chen Zhou immediately connected the person who fell into the water with Robinson Crusoe who fell into the sea. His intuition told him that the small black dot floating in the huge waves might be Robinson Crusoe.

So Chen Zhou stared at the person who fell into the water and secretly encouraged him, hoping that this "child of destiny" could successfully get ashore like in the original book, and then cooperate with him to complete the challenge.

However, this time, Robinson, the protagonist, lost his usual good luck.

The heavy waves did not give him a chance to breathe. Under the turbid water, a sharp reef severely hit his head. Even though he used up his last bit of strength to swim to the shallow water, and even though Chen Zhou bravely took the risk and dragged him to the beach, he still could not escape the shadow of death.

Watching a living person die in agony and struggle, Chen Zhou felt indescribable fear.

For a long time, he sat there in a daze, his face lifeless, his mind blank, replaying what happened after he woke up.

When his pounding heart calmed down and the sea breeze interrupted his memories, he finally withdrew his gaze from the distance, the bloody scene of Robinson Crusoe being dragged ashore still flashing in his mind.

Chen Zhou knew clearly that Robinson did not die in the sea, but in the rules, the rules of this "large-scale reality challenge show across time and space".

Those rules that were criticized and ridiculed in forums are ironclad and cannot be violated here.

The cold body lying beside him seemed to remind Chen Zhou——

Here, don't have unnecessary hopes, get rid of cowardice, abandon fantasy, and work hard to get what you want with your own hands. There is no shortcut.

However, recognizing the ruthless rules and the death of Robinson Crusoe added to Chen Zhou's inner pressure.

For a moment, a strong urge to vent stress through hysteria occupied his mind.

If he was in college, this nameless fire in him would have never stopped until it ignited and burned to its full potential.

But after all, having worked in the cement factory for more than a year, mixing with those old hands who have worked there for more than ten years, Chen Zhou didn't learn anything else, but he became better at controlling his emotions. Just like what middle-aged people often lament - life has eventually smoothed out his edges.

It's just that his edges and corners haven't become particularly rounded yet, and sometimes he wants to draw a clear line between mediocrity...

His facial muscles trembled slightly, and Chen Zhou barely controlled himself to take a deep breath and exhale.

"Whoo~"

He kept telling himself that using crazy shouting to relieve stress would only waste his energy and reduce his chances of survival. In the end, he overcame his fear and suppressed his irrational thoughts.

Staring fixedly at Robinson's blood-stained body, after his fear subsided, Chen Zhou felt as if he had seen a treasure.

This is the adventurer's final gift, he reminded himself.

"You shouldn't waste it. You should work to survive."

Encouraging himself in his heart, he stretched out his hand and let it hang in the air, hesitating and not falling.

After all, he was not yet at an age where he frequently experienced birth, aging, sickness and death. This was Chen Zhou's first close contact with a corpse. Although he never believed in ghosts and gods, and did not feel disgusted or unlucky, his heart felt like a bottle of seasoning had been overturned, and he always felt bad.

This feeling comes and goes quickly, coming in like a tide and eventually dissipating on the beach.

Chen Zhou knew that no matter how many ideas he had now, he could only do what he should do.

It only took him a few seconds to prepare himself mentally, and his hands fell on Robinson and quickly unbuttoned his wet coat.

Some things are not as difficult as you imagined until you try them.

The dead body was not so cold and stiff that it was frightening to touch and caused vomiting. The psychology of an ordinary person like him was not as fragile as imagined.

He felt no fear or discomfort, nor did he feel nauseous or even feel anything. He was so calm that he felt strange for himself.

Under the threat of the sword of Damocles of death and the temptation of the unattainable challenge reward, Chen Zhou armed himself with a layer of armor called indifference. His body worked mechanically, leaving only his brain to calmly think about how to extract the deserved benefits from Robinson.

Perhaps because the time spent struggling in the sea was much shorter than described in the original book, although Robinson was soaked, the buttons of his coat were not washed open by the water and remained firmly tied together.

There was a noticeable bulge on the left side of his chest, indicating that the liner pocket contained some sundries.

After opening his shirt, Chen Zhou found a small knife in a cowhide sheath, a carved pipe with a silver mouthpiece, and some candied oranges that had become sticky after being soaked in sea water in the damp lining pocket.

Under the coat, Robinson wore a thin shirt, and underneath the shirt a close-fitting vest.

Thinking that clothes would become a luxury item that was difficult to manufacture in the next twenty years or so, Chen Zhou placed his knife and pipe neatly on the beach and began trying to take off the shirts.

The wet sea water made the clothes stick to the skin, and Robinson's gradually stiffening body made the task more difficult. Chen Zhou spent more than ten minutes and finally only obtained a complete coat and shirt. As for the cotton vest, it was torn into rags by the violent pulling.

After finishing this task, it was already dark.

The moon and stars could not be seen on the isolated island shrouded in dark clouds, and all kinds of strange sounds could be heard from the woods near the shore from time to time.

Accompanied by the endless sound of waves, the increasingly dim light built a primitive cage called the unknown, which was creepy.

The wind was getting stronger and stronger, and a lot of water droplets were floating from the sea, as if it was going to rain.

Worried that the clothes he had just taken off would be blown away by the wind, Chen Zhou wrapped the knife and pipe with clothes, tied them tightly with a cloth strip, tied a knot and tied them to a small tree.

Then he trotted back to Robinson, ready to continue his work before it was completely dark.

After taking off his outer clothes, you can see that Robinson has an exquisite leather belt tied around his waist. The surface of the belt is printed with complex geometric patterns, and there is a buckle made of brass and silver at the end.

As a Brazilian plantation owner and one of the major shareholders of merchant ships, Robinson's belt clearly reflects his status.

"As expected of the earliest capitalist, the cost of this belt alone is probably half of my monthly salary."

Thinking of this, Chen Zhou quickly unbuckled the belt, pulled it out and took it for himself.

Then he took out a long wooden box from Robinson's shorts pocket.

The sealing of the small box was not very good, and a lot of sea water entered it. There were some shredded tobacco leaves in it, which gave off a strange, fishy, bitter and pungent smell after being soaked in sea water.

Chen Zhou never smoked. He poured out the tobacco leaves in the wooden box, wiped them with a rag, put them in his trouser pocket, and then began to pull off Robinson's trousers.

Before it was completely dark, Robinson had become as clean as when he came into this world, lying naked on the beach.

After keeping the linen shorts, underwear and socks safe, Chen Zhou worked tirelessly to push Robinson's body into the sea.

"For an adventurous sailor, being buried at sea may be the best destination..."

"But seeing you off means my lonely journey has officially begun."

Chen Zhou looked up at the sky. The water droplets blown by the wind were becoming more and more dense, while the thunder and lightning that raged a few hours ago were becoming increasingly sparse. He couldn't tell whether it would rain or not.

Trying hard to recall the description in the book, Chen Zhou only remembered that there were no large man-eating beasts on the deserted island, and he had no idea whether it rained on the day Robinson Crusoe landed on the island.

"It's better not to get off." Chen Zhou prayed.

No one wants to sleep in the rain.

Even though the warm climate here reduces the risk of catching a cold, the moist body surface is enough to create a breeding ground for pathogens.

Without medicine, colds and fevers can also take your life.

Sitting under a small tree where clothes were tied, leaning against the trunk, Chen Zhou looked out at the dark sea, but for a moment he did not feel sleepy at all.

There is no noisy sound of machines running, no mobile phones, and the passage of time is terrifyingly clear, just like the medicine slowly falling from the drip bucket of an IV bottle, intensifying the torment of waiting.

Having nothing to do for the first time in a long time, his mind was extremely confused.

The enlightened thoughts died down, and some new worries and emotions came up.

"Tomorrow is the day when the merchant ship runs aground. With my poor swimming skills, I don't know if I can swim to the side of the ship. What if I drown..."

"I remember the drawings of the shipbuilding guy on Tieba very clearly, but I don't know if his drawings are reliable..."

"Hey, even if it's reliable, I may not be able to make it..."

"Now that I think about it, it was the right decision to push Robinson into the sea. Otherwise, if I didn't dare to get on the boat and went crazy with hunger, I might have used him as emergency rations."

"Even if they don't eat people, the outbreak of plague from rotting is a hidden danger..."

"Ah, I don't know if it will rain tonight. I should have watched more of the part about the day when Robinson Crusoe landed on the island."

"It's like a dream. It's so dark."

.........

The moisture of the soil and the astringency of the leaves were blown away by the sea breeze. Amid the long roar of the waves, the last glimmer of light in the world also disappeared.

The shock and exhaustion from work gradually flowed out from his chaotic thoughts, drowning Chen Zhou along with the singing of birds and the sound of the tide.

His thoughts became slow, his upper eyelids became heavier, and finally fell down and hugged the lower eyelids tightly. Soon, a "snoring symphony" that was incompatible with the isolated island was played between his mouth and nose.

(End of this chapter)