I sell Coke in the doomsday

I took the jerky and took a big bite. I didn't taste anything, so I just chewed it hard and spoke incoherently to the young man.

"Thank you."

The young man was still smiling, as if there was nothing in the world that could make him worry. He was optimistic and free and easy.

Not long after, the young man and I finally walked out of the forest, but outside the forest, there were only rugged paths and no buildings in sight.

What surprised me was that on a small road not far away, there was a somewhat funny cart parked with several dead animals on it.

When I got to the cart, I found that the small animals inside were a little bit strange.

Rabbits, sparrows, and spotted venomous snakes are relatively normal, but then there are some strange things like chameleons and squirrels.

The young man simply pulled up the cart, looked at the mess of prey in the cart, and smacked his lips.

"Today's harvest is good. I wanted to go to the river to catch some fish, but I didn't catch any fish and I ran into a weirdo like you."

I smiled awkwardly and said nothing, and the young man didn't continue talking nonsense. He pulled the cart and walked slowly.

It was not until this moment that I realized that this optimistic and free-spirited young man seemed to have no strength in his right leg, and he actually felt some difficulty pulling the cart on the flat road.

The road was not flat, and the young man was pulling the cart very slowly and with great effort, even slower than me who was exhausted and weak.

Under such circumstances, I couldn't take my eyes off the young man's right leg. There must be some disability in his right leg.

I became more and more curious about why a young man with a leg disability would live in such a remote place and next to wild animals.

With this doubt, I followed the young man, and after walking for another twenty minutes, I finally arrived at a wooden house.

The wooden house looked a little old and small, and did not look like a recent building. A red car was parked not far from the house.

However, the car was covered in dust and surrounded by dense weeds, and it looked like it had not been started for a long time.

A few poles were simply erected on the flat ground, with thick ropes connecting the two ends, and a few pieces of washed clothes hung on them.

The unknown young man pushed the small cart in front of the wooden house, kicked the door open, and pulled the cart straight into the wooden house.

I followed closely behind him and we entered the wooden house together. The lighting in the house was very poor and the small room was filled with a pile of videotapes.

Honestly, I thought I would see a room full of animal skins, dried meat and the like, but I never imagined I would see DVDs and videotapes all over the floor.

After putting down the cart, the young man sat down on the ground tiredly, panting, looking up slightly, and spoke to me.

"My name is Song Ji, what's yours?"

Looking at Song Ji's sincere smile, I sighed, lowered my head slightly, and spoke softly.

"Su Li, my name is Su Li."

Hearing this, Song Ji smiled even more happily, raised his eyebrows, and said softly.

"I thought you were embarrassed to say it because your name was too ugly."

“Isn’t this quite nice to hear?”

Hearing this, I just smiled bitterly. Why does this young and optimistic guy look so interesting?

After resting for a while, Song Ji stood up again, found a wooden basin from the debris in the room, threw the prey on the cart into the cart, and began to skin and clean the prey.

I felt that it was not appropriate for me to just stand there like that, so I asked for a knife and helped Song Ji clean the prey. I asked softly while peeling the rabbit's skin with the knife.

"Can you tell me why you want to save me?"

Hearing this, Song Ji paused his movements, and after a moment of silence, he spoke in a low voice.

"I'm afraid you'll feed the blind bear and it will be hard for me to deal with it."

Chapter 19: Movie Maniac (Part 3)

"That blind bear is very smart. He will hide as long as there is food. Judging from your size, you are enough for him to eat for several days."

"So, if you are caught by him, it will be very difficult for me."

I looked at Song Ji speechlessly, not knowing what to say. I had made many guesses about this matter, but I never thought that he saved me just for such a weird reason.

"No, why don't you use me as bait to lure out that blind bear."

Song Ji had a strange look in his eyes and stopped peeling the skin. He thought for a long time before sighing.

"You are such a dark person."

"If you behave like this, you can't be the protagonist."

Protagonist... This is the second time I heard this word from Song Ji's mouth. Apart from the fact that it sounds a bit childish, I totally don't understand why he keeps saying this word.

Song Ji seemed to see my confusion and explained patiently.

"Do you like watching movies? The protagonists in the movies won't just kill someone they meet for the first time."

"Even in bad movies, there's no protagonist who kills innocent people like this."

"So, if you behave like this, you can't be the protagonist."

The protagonist, the movie, and the room full of movie tapes and DVDs, I seemed to understand something.

There is no doubt that this guy is a chuunibyou, the kind that is hopeless.

I didn't want to say anything more, but Song Ji seemed to be turned on by the topic of movies and started talking nonstop.

"What kind of movies do you like? Comedy, suspense, action, which one excites you more?"

I sighed, not wanting to continue this topic, and answered softly.

"I like movies that have subtitles, but I don't mind watching them without them."

Song Ji simply ignored my answer and continued talking on his own.

"I remember someone said that after the advent of movies, human life expectancy increased by ten years."

"With movies, people can freely imagine lives other than their own."

“Mythology, the universe, history, love, movies give people what they can’t get.”

Song Ji kept talking about movies. To me, this was a very boring topic. I didn't want to know what the first movie in the world was, nor did I want to know the first movie with naked scenes.

But Song Ji had obviously entered his own world, and kept talking about epic long shots and shark tornadoes.

While he was talking nonstop, I casually glanced at the piles of movie tapes in the room and suddenly asked.

"Did you bring all these videotapes with you?"

Song Ji was stunned when he heard this, then he looked somewhat complacent, nodded and said with a smile.

"Yeah, thanks to the zombie virus outbreak, everyone was busy grabbing food and stuff, no one was competing with me."

Hearing this, I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. This was not something to be proud of at all. This Song Ji was really a weirdo. Didn't he ever think that even if he snatched the DVDs of these movies, he wouldn't be able to play them.

Forget it, just rest here for a night. After I recover my strength, I will leave here. As for whether to take Song Ji with me, it depends on whether he is willing.

While Song Ji was chattering to himself, the small animals were cleaned up. Song Ji cut two chameleons, threw them into the pot, and started to make a fire using the most primitive means.

I had nothing to do, so I watched him make a fire and cook. It was only then that I noticed his right leg again and asked him.

"Song Ji, is your leg injured?"

Hearing this, Song Ji, who was adding firewood to the stove, waved his hands nonchalantly and spoke casually.

"It's just a small problem."

As he spoke, Song Ji stretched out his hand and rolled up the trouser leg of his right leg, revealing only a slightly yellowish white prosthesis underneath the shabby trouser leg.

Yes, prosthetics.

I suddenly froze in place, staring blankly at the prosthesis on Song Ji's leg. For a moment, I completely forgot what to say. After a long time, I faced Song Ji's hearty smile and whispered.

“This is no small matter.”

Song Ji didn't take it seriously. There was no falseness in the smile on his face. He even patted the yellowed prosthesis with his hand and smiled.

"It's nothing. Many movie protagonists are also missing arms and legs."

"This is a normal development. The protagonist is destined to suffer more than others."

I smiled bitterly, and suddenly felt that the protagonist he mentioned seemed to have other meanings. An optimistic person like him seemed to be really like the indomitable protagonists in those movies.

"I want to know, why do you think you are the protagonist?"

When I asked him seriously, Song Ji raised his eyebrows slightly, and did not answer my question immediately. Instead, he turned around and continued to add wood to the fire. I waited for a long time before I heard him speak slowly.

"Many highly rated movies use the method of first suppressing the main character and then praising him, by having the main character encounter some bad things in the first half of the movie."

“Then these repressed emotions are accumulated until they are all released in the end, and I watch the protagonist finally get a happy ending.”

"For example, in The Shawshank Redemption, when Andy crawled through the long sewage duct, he stood in the heavy rain and took off his prison uniform. This scene has always been a classic screen scene."

Having said this, Song Ji turned around, squinted his eyes and smiled. There was no trace of sadness on his handsome face. He just spoke in a casual tone.

"I've probably made it through the first half of the movie, so I should be getting to the climax by now."

"Otherwise, it doesn't make sense."

I seemed to understand what he said, and although I knew it was a bit impolite, I couldn't help but continue asking.

"The first half... was it hard to endure?"

After hearing this, Song Ji squinted his eyes and thought for a long time, then said in an indifferent tone.

"It wasn't that hard to endure. Although it felt like a collection of melodramatic stories, the first half of my life was still quite exciting."

"I remember when I was seven years old, my father told me one day that we were going to move to a very big house."

"But he took my stepmother and my step-sister, and all the furniture, but he forgot about me."

"Later, my dad sent me to my mom's house, but my mom didn't want me, so she drove me to my grandma's house."

"As soon as I got out of the car, my mother drove away, and my grandmother held a broom and wouldn't let me in."

"I was ignorant at that time. I just cried and cried, but in the end no one wanted me."

"Finally, an elderly man who lived alone in the village took me in."

"The old man treated me as his grandson, and I called him grandpa. Although we could only make a living by picking up scraps every day, I was actually much happier than before."

At this point, Song Ji's face was obviously more smiling, and his eyes were shining. Perhaps it was really as he said, he was very happy during that time.

"My grandfather paid for my education and schooling. He would often wait for me at the school gate, but he never dared to go into the school to see me."

"He also didn't let me call him grandpa in front of my classmates, saying he was afraid I would be embarrassed."

"That's how I spent my childhood, which was pretty good, until I was in high school."

"My stepmother suddenly found me and told me that my father had uremia and needed a kidney transplant. She hoped that I could give my kidney to my father."

"I refused."

"My father has connections with several well-known media outlets. At my father's behest, those media outlets turned the story into something else."

"A father who loved his son dearly had spent years searching for his abducted son. He became ill from overwork and developed uremia. His son was bought by an old man who collected rubbish in the countryside. Upon learning about his father's condition, he refused a kidney transplant."

"Then, all the public opinion and malice fell on me and my grandfather."

"I became an unfilial son who was unkind and unjust, and my grandfather became an ignorant villager who bought and sold children."

Chapter 20: Movie Maniac (Part 4)

"I always thought that the plots in some bad movies were too ridiculous, but I didn't expect that reality is even more ridiculous than life."

"Because reality has no rehearsal and no script."

"People say that children are a piece of flesh that falls from their parents, and it's not wrong."

"It's just that some people lose a heart, while others just lose insignificant hair."

"The person who gave birth to me hates me and ignores me, while the person who raises me loves me and cares for me."

"What a plot that fits the script of a movie, even though it's a bit cliché and melodramatic."

When saying these words, there was no sadness on Song Ji's face. Instead, he was smiling. There was no sarcasm, nor any forced relief.

He really doesn't care about these things anymore.

I lowered my brows slightly, and suddenly felt a little more admiration for Song Ji in front of me. If it were me, I would never be able to be so indifferent.

"I want to know, did you finally give your kidney to your father?"