Mastering the Sword Manual, sweeping across the globe

Then I woke up.

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Sunlight streamed through the gap in the curtains, casting a bright line on the floor.

Chen Juefei lay there, motionless.

The bed next to her was empty; the woman had left sometime earlier.

There was a note on the bedside table that read, "I'm leaving now, let's meet another day," under the water glass.

Chen Juefei stared at the ceiling.

Five years.

More than 1,800 days.

75 38.5 yuan

At 8:10 a.m., Chen Juefei sat down in the psychiatric outpatient clinic.

The examination room was small, only a dozen square meters, with a desk, two chairs, and a narrow examination bed against the wall, covered with a disposable blue sheet.

The window was open, and outside was the hospital's inpatient building, with its gray-white exterior and rows of neat windows.

The doctor's surname was Zhou, he was in his fifties, wore frameless glasses, his hair was neatly combed, and he wore a name tag on his white coat.

He was looking through the initial consultation form that Chen Juefei had just filled out, flipping through it slowly, page by page.

Chen Juefei sat opposite him, his hands on his knees.

Dr. Zhou looked up, his gaze passing over his glasses. His expression was blank, a calm demeanor born from seeing so many patients.

"You just said," Dr. Zhou began, "that in your dream, what city were you in?"

Chen Juefei paused for a moment, then said, "Xin'an City."

"Xin'an City?" Dr. Zhou repeated, picking up his phone to type it in.

The search results popped up.

Dr. Zhou turned the screen toward Chen Juefei.

"See for yourself."

Chen Juefei leaned over and took a look.

On the search results page, the first result is "Xin'an Town People's Government", the second result is "Xin'an Street Community Health Service Center", and the third result is "Xin'an River Travel Guide".

There is no Xin'an City.

“You just said,” Dr. Zhou glanced at the initial consultation form again, “that in your dream, you had to give 100 phone calls to clients a day… What were the numbers?”

“138…” Chen Juefei blurted out.

Dr. Zhou picked up a pen, wrote something in the blank space of the prescription slip, and pushed it in front of Chen Juefei.

"Count them yourself."

Chen Juefei looked down at the string of numbers.

1, 5, 8, 7, 3, 0, 2, 4, 9, 6, 3, 8, 1, 2.

By the time I counted to the seventh one, I started to get really nervous.

"Ten...fourteen." Chen Juefei's voice was a little dry.

The doctor nodded, said nothing, took the paper back, and put it aside.

"You also said," Dr. Zhou continued flipping through the initial consultation form, "that in your dreams, the delivery boxes are always particularly heavy, just like the gas cylinder you helped carry when you went to a classmate's house in high school?"

Chen Juefei immediately nodded: "Yes! Exactly the same kind of heavy! Pressing down on your shoulders, it's so heavy you can't breathe."

Dr. Zhou looked up at him, then stood up.

"Come."

He walked to the corner, where there was a square blue plastic water tank with the words "Medical Distilled Water 19L" printed on it and a handle.

Dr. Zhou pointed to the water tank: "Let's try moving it down."

Chen Juefei walked over, bent down, and grasped the handle with one hand.

Shen.

He switched to both hands and used their strength to lift the water tank, which was less than ten centimeters off the ground.

It's fucking heavy.

Chen Juefei tried to lift the water tank onto his shoulder, but it wobbled and almost slipped from his grasp.

He quickly put it back on the ground and took a breath.

“19 liters,” Dr. Zhou said, “...6 kilograms less than a full gas cylinder.”

Chen Juefei stood there, looking at the blue plastic water tank on the ground.

19 kg.

He barely managed to lift it up with both hands.

In his dream, he carried that delivery box every day, running up and down the hills, for five years straight.

How can it be?

Yet, that exact same heaviness felt so real...

“So,” Dr. Zhou returned to his consultation desk, “Relax, this is a typical dream. It’s not that you’re possessed by someone, nor is it that you’ve received anyone’s memories. Dream experiences are amplified, which is a normal physiological phenomenon.”

Chen Juefei slowly sat back down.

The city wasn't found in the phone search. The phone number is 14 digits. The weight of the delivery box is fake.

Each one proves that it was just a dream.

but……

“Dr. Zhou,” Chen Juefei finally spoke, his voice weary, “but…they’re too real. I’m not talking about the numbers, not the details. I’m talking about…the feeling.”

"How does it feel?"

“It’s like…” Chen Juefei frowned, trying to find the right words, “It’s like every single day. The feeling of living each day one by one. Not skipping through them, but truly getting through every single minute.”

He looked at Dr. Zhou with an indescribable look in his eyes.

"Five years. A full five years. I got up at 5:20 every morning and went home after 11 p.m. In the summer, my back would peel from the sun, and in the winter, my fingers would crack from the cold. Once, I spilled soup on a delivery and lost 38.5 yuan. I felt bad for the whole day. That was my earnings for two hours."

"It's not the kind of pain you feel knowing it's gone. It's the kind of pain that's real. It's like... it's the pain of having thirty-eight and fifty cents in my pocket all day, and then it's gone."

"I was late for one order and a bald man yelled at me for five minutes. He stood at the door, pointing his finger at me and spitting in my face. I just stood there listening without saying a word. My legs were shaking when I went downstairs. Not from fear, but from anger. But on the way back, I thought, oh well, maybe he was just in a bad mood today."

"These feelings are so real. So real that even as I sit here talking to you, I'm still thinking that I forgot to tell my wife this morning that I might be home late tonight."

Dr. Zhou looked at him quietly, and after a few seconds, she spoke.

"Okay. Then let me ask you another question. What was your name in your dream?"

Chen Juefei was stunned for a moment.

"My name is……"

He got stuck.

what is it call?

What's the name of the man who ran a food delivery business in his dreams for three years, the man with a wife and daughter, the man who got up at 5:20 every day?

Chen Juefei thought hard.

How could this be?

He remembered it clearly, sitting in the taxi on the way here.

The name was on the tip of my tongue, three characters, as ordinary as could be. What was the last name again?

He opened his mouth, but the name had already slipped onto the tip of his tongue.

And that was it.

It's like holding a handful of sand; the tighter you grip it, the faster it slips through your fingers.

“…I can’t remember,” Chen Juefei said, his voice trembling with panic. “I remembered it in the car just now…I really remembered it.”

Dr. Zhou nodded, his expression remaining unchanged.

"What color overalls were you wearing in your second dream?"

Chen Juefei thought again.

Work clothes.

He wore the same work clothes every day, with the platform's logo on them and an advertising slogan printed on the back. He wore them before leaving home every day and took them off when he came back at night, hanging them behind the door. He wore them for five years.

what colour?

Blue? Orange? Yellow?

"Blue...?"

Dr. Zhou looked at him without saying anything.

"Yellow?" Chen Juefei said again, as if asking himself.

"What was the phone number in your dream?" Dr. Zhou asked.

Chen Juefei opened his mouth as if to answer.

Then... it closed.

Can not remember.

I can't remember a single number.

Dr. Zhou pushed the medical record book on the table forward.

1, 5, 8, 7, 3, 0, 2, 4, 9, 6, 3, 8, 1, 2.

Chen Juefei looked at them as if they were a string of gibberish.

“I noticed that just now,” Dr. Zhou said. “Your memory is fading rapidly. This is exactly what happens with normal dreams. When a person wakes up, the content of their dream is quickly lost; this is a normal mechanism of the brain. Generally, a person can remember 50 to 60 percent of their dream content when they first wake up, but after half an hour, only 10 percent remains, and after an hour, nothing is left.”

He closed the medical record and looked at Chen Juefei.

"It was just a normal dream... Try to relax and don't put too much pressure on yourself in your work and life going forward."

Chen Juefei sat there, staring at the unfamiliar string of numbers.

Does it fade quickly?

Yes.

The details are indeed fading quickly.

On his way here, he remembered what the city looked like—some kind of tree planted on both sides of the main street, and a beef noodle shop called "something," with a corner of its sign missing. Now, that tree is still there, but he can't remember which direction that street was in.

He just remembered that guy who used to squat by the station entrance every day, smoking. He was in his forties, half-white-haired, and said he'd quit after this year. Now, that guy's face was blurry, just a silhouette, squatting there, smoking, smiling at him.

He just remembered that girl who was on duty somewhere... or something like that? She often wore pajamas and had red eyes. Now, he couldn't tell what shade of pink that pajama was—was it a purplish pink or a whitish pink? He didn't know.

but--

Those exhaustion...

Those heavy...

The heat, the cold, the pain...

Why are they still here?

It was midday in summer, the sun was shining on the back of my neck, making my skin feel hot, and sweat was streaming down my back, soaking my work clothes and making them stick to my body—that feeling is still there.

It was a winter morning, my fingers were so frozen they were numb, I couldn't grip the handlebars. After finishing a delivery, I stopped and breathed on them to warm them, and the breath came out white, but my fingers still wouldn't obey me—that feeling was still there.

It was a rainy day. Rainwater dripped from the brim of my hat, into my collar, and down my neck. My underwear was soaked and clung to my body, feeling chilly. When I stopped after finishing a delivery, I was shivering all over—that feeling is still there.

It was late at night. After delivering the last order, I returned to the station and squatted at the door smoking with someone. That person asked me how many orders I had made that day. I said more than forty. That person said I was awesome. I smiled, then stood up and rode my bike home—the exhaustion was still there.

That kind of exhaustion that seeps from the very bones, that you can't seem to get any rest from, is still there.