Chapter 1: New World

As the sky began to lighten, the people on the Fengcheng were already stirring. The events of last night, especially the spectacular scene of the wormhole’s disappearance, became an endless topic of conversation. Most people hadn’t seen it from inside the cabins, but there was no shortage of DV footage and digital photos that had captured the moment.

The Executive Committee had not yet given the order to weigh anchor and set sail, but everyone immediately discovered the first problem that hadn’t been anticipated in the plan: feeding so many people for breakfast was impossible. The ship’s galley was built for a crew of 40, but now there were 400 people on the Fengcheng alone. To make matters worse, washing up also became a problem. Long lines formed in front of the toilets. Some who couldn’t wait any longer took the risk of climbing onto the swaying decks of the small boats tied alongside and relieving themselves directly into the sea.

“Commissioner Ma, this won’t do!” Bei Wei, the appointed leader of the landing reconnaissance team, was furious. He ran up to the sterncastle and shouted at Ma Qianzhu, the newly appointed landing commander. “All this human waste will attract sharks! It will make the landing too dangerous.”

Ma Qianzhu said helplessly, “Then what do you want me to do? There are only 10 toilets on the ship, and now 400 people need to use them.”

“If you don’t handle it, we’ll be in big trouble if there’s an accident! Never mind the sharks, they’re all climbing onto the decks of those wobbly little boats. If one of them falls, we won’t even need to bother fishing them out.”

As they were speaking, “Auntie Tian” from the cafeteria management came in with a look of resignation.

“Commissioner Ma, what should we do? Everyone wants to have some congee, but I looked at the galley on this ship, and it can’t make congee for four hundred people. There’s not enough time…”

Ma Qianzhu, having just been lectured by Bei Wei, now had someone else bothering him about congee. Seeing that the landing plan had already run into several hitches before it even began, he grew impatient. “Why are you bringing this to me? Go find Xiao Zishan! Isn’t he your superior?”

“But aren’t you the landing commander? Aren’t all matters on this ship under your command?”

Isn’t this all a mess of your own making? And now you’re asking me what to do? Ma Qianzhu cursed inwardly, but he couldn’t show his anger—Auntie Tian was over fifty years old and had followed the transmigrators to risk her life and build a new world. He could only placate her for now, passing the buck back. “Cook as much as you can first, and distribute it in batches. Something is better than nothing… Go discuss it with Zishan.”

Not making congee for everyone wouldn’t have been a big deal. Everyone had been issued two days’ worth of dry rations. As long as the fresh water supply was maintained, they could get by gnawing on those energy bars.

The problem was that as soon as Auntie Tian saw the ship had a galley, she had, without a second thought, started making breakfast according to her old habits. Before dawn, Li Yuanyuan from the General Affairs Group had led a few girls to serve the Executive Committee members in the ship’s superstructure freshly cooked congee and steamed buns, each with a small dish of pickled vegetables and some fried peanuts.

At that moment, Ma Qianzhu knew there was trouble. The masses are not troubled by scarcity, but by inequality. Why should the leaders get to eat hot congee and steamed buns while the masses had to chew on energy bars that tasted like expired mooncake filling with cold water? To create such differential treatment at the very beginning of their enterprise would cause morale to plummet and make the group difficult to lead. So now, the Executive Committee was drinking their congee in secret, with no one daring to go near the portholes. He picked up the phone. “Engine room? Run the desalination equipment at maximum capacity. We must ensure a full supply of fresh water!”

“Ensure a full supply? Who do you think you are?!” a resentful voice came from the phone. “The desalination equipment only has this much output. Do you want us to piss fresh water for you?” Ma Qianzhu recognized the voice as Xiao Bailang’s. He had a degree in mechanical processing and knew equipment installation and management, so he had been assigned to follow the ship for three months to learn about the engine room.

Insubordination! Ma Qianzhu cursed silently. You pretty boy, just you wait, I’ll sell you to Thailand! After venting his frustration internally, he realized it was useless to stay there. He might as well follow Bei Wei down to the deck.

Dong Shiye sat on the deck, leaning against his backpack. His legs were weak when he came down from the small boat’s deck. The sea was right between his legs, and just a glance was enough to make him dizzy. Fortunately, the ship was barely rocking; the sea was calm. The crescent moon in the sky was slowly fading. Watching the crowd queuing by the toilets, cursing, he felt the risk had been worth it.

There was nowhere to wash his hands, but he had prepared for such problems long ago. He took out a disinfectant wipe and cleaned his hands. He had brought plenty of toilet paper, disinfectant wipes, and water purification tablets—it was unreliable to depend entirely on the organization. He didn’t take out his cup to brush his teeth either. Many people were leaning over the ship’s rails, spitting out white foam that left streaks on the hull, a spectacular sight. He just used dental floss and a piece of chewing gum to clean his teeth. His principle was to avoid opening his fully packed backpack as much as possible.

The congee supplied by the Executive Committee caused some chaos for a while. Dong Shiye didn’t join the crowd—each batch of four large pots was only enough for 40 people to have one bowl each. The wait was too long. He didn’t bother with the disgusting energy bars either. He had his own PLA special forces rations. Chewing on compressed biscuits and drinking some water was enough. If he had congee, he would have to find water to wash the bowl later. If he didn’t wash it, the bowl would become a breeding ground for bacteria.

Looking out from the ship, the coastline that had been a pitch-black mass yesterday was now clearly visible. Lingao in the 21st century was supposed to be a well-developed county, but this stretch of coast looked uninhabited.

The beach not far from the ship’s side was narrow, covered with black gravel, not at all like the image of Hainan’s turquoise sea and silver sand. Behind it was a low cliff, fractured by an earthquake into numerous gaps of various shapes and sizes. In some places, there were a few gentle slopes leading to the top of the cliff.

Looking west, less than a nautical mile from the Fengcheng, there was a cape jutting out from the land. That was probably the estuary of Bopu Port. The cape was covered with mangrove trees leaning towards the water. These lush mangroves covered almost the entire coastal area and extended into the water. If a botanist had come to this place, they would surely have jumped for joy—such a complete mangrove ecosystem was rarely seen in 21st-century Hainan.

Dong Shiye suddenly noticed a strange phenomenon: among all these coastal trees, there was not a single coconut tree, the most common tree in Hainan! This greatly surprised him, an experienced backpacker. Coconut trees are relatively easy to grow and can be seen everywhere on tropical and subtropical islands and coasts. He didn’t know that Lingao originally had no coconut trees—the coconut trees in 21st-century Lingao were introduced successively after the 1930s.

On the beach, large flocks of screeching seabirds were taking off and landing. Most of them were various types of gulls, but there were also loons. It was clear that such a dense flock of birds was a rare sight in the 21st century. This sense of wilderness made him feel a little oppressed—this was a place where humans had rarely set foot.

A commotion arose on the starboard side of the Fengcheng. The first landing reconnaissance team, led by Bei Wei, slung their rifles and machetes over their backs and, under the watchful eyes of their comrades, climbed down the gangway and boarded a motorboat.

The landing reconnaissance team consisted of military personnel, engineering surveyors, and geologists. Their mission was to investigate the terrain, hydrography, and possible villages and water sources of the port and the coast for several kilometers. They were equipped with walkie-talkies, self-defense weapons, 25x8 binoculars, surveying tools, and a 3-megapixel DV camera.

To deal with possible accidents, everyone wore anti-stab vests, camouflage uniforms, and steel helmets. The Executive Committee had originally intended to equip them with riot gear, but Bei Wei refused—although the protective effect was first-class, it was too cumbersome to move around in.

“Be careful!” Ma Qianzhu said to Bei Wei at the top of the gangway.

“Don’t worry,” Bei Wei replied, turning and descending to the motorboat.

The “putt-putt…” of the engine broke millennia of silence several centuries ahead of its time. The motorboat cut through the waves and sped towards the faint coastline.

Bei Wei was the captain of the landing team, with full authority over the safety of the landing. The order from the landing command was to focus on gathering information and to avoid armed conflict with the locals. If they could make contact with people, they were to try to inquire about the local situation. For this purpose, Xiong Buyou was specially assigned to the reconnaissance team. Logically, this otaku from a manga company should not have been in such a first-wave reconnaissance team, but he could speak the Lingao dialect and served as the team’s interpreter.

The Lingao dialect is an anomaly among Hainanese dialects. In modern Hainan, it is only used by some people in Lingao, Danzhou, and Chengmai. It is not only vastly different from Mandarin but also completely different from the mainstream Hainanese dialect, Qiongshan dialect. It is generally believed that this language shares a common origin with the Zhuang language of Guangxi.

This linguistic difference has always made Lingao a unique and independent existence in Hainan, with little communication with the outside world and a very closed social environment.

Xiong Buyou had originally planned to wear the chainmail he had brought at the cost of precious luggage weight, but Bei Wei had strictly forbidden it—it was too heavy. The anti-stab vest was more practical.

Because positioning based on the map would have a large margin of error—although the map they had was the largest scale map of Lingao County and its topography, it was still 400 years old, and it was hard to say how accurate the terrain was; it was better than nothing. Therefore, Bei Wei decided not to approach the coast directly for the time being, but to head straight for the most prominent geographical landmark here—Lingao Cape.