The Useless Cui

The two guys didn't hesitate. They either had an insatiable appetite for cheap thrills or they were genuinely generous types worth making friends with. They said another guy wouldn't be back until the evening, so after I made up my bed, we headed out to drink. They took me to a small local restaurant, where we ordered a dish of boiled pork slices, sauce beef, and a common cold dish. I asked if they could drink, and they laughed, saying, "Just drink, brother, we'll keep up with you no matter how much you drink."

Hearing that, I had no more reservations. I called the waiter over and ordered a case of Harbin beer. "Get the cold dish out first."

I genuinely wanted to drink, to get drunk. I wanted to forget everything. If she was going to break up with me, why did she want me to send her off? Why did she smile at me? Was this revenge? Did I deserve this much punishment?

"Come on, brothers, I'll drink first. You guys follow." This was my third round, and to be honest, in terms of tolerance, they should have been able to drink more than me, but I was already on my third bottle. Anyone would think this was too much. Bao Long toasted me again, and then asked, "Bro, you okay? Got something on your mind?"

I poured more beer into my glass. The beer here was better than the one back home, but the more I drank, the more sour it felt. The alcohol was starting to hit, so I smiled and said to them, "Bro, I got dumped."

By the time we were done, we were all drunk. When it came to men, the best way to communicate was either through fighting or drinking, and we sure drank a lot. By the end of the night, we felt like long-lost brothers, each with a cigarette in hand, walking back to the dorm, laughing and joking.

When we returned, the guy who had been missing was back. He looked pretty old, with a thick beard. I handed him a cigarette and introduced myself. His name was Wang Cheng. Later, I found out he was already twenty-three.

The lights went out, and I lay in bed, listening to Li Xiaoqiang snoring. My head still felt fuzzy. Who said that drinking would help you forget your troubles? I cursed their eight generations of ancestors.

People can be so miserable. I now fully understood that. The more you try to push something out of your mind, the more it keeps spinning inside. It buzzes around your head like a fly you can't get rid of.

It wasn't until I got up to pee and looked outside that I noticed the sky was starting to lighten. My college life was about to begin. Well, I guess this was how it was going to be.

Looking back, I was actually quite fragile psychologically. Even many years later, one of my good friends would often bring it up. My boss also frequently scolded me, saying I wasn't cut out for this job.

This, indeed, was how university life started. The next day, classes began. They had even skipped the military training. There were over thirty people in the class, and as usual in this field, there were more girls than boys. But honestly, the girls' looks weren't something to be proud of. Later, when I heard Teacher Guo's comedic skit, I couldn't help but feel like he was describing the girls from our 06 Visual Communication department.

Forget it. How they looked didn't concern me. I noticed my personality gradually turning more and more silent. Maybe it was due to the emotional shock, but I began to feel that everything around me didn't really matter. Except for drinking with Bao Jinlong and the others in the dorm, I barely said a word. When I went to class, I couldn't care less about what the teachers were talking about. I didn't listen at all. Half a semester had passed, and most of my classmates didn't even know my name. Some didn't even realize I existed.

My advisor, Liu Mingming, was a meticulous person. He had talked to me several times, telling me that I was too introverted, and that wasn't good. I knew it wasn't good. I had lost all motivation and was simply going through the motions. But it was a habit that had formed, and changing it was hard.

An old saying goes: "If you don't choose to go crazy in silence, you'll just continue to silently become a weirdo." Liu Mingming probably worried I might turn into a second Ma Jiajue.

Maybe I was turning a bit weird. One day, Bao Long said he was going to dye his hair, and asked if I wanted to join him. I agreed. He got his hair shaved to a buzz cut and dyed it yellow. As for me, I let my hair grow long, covering my eyes, and dyed it blue. I looked like I was cosplaying, honestly. A yellow and a blue walking together—it was ridiculous. I'm not even exaggerating; it was a total disaster. When we got back to the dorm, we thought the primary colors were missing one, so we convinced Li Xiaoqiang to dye his hair red. He was lying on his bed reading fantasy novels, and when he heard us, he turned over and lazily said, "You guys are idiots."

Honestly, none of us in the dorm were saints. Including myself, I knew full well. By the end of the first semester, we hardly went to class anymore. We spent all our time in internet cafes. Me, Qiangzi, Bao Long, and another guy from a different dorm, Xiao Tao, spent endless hours in an internet café playing WM World. We rarely returned to the dorm. When we got hungry, we'd go out for drinks. We'd only go back to the dorm when we were too tired to stay awake.

Thinking back on that period, it was pretty ridiculous. One day, the four of us were pulling an all-nighter. I was sitting next to a kid who looked about the age of a high school sophomore. His hairstyle was even more exaggerated than mine—pink. No exaggeration, it was a bit like Trunks from Dragon Ball Z transforming into a Super Saiyan. It was even a little like the Statue of Liberty. I was so scared walking past him that his hair might poke me. I glanced at his QQ name, and it was equally ridiculous. "潙沵芣夃芣唷"—I had no idea what it meant. I stared at it for a while before Taozi finally told me it was supposed to say "For your infertility."

I couldn't help but feel this kid's aura was overpowering. Damn, I'm almost twenty and still a virgin, and this kid's already going for infertility?

By late night, my eyelids were heavy, and I couldn't stay awake any longer. I put on my headphones and collapsed at the computer, falling into a half-sleep. I don't know how long I slept, but suddenly, a loud noise startled me awake. I thought the lighter on the table had exploded. When I sat up, I realized it was this kid playing a dancing game. He was slamming the spacebar like he had a grudge against the keyboard, swearing non-stop.

I was speechless. I tapped him on the shoulder and politely asked him to be quieter. To my surprise, he glared at me and snapped, "Who the hell are you?"

I couldn't help but laugh. My buddies heard it and also started laughing. Qiangzi got up, smiling, and went to the bathroom. When he came back, he was holding a plunger. He lit a cigarette, stood behind the kid, and waited. I saw Qiangzi was ready, so I slapped the kid across the face. Let me show you who I am.

The kid froze, and Qiangzi dragged him into the hallway of the internet café. Since we came here all the time, and the night shift manager wasn't fond of this kid either, no one stopped us. The four of us gave him a good "harmonious society" style beating. This poor guy fell to the ground, covering his head to protect himself from the plunger. Seems like he was the type who could take a beating or a verbal insult, but not a hair touch.

I squatted down, grabbed his collar, and pulled him up. "Now do you know who I am?" The kid nodded repeatedly.

I still wasn't satisfied, and for some reason, I suddenly remembered his QQ name. I yelled at him, "It's not our fault you're getting beaten. You can't even write a proper Chinese character, and you're using 'For your infertility'? Change it! Change it to 'Loyalty to the Country!'"

Watching this poor kid change his QQ name to "Loyalty to the Country" through his tears, we all burst out laughing. The people in the internet café laughed too. I told the kid, "You're not a warrior yet, you're just a pathetic little baby. Now go, get out."

I watched this unlucky guy run out of the café, then we went back to playing games. Suddenly, it hit me.

Wait. I wasn't like this before. What the hell happened to me?

Having gone a whole week without proper sleep, I fought to stay awake and entered the game, starting to do quests. If you think about it, the quests in WM were just endless running. My character was a feather, flying from one end of the map to the other. The music in my ears was gentle, and I stared blankly at the screen, but after a while, I started to hallucinate.

It's true what they say—when you're extremely tired, you start to see things. This was the first time in my life I experienced a hallucination.

I felt like I was flying in the game, above mountains and rivers. Then, I suddenly remembered the "Three Pure Books" that I hadn't touched in a long time, the patterns flashing in my mind. The whole scene made me feel strangely happy. I thought to myself, maybe only in these hallucinations can I truly feel joy. Reality was too harsh, too cold.

I woke up when Bao Long shook me. He told me the school was checking attendance, and I had to show up, or I'd lose credits. I stretched lazily and thought to myself, maybe I really shouldn't neglect the "Three Qing Book" anymore.