Trembling in the Skies

Chapter 1: Isn't That a Bit Too High?

“Huh?” Li Teng woke up, sat up, and was just about to get out of bed when he suddenly pulled his legs back and let out a startled cry as he looked around. “What on earth is going on?” Li Teng looked around in panic, then carefully shifted his body to the edge of the bed and peered down. He remembered falling asleep last night in his own bedroom at home, but when he woke up this morning, he discovered that the bed he was lying on had somehow been placed right on the edge of a cliff! No, not on the edge of a cliff… After scanning the other three directions around the bed, Li Teng discovered with utter horror that his bed was perched atop a stone pillar! The stone pillar’s length and width matched those of his bed exactly, and it seemed to rise more than a thousand meters above the ground! “This must be a dream! It has to be a dream!” Li Teng backed up to the center of the bed, curled up, and kept reassuring himself. After closing his eyes for quite a while, Li Teng opened them again, hoping that this time, when he opened them, he would be back in his familiar bedroom. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the case. He was still perched atop a stone pillar over a thousand meters high! “Wake up! Li Teng reached out and slapped his own face, trying to rouse himself from this ‘nightmare.’ Unfortunately, it was all in vain; doing so only made him more and more alert. “I’ve been kidnapped! I need to call for help! My phone…” Li Teng fumbled around under his pillow and blankets. Usually, he’d use his phone until the battery died at night, so he had a habit of placing it on the desk next to his bed to charge before going to sleep. So there was no way he’d find it in bed. Unwilling to give up, Li Teng carefully crawled to the edge of the bed and peered closely beneath the wooden frame. Beneath the wooden bed was a smooth stone ceiling—his phone wasn’t there either. “Who did this?” “Who brought me here?” “Do you know this is against the law?” “Let me down right now!” Li Teng screamed at the top of his lungs toward the sky. There was no response. Having calmed down a bit, Li Teng lay face-down on the bed, peering over the edge to carefully examine the area below the stone pillar, trying to figure out exactly where he was. From a height of over a thousand meters, it was difficult to make out the scene below with the naked eye. Fortunately, Li Teng had good eyesight. After cupping his hands around his eyes and peering intently for a while, he could make out the general outline: it seemed there was a small town below the stone pillar, with crisscrossing roads and several buildings. Next to the town was a mountain, and beside the mountain lay a large lake. Is there really a town like this in the world? A town with a stone pillar rising straight up into the sky right in the center? It was a shame he didn’t have a cell phone; otherwise, he could have looked it up online to find out where this was. “Help! Is anyone there?” Li Teng shouted for help again from beneath the stone pillar. There was no response. Except for the whooshing sound of the wind in his ears. In despair, Li Teng lay back down on his bed. Although he was lying in his own bed, Li Teng’s mind was anything but at ease at that moment. He was over a thousand meters up in the air! One careless roll toward the edge of the bed, and he could fall and be smashed to pieces! Li Teng did his best to position himself right in the center of the bed to avoid accidentally falling off the edge. Lying there, staring at the sky, there was nothing he could do. Li Teng soon realized there was a problem he urgently needed to deal with. His stomach had started to growl. He usually ate breakfast around seven o’clock every morning, and it must be close to eight now. But he hadn’t had breakfast yet, so it was only natural that he was hungry. The problem was, in his current situation, where could he go to buy breakfast? If he didn’t get any food, wouldn’t he starve to death right here? It wasn’t just a matter of starving to death—there was also the issue of water. They say a person can survive for about ten days without food, but without water, a person can’t even last three days. Li Teng grew increasingly panicked. “Who’s playing this damn joke on me?” “Just end it already! Stop messing around!” “Help me!” Li Teng cupped his hands to form a megaphone, leaned over the edge of the bed, and shouted for help several more times toward the base of the stone pillar. When he still received no response, he had no choice but to give up for the time being and obediently lie back down in the middle of the bed. Calling for help was completely ineffective; it only wasted his energy and even accelerated the loss of fluids in his body, making it even harder for him to survive atop the stone pillar. His best option now was to lie completely still, trying to prolong his survival as long as possible until the moment someone discovered him and came to his rescue. Would help ever come? As Li Teng lay in the middle of the bed, his mind wandering, his consciousness began to grow hazy. At one point, he suddenly realized that simply falling asleep like this was far too dangerous! What if he fell asleep and rolled off the bed? He’d slept in this bed for so many years and had never once rolled off it while sleeping—surely it wouldn’t be that easy to fall off, right? But this was over a thousand meters up! He’d never slept at such a height before! It’s like standing at the edge of your bed in your own bedroom—no matter how dangerous the move, you don’t feel afraid because even if you fell, you’d be fine, so it’s hard to actually fall. But if you were standing on the edge of a cliff with no railing and tried to pull off such a reckless stunt, the consequences would likely be very different. Mainly… the psychological feeling of standing at the edge of a bed is just different. Just as he was lost in his thoughts, a faint rumbling sound came from the distant horizon. Li Teng looked toward the horizon and realized it was an airplane! It looked like a commercial airliner, flying toward him from the distant horizon! Li Teng quickly stood up on the bed and began waving vigorously at the approaching commercial airliner. Unfortunately, the plane was flying too high. As it passed directly overhead, it didn’t slow down at all—there was no way the crew could see Li Teng below, who looked like a bacterium perched on the tip of a needle. “The fact that a commercial airliner is passing by at least means this isn’t a completely desolate place. Who knows—maybe other aircraft will show up too. I have to keep fighting to survive; I’ll definitely make it until the day rescue arrives!” Li Teng encouraged himself. Lying in bed, he held out until noon, but aside from the occasional commercial airliner passing overhead, Li Teng saw no other aircraft. The midday sun was scorching. Although it wasn’t particularly hot at an altitude of over a thousand meters, it still left Li Teng feeling parched. He longed for a glass of sweet, ice-cold drink right in front of him. He would definitely grab that drink and down it in one gulp. Unfortunately, there was nothing. Not only was he thirsty, but he was hungry, too. Up here at this altitude, there was absolutely no way to satisfy either need! Thirsty and hungry, Li Teng, bathed in the midday sun, drifted off to sleep without realizing it. He didn’t know how long he’d slept. When Li Teng woke up, he found himself back in his own bedroom! “Thank heavens! This nightmare is finally over!” Li Teng was overjoyed. Thirst. He quickly reached for the glass on the nightstand and gulped down the cold water in one go. It still didn’t quite quench his thirst. There were ice-cold beers and soft drinks in the fridge. He needed to find something to eat, too. Li Teng stumbled out of bed and staggered out of the bedroom. Just as he was about to head to the fridge for food and drinks, he spotted the bathroom next to him and decided to use the restroom first. As he staggered into the bathroom, unbuttoned his pants, and aimed at the toilet, Li Teng suddenly sensed that something wasn’t quite right. Where was the toilet? How had the space in front of him turned into a bottomless precipice? Li Teng instinctively leaned forward to look down, but his body stumbled and plummeted into the abyss! “Aaaah!!!” With that scream, Li Teng finally woke up for real. He realized he hadn’t actually woken up—he was still lying in his own bed. And that bed was still perched atop a stone pillar over a thousand meters high! That scene from a moment ago, when he returned to his bedroom, had been nothing but a dream! “Oh my God! No!” Li Teng began to scream in despair.