One year after graduation, Jing Bo's life was like the delivery box on his electric scooter: it carried hot meals for other people, while he was always stuck eating cold food.
The day he was laid off, a torrential downpour destroyed his last umbrella. When his landlord came to collect the rent, he stood in the hallway clutching a handful of crumpled bills, listening to the neighbors say, "Even a graduate from a top university is nothing special." At his lowest point, he sat beneath a bridge chewing on a steamed bun. He looked at the message from his family on his phone, "Take care of yourself," and swallowed back his pain.
But no one knew that this delivery worker, ground into the dirt by life, had a stack of sketches hidden in his briefcase, filled with mechanical lotuses he'd drawn in college. They were the dream he and three friends had sketched over barbecue at a restaurant: a dream about originality, dignity, and not letting their passion die at the hands of reality.
When the betrayer from their past strode into the spotlight on the back of their hard work, and a tycoon scoffed, "A tiny workshop dares to talk about originality?" Jing Bo wiped his face and turned to his equally exhausted but bright-eyed companions. "Scared? If we are, we've already lost."
From electric scooters to office towers, from a bridge beneath the cold rain to the glare of the spotlight, the designs they spent three years bringing to life would at last ignite a wildfire of sparks amid the ruins of the industry.
"Life can knock me down, but it can't silence the words I haven't said: I haven't given up yet."
