The phone screen was stubbornly lit in the darkness. The latest text message came from the bank. The cold numbers were followed by words such as "overdue", "credit investigation", and "legal procedures", which were like red-hot needles piercing his retina.
Just ten minutes ago, the landlord's gruff ultimatum was still echoing in my ears: "Xiao Lin, the end of the month! It's the end of the month! If you can't pay the rent again, get out of here with your rags!"
He lifted the red cloth.
A piece of jade pendant lay quietly in the palm of my hand.
It is about the size of a baby's fist, and its texture is neither gold nor stone. The tentacles are warm and cool, and there are some scratch marks on the edges. The whole body is a dark blue-gray color, without any carvings, and only an extremely dim, almost imperceptible shimmer flows on the surface.
This was the only relic left by his father. The taciturn man who died of illness when he was in college put this jade pendant into his hand before he died and only said: "Keep it... Don't sell it."
Don't sell.
Lin Fan chewed on these two words, and a bitter curve formed at the corner of his mouth.
His mother's kidneys failed, and the weekly dialysis costs were like a bottomless pit; he himself was a gold medal salesman for "AXA Insurance" for three consecutive years. His insight into the world and his grasp of opportunities were his greatest pride.
But the "spiritual resurgence" that swept the world three years ago was like a silent tsunami, overturning the entire society overnight.
