默读/Silent Reading by Priest - Book 1 Translated by E. Danglars at edanglarstranslations.com. For comments, questions, and corrections, e-mail
[email protected]. 1 CHAPTER 1 - Prologue The truth, the bitter truth.—The Red and the Black1 The zone around Yan City’s North Nanping Road in the Flower Market District was like a demon with half a face of makeup. The broad, straight two-way road split the whole of the Flower Market District in two. The East District was one of the city's busiest commercial centers, while the West District was a forgotten old slum, gathering place of the city's poor. Following several years of properties in the East District successively being auctioned off at sky-high prices by real estate tycoons, the old neighborhood, badly in need of transformation, had caught some reflected glory. The cost of paying off and relocating the residents had risen with the tide, frightening off a clutch of developers and erecting a capital barrier among the cramped and impoverished alleys. Neighbors living in dilapidated houses dreamed all day of using their dozen-square-meter run-down rooms to get rich overnight. Already they were feeling the sense of superiority from the idea that "my home is worth millions torn down.” Of course, these slum millionaires still had to put on their slippers and line up to empty their chamber pots every day. There was still a chill in the air on this early summer night. The summer heat that had accumulated during the day was quickly overwhelmed. The barbecue carts illegally occupying the streets packed up and left one after another; the inhabitants enjoying the cool air went home early, too; occasionally an old streetlamp flickered unsteadily, most likely because the nearby illegally crowded rentals were siphoning electricity off the power line.