This series is taken from Lú Chānghǎi’s Retrospection. Only after being reminded by a classmate did I come to understand that Chānghǎi’s account of his unique experiences with his contemporaries was not accidental. I did not lament, for they at least had once been the chosen ones, whereas I was far from being someone at the forefront of the present age. No matter how difficult or arduous, or even how resentful, I was merely a country bumpkin, watching the spectacle from afar, unable to take part.

Though our choices varied greatly, my nostalgia was in many ways similar to Chānghǎi. My self-perception in high school was even based on the concept like ‘Muqliongism,’ but the distant past merely existed like still water in an old well, a phantom lodging in the present. The later misfortunes could not be blamed on the hometown; they were equally due to the limits of my nature and mistaken decisions. Indeed, my peers all succeeded: among them, some were hailed as geniuses, some were like lotus flowers emerging from muddy waters, incompatible with the world, and others displayed their talents in dazzling brilliance. I have never seen anyone like them. They had all come from the same damp staircases, blackened fences, oppressive winters, and the constraints of the alleyways, constantly making me feel ashamed.

To my desperation, I am not one of them.

My name was chosen using a divination website, perhaps symbolically marking the beginning of the digital age. I do not like to move about, preferring to live in the outskirts of the city, lamenting the seasons, and never wanting to answer simple questions. Whenever I was called upon to visit someone’s home, I would pick up an old book, but never actually open it on the way back, just as many things I had planned never came to fruition.

The person who broke the silence, in order of acquaintance, was Mocsieng, Hiuenqiuet, Luiqiuet, and Yuulim. Of course, these were pseudonyms taken to identify each other, and I called myself Ligi, hence the Ligi Studio. Hiuenqiuet and Mocsieng had known each other for years, and later they led the gang with influence spreading throughout the school, the Muqliong. After several mergers and conflicts, I and the aforementioned members were the only few still maintaining a close relationship.

The gang was created, tacitly, for entertainment. We transplanted the concepts of online games or reality shows, with one person acting as the emcee, called system,¹ while the rest were players. We ourselves created games, usually adapting from novels or comics; the system did not generate maps or battles within the game, but also had to record each player’s account, level, and equipment. I had several beautiful notebooks, where there are profile pages for players, though these are not always seen attentive. Since everyone had one or more games, game items could even be traded. Later, I saw on Zhīhū that others had done similar things.

Muqliong also undertook many other miscellaneous tasks. A so-called volunteer work we did on our own (my father mocked me, asking, could volunteer work done in isolation be of any value to others); or making short films, such as robot–human duels, mocking textbook content, and contending for ‘renewable energy resource for humankind’ or a basketball; I edited them using pirated software, that were proudly mentioned in Mocsieng’s journal. There was also a zero-code application generation platform, on which we once ‘produced’ strange studios such as Ligi Studio, Mocsieng Factory, and Everybody Up (Zienndzaehienzhag, literally ‘arrow is already drawn’), which remained in beta testing due to lack of users. The only officially assigned task the gang ever had was a small science project; although the copied work made in the basement over two weeks still leaked, our teacher made a more vital acknowledgement by citing ‘you all often hang out together.’

This website originally started as a series of HTML files, with flamboyant letters in Office 2003, frames, and a contact commander button that opened QQ. Due to the network tunnel seemingly broke internet connection, I gave up publishing it. Unable to realize the dream of unifying all things through a website, I used Authorware to achieve it, inputting catalogues, matching knowledge objects, and jumping to resources. There were also administrative experience cards — Hiuenqiuet and Mocsieng later became class committee members, and I helped prepare materials for class meetings every week. Combined with the scattered documents I handled with school teachers, I fear I will never see so many documents again in my lifetime. If the internet still remains a mixed blessing², the physical world may be even more full of misfortune. To satisfy the mechanical enthusiasts hiding behind the hedges, the wooden boards, the small carts made from cardboard and water bottles, and the curtains placed in the gaps of private cars, every time I returned home, I instinctively thought I was still in the same place. There are still unfulfilled dreams, such as the competition Muqliong King of Karaoké (a temporary name, only a promotional video has been made so far).

These ridiculous yet perilous attempts were not a blow to me at the time, and soon faded away. We ranked ourselves like the heroes of Water Margin, blowing electric codes with plastic whistles to call each other, walking back from the tutoring class an hour late, and still going to a small store in the bubble economy to buy a cup of tea, or visiting someone’s house to borrow wireless internet to connect, unable to distinguish whether the words on our lips, ‘tomorrow’ or ‘first night,’ were in real life or game. I once imagined that while I lived on the earth, another version of me existed in another world, lingering in our fictional realm. Of course, that world³ was much smaller than Phesoca, just as my hometown than Běijīng. It was only when I sat by the lamp trying to write an anthem for Muqliong, driven by emotion but no skill, and was scolded by my parents, ‘You think you know composing?’ that I suddenly returned from fantasy to reality.

The tranquill life has an end. Muqliong reached its climax, and we began writing fiction, either about being recruited as comrades by a warship, or about the gang pausing reluctantly at the time of the college entrance examination, and four years later, when we reunited, someone had become a millionaire. We chased each other with our manuscripts under the circular tower, not noticing the willow fluff falling from the trees behind us. I finally realised that childhood had passed forever, possibly sweating heavily on a playground, in some nameless afternoon.

Translated from Mandarin.