From the Abyss of Stars Part 1

053. Craftsman

053. Craftsman

Leaving the tavern, Old Dmitry led Li Aozhi and Qiu Ran through the complex alleys and containers of the Sikkim settlement, opened a manhole cover, and took them down.

"Is this... a sunken ship?"

Qiu Ran brushed her fingers over the alloy plates on both sides of the corridor, surprised, and said:

"The entire Sikkim settlement is actually built on a ship... It's unimaginable. How big is this ship?"

"A small freighter under a million tons. In the old days, this was small, not even equipped with a nuclear reactor. The warships and aircraft carriers of the old days were often five or six hundred meters long."

Dmitry said with some longing:

"There used to be a lot of water outside, forming oceans. But after that war, the red and black clouds of the apocalypse swept across the world. The oceans either froze into ice, were buried by snow and sand, or turned into permanent snow and blew away with the wind."

"The old world seems like everything was big." Qiu Ran looked enviously at the spacious corridor. "Even Frost-Plated doesn't seem to have such a big ship."

"Yes, the old world's productivity was excessive. The clothes they produced in a year could clothe billions of people for a thousand years," Dmitry said.

"That's amazing... They must have been very wealthy then, with big wardrobes to hold hundreds of clothes."

"Not really. According to the scavengers' excavations, most clothes were discarded after being worn only a few times." Li Aozhi shrugged, dispelling Qiu Ran's fantasy. "In reality, the old times were no different from now. The poor remained poor, and the rich remained rich. Just the quality of life was much better."

"Uh..."

Qiu Ran opened her mouth and finally said:

"Even so, it's better than now."

Compared to above ground, the underground wasn't much warmer. Homeless wanderers were everywhere in the corridors, but compared to those living in iron containers above ground, they had some assets, at least a blanket, a vessel that might be a pot or a skull, some weapons, and that's all.

Almost everyone slept on their boxes. Unlike above ground, there were few fights here, giving a bit of a community feel. Some places had scattered campfires, around which dozens of people crowded to sleep. With the ship's original ventilation ducts, no one should die from carbon monoxide poisoning.

It was much cleaner here than above ground, perhaps because there were more toilets on the ship. The filth and excrement above ground were only temporary, often disgusting at first but blown away or buried by snow by midnight.

In fact, Li Aozhi knew that outside, even excrement was fought over. Without fertilizers, the soil's nutrient layer had long been destroyed by wind and sand, leaving little material to grow crops. In such places, public toilets often had armed guards to prevent the theft of this important resource.

Everything related to humans was precious outside, except for human lives.

Old Dmitry walked to the end of the stairs, used a key to open a door to a sailor's dormitory:

"I live here."

As soon as the door opened, a warm breath rushed out. Qiu Ran smelled water vapor, a woman, and a faint scent of milk. She curiously peeked inside. The orange candlelight was especially precious in the darkness. A middle-aged woman with a sallow face but a kind expression lay on wooden boards, surrounded by a bed made of furs, quilts, and even chicken feathers.