[Crossing] Beacon Fire Dragon Line

[April 1944, Rome]

In the spring of [-], the war in Italy was in full swing.

Across the Gustav Line, the Allies faced off against the Germans north and south.On the long and narrow Apennines Peninsula, the flames of war are raging everywhere.

Rome stands silently in the center of the flames.

In front of the steps of the Pantheon, the curate Father Padreio looked at the twilight sky and crossed himself on his chest.He was a thin, haggard old man, with enough room for three bodies in his green robe and white gown.As soon as the wind blows, the thin circle of gray hair on the top of the head flutters weakly in the air, like a group of old spider silk.

Because of the war, the Pantheon has not held mass for a long time, and the door is closed.The priest crossed the porch, took a key from his pocket, and opened the thick padlock on the chain.Pushing hard, the two seven-meter-high bronze carved door panels suddenly opened.The musty smell of old paper comes out, mixed with a little dusty smell, as if reminding visitors how long this place has been stored for a long time.

The priest turned around, held up the boxy old-fashioned metal hanging lamp with one hand, raised the other hand to check it, and called to those who followed him: "Come here, child."

Evening light from the skylight of the stone dome illuminated the silent Pantheon.In the rotunda with a diameter of more than 40 meters, rows of neatly stacked crates with a height of one person almost occupy the field of vision, making people feel like they are in a large freight warehouse.The floor was thick with linoleum, and the sharp corners of each box were wrapped with cloth strips to prevent damage to the marble floors and walls.

The priest moved cautiously along the narrow passageway left between the crates.He sprained his ankle, which made him walk like a waddling penguin.He went all the way to the middle of the main hall, directly under the circular skylight.There are no piles of items here, and there is a piece of ground about [-] square meters free, with a simple bedding.

"If you are not afraid to spend the night here alone, you can sleep here." The priest said, pointing to the skylight with his finger up again: "When it rains, cover the box with a tarpaulin, and remember to check whether the drainage holes on the ground are correct. Unobstructed. There is also this hanging lamp——” He flipped a movable metal plate in front of the glass light box with his hand, “Remember to turn it off when you go to bed, it contains carbide fuel, be careful not to cause a fire.”

After getting the other party's promise, the priest sighed and stroked a crate beside him: "I'm sorry, kid, don't blame me for being too wordy. Almost half of Rome's library is here, please be sure, be sure, Take care of them."

At the beginning of the year, the Allied forces reached the town of Cassino, which is only 130 kilometers away from Rome, and the bombing there lasted for more than a month.From time to time, swarms of aircraft would fly over Rome in darkness, causing alarms to be raised.Although Rome is an undefended city and has never been attacked, it is already full of panic.

Since then, Father Padreio, who has prepared for a rainy day, has started to do one thing: transport the materials of the libraries and archives in Rome to the Vatican or store them in the church, hoping that they can escape the catastrophe that may come.

This can be done almost exclusively by self-reliance.In this turbulent age, the Holy See and the Italian cultural relics department have no time for other things. Even if they have energy, they mainly focus on the priceless art treasures of sculpture and painting, and pay much less attention to books.Father Padreio couldn't even find a regular helper, so he had to drag his old body around.

Fortunately, he came across a volunteer.

The young man called himself Ray and could speak simple Italian.According to his own statement, he is an international student from China, and all his documents and belongings were lost in the air strike.He is willing to be a helper to the priest, hoping to exchange for food and shelter.

After a "trial period", the priest thought he was reliable and clear-headed, and decided to entrust him with the work of the Pantheon.

This young man is the CEO who unfortunately crossed over.

In the first few days, Sheng Rui had a hard time looking back.

Needless to say, the mental pain.Every day, he was thinking about two serious philosophical propositions: [-]. I must be dreaming; [-]. This is not scientific.

And the more threatening pain comes from the body.For a full month, he didn't eat a decent meal, and only had a pitiful relief from porridge.

To make matters worse, he had a stomach problem.

The disease fell when he was studying at the University of Pennsylvania.The competition in Wharton Business School is very fierce. Everyone is a pretentious future business elite. If you don't pay attention, you will be beaten into the team of useless wood.As a result, he developed stomach ulcers.From then on, as long as he is too nervous or his life is irregular, he will relapse, reminding him to treat his body well.

Now, it was the cramping stomach again that woke him from the shock and frenzy.He realized that if he didn't stop panicking and find a way to feed himself, he would soon become a stiff, nameless corpse on the streets of Rome.

Finally, on a night of starvation and cold, he examined his life as thin as paper and was starving to death, and made a great decision: do whatever you want.

Stop trying to figure out what happened to him, accept it as if he's been here since he was born, and will always be.

However, determination is strong and reality is bleak.

While trying to find odd jobs to make a living, he gradually realized one thing: he unfortunately came to Italy in the most expensive year in the history of World War II.

Four years ago, at the beginning of the war, the average cost of living for a Roman was five lire a day.

This year it is a thousand lire.

His current total fortune is one euro.

And it doesn't work yet.

This kind of mood of "the wind is rustling, the water is cold, and I want to eat but I have no money" is nothing short of worrying.

Fortunately, by chance, he noticed Father Padreio, who needed to hire help.Without much effort, he won the job.

The work to be done is very simple: firstly, organize and register, and record the information of each book in detail, so that it can be re-filed in the future; secondly, clean and maintain, and dry it regularly to prevent these fragile papers from becoming moldy and moth.

In return, he gets a potato soup, a little vegetable and two pieces of bread every day.It is said to be bread, but it is really just a rough, dark dough mixed with bran and ground corn.It's not that the priest is stingy, the ration is only [-] grams per person per day, and it's often not enough.Just such a small amount of food can be sold for one or two hundred lire or even more.

Sheng Rui has no objection to such an arrangement.Being in the Pantheon made him feel safe, like a lost child who stays in a place where he is separated from his adults, hoping that someone will come to find him.

After the priest left, Sheng Rui locked the door from the inside, and the entire Pantheon became his private space, an independent world.After finishing all the affairs according to the priest's instructions, he lay down on the simple bed, folded his hands behind his head, and looked up at the circular skylight in the middle of the tens-meter-high dome.

This skylight is called the "Eye of the Sky" and is the most famous spectacle in the Pantheon.

During the day, the sun shines in from here, and it is set off by rows of carved squares surrounding it, creating a radial visual effect.What's even more amazing is that at a specific time, the light spots will sequentially illuminate the seven recesses on the upper floor of the inner wall of the hall.In a way, the entire Pantheon is a giant sundial.

On such a clear night, you can look up at the starry sky through it.

Looking to the left from where he lies, there is a statue of the Madonna.He looked at it from a distance—in that direction, to be exact.Because there was no lighting and the box was heavily blocked, he couldn't actually see anything.But the posture of the statue came to his mind very clearly: the Virgin Mary stretched out her arms, with a calm expression, holding the Holy Child in her hands.

Below the base of the statue is Raphael's tomb.At this moment, life and death, man and god, the short-lived world and the eternal stars all coexist wonderfully in this space.

He's not a Christian, and he didn't feel anything when he visited here in the past.However, on such a night, there was a strange pity that hit his heart at a certain moment.

Before dedicating Christ to the world, what kind of mood did the Virgin Mary face the child she was destined to lose?

That may never be known to mortals, because mortals are always obsessed with what is lost.

He reached into his inner pocket, took out the one-euro coin, and played with it in his palm.The coin was made in Germany and featured the "Federal Eagle" on the reverse.Because it is rubbed every night, it becomes crystal clear and shiny, like a small and exquisite bronze mirror, reflecting the starlight falling from the "eye of the sky".

His wealth, reputation, and status were all lost in a flash in an inexplicable way.Only this coin remained, like an unfulfilled wish from a previous life.

For whatever reason, and whether he wanted to accept it or not, the past was over, at least temporarily.

He forced himself to believe that if all this was a game played by fate with him, then God would at least give him a chance to be rewarded.The longer he persists, the greater his wish will come true.Only when he approached the game with sincerity will the turning point come.

Perhaps such an idea worked somewhere.The turning point appeared faster than he imagined.