"Unbelievable!"
"What the hell, are you playing Minesweeper here? Damn it! Why is even the sidewalk showing traffic jams!"
Momo, who was responsible for driving, looked at the navigation map on the central control screen all marked in red and cursed. She let go of the steering wheel and turned on intelligent driving, allowing the electric car to slowly crawl with the traffic.
"Hmm..." Ah Qing, slightly curious, looked at Momo, who had muttered a curse then calmed down: "Aren't you going to continue cursing? I feel a bit unaccustomed to this silence."
The city where they studied last semester was also a tourist city. Momo cursed along the way and almost got into a fight with the culprit of the traffic jam.
Three snail-paced cars blocked the road, plus the interference of traffic lights, creating a five-kilometer-long traffic jam.
Momo, seeing the scene, was on edge. If it weren't for Ah Qing's quick reflexes holding her back, she might have rolled down the window and spat at the driver opposite.
"Because... I've chosen to embrace the electric car." Momo stomped her foot happily, indicating she was just holding the wheel with one hand and her foot wasn't on the pedal.
Traffic congestion is extremely frustrating, crawling at a snail's pace, constantly stopping and going, requiring continuous brake control.
Some family cars are okay, but sports cars or muscle cars have pedals like they are made of gold, requiring extra effort to push down.
Driving for so long felt to Momo like exercising her legs at the gym, leaving her entire body numb.
Now...
Who cares! The electric car can steadily follow the traffic automatically.
"Smooch, smooch, come here, little fox..." Momo relaxed her face and started teasing the little fox.
"Ugh..." The little fox rolled its eyes and raised its big fluffy tail to show Momo.
Hey, Sister here might belong to the canine family, but foxes and dogs are still somewhat different.
Your "smooch, smooch" doesn't work on me, save it for teasing Doggy in Potou City!
......
The group planned their trip well, but they greatly underestimated the charm of the "Thirteen Dynasties' Ancient Capital," the "Terracotta Warriors," and "Zheng Gege." A trip that should have been less than an hour was stuck on the road for an hour and a half.
When they got to the airport, they waited another hour amidst congestion before boarding the little fox's plane.
After a two-hour flight, it was already completely dark by the time they landed at the Imperial Capital, disrupting their plans to visit Wangfu Street for a shopping trip.
After eating at the hotel's buffet, everyone returned to their hotel suite, weary, and rested after showering.
Their bodies weren't especially tired, but sitting in the car made their butts ache, making them feel mentally exhausted.
"You-er~ what time's the high-speed train tomorrow?" asked Momo, lying on the bed, holding the little fox's white, tender paw, drawing him away from Ah Qing's embrace and placing him on her butt, hinting the little fox to give her a "fox stepping on dough" performance, a massage of sorts.
While teasing the little fox, Momo looked towards Tang You and asked about tomorrow's high-speed train so she could set a wake-up alarm.
"No tickets bought, just buy tickets when we wake up, whenever that is."
Tang You, lying on the white bed holding a pillow, was playing PUBG while casually responding to Momo: "Ninety-nine percent of tourists going to Northern will choose self-driving."
"They are likely stuck on the highway by now, so getting high-speed train tickets should be a breeze. If there are no tickets, I even know the entrance for standing tickets."
With rich experience, Tang You indicated Momo didn't need to worry about the itinerary arrangement for tomorrow.
Though the three major Nothern cities are tourist spots, Northern is more famous for its vast, sparsely populated areas.
Not to mention traffic jams, you could run naked for half an hour on the open field without seeing a soul.
"Since tickets are available anytime, then... before we leave tomorrow, shall we visit the Great Wall?"
Ah Qing, who had never visited the Imperial Capital before, brightened up at the suggestion.
But her proposal was met with big eyerolls from Momo and Youyou.
"...Don't be silly, tomorrow there's a flag-raising ceremony, and tourists from all over the country are coming to the Imperial Capital." Momo's face was full of black lines.
"Although, but... that Great Wall was built to keep me out." Tang You joked with a hint of humor.
The original intention of building the Great Wall was to defend against cavalry.
Especially the cavalry from the mid-western part of Northern.
And Potou City is precisely located in the mid-western part of Northern.
"Oh? Oh!?" Ah Qing was taken aback, then realized the implication of Youyou's joke, immediately blushing and burying her face in the pillow like an ostrich.
"Being a fox isn't all bad." Lingren, just out of the shower, saw the small fox bouncing around on the bed, hopping across the three, and sighed.
After a night's rest, at eight the next morning, everyone checked out of the hotel suite and headed to the high-speed rail station to travel to Potou City, Tang You's hometown.
The 300 km/h high-speed rail sped out of the city of steel and concrete.
Passing through urban jungles, through suburban areas, and heading straight into the lush wilderness.
The azure sky, unobscured, with clouds seemingly sculpted from 3D modeling.
Against the blue sky, the green of the prairie seemed to have its contrast tuned up a notch, as if wearing a filter. Huge, white-as-snow wind turbines stood on the grassland.
Blue sky, white clouds, green grass, and wind turbines.
As the high-speed train ventured deeper into the prairie, flocks of sheep and horseback herdsmen came into view.
Everything seemed like a North European fairy tale.
Sitting by the window, Tang You, seeing the fairy-tale-like scenery, was momentarily dazed.
This place... when she was little, didn't look like this fairy-tale scene at all.
It used to be a desert, with sparse yellowed weeds due to lack of water.
No cattle, no horseback herdsmen; the entire prairie was a barren expanse, dust flying everywhere.
Stepping out, if you didn't wear sand-proof gear, the sand would hit your body directly, letting prairie people experience harshness.
And sometime ago, wearing sand-proof gear became a thing of the past. With the normalization of cattle, sheep, and horse husbandry, the barren grasslands grew green again.
Except for the occasional springtime complaints about Northern's wild dust storms, Tang You no longer remembered what it felt like for the sand to strike one's body.
"Wow! Xiaolan, Xiaolan! Look, your buddy just jumped up and dove into the dirt for food!"
While passing the prairie, you could see marmots and other small animals moving around.
A yellow-and-white sand fox sneaked up quietly to a jerboa den, erecting its big ears to listen closely to the sounds inside. Once sure there was indeed a jerboa, it jumped and dove into the den, kicking with all its might.
A moment later.
The sand fox happily strutted, holding the jerboa by the waist, heading home.
On the way home, as if sensing something, it paused and looked at the swiftly passing high-speed train.
Ah Qing quickly woke up Xiaolan, who was curled up asleep, to watch the fox compatriot.
"Don't think about it... I won't go burrowing," the little fox yawned, waving its little paws.
"Have we reached Potou yet? I'm really anxious, very, very anxious."
"Oh? Why so anxious? Please don't mess up the chair!"