Long Ge called to ask about the situation. Upon hearing that the guests had gone missing after arriving in Baotou, he let out a quiet sigh. “Let this be a lesson to us — from now on, when we see guests off, we must always ask clearly about their destination: whether they’re heading home or continuing their travels somewhere else.”
“Understood,” Ba Yunye replied, feeling dejected.
“What’s the matter — feeling hard done by?” Long Ge asked.
“How could I dare feel that way… I’m sorry, Long Ge. I don’t know whether this will affect our club’s business.”
There was a brief silence on the other end. “Can’t really blame you — after all, you brought them safely to the agreed endpoint of Urumqi.”
That evening, Ba Yunye’s messages nearly exploded. Fellow backpackers who had ridden in her vehicle all guessed, upon seeing the news about that self-drive carpool group’s “Master Ba,” that it was her.
Still typing: Was it you being interviewed in today’s news about the missing university student?
Spicy Strip Princess Little Fishy: Master Ba, you’re famous now.
Slow and Steady: It’s definitely you, Master Ba — no question about it.
Noon Sun: Master Ba, saw the news — miss you! Next year I’ll make time to travel with you along the Ali route.
Why Not Be Joyful: Fire tongs, Liu Ming — the Master Ba we knew back in the day.
Solitary Isle: I got my marriage certificate. I was just about to tell you — sometime this month or next, I want to book a private car for my honeymoon. Now that you’re this famous, will it even be possible to make a reservation?
Reading the stream of messages — some asking for details, others teasing her — Ba Yunye didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. At the same time, she marveled at the popularity she had accumulated over her years of driving; she’d never known that so many people were paying attention to her.
Ba Yunye had just collected a deposit from Solitary Isle when a phone call came in — it was actually Diao Zhuo.
“Master Ba, I trust you’ve been well?”
Ba Yunye didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. She flipped over and lay face-down on the bed. “You’re a rescue team leader, and instead of worrying about the missing university students, you’re actually here mocking me — is that any way to behave? Do you believe I’ll post your naked photos online and make you famous overnight too?”
“You have naked photos of me?” His tone was completely calm.
“Of course.”
“I don’t believe you have the energy for that.”
Ba Yunye clicked her tongue in disdain.
Diao Zhuo got back to the point. “I have some news for you — it might offer some comfort. Those three going missing has absolutely nothing to do with your carpool group.”
Before he could finish, Ba Yunye cut in. “I know they flew to Baotou…”
Diao Zhuo then told her something even more explosive — “They’re planning to trek on foot through the Badain Jaran Desert.”
“What?” She shot upright, agitated. “Just the three of them? On foot through the Badain Jaran? That won’t do! Tell them to come back immediately! Especially that girl — she’s nowhere near cut out for this!”
“They’ve been on foot for at least three days.”
“Three days… there’s still a chance to call them back!”
“Whether or not they’ve run into danger, a police report has been filed by their families — they must be found. Especially since two of them have no trekking experience.” Diao Zhuo continued, “The general command has issued an urgent rescue mission, urgently recruiting volunteers from Inner Mongolia and others familiar with the desert to cooperate with local public security in the search and rescue. Now that the National Day holiday is over, there are relatively few qualified volunteers available. I’m currently on leave — one word from you, and I’ll go.”
Diao Zhuo’s last few words were crisp and abrupt.
Ba Yunye paused for a moment.
The Badain Jaran Desert was completely unlike anything Meng Xiao’ai had imagined.
Three days earlier, they had set off on their desert crossing from the town of Gurinai in Ejin Banner. The roads on both sides were vast stretches of Gobi, and rumor had it that agate stones could be picked up in the Gobi — Xiao’ai was genuinely excited about that. But Zhang Chenguang had his mind entirely fixed on completing the crossing, with little interest in agate or anything of the sort.
They had not lingered in Gurinai, pressing into the desert almost without pause.
“Did you two know — even though we went to Xinjiang this time, we didn’t actually cross the Taklamakan. If you follow the desert highway, you’d come across a line of words…” Zhang Chenguang appeared more animated than he had in the previous few days. Having arrived at the place where he could realize his dream, he was gradually becoming more talkative. “There is no barren desert — only a barren life!”
Zhuo Ming seemed profoundly moved by the line. He took Xiao’ai’s hand with one hand and Zhang Chenguang’s with the other, then suddenly roared at the top of his lungs: “Dan Ba Ji Lin, here we come!!”
“It’s Badain Jaran,” Zhang Chenguang corrected him coolly. Having had the experience of the previous Tiger Leaping Gorge trek, he had already come to regard himself as the leader among the three, and even his tone carried a faint air of authority.
Their grand ambitions were quickly doused by a few words from the taxi driver who had brought them there. The burly man said, “Kids, your uncle will wait right here for you — go have a look and come back, yeah? Two hours enough? Same price to take you back, fair and square.”
Zhuo Ming waved him off. “Sir, you go on back. We’re trekking all the way through — we won’t be going back with you.”
The man was entirely unbothered. “Stop bragging. Trek all the way through… You’d better think carefully — vehicles are hard to come by out here, and the prices are also…”
“Let’s go.” Zhang Chenguang couldn’t be bothered to waste words on him, and waved the others forward.
It was this very driver who later recognized the three university students from the news reports, and told the police where they had gone.
The Badain Jaran Desert covers an area of 47,000 square kilometers. The uninhabited zone spans roughly 10,000 square kilometers. Located in western Inner Mongolia, it forms the main body of the Alashan Desert and is China’s third largest desert. Gurinai lies to the northwest of the Badain Jaran Desert and is the starting point for many who attempt to cross it.
When Xiao’ai listened to Zhang Chenguang lay out the planned route, she heard him say that their destination was Bilitu Peak — dubbed the “Everest of the Sand Sea.”
On the first day, everyone walked in good spirits. They played “Desert Camel” out loud on their phones and took in the sweeping curves of the sand sea. Humming a song that matched both the scenery and their mood while crossing the vast, golden sands was an incomparable feeling. Everyone’s heart opened up like the heaven and earth around them, each step landing with vigorous purpose, their wild and howling voices echoing to the skies —
“What ghoulish legends! What demons and monsters!”
“Only the egret singing its lonely song on high!”
“Sweeping through endless yellow sand, crossing every corner!”
“Walking through the boundless, star-filled river of the sky!”
In principle, they should have rested during the day and traveled at night, but they hadn’t yet been able to adjust, so Zhang Chenguang set aside a day or two first for everyone to adapt. Xiao’ai and Zhuo Ming had never seen a real desert before; now that they were truly walking through the sea of sand, they were especially exhilarated. Xiao’ai had previously assumed that the desert would be as soft as a beach — that each step would sink deep — but to her surprise, the surface of the desert was actually quite firm underfoot.
The path at the start was reasonably easy, with no towering sand dunes to climb over. Looking out into the distance, a stretch of sandy yellow spread in every direction. The dunes far away were a faint blue, layered one upon another, like a landscape painting — simply gazing at them was a pleasure in itself.
Their classmates back home, buried in civil service exam practice papers and drifting between large job fairs, surely couldn’t imagine that the three of them were striding gallantly through a vast desert on a cross-country trek! Zhuo Ming thought with delight, and felt a surge of superiority he hadn’t experienced once in all four years of university.
Full of excitement and wonder, the two of them followed behind Zhang Chenguang, occasionally asking him to take photos with them — though it was apparent that Zhang Chenguang wasn’t particularly keen on playing photographer for them. They also knew it wasn’t quite decent to flaunt their romance in front of a single person, so they switched to a selfie stick afterward. But taking photos wasted a fair amount of time, and Zhang Chenguang kept urging them along.
Xiao’ai felt that since starting the trek, Zhang Chenguang had become a different person.
Before, he had been quite easygoing — genuinely carrying a certain tranquil, unassuming quality. But now he was more like a senior figure, especially resembling her own father. Perhaps because he had more outdoor experience than them, he liked to lecture them with a stern expression — reminding them, for instance, to regulate their water intake and not to waste time on selfies, and so on.
But regulating water intake — how was that so easily done?
The desert climate was dry, and the daytime temperatures were fairly high. By midday, the surface of the sand was scorching, and through the soles of their shoes they could feel the heat. With the heavy packs on their backs, they would feel thirsty after only a short while of walking. Xiao’ai and Zhuo Ming had tried to hold back from drinking, but doing so left their throats itching, as though they were on the verge of getting a dry cough, and only drinking more water could suppress it.
Zhang Chenguang had multiple trekking experiences behind him and better self-control than they did, but when he saw the two of them drain seven bottles of water in two days, unease settled in his heart. He had managed to restrain himself quite well, strictly following the rule of one bottle of water per day.
When they made camp in a sheltered spot during the morning, he noticed Xiao’ai and Zhuo Ming squeezed into the same tent together, from which the occasional burst of laughter and playful noise could be heard — and he felt distinctly uncomfortable. In his view, a desert crossing should be a solemn and even somewhat arduous affair. And besides, he hadn’t told the two of them that the route he had planned for this crossing was one that no other trekker had ever attempted. If they succeeded, the three of them would stand in the history of crossing the Badain Jaran Desert like the peak of a great mountain.
Because there was no signal in the depths of the desert, none of them had even brought a power bank, and all three phones had run out of battery. The desert nights began to grow unbearably dull. The young couple clung to each other like newlyweds, leaving the solitary singleton to gaze up at the stars alone.
It was on one of those desert camping nights that Xiao’ai gave herself to Zhuo Ming for the first time. Both of them felt that this was something deeply meaningful, and worthy of being cherished for the rest of their lives.
“Xiao’ai — even if we’re not together in the future — and I mean just hypothetically — you’ll still remember me for the rest of your life,” Zhuo Ming said afterward, holding Xiao’ai close, his voice wistful.
Girls tend to be more sensitive to such things. Xiao’ai heard the words and felt a pang of dejection. She had thought that now their relationship had deepened, he would make some grand, sweeping vow — to love her and cherish her for a lifetime, something of that sort. She hadn’t expected him to say something like this.
Before long, exhausted, Zhuo Ming fell asleep, his faint snoring filling the tent. Xiao’ai dressed herself and stepped outside.
Zhang Chenguang hadn’t yet gone to sleep. Using dry branches he had gathered along the way that afternoon, he had kindled a small campfire. He was holding a trekking pole and appeared to be writing something in the sand.
She walked over and looked up at the sky. She hadn’t expected the desert night to be so desolate and yet so beautiful. She even spotted two shooting stars, and quickly knelt down to make a wish — that everyone would make it out safely. Thinking of this, she felt tears beginning to prick at her eyes.
Zhang Chenguang was at a loss, unsure whether he should say anything to her. After a long, halting silence, he managed to squeeze out: “Are you tired?”
Xiao’ai’s face went beet red. She almost wished she could bury her head in the sand like an ostrich.
“I noticed you were rubbing your shoulder all afternoon — is your pack too heavy?”
Oh — so that was what he was referring to… Xiao’ai exhaled with relief and stretched her limbs. “To tell you the truth, my shoulders are terribly sore, and my lower back aches a bit too. Carrying something that heavy, you have to keep your back quite rigid — hold it taut all day — and by evening, you really feel it in your back and shoulders.”
“Trekking isn’t the same as how we walk normally. You have to keep a steady pace, and even during breaks, it’s best not to take the pack off your back. While you’re walking, do it like this…” Zhang Chenguang stood up and demonstrated for her. “Tomorrow, walk the way I’m showing you — don’t force yourself to hold your back straight. Shift your center of gravity slightly forward…”
He had no idea that when he was alone with Xiao’ai, he was this gentle and sincere.
“I’ll keep that in mind,” Xiao’ai said with a nod. “Tian’en, you’re the most reliable one — I’ll give you full marks for that.”
The corners of Zhang Chenguang’s lips curved upward. He turned his face away, concealing the irrepressible bloom of joy flowering in his chest.
“By the way, were you just now practicing calligraphy in the sand?” Xiao’ai smiled.
“Just scribbling something to encourage myself.”
Xiao’ai walked over and saw that written in the sand were the words: “In my heart I have already heard the call from far away. I no longer need to look back and trouble myself with all the rights and wrongs and gossip left behind. I have no time to spare for the past — I must walk forward.”
“Is this what you’ve been feeling these past few days?” Xiao’ai asked.
“It’s a line from The Unbearable Lightness of Being — I like it very much,” Zhang Chenguang said.
“Wow, you’re quite the literary soul.”
Zhang Chenguang, who considered his own mindset far more mature than Zhuo Ming’s, thought for a moment before replying: “Not exactly. I simply have a great deal of passion inside me, and out here on the road I can release it — and draw even more energy from it.”
In the distance, a rumbling sound suddenly arose — like the beating of a great drum.
“Thunder?” Xiao’ai asked in wonder. “Does that mean rain is coming?”
“Singing sand,” Zhang Chenguang replied calmly — he had researched this extensively. “Simply put, it’s the sound produced by the sand. The reason for it is still a mystery. One theory holds that it is the sound of friction between grains of sand as they cascade down the dunes, driven by the wind.”
“How extraordinary,” Xiao’ai said in admiration. “This trip was truly worth it.”
Zhang Chenguang smiled softly.