As she walked out of the school gates, Tang Mo looked up at the sky.
The winter sun was glorious, and the sky was a deeper blue than before, like it had been a long, long time ago.
Looking around, the earth was no longer a barren expanse but was covered in vast swathes of green.
Countless towering ancient trees and low-lying tender grasses had broken through the ground, cracking the hard concrete and tiles and flipping up chunks of fresh soil.
The plants grew lush and unrestrained, with none of the awkwardness of newcomers. It was as if they had always belonged here.
The air, cleansed by the green cover, had become fresh. For a moment, Tang Mo felt like a traitor to this world.
She forgot the people struggling between life and death, forgot that she herself was in constant peril, and felt that what had befallen the Earth wasn't an apocalypse, but a purification, a rebirth.
