Sapporo is only 140 kilometers from the city of Asahikawa, but the snowstorm in Hokkaido at the end of December was so severe that several people were delayed on the road.

Enter Asahikawa City, located in central Hokkaido.

It no longer has the bustling scenery of a metropolis like Sapporo, Tokyo, but is sparse and low-rise like a village market.

It seems that the population of the entire urban area is only 330,000.

On a snowy day at the end of December, there were hardly any people to be seen on the white snowy road.

The shops I occasionally encounter are also closed.

Sakakihara Suzu originally said that she would be able to resupply and rest as soon as she entered the city, but she didn't expect to have to continue driving to the city center.

Everyone stopped for a break to clear the snow from their cars and luggage.

"Hiss~ I'm cold. How can this place be like a ghost town, people? ”

"The further north we go, the less crowded we are, not to mention the fact that we have to go to Lake Kusshalu with fewer people."

"Huh? There are even fewer people over there."

"After all, the population of Sapporo, the largest city in Hokkaido, is only 1.1 million, and most of the people of Hokkaido are concentrated there, and the further west you go, the fewer natural people there are. ”

"What is Asahikawa?"

"Asahikawa is second in Hokkaido."

"Huh?! It looks like the small towns around Tokyo. Is Hokkaido so poor? ”

On the other end, Tianhai Qi Mingyue, who stopped to rest, reached out and dusted off the wind and snow on his leather coat, and explained:

"Hokkaido's population is fragmented, with agriculture, fishing, and forestry as the main industries, and these traditional industries face considerable competition and market challenges in the context of globalization and technological development, and many regions have not succeeded in diversifying their industries, resulting in overall economic instability. Coupled with the fact that winter is maintained for five months a year, and there are also extreme weather, Hokkaido's overall development is quite lagging behind. ”

"Uh-oh." Suzu Sakakihara listened half-knowingly.

Sakakihara Le suddenly turned his head, looking through the helmet lenses and the snowflakes floating in the air, "Ah Ling, I'll test you with a question, which happens to be geography knowledge." ”

"What?"

"What is Sapporo's main source of income today?"

"Yes"

"It's tourism." The snow of the sky poked her head out behind Suzu Sakakihara, and her head was large in a white helmet.

"Yuki got it right." Sakakihara suddenly squinted his eyes in the helmet, "Ah Suzu-"

"I'm here. Didn't think about it for a while! Haha~" Sakakihara Suzu laughed and snorted, and slowly moved her gaze to something else.

Tianhai Nanagi Mingyue took over the conversation, "The whole of Hokkaido, except for the Sapporo metropolitan area, is very poor. The land here is barren, and it can only be supported by the sale of resources and underdeveloped tourism. The population is also very old, which is why the urban area here looks like a small town. ”

"All the young people have gone to Tokyo?"

"That's right."

"That's not the same as our hometown."

"This sister sauce is wrong, the geographical location of Matsuyama City is good, and the climate is also excellent. You only need to compare the urban area a little to understand that the development of Matsuyama City is much better than that of Asahikawa. ”

Tokyo is full of high-rise buildings, and Sapporo can also see many high-rise buildings.

Asahikawa is basically a large flat land

In other words, desolate.

Drive into the city center, where there is finally a supermarket still functioning.

A few people went in to resupply some supplies, and took advantage of the fact that it was just past noon, and continued to set off towards Quscha Road.

The further you go on a motorcycle, the more you can see that Hokkaido's road administration really has no money

The national highways are getting narrower and narrower, and the roads are getting worse and worse.

There are basically cracks in the cement, and sometimes there are potholes.

At first glance, it is in disrepair, and eighty percent of them don't even have anyone complaining, right?

Leaving the city and driving out of Kamikawa Town, it is basically a wilderness.

I couldn't see the shadow of other cars for half a day. There is a mountain on the right, a mountain on the left, and if you continue to go on, it is still a mountain.

Along the way, the scenery is only snow-white, and the occasional train with a sneering sound passes quickly in the distance against the wind and snow.

Several people didn't dare to drive fast on a heavy snowy day, so they could only move forward slowly.

Until Ah Ling stopped in front.

Through the gray wind and snow, Sakakihara saw the brake lights lit up at the rear of the Suzu car in front of him.

He also stopped the car and turned off the fire, and after seeing that July and Liuli behind him were not left behind, he untied his mask and shouted at Ah Ling in front:

"What's wrong!"

A few seconds later, Ah Ling's voice came back through the icy snow wind.

"Dude! There's a lot of snow ahead! No way! ”

Out of the way?

Sakakihara Raku exchanged a look with Tiankai Nanachizuki, and then re-ignited the motorcycle.

Sakakihara drove to Suzu Sakakihara's car, reached out and wiped the snow from his helmet, and looked ahead through the helmet.

Sure enough, it was full of snow.

The road was blocked by heavy snowfall.

The trees along the national highway are connected to the road, and the snow is about one and a half meters thick.

It's too thick to drive through.

Sakakihara looked around for a while, unable to make up her mind: "What should I do?" ”

"What to do, take a detour."

"Then we won't be able to get to Kitami City at night?"

Sakakihara Le silently stared at the road blocked by snow, spit white mist in his mouth, and said lightly: "Thank God for being able to stay in the valley." ”

In desperation, several people had to turn back and choose National Highway 242 to drive south.

The road conditions here are fine, but not very optimistic.

Sure enough, after driving for less than an hour, the road was blocked by snow again.

"Dude?"

"Change again, here Liuli leads the team, I follow the team, on a snowy day, don't get separated."

"Oh."

However.

This time, it was not fifteen minutes before the road was blocked again.

"It's too much snow, it's not a way to go on like this." Tianhai Qi Mingyue saw the seriousness of the situation.

"National Highway 211 from before?"

"Didn't my sister notice that the road is getting narrower and narrower, we have passed through the snow several times, and if we go back, I'm afraid that the road over there will also be blocked."

Sakakihara Raku's scalp tingled for a while.

It's not a good idea to go out on this snowy day.

It was starting to get dark, and Suzu Sakakihara was a little nervous:

Brother, or. Looking for another way back to Asahikawa City? ”

Sakakihara glanced at the time on his watch, looked at the sky again, and said: "It's too late, I can't go back to National Highway 211, how can I still find my way back to Asahikawa, and the GPS signal here is not good." ”

"Why don't you find a place to set up camp?"

"I'd like to, but it's hard to say whether our small camp can withstand the snow on such a snowy day."

So what to do? I have two bars of oil left. ”

"Let's go further and see if we can find an abandoned wooden house or a school or something to set up camp."

Helplessly, several people could only dig up the snow in front of them a little and continue to move forward

The scenery on the road is quite beautiful, with a white snow color.

In particular, you can occasionally see a large white mountain hidden in the wind and snow in the distance.

It's just that it's getting darker and darker, and the temperature is getting colder.

Before they knew it, they were driving into a village road that was not shown on the map.

Continuing along the village road, I didn't see any village.

It was just at the end of the village road that I drove into a mountain road.

The road navigation also did not show it, and Sakakihara only knew that at this time, several people were currently on a bend in the middle of the mountainside, and there was a cliff on the side of the road.

Tianhai Jiu Ruri, who was in charge of taking the lead, stopped the car in front at this time, and Sakakihara followed up, and she immediately turned back a little nervously and said:

"Lejun, my phone has no signal. Do you have one over there? ”

Sakakihara quickly took off the phone from the phone holder and took a look, "No." ”

"What about July?"

"Nope."

Suzu and Zhixue's mobile phones also have no signal.

Now the situation is in trouble.

"Don't worry, just drive ahead, there's no fork in the road anyway. No matter how bad it is, it can be driven to a small village. ”

Sakakihara Suzu is becoming more and more bottomless in her heart, "A small village in the mountains is not haunted, right? ”

Sakakihara was not frightened by her, but Tianhai Qimingyue seemed to be a little concerned after hearing it on the side.

"Don't talk nonsense."

"Oh"

He didn't want to blame Ah Ling, no matter what, the current situation was indeed not optimistic.

It's starting to get dark.

The snow is getting heavier and the road is getting narrower.

Driving in the snow in the dark of night can be dangerous, let alone driving a motorcycle.

The road was covered with heavy snow, and the people were driving up the mountain, and everyone dared to slow down at a speed of 15 kilometers per hour.

The cold wind was mixed with the slight roar of the engine. The chains wrapped around the tires occasionally pressed against the branches hidden in the snow, making a crisp and dull sound.

It was twelve o'clock in the morning.

Even with such a slow pace, Sakakihara's tires still skidded twice on the uphill road, and the fuel tank was basically at the last level, flashing constantly.

You can probably drive about 60 kilometers of oil.

At the moment, except for the mountains and mountains, the GPS signal has completely lost its signal.

Sakakihara has no idea where his group is now. night

The place where the headlights can illuminate, except for the trunk of the tree, is snow.

In the current situation, Sakakihara Le is afraid to let everyone continue to drive, especially Ah Ling's car plus luggage, the car weighs more than 500 pounds, if there is another uphill downhill, skidding on the uphill road, and there are cliffs behind the buttocks, it is too dangerous.

Even if there was still not a single clearing around where to camp, it had to be stopped.

Stopping the car on a gentle terrain and turning off the engine, Sakakihara got out of the car. Only then did he realize that his feet were numb from the cold, and he almost lost consciousness when he stepped on the snow.

Fortunately, the vehicle was upgraded before coming, and the motorcycle has a handlebar heating function. Otherwise, my hands would have been cold and red.

The situation of Ah Ling, Zhixue, July, and Liuli is not very optimistic.

Not for any other reason. It's that the temperature in Hokkaido in the early morning is too low.

If we don't camp again, I won't be able to survive tonight with the padded jacket I wear.

"Shhhh It's cold! ”

"It's good to have the strength to shout."

"It's such a cold day. Old, brother, you still have to talk about the wind and cold. Be. Isn't it time to set up camp?" Suzu Sakakihara clasped her hands on her chest, constantly shrinking her legs, rubbing her arms up and down. She didn't even dare to take off her helmet.

"Yes."

"There's no place for this. A bare patch is covered with thick snow. Who knows if it's a bush or a cliff inside, if only there were trees in the way. ”

"It's not necessarily good to have trees, maybe the snow on the trees accumulates too much, and it falls down and directly crushes our camp."

"Hiss. And so it is."

"I'll see if there's a safe open space."

"Then be careful, don't step on the air."

"Lejun be careful."

"It's fine."

After nodding to everyone, Sakakihara took off his helmet, let out a "whew", took the flashlight in his bag, and went to the woods on the mountain to see if there was any open space that could be used for camping.

Skirting the woods, I found a stick and carefully probed the path under my feet.

This is the slope near the top of the mountain, and as Suzu says, if you are not careful, you may step on the snow-covered bushes.

Rolling down the hill is no joke.

Fortunately, God still has a little conscience, and Sakakihara found a fairly large open space.

It is equivalent to digging a trapezoid uphill.

This is probably the place where the road was dug to accumulate materials when the road was built in the past.

There are a lot of weeds under the snow, but it can be used with a little clearing.

And it's not far from the road.

Sakakiwara immediately turned back and informed everyone of the news.

After driving back a little bit.

Begin to work together and set up camp.

The five of them were busy, and the speed of camping was still very fast, supporting the skeleton of the skeleton, and the nail of the ground.

By the time I was done, it was already half past one in the morning.

At this time, the sky was pitch black.

The temperature is frighteningly low.

Sakakihara is a little unable to bear this temperature.

"Are you hungry?"

"Definitely, I must be hungry."

It's a necessity to start a fire now.

A small gas bottle is certainly not enough.

Sakakihara had to shovel the snow and dig through the bushes to find some dry firewood to burn at the bottom.

If it weren't for everyone's help, I wouldn't know if I wouldn't be able to find all the firewood until the Year of the Monkey.

The snow gradually covered the tents, compressing the space of the crowd smaller and smaller.

The five of them huddled together in front of the tent, huddled around a small fire, and boiled two buckets of instant noodles with the few remaining bottles of mineral water.

Then you pass each other one bite at a time, eating the few hot foods.

Following the light of the camp's fire swaying in the snow, Suzu Sakakihara grinned and squeezed towards Sakakihara.

"It's been so miserable, Ah Ling, can you still laugh?"

"What's this, at least there's instant noodles to eat~~ It's good."

"My sister is optimistic. Ever wondered what we would do if the snow didn't stop for a week? ”

Sakakihara Suzu's eyes widened suddenly, "Then can't we drive out?" The phone has no signal here."

"No, it won't."

Tianhai Jiuliuli smiled bitterly, "That's right."

Sakakihara Suzu immediately felt that the temperature was instantly colder by more than a notch, "Then what should we do?" ”

"We can die together." The face of the snow of the sky and sea was illuminated by the flickering firelight.

This scared Suzu Sakakihara, "Yuki! How can you say such scary things! ”

Tianhai Qi Mingyue nodded, "But it's a fact. ”

"Then there's really no way?!"

"Nope." Sakakibara added a small stick to the campfire, and sparks flew in the snowflakes, "Maybe my mother and uncle will notice that we haven't contacted them on the third day, and send a search and rescue team." ”

"Day three?! But the food we brought with us was enough for us to eat twice! And the oil of our car. It's probably only about fifty or sixty kilometers away! I don't know when I'll be able to get out of this wilderness! ”

Tianhai no Yuki blinked, "So we can be together forever." ”

Suzu Sakakihara was so anxious that she grabbed Amami no Yuki's shoulder and shook it vigorously, "Yuki, don't talk nonsense!! ”

Tianhai Qimingyue signaled to her to feel at ease, "Sister-chan doesn't have to think about these things, take a step at a time, save your strength now, and then talk about sleeping." ”

"Sister July can think about it."

Tianhai Jiu Liuli reluctantly smiled and said, "After all, there is no good way to do it at the moment, is it?" ”

(End of chapter)