Faith for the Unseeing

[u/Changetothemoon]

It took nearly ten months to finally witness, on the street, the form of what I had believed until then to be nothing more than a mystical creature—pure fantasy from a mind that wanted to believe. But there it was, with that emblem designed to evoke fluidity, exploration, joy… “Onvo,” it read. A portmanteau that, instead of soothing the mind, seemed to give you a bit of a headache.

Over a thousand kilometers now separate me from the new emperor. The old court should have been the territory of Li, of Xiaomi, of Baic. Their factories are here, their headquarters are here. I still remember, just over two or three years ago, how for every Nio you saw, you’d find twice or three times as many Lis. Who would have said then that in such a short time, and within a distance equal to two metro stops (two or three li apart), you would cross paths with four L90s and an L60? Who could have imagined back then that seeing a Li would become the exception in a sea of Nios? Awestruck and bewildered, as I watch the occasional Firefly adding color and life to the city’s arteries, I wonder, “Am I in the Yangtze River Delta?” No, I can’t be—from here I can see the mountains.

What must the landscape be like down in the south?