EGRV 2 | Addiction

“It was as if the heavens had played a cruel, cosmic joke on him.”

He did have plans elsewhere.

At noon, his friend of ten years, Wang Nan’ou, made a rare visit to Beijing, staying for less than twenty-four hours and asking if Liang Muye had time to grab a drink.

Liang Muye arranged to meet him at a quiet bar near the studio. Wang Nan’ou had been waiting for a while, and as soon as Liang Muye walked in, he gave him a hearty hug.

“Muye, they say you’re hard to pin down these days.”

“Long time no see. Bad timing—Boss Li’s not around.” Wang Nan’ou was the leader of the commercial mountaineering expedition Li Xiangwan had joined years ago. After that successful summit, Li Xiangwan became friends with everyone on the team.

Wang Nan’ou, a Sichuan native, was a compact bundle of boundless energy. Once an employee at an internet company, he fell hard for high-altitude mountaineering and never looked back. Now, he worked for an adventure company, managing logistics and guiding climbs, spending nearly three hundred days a year on the road.

“How’s… work going? Li’s treating you well, I assume?” Wang Nan’ou, half an insider, had heard about Liang Muye’s recent endeavors.

Liang Muye chuckled. “Nan’ou, let’s not talk about my work—it’s boring. Tell me about your last six months. I heard Longshan’s doing great.” Longshan was the adventure company Wang Nan’ou worked for, and Liang Muye knew its female boss.

“Not bad at all. This year, besides leading groups, I’ve been helping a Sino-American organization with an environmental documentary. Met a guy who bikes up mountains—zero carbon footprint. Wild stuff…”

Wang Nan’ou got lost in his stories, talking for nearly ten minutes before smacking his forehead. “Ah, I’m just rambling. Drink up!”

Liang Muye raised his wrist, taking a sip as a gesture. His drink was non-alcoholic—he’d been off booze for two years.

“Muye, Mont Blanc—you in? With your stamina, it’s a four-day hike.” Wang Nan’ou, always blunt, got carried away and asked outright. Their friendship, sparked over a cup of hot tea at Everest Base Camp a decade ago, had led to many trips born from casual post-drink ideas.

“Nope,” Liang Muye laughed. “You’ve been asking for three years.”

“Come on, how do you do it? Don’t you itch for it? Honestly, my girlfriend says this job’s too dangerous, and I get it. I told her I’d quit at forty, but I hope that day never comes. I think of blue skies, white clouds, that thin air, and my heart races.”

Liang Muye just said, “I’ve had my fill.”

“I’m thirty-seven and still not done. What’re you talking about…” Wang Nan’ou caught himself, realizing his words might sting.

Over three years ago, Liang Muye and Chen Nian, a top mountaineer, returned to Mustagh Ata in Xinjiang’s Akto County. The peak, a well-known high-altitude training ground, wasn’t technically demanding—the easiest of the 7,000-meter-plus mountains.

Liang Muye had been documenting Chen Nian’s climbs for over five years, his longest project. Chen Nian aimed to summit all of China’s 7,000-meter peaks in Alpine style—no oxygen, no fixed ropes, carrying his own supplies. They chose Mustagh Ata as the starting point, an easy first step.

Perhaps feeling the peak was too simple for someone who’d conquered Everest, K2, and Lhotse, Chen Nian added a goal: break the speed ascent record in Alpine style.

But accidents strike silently. On the descent after summiting, under cover of night and thick snow, Chen Nian slipped into a crevasse dozens of meters deep, suffering a severe head injury and falling into a coma. Despite the team’s efforts, including Liang Muye’s, they couldn’t save him. No one could believe China’s finest mountaineer fell on such a straightforward peak.

2014 was a cursed year. Three months after Chen Nian’s funeral in his hometown, Liang Muye packed up and flew back to Beijing. But within a month, he got a call from his mother, Han Zhixia.

Her voice, choked with sobs, was unrecognizable. He urged her to calm down, barely making out that she was calling his younger brother’s name—Liang Yichuan. Nine years his junior, Liang Yichuan was a freestyle skier training in Canada for a year. Han Zhixia said he’d been in an accident—not on a snowy slope, but in a car crash on the way to a competition. It was as if the heavens had played a cruel, cosmic joke on him. By year’s end, his life had spiraled out of control.

His usual way of coping with upheaval was simple and effective: return to nature, to the mountains. So, he didn’t cancel his next trip.

Few technical peaks are climbable in spring, but Que’er Shan was one. On the eve of the summit push, Liang Muye backed out, saying he had a bad feeling—not physical, just a gut instinct. He later told Wang Nan’ou it was an overwhelming premonition, as if stepping out of the tent would mean never returning.

As the team’s only photographer, his decision didn’t derail the summit plan, but it infuriated the leader. At Camp 3, the leader, a doctor, pleaded, “Muye, I’m a doctor. Your physical condition is excellent. I’m hoping you’ll push through…”

Liang Muye cut him off: “If I lived by others’ expectations, I’d have died a hundred times over.”

After Que’er Shan, the team, including the leader, blacklisted him. It didn’t matter—he was already weary of the mountaineering world’s hero-worshipping culture. Most chased it; he couldn’t run far enough away.

As for Wang Nan’ou’s words, Liang Muye didn’t hold it against him. It’s what everyone thought; he just said it out loud.

During their chat, his phone rang. Seeing it was Li Xiangwan, he said, “Boss Li’s calling. Gotta take this.”

Li Xiangwan asked about the shoot. He said Xu Xiaochen was cooperative, and the proofs were uploaded to the cloud for her to review.

“Not about the proofs—I trust your work,” Li Xiangwan laughed over the phone. “A friend of mine knows the marketing head of Summit’s China division. They need an ice-climbing ad shoot, outdoor. Their team’s already in Beijing, and it’s urgent.”

Summit, a Canadian outdoor brand recently entering China, translated from “Summit” with the tagline: The next one is higher. Their product line spanned outdoor clothing, hiking, camping, and climbing gear, sponsoring elite climbers and trail runners. Liang Muye was familiar with them. Listening, he pulled a cigarette pack from his pocket.

“Where’s the shoot?”

“Beijing suburbs, not far.”

Liang Muye lit a cigarette single-handedly, not looking up. “How urgent?”

“Shooting starts in three days.”

“How much?”

“They’re offering a good number,” Li Xiangwan quoted a figure, adding a personal favor. “It’s your gig—no commission talk needed. They want you specifically.”

“If they wanted me, why only tell me three days in advance?” Liang Muye found it amusing, knowing he was a backup. He didn’t mind calling her out. “How about this: last-minute plan changes aren’t easy. Round up the number, and I’m in.”

“Shouldn’t be an issue. Clear next week. Delaying your personal projects a few days won’t hurt, right?”

“No problem. Then I’ll—”

“Oh, one more thing,” Li Xiangwan cut in. “After this, take a break. You’ve been working too hard this year. I don’t care where you go—take a vacation, relax, and welcome the new year.”

“I’ve got a Jiayun ad to shoot before year-end.”

“Already handled—pushed to next year. Their proposal’s not even done. I told Xiao Tang to lock the studio. You couldn’t get in if you tried.”

Liang Muye nodded. Li Xiangwan asked him to pass her regards to Wang Nan’ou before hanging up.

Wang Nan’ou watched him exhale smoke by the window, lowering his voice with a sigh. “You’re really not going back, are you? Even smoking now.”

No one needed to tell him how critical lung capacity is for high-altitude climbing. Every cigarette traded away cubic millimeters of oxygen. Seeing Liang Muye smoke pained Wang Nan’ou as if it were his own lungs.

“You… still believe?” Wang Nan’ou pressed, unwilling to let it go.

Liang Muye smiled. “What do you think?”

“Addicted yet?” Wang Nan’ou asked, playing the big brother.

Liang Muye only said, “Back then, I had an addiction too—just a different kind.”

One far deadlier than nicotine.