Deep in the mining farm, the huge roar never stops, like a steel monster lurking underground gasping for breath. Old Chen, hunched over, carries a heavy tool bag, weaving between rows of hot mining machines. The air is filled with the smell of ozone, dust, and burnt electronic components. His job is simple: check the circuits, replace burnt-out fans, record the numbers that flicker on the dashboard—ensuring that this 'electric beast' can continuously mine the invisible 'digital gold'.
This is a battleground of computational power and a coliseum of wealth. Most miners are young faces, their eyes bloodshot, staring at the fluctuating coin prices and hash rate curves on the screen, their emotions rising and falling with the K-line. When the bull market arrives, the mining farm is filled with ecstatic shouts, the clinking of beer bottles, and grandiose declarations of 'Let's have extra chicken legs tonight'; when the bear market comes, there is a deathly silence, occasionally interrupted by the sound of machines being cheaply dismantled and the piercing ring of debt collection calls.
Old Chen feels like an outsider. He rarely participates in discussions about market trends and avoids the 'off-exchange trading' or 'contract betting' that miners are keen on. The only action he has related to Bitcoin occurs on payday each month. When the cash salary is handed to his rough, oil-stained hands, he silently pulls out a bright red hundred-yuan bill and walks over to the inconspicuous earthen stove in the corner of the mining farm.
The stove, once used for boiling water in earlier years, is now abandoned, leaving only cold iron sheets. Old Chen lifts the lid of an inconspicuous, rust-covered small iron box on the stove, carefully smooths the hundred-yuan bill, places it inside, and then closes it again. Inside the iron box, there are no gold bars, no bank books, only stacks of equally flat and silent hundred-yuan bills, quietly lying in the darkness, accompanied by the cold ashes in the stove.
'Old Chen, saving your 'coffin fund' again?' Young miner Xiao Zhao comes over with a cigarette, his tone mocking, 'Who saves cash these days? Buy some coins! Look at Brother Wang, he bought the dip last year and now drives a luxury car!' He points to a coworker in the distance, animatedly sharing his 'wealth story.'
Old Chen just grins, revealing teeth yellowed from poor-quality tobacco, and smiles innocently without saying a word. He brushes off the dust from the iron box again, picks up the tool bag, and walks toward a beeping mining machine. His silhouette merges into the flickering indicator lights and the rising heat waves, like a silent rock.
His coworkers laugh at him for being stubborn, calling him 'Iron Box Chen'. During the wildest bull market, even the mining farm boss couldn't help but pat him on the shoulder, advising, 'Old Chen, just buy a little; you can double it with your eyes closed! The way you save, you can't outpace inflation!' Old Chen just smiled and shook his head. During the bleakest bear market, the mining farm was shrouded in gloom; coworkers either sighed heavily or desperately borrowed money to 'buy the dip,' but Old Chen still opened his iron box on time, putting in that unchanging hundred-yuan bill, his actions as steady as the emergency light that never goes out on the wall of the mining farm.
Time flows amidst the roar of the mining machines. The mining farm has changed hands three times, the machines have been updated five generations, and the coworkers around me have come and gone like a stream. Some have made a fortune and left, indulging in a life of luxury; some are deep in debt, disappearing without a trace; many more have been worn down by repeated bull and bear cycles, returning to ordinary life with varying degrees of scars. Only Old Chen and his iron box remain, like a forgotten coordinate deep within the mining farm, stubbornly staying in place, measuring the chaos and madness of the outside world with the hundred-yuan bills added each month.
Seven years, eighty-four months, eight thousand four hundred yuan. The iron box has long been heavy.
The fate of the mining farm has come to an end. Policies have tightened, electricity prices have soared, and the once roaring 'electric beast' has become unprofitable. The last batch of mining machines is being auctioned off at low prices, and the huge factory is about to be demolished. Workers collect their last severance pay and scatter like birds and beasts, like shells left on the beach after the tide recedes.
Old Chen is the last to leave. He silently packs up the tool bag that has accompanied him for many years and walks to the abandoned stove. The afterglow of the setting sun shines through the broken windows, slanting onto the cold iron sheets, coating them with a layer of warm golden light. He crouches down, gently brushing off the thick dust from the iron box, and opens the lid.
Inside, the bills are no longer neatly arranged.
At the very bottom, resting on the stack of hundred-yuan bills that have accompanied him for seven years, lies a palm-sized cloth bag, carefully sewn from faded blue fabric. The opening of the bag is tied with a rough hemp rope.
Old Chen's calloused fingers tremble a bit as he unties the hemp rope and pours out a small black USB drive from the bag. The surface of the USB drive has no markings, is heavily worn, and its edges even shine, clearly having been rubbed countless times.
No one knows when this USB drive was put in. Perhaps it was at the peak of a bull market, when coworkers were drunkenly celebrating; or maybe it was during a late-night bear market when he was alone repairing the circuit. Old Chen simply used the clumsiest way to exchange that hundred-yuan bill each month for another form of 'storage,' at a time he deemed 'appropriate,' through an old computer in the corner of the mining farm that was hardly used, bit by bit, silently.
He grips the small USB drive tightly, the cold metal shell digging into his palm. He takes one last look at the empty, dilapidated mining farm; the once deafening roar is replaced by dead silence, with only the wind whistling through the broken wires.
Stepping out the door, the huge roar sounds again. This time, it is the roar of excavators and bulldozers. The giant steel arms raise high and smash fiercely against the mining farm's weathered outer walls, sending dust soaring into the sky. Old Chen does not look back.
He sits down at the only internet café in town with an old USB port. When the wallet software that has been dormant for years is opened, and after entering a complex password, the number that pops up in the balance field seems to freeze the dim light:
527.00000000 BTC
The noise outside is earth-shattering, signaling the collapse of the old world. The numbers on the screen are as silent as the sea, the tip of the iceberg of the new world. There is no ecstasy on Old Chen's wrinkled face, only a near-pitying calm. He carefully pulls out the USB drive, puts it back into the faded blue cloth bag, ties it securely with rough hemp rope, and deeply tucks this light but weighty bag into his pocket.
The bag is pressed against his heartbeat, warm and solid. The roar of the mining farm over seven years, the howls of bulls and bears, the laughter and sighs of his coworkers... all the noise settles into this warm silence, transformed into fine fiber patterns on the bag.
The tracks of the bulldozer crush the remains of the abandoned mining machines, producing a screeching metallic distortion. Old Chen, hunched over, steadily walks step by step into the depths of the sunset amidst the swirling dust. He has traversed the wildest bull and bear markets, and the answer lies quietly shimmering in that inconspicuous bag, a light eternal, belonging to time and faith.
