Chapter 15 — Satellite Channel
The Herdsman of the Wasteland · Page 2 of 2
The whole villa was still quiet. Wei Zhao looked up toward the stairs; the two girls were probably still asleep. He sat down on the sofa, turned on the sixty-inch LCD television in the living room, muted the sound, and began watching.
A big TV really was a pleasure. Wei Zhao lounged on the sofa in ease; this was the first time he had ever watched such a wonderful television. Back home, apart from his knockoff netbook that could show a few flickering images, there had been only a twenty-five-inch ordinary flat-screen CRT television.
"Achoo!" Wei Zhao sneezed. He hadn't expected that with his constitution he could still catch a cold. But then he reflected that he had always lived in the south, and this was the north; though it was summer, the difference between day and night temperatures was considerable, so it was only natural that he should be unaccustomed to the climate.
Wei Zhao pulled two tissues from the tissue box on the coffee table, wiped his nose, and tossed them aside.
But it was early in the morning, and most channels had no programming. Wei Zhao pressed the channel button on the remote in his hand. Yet after pressing for quite a while, the television did not respond; the screen still showed the same big globe and no programming.
"Damn, don't tell me the remote's out of batteries?" Wei Zhao cursed under his breath. Then he thought again: no, that couldn't be right. Hadn't he just used this remote to turn the TV on?
At that thought, Wei Zhao took a closer look at the television. It turned out the villa had satellite TV installed, and changing channels required the set-top box's remote; the television's own remote could only control the power and the volume.
Although Wei Zhao came from a mountain village, Old Man Wei had bought him a knockoff netbook, and through the internet he had learned something of the technology and knowledge of the outside world, so at this moment he did not look too much like an ignoramus.
He searched around and, sure enough, found the satellite set-top box's remote under the coffee table. Wei Zhao picked it up and began changing channels on the television.
"Satellite TV really is something. So many channels." Wei Zhao had flipped through dozens of them and still hadn't hit a single repeat.
"This channel is an adult channel. A parental lock has been set. Please enter the password. Default password: 000000."
When Wei Zhao switched to one particular channel, this line of text appeared on the screen.
No way. These two girls had an adult channel at home? Wei Zhao had long since heard that a "big dish" could pull in certain adult programming, but he had never actually laid eyes on one.
Widow Wang at the head of the village had satellite TV too, but the only stations she could get were the free provincial satellite channels; a paid adult channel like this was out of the question.
A tingling itch stirred in Wei Zhao's heart. He wondered whether the password had been set by Gu Pengzhan, or by that young miss Gu Mengyao, or perhaps by Shen Yushu. Mm, very likely — that girl had a flirtatious look about her, and the way she talked was pretty forward too... Wei Zhao thought, his mind drifting somewhere decidedly unwholesome.
Casually he typed in a password: "123456". The screen came back with: the password you entered is incorrect, please enter it again.
"888888," Wei Zhao tapped in another password. Again the screen said: the password you entered is incorrect, please enter it again.
Wei Zhao scratched his head. This time he entered "000000". No incorrect-password warning appeared; instead the screen seemed to freeze, and he couldn't tell whether it was checking the password or had simply hung.
Just as Wei Zhao was about to press some other key at random to see what would happen, a picture appeared on the screen.