Chapter 2657


    With a rough shove, Valor found herself crashing down onto the cold concrete.


    All she had wanted was a glimpse of the world beyond her small bubble. Was that such a crime?


    Had she erred right from the start by leaving her quaint hometown?


    Otherwise, why would she now be lost in this unfamiliar city, clueless about the way back home?


    Valor regretted.


    Thetter part of the story is about Valor’s quest to find her way home – a concept that might baffle


    many city-dwelling college students today. How could someone not know their way back?


    But for a girl like Valor, who had grown up in a quaint, technologically untouched fishing vige, it was a


    stark reality.


    The man had lured her out of her vige with promises of adventure, only to abandon her in the


    sprawling metropolis.


    It was unfair to im he had taken Valor away solely for a taste of novelty; perhaps, amid the natural


    purity of the vige, he had genuinely felt a fleeting impulse for the naive, passionate girl.


    They might have shared a sort of hazy love story.


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    But once engulfed by the city’s splendor, that hazy love became a burden.


    He didn’t need someone as clumsy and unsophisticated as Valor by his side, and she, knowing nothing


    of the city’s ways, became an encumbrance.


    The story ended with an open ending – whether Valor ever made it back to her beloved vige, whether


    she reconciled with her best friend, were all left to the interpretation of the audience.


    Ivy believed Valor never returned. Had she made it back, her face wouldn’t still bear the streaks of


    fresh tears.


    As the film’s ending credits rolled and the lights brightened, the audience remained silent for a long


    while. They hade for light entertainment but had been served a taleden with sorrow.


    The director had said that making this film took a long time, not just in securing funding but also in


    telling a story drawn from real life a real story that had unfolded in a remote fishing vige.


    Yet, they allmented the uncertainty of Valor’s fate, both in the story and in reality.


    Such tales were all toomon in that vige. Valor, left adrift in the big city, was one of the lucky


    ones, as her only trouble was to find her way home.


    Many others girls had been lured into nightmarish hell from which there was no escape.


    The original script given to the director had been even more harrowing. But from the onset, he wanted


    to infuse the story with a touch ofmercial appeal and to do something for that remote vige.


    The initial version was award-bait, but in this era of fast consumption, few were willing to spend two


    hours in a theater immersed in such a narrative.


    The story began with a dreamy tale of young love, capturing everyone’s attention, only to reveal the


    harsh reality faced by girls from the vige venturing into the city.


    Was Valor wrong to seek out the city? No.


    Was the man wrong for having a fling with her? No, not in itself.


    But his faulty in recklessly taking Valor out of her vige, only to cruelly discard her in a city where


    she wandered, lost and alone.


    In the movie, Valor’s love interest never even had a name, referred to simply as “he” a ceholder for


    the countless others like him.