For these three weeks, the air in Ya’nan Village was cold as ice.
Fu Songcheng and Shen Ning were like two ghosts moving through the dead of night, forcibly carving several cracks into this man-eating mountain.
Shen Ming became the best liaison. Her hands, which had once clutched a rag, now gripped hope tightly.
Yet reality was crueler than they had imagined.
Those women—humiliated, beaten, penned like livestock for decades—most of them closed their eyes when the light appeared.
“Forget it,”
A woman locked in the wood shed for five years shook her head woodenly, her hollow eye sockets unable to produce a single tear. “I’ve even forgotten what my parents look like. Even if I got out, I couldn’t find home.”
In the end, standing beneath the old crooked-neck tree behind the village, apart from Shen Ning and Fu Songcheng, there were only six people.
The one who’d been here longest had seven years; the shortest, only half a year.
These six women’s belongings were extremely meager—some carried only a piece of dried food hidden away for a long time. None of them brought their children.
“Let’s go.”
Fu Songcheng was brief. The dagger in his hand refracted a chilling cold gleam in the moonlight. He glanced at Shen Ning, who had once escaped before. “Lead the way.”
The path Shen Ning had used to escape death back then.
Dense with thorns, the mountain steep—barely a path at all.
The moment they entered the dense forest, an eerie damp cold coiled around them.
Shen Ning walked at the very front, swinging a woodcutter’s knife to hack through the bushes.
Those gnarled, tangled dead branches seemed to come alive, their withered, claw-like twigs clutching desperately at the women’s clothes and trouser legs.
“Ah!”
Wang Xiu let out a frightened yelp as her body was caught by a thorny vine, a bloody scratch torn across her skin.
“Don’t look back!” Shen Ning yanked her hard, her voice hoarse yet firm. “Don’t look—walk forward!”
Fu Songcheng brought up the rear. He keenly caught the clamor rising from the valley below.
It was the men’s furious roars, carrying the rage of being defied.
“They ran! Those bitches actually dared to run!”
“Catch them! I’ll break their legs!”
“Those two madwomen—I’ll chop them up and feed them to the dogs!”
The flashlight beams swept wildly through the forest like beasts’ eyes.
The barking and cursing grew closer.
“Shen Ning, speed up!”
Fu Songcheng stopped, turning sideways to hide in the shadow of an ancient tree, his tone terrifyingly calm. “No matter what happens behind you, take them and go. Don’t look back.”
“Zhang Xinci!”
Shen Ning turned back, her eyes full of worry.
“Go!” Fu Songcheng roared low.
Shen Ning gritted her teeth, pulled the cowering Shen Ming and those few faltering women, and climbed with all her might up the mountain.
From the forest behind came the violent crash of heavy objects and men’s screams.
Fu Songcheng didn’t need to kill—he only needed to cripple.
Every strike landed precisely in a thigh or shoulder. He listened to those men who were usually so imperious howling in the mud, not a ripple in his heart.
“A madman! A real madman!”
The lead thug clutched his blood-soaked wrist and backed away. He had never seen a “woman” like this—carrying a fierce, unyielding will, like a warrior.
No—he had seen it before.
When his own wife first came to Ya’nan Village, she’d had that same look in her eyes. Only later, amid endless torment, had she gradually grown numb.
“Who else wants to come up?”
“Zhang Xinci” wiped the muddy water off his face. Moonlight filtered through the treetops onto his pale face—breathtakingly beautiful, and chilling to the bone. “One more step, and I’ll cut out your tongues.”
The men were stunned by this pure killing intent. For a moment, no one dared step forward.
Seizing that instant of hesitation, Fu Songcheng turned and vanished into the darkness, using his astonishing stamina to catch up with the group ahead.
Four hours, like crossing several centuries.
When their feet finally touched a hard, flat surface, Wang Xiu collapsed straight onto the ground.
It was a concrete road.
A road to civilization, to home—a way out.
“We’re here… we made it…”
Shen Ning’s face was streaked with tears. She pulled up her collapsed companion. “Follow this road and we can get out!”
Before the words faded, her voice cut off.
At the end of the concrete road, a black minivan sat quietly across it, blocking every way forward.
The headlights flared on, the beams stabbing so bright no one could open their eyes.
The door opened, and a middle-aged man in a dark gray Zhongshan tunic, his hair combed immaculately, stepped out.
The village secretary.
Behind him stood over a dozen silent, burly men. Unlike the villagers, these were a real, organized interception.
The village secretary’s tone was almost kindly. “Haven’t you caused enough trouble?”
Shen Ning and the other women trembled violently—fear carved into their very bones.
Shen Ning screamed, “Let us go, or else…”
The village secretary laughed softly, as if he’d heard a joke. “You think getting out of this forest means getting out of these mountains?”
He looked at the women behind Shen Ning, his gaze suddenly turning cold. “Wang Xiu, Liu Qin… you few. Kneel down now and come back with me. I can pretend today never happened. Go back, let your men dote on you a bit more, and we’ll call it even.”
The women who had just kindled hope collapsed instantly. They lowered their heads again, knees bending slightly, as if accepting yet another failed escape.
“Don’t kneel!”
Fu Songcheng walked out of the shadows and stood in front of everyone.
His clothes were torn, his body covered in mud and blood—but the blood wasn’t his own.
If they knelt here, they’d fall from the human world straight back into hell.
Fu Songcheng’s figure swayed slightly, then planted itself like an insurmountable iron gate, nailed dead in the center of the concrete road.
The kindness on the village secretary’s face finally cracked open, revealing the rotting hideousness beneath.
He waved his hand, his tone sinister. “The two leaders—cripple them and throw them into the sinkhole in the back mountain.”
At his command, the dozen burly men lunged like ravenous wolves.
They carried shovels and wooden clubs, bearing the arrogance of those who had ruled this land for years.
“Shen Ning, protect them!” Fu Songcheng sidestepped a heavy hammer blow and answered with a back-elbow that shattered the man’s nose bridge.
Every swing of the dagger in his hand brought up a spray of blood. He used the most primal, most vicious means to shatter any villager who tried to get near the women behind him.
Shen Ning’s eyes were bloodshot. She was no longer the meek fugitive—for the first time, Fu Songcheng saw Shen Ning pull her weapon from her system space.
Brass knuckles.
She charged like a madwoman at the man trying to drag Shen Ming away, punching him in the face. The metal spikes on her fingers gleamed as they sank into his skin.
Once. Again.
The fists Li Guoping had once rained on her and Shen Ming—she returned them a thousandfold to the villagers blocking her path to freedom.
When she’d chosen to stay in the instance and save the other women, she had fantasized about this scene every single moment. Now it had finally come true.
She had urged the other women to take up blades and resist—but this instant was when she herself truly began to resist.
The only thing Shen Ning felt in her heart was regret.
She should have thrown this punch sooner.
Goddamn, this feels good.
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