Chapter 534: Rescue (9)

Miao Zhi knew at once that Xiao Mi had suffered the same fate, and she quickly nodded. "Alright."

"Don’t you two go down." Miao Zhi wiped her tears and rushed to find a set of clothes.

Su Li and Miao Zhi went down and saw Xiao Mi in the dark, damp cellar. She was an absolute wreck.

"Miao Zhi!" Xiao Mi threw her arms around Miao Zhi, trembling, and burst into uncontrollable sobs.

"We’re saved! We’re saved!"

Watching the two of them clinging to each other and crying, Su Li’s heart clenched in anguish.

"It’s alright, it’s alright." She draped the clothes over the scarred and battered Xiao Mi, her own body trembling with rage.

"Thank you, thank you... I... I’m not dreaming, am I? This isn’t a dream..."

Xiao Mi slapped herself hard across the face twice. Only after confirming she wasn’t dreaming did she allow herself to feel joy again.

When they brought Xiao Mi upstairs, both Wu Sheng and the squad leader wore grave expressions.

"Let’s go," the squad leader said, preparing to leave with the accountant.

"Wait a minute." Both Wu Sheng and Su Li started to speak at the same time, but Su Li was faster.

Su Li stopped them and walked up to the accountant.

"Where are the others?"

The accountant’s eyes flickered. "What other people?"

Su Li sneered. "Don’t play dumb with me. Where are the other women you’ve bought over the years?"

The accountant feigned ignorance. "I really don’t know what you’re talking about. Weren’t there only two who were bought? You’ve already rescued them. The rest of the women are all in that courtyard, aren’t they?"

Su Li’s eyes were glacial, her sharp gaze threatening to pierce right through him.

"Don’t think for a second I don’t know what goes on in this village. ’Only bought two women’? Your village has been buying and selling women for generations! Who knows how many there have been!"

"Take us to the rest of them. Now. While I’m still asking nicely. And there had better not be a single one missing!"

Hearing this, the color drained from the accountant’s face. ’How on earth does this woman know?’ He was about to argue, to struggle, but then he heard a soft chuckle.

Though it was just a soft chuckle, a chill ran down the accountant’s spine, and the hair on his arms stood on end. He looked over, alarmed and suspicious, at Wu Sheng, who had casually stepped to the side.

A small knife had appeared in Wu Sheng’s hand, and he was twirling it deftly.

"Tell one lie, and I’ll take something from you. For every person that’s missing, I’ll take something else. You do the math."

"You..." The accountant was horrified. "What do you mean, ’something from me’?"

"A hand... a foot... an ear. Those are all parts of you. Or..."

Wu Sheng said nonchalantly, his gaze suddenly flicking to the area below the man’s navel. The implication was unmistakable.

The accountant was middle-aged, but he was still a man. Hearing that, he nearly wet himself.

"You... You’re a monster."

The accountant looked at Su Li, then back at Wu Sheng. Finally, he closed his eyes, his entire posture one of utter dejection and despair.

"Alright... I’ll take you. I’ll take you there."

He turned and led the way, the squad leader following with a look of stunned disbelief.

"Su Li, what does he mean? There are others?" Miao Zhi grabbed Su Li’s hand, her face a mask of disbelief. Beside her, Xiao Mi looked equally incredulous.

Su Li nodded. "Yes. There are more. You weren’t the first, and if we hadn’t come, you wouldn’t have been the last."

Su Li’s gaze drifted toward the village chief’s house. In that courtyard... among the women who had been "watching" Miao Zhi and the others... many of them had been bought as well.

And a long, long time ago... they had gone through the exact same thing.

But in the end... they had been tragically assimilated. Holding onto who-knows-what feelings, they began to participate in the same atrocities as the people of Taoyuan Village.

Miao Zhi and Xiao Mi were still reeling from Su Li’s words, so they didn’t notice the look of inexpressible sorrow in her eyes.

But Wu Sheng saw it crystal clear.

Holding Little Tang Mo, he stepped forward. "Let’s go." He patted Su Li’s shoulder, offering silent comfort.

Su Li met Wu Sheng’s eyes and knew he understood. She took a deep breath and nodded. "Let’s go."

That night, the dogs in Taoyuan Village barked ceaselessly.

That night, in the seemingly picturesque, idyllic paradise of Taoyuan Village, Su Li and her group rescued six more women from cellars.

The one imprisoned for the shortest time had been there for two years. When they found her, she was pregnant, her expression lost and dazed.

The one held captive the longest had been there for twelve years... After so long without sunlight in that cellar, her mind had broken and her body was failing.

Though only in her thirties, she looked like she was in her fifties or sixties—skeletally thin, more a ghost than a person.

The duration of their imprisonment varied, but the one thing they had in common was their refusal to settle down and become obedient wives, even after being forced to bear children.

They had tried to escape, again and again, only to be caught and dragged back each time.

Fearing they would run again, their captors eventually resorted to locking them away permanently, throwing them naked into cellars to spend year after lightless year.

When the women were brought up, Su Li, Miao Zhi, and Xiao Mi couldn’t bear it and broke down crying.

Miao Zhi and Xiao Mi were overcome with waves of terror and belated fear. They knew that if they hadn’t been rescued today, the fate of these women would have been their own.

Aside from the two women who had been held for two and three years, and the one who had been imprisoned for twelve years and was now eerily calm and on the verge of death, the other three were in terrible condition.

Watching the rescued women—dazed, screaming, scratching at people, trying to run, flinching from the light—a fire blazed in Su Li’s heart. She wished she could burn this wicked place to the ground and incinerate every last person in it.

Su Li was also filled with regret. She regretted not thinking of this place sooner, not rescuing them from this hell earlier.

If she had just remembered earlier, fewer people would have had to suffer.

But there are no ’if onlys’ in this world. It was useless. All of it was useless.

The three who were no longer mentally stable were thrashing about so violently that, fearing they would run off and get hurt, Wu Sheng had no choice but to knock them unconscious.

When they brought the women back to the brightly lit village chief’s house, the police officers’ eyes went red with fury. They looked like they wanted to put a bullet in every one of the villagers.

And the people of Taoyuan Village, seeing that even these six women had been found, shot hateful, resentful glares at the accountant.

Not one of them would admit any wrongdoing. They didn’t feel they had done anything wrong at all.

Just as Su Li had suspected, many of the other women in the village had also been trafficked here. They ranged from young wives in their twenties to women in their fifties, sixties, seventies, and even eighties.

When asked why they never tried to escape or help the other unfortunate women, they all said you have to accept your fate.

"Once you belong to a man and have his children, you should just settle down and live your life. Isn’t that how it is for all women?"

"That’s right. Life is life, no matter where you are. Trying to run away just brings more suffering on yourself."

Su Li trembled with rage as she listened to them. Wu Sheng squeezed her hand and whispered softly.

"Even the pitiful can be detestable."

But words far more outrageous than theirs came from the man who had kept his own wife locked up for twelve years.

He said bluntly, "Buying a wife is just buying a piece of livestock that can talk, work, and give you children. What’s so strange about that? I’ve done nothing wrong."

After he spoke, the other villagers either nodded or remained silent in tacit agreement. Most of them believed the very same thing.

Su Li looked at them and took a step back, then another.

’These are... beasts in human skin.’

’Absolutely terrifying.’