chsdbacks Chapter 40 I failed to protect you!
Chapter 40 I failed to protect you!
Li Laogen huddled in the corner, no longer in the mood to smoke his pipe, the soles of his shoes clattering loudly.
Niu Guihua stood with her hands on her hips, her chest heaving violently, her triangular eyes fixed on her husband, spittle flying everywhere: "You still ask what happened? Your good in-laws have lost Da Bao's wife! Gone! Such a grown woman, they say she was kidnapped!"
"Lost...lost?"
Li Laogen's mind went blank for a moment, unable to process what was happening. "That's a person, not an object. How could it be lost?"
"That old woman Zhao said she met a beggar on the road! Bah! I think that old hag doesn't want to live with our Da Bao anymore, so she's deliberately hiding him to try and renege on her debt!"
Niu Guihua spat a mouthful of phlegm onto the ground, then pointed to the locked woodshed door, "Since our wife is gone, we can't just sit idly by! It's only right that we bring this worthless woman back to pay off our debts!"
Li Laogen was completely confused, but one thing he understood was that Da Bao's wife was gone, and the important matter of carrying on the family line was ruined.
This old man was usually so quiet he wouldn't utter a sound, but when it came to his son's affairs, his cloudy old eyes would turn red with anxiety.
"But... but we can't bring Xianglian back..."
Li Laogen stammered, his voice barely audible, "Xianglian and Zhao Gang are legally married and protected by law. If this goes to the commune, we won't be in the right..."
"Being in the right? In Old Li's family, I'm always right!"
Niu Guihua shoved Li Laogen away with such force that she almost knocked him over. "What's the use of getting a marriage certificate? A life for a life, a debt for a debt! Now that Zhao Xiaoyun is gone, who's going to pay the bride price for Dabao's next marriage? Are we going to tear you apart and sell you?"
She got more and more excited as she spoke, her eyes darting around, clearly calculating to the core: "I've already found out. Zhang the butcher in the next village recently lost his wife and is in a hurry to find a replacement. This girl may be a divorcee, but she's got the looks and figure. If we send her over, Zhang the butcher has said he'll give a dowry of three hundred!"
"Three...three hundred?!"
When Li Laogen heard the amount, his mouth dropped open wide enough to fit a duck egg. He had toiled in the fields his whole life and had never seen so much cash.
But then he thought again and shuddered: "That butcher Zhang... I heard that his wife was beaten to death by him when he was drunk... If Xianglian were sent there, would she still be alive?"
"Fate? That's her fate!"
Niu Guihua glared at him and pinched Li Laogen's thigh hard. "Why are you so worried about this good-for-nothing? If you care about her, why don't you conjure up a wife for Dabao? Why don't you get three hundred yuan? If you can't do that, shut up!"
Li Laogen gasped in pain, his neck hunched, and he fell completely silent.
Seeing that she had subdued the old man, Niu Guihua became even more arrogant. She turned around and shouted at the woodshed door, "This matter is settled! Tomorrow morning, we'll wash this jinx clean and send him to the Zhang family! If anyone dares to stop us, I'll burn this house down and our whole family will die together!"
The woodshed was so dark you couldn't see your hand in front of your face.
Li Xianglian curled up on the cold mud, her hands and feet numb from being bound.
Every word her parents said outside felt like a nail piercing her heart.
This is her father, this is her home.
In order to find a wife and money for their useless younger brother, they are pushing her into a pit of fire and forcing her to her death.
"Mom, don't lock the door yet, let me in and have some fun!"
A lewd voice came from outside the door, accompanied by the sound of slurping saliva, "Anyway, it's going to be sold tomorrow, so I'll get a good deal tonight. It's a way to make use of waste."
"Get out of my way!"
Then came a crisp slap, which made Li Dabao yell.
Niu Guihua cursed, "You good-for-nothing! This is three hundred yuan worth of goods! What if you ruin it and Butcher Zhang doesn't want it anymore? You're going to pay me back? Get back in your room and go to sleep! They said as long as the goods are intact, you won't lose a penny!"
With a loud clang outside, the rusty iron lock completely extinguished Li Xianglian's last hope.
The woodshed fell into a deathly silence.
She knows this place very well.
The air was filled with a damp, musty smell, and the scurrying of mice.
When Li Dabao was little, she would be locked up here and starved whenever she cried. It was bitterly cold in winter and unbearably stuffy in summer.
Unexpectedly, after escaping for so long, she ended up back in this cannibalistic place.
Li Xianglian moved her tightly bound wrists; the ropes had already dug into her flesh, chafing her skin, and the sticky substance was probably blood.
My stomach was growling with hunger, and the places on my body where I had been hit were burning with pain. But none of that was as real as the fear in my heart.
Tomorrow morning... I'll be sent to Butcher Zhang's house.
That butcher whose wife died, that beast who treated women like livestock.
Is this the end of my life?
And there are mountains of them...
That shovel strike soaked through his waistband with blood.
Even if he's incredibly strong, he's not made of iron.
Will something happen to him?
Li Xianglian dared not think about it and could only pray to God in her heart again and again.
Even if it means her death, let nothing happen to him.
After some time, the barking of the dogs outside stopped, and the moon rose high in the sky.
A few pale rays of moonlight pierced through the cracks in the dilapidated door, like death warrants.
Sudden.
From the broken window on the back wall of the woodshed, which had long been blocked with dry straw, came an extremely faint sound.
"Shh...shh..."
It looked like something was digging in the soil, or like it was prying up bricks.
Li Xianglian froze, not daring to even breathe. Every hair on her body stood on end.
Could it be that beast Li Dabao? He's still up to his old tricks, trying to break in through the window?
Fear coiled around her neck like a venomous snake, and she desperately shuffled deeper into the woodpile, trying to hide herself in the darkness.
The rope chafed against the wound on her wrist, causing excruciating pain, but she gritted her teeth and refused to make a sound.
The noise stopped for a moment.
Immediately afterwards, the clump of rotten straw blocking the window was gently pulled away from the outside.
A large hand, covered in mud and dried blood, reached in and groped its way to the window frame.
"Crunch—"
The long-neglected window frame made a sickening thud as it was forcibly pried open a crack.
A tall, slightly hunched black figure struggled to climb in through the small window.
He landed lightly, but still lost his balance, kneeling on one knee and panting heavily, a hissing sound of suppressed pain escaping his throat.
It's not Li Dabao!
Li Xianglian's heart was pounding so hard it felt like it was going to burst out of her chest.
After a moment, the man stood up, supporting himself on his knees, and walked towards her step by step.
By the light of the moon, Li Xianglian could see clearly.
The man was shirtless, his chest covered in sweat and dirt, and a dirty shirt wrapped around his back, soaked with blood.
But his eyes shone frighteningly bright in the darkness, like two clusters of wildfire that could never be extinguished.
A familiar scent wafted towards me, carrying a strong rusty smell and that pleasant scent of soapberry.
Li Xianglian's tightly strung bowstring snapped with a loud "pop".
Tears welled up like a burst dam.
"Like a mountain..." she murmured, her voice trembling like a leaf in the wind.
Qin Rushan remained silent.
He took a few steps forward, his knees buckled, and he knelt directly in front of her.
His rough, large hands cupped her face, and by the moonlight, he could see the tear stains on her face, the bloody mark on her neck from the kitchen knife, and her messy, bird's nest-like hair.
In that instant, Li Xianglian felt that the man's hands were trembling.
He pulled a short knife from his waist and cut the rope binding her with a "whoosh".
Once the restraints were released, Li Xianglian, ignoring the numbness in her hands and feet, rushed into his arms like a madwoman, her hands haphazardly trying to touch his back.
"Your wound...let me see your wound..."
Before my hand could even touch that bloody, mangled area, he grabbed it.
His palms were burning hot, and his strength was so great that it felt like he was going to crush her finger bones.
"Don't touch it, it's dirty." Qin Rushan's voice was hoarse, as if he had swallowed a handful of sand.
He pressed her firmly against his chest with his other hand, his strength domineering and unreasonable, as if he wanted to mash her into his very bones.
Li Xianglian pressed herself against his hot, hard chest, listening to the thunderous heartbeat within, and cried even harder.
"It's all my fault... It's all my fault for being a jinx... If you hadn't come, you wouldn't have gotten that shovel blow... What would I do if you died...?"
She was incoherent, tears and snot all over his chest, and she kept hitting his shoulder with a little force, like a cat scratching.
"Shut up."
Qin Rushan roared and grabbed the back of her head with his large hand, forcing her to raise her head.
Those bloodshot eyes stared intently at her, a fierce determination that seemed to have crawled out of a mountain of corpses and a deep affection that would give her one's life.
"Li Xianglian, listen to me carefully. You are my woman, and I'll hold the sky up if it falls. Anyone who dares to lay a finger on you will be killed by me. There's no such thing as being implicated or not; it's just that I failed to protect you."
These words were rough and harsh, like a raging fire that burned directly into Li Xianglian's heart.
All the grievances, fears, and self-blame turned to ashes in this domineering tenderness.
She looked up at the man's strong chin and the dried blood at the corner of his mouth, her heart aching as if it were about to break.
"But...but there are so many of them...they're going to sell me to Butcher Zhang tomorrow...Rushan, you have to go! Don't worry about me! You're so badly injured, you'll die here if you don't leave!"
"Go? Where to?"