"Understood, brother." The two replied in unison, and then left with Li Hongying.

After Tiger and Leopard left with Li Hongying, Chen Jinlong was alone in the room. He took out the bloodstone pendant from his chest and admired it. The more he looked at it, the more he liked it.

Once he finds the girl he likes best and she pleases him, he might give her this necklace.

A dozen minutes later, Hu Zi returned, entered Chen Jin Hu's room, and closed the door.

Before long, through the flickering candlelight in the room, two intertwined figures were reflected on the white paper-covered window.

Tiger lay on the earthen bed, gritting his teeth and enduring the excruciating pain. He desperately told himself that he would get through it if he just held on.

After tonight, even if no new girls come, it will be someone else's turn tomorrow.

After one night, a new day begins.

The Victory Brigade at the foot of the mountain

Early in the morning, two people came from the mountain. They were Zhang Xiaolong, the third leader of the mountain gang, and Leopard.

They were afraid that their unfamiliar faces would arouse suspicion, and even more afraid that Luo Jingyan and Zhuang Feifei would discover something and cause them to panic. The two of them squatted outside Luo Jingyan and Zhuang Feifei's homestead, in a cornfield about two hundred meters away from the homestead.

The spring corn is now over a meter tall; when they bend down slightly, they are completely invisible to outsiders.

“Third Brother, that woman surnamed Li really wasn’t lying. There are indeed two adjacent courtyards here, both built outside this village. Those two weak women are quite bold,” Leopard said.

"They say they're the prettiest girls in the village. Oh, I really want to see what they look like."

"We've arrived too early. Both their doors are closed. They're not coming out, so we can't see them. Let's just wait. Can they stay indoors forever?"

So the two of them waited in the cornfield.

Luo Changtian goes for a run every morning, and Black Tiger often goes with him.

Zhang Xiaolong and Leopard saw Luo Changtian leave. Leopard frowned and said, "Hey, could this be the beauty's man? Why does he look so young? The beauty already has a man. Then our boss won't be able to get a virgin this time. Sigh, he always uses other people's leftovers, and he's still so enthusiastic every day."

"And you call yourself the eldest brother? You can't even get your hands on what's left."

The leopard rolled its eyes and stuck out its tongue: "I can't touch it, and you're not much better than me."

"I have serious business to attend to, so I can't waste time chatting with you."

Zhang Xiaolong looked at Luo Changtian carefully.

"He looks quite young, only about thirteen or fourteen years old. How can someone so young get married? Why didn't that woman surnamed Li clarify whether there are other people in her family? I don't think he's the beautiful woman's husband; he's probably her younger brother."

"Yes, yes, it should be the younger brother. This younger brother is still small and won't hinder our actions."

No sooner had the leopard finished speaking than Zhang Xiaolong slapped him on the head.

“You shouldn’t be called Leopard, you should be called Fool. Don’t you know what use a child this big is? He’ll be an obstacle for us? From now on, he’s our target.”

Leopard finally got it: "Yes, yes, when we snatch the beauty up the mountain, we can take her with us and sell her to a black coal mine as a child laborer. We can even make a profit that way."

Unexpectedly, he had barely finished speaking when Zhang Xiaolong smacked him on the head again.

This time it was a compliment: "You're not so bad after all, you actually have some intelligence!"

The leopard complained, "You hit me when I was wrong, but why did you hit me when I was right?"

Tiger looked at his palms: "There's nothing I can do, I'm used to hitting people, I can't change it overnight."

Luo Changtian took Black Tiger and the cat out for a run. When they returned, Luo Changtian said to Black Tiger, "Want to sit on my shoulders?"

He often puts Black Tiger on his arm after running, claiming that the kitten is too tired from running with him and he needs to take care of the kitten.

He leaned down, and Black Tiger leaped onto his shoulder with a push of its hind legs.

Because of its sensitivity to its surroundings, the cat is always observing its surroundings, able to see in all directions and hear in all directions. Because of its short stature, Black Tiger did not notice the two people hiding in the cornfield when it was on the ground.

At this moment, while perched on Luo Changtian's shoulder, I saw the two blurry figures hidden behind the corn stalks.

It is necessary to find out the intentions of people who are acting suspiciously near the owner's residence.

After Luo Changtian brought him home, Luo Jingyan had already prepared dinner, and Hei Hu ran to Luo Jingyan.

[Master, I saw two suspicious-looking people hiding in the cornfield outside. I'm going to check them out.]

Okay, go ahead.

Black Tiger ran out again, sneaking quietly into the cornfield and using the corn stalks as cover to approach the two people.

A cat's footsteps are very light; generally, you can't hear them unless you see the cat approaching with your own eyes.

Black Tiger walked to within five or six meters of them and saw that they were indeed watching Luo Jingyan's house. It lay down on the ground, pricked up its ears, and listened carefully to their conversation.

Zhang Xiaolong and Leopard kept their eyes fixed on the direction of Luo Jingyan's door. Leopard's voice sounded a little weak.

"I'm getting impatient because I haven't seen any beautiful women come out. I really want to see what they look like."

"Don't worry, she can't stay indoors forever. Let's wait a little longer."

Hearing their conversation, Black Tiger was certain they were talking about Luo Jingyan. It really wanted to pounce on them and bite them, but it held back for the time being so as not to alert them.

Leopard then asked, "Who do you think our elder brother will send tonight to snatch people up the mountain?"

"I don't know, it depends on my brother's mood."

"I wish they could send me again." Leopard recalled the night he took Li Hongying up the mountain, hoping to gain more advantage this time as well.

Zhang Xiaolong saw through his thoughts: "If you want to come, you'd better perform well in front of your big brother."

"How should we perform?"

"Give him a striptease, hahaha."

"Third brother, are you kidding me? It's not like I haven't done it before. What you did was even more outrageous than what I did."

As soon as he said that, Tiger immediately shut up and stopped talking.

Leopard sighed, "I'm so envious of you, Big Brother. Every time you get a beautiful woman, you get her first. This time you got two at once. I wish I could have that kind of treatment in my next life."

After listening to their conversation, Black Tiger roughly understood what they were planning to do, and it quickly went back to tell Luo Jingyan.

“Master, they must be bandits. Those two have an older brother. They said they’d come tonight to kidnap someone. Master, I think their target is you. Oh, they’re both beautiful women, one of them is you, but I don’t know who the other is. They said they’d kidnap you and take you up the mountain to their older brother.”

"Um?"