Chapter 126
Gu Xi asked Xiao Zhou to take Fang Suihua to the town's police station first, while she stayed behind to wait for Shen Mingzheng.
These days, many roads don't have streetlights, and naturally, there aren't any from the county town to the town either. Plus, there's no moon tonight, so it's pitch black.
Fearing it was too dark and Shen Mingzheng wouldn't see her while driving, she disregarded the waste of battery power and waited by the roadside with a flashlight.
While waiting, Gu Xi rummaged through the things she had bought at the department store that day, took out a bag of cookies and stuffed them into her mouth.
Luckily, I bought some candy and biscuits in the county town to fill my stomach, otherwise I would definitely be dizzy with hunger now.
I was originally planning to get home before 7 p.m., but then this happened, and it's already past 9 p.m.
After eating several cookies, she popped a candy into her mouth to sweeten it, all the while thinking about what had happened earlier.
If she hadn't recognized a familiar face among the group—one she'd seen at Uncle Qiu's place—she would have actually gone there herself to rescue those people, deal with the human traffickers, and settle the abducted women before reporting it to the police.
After all, these kinds of things require a quick and decisive approach, leaving no chance for human traffickers to escape; it's best to take them all down in one fell swoop.
However, she realized that this matter was far too complicated, and this place was probably just one of the strongholds. If she went there like this, she would easily alert the enemy, and since she was not a professional, she could easily make things worse.
Even if she is strong, an individual's strength is ultimately limited.
Although she didn't know if Uncle Qiu and those people were in cahoots, their interactions were indeed very close. Over the past year, she had often seen them when buying meat from Uncle Qiu, which inevitably made her suspicious.
If Uncle Qiu was one of them...
As I was pondering this, I suddenly heard a sound coming from ahead, which immediately put me at ease.
Soon, a jeep appeared in the darkness, its headlights illuminating the darkness.
Gu Xi and the others stood by the roadside, shining flashlights in the middle of the road.
After the car pulled up and stopped beside her, the door opened, and by the light from the car lights inside, Gu Xi saw Shen Mingzheng in the driver's seat.
He was all alone.
"Big brother!" she exclaimed, running over excitedly.
Shen Mingzheng unbuckled his seatbelt and jumped out of the car, reaching out to catch her. While checking on her, he asked, "Xixi, what happened? Aunt Ye said you left the county town a long time ago, why haven't you come home so late? Are you alright...?"
Earlier, when he went to town, he went to the paper mill to find Ye Fenghua. He learned from Ye Fenghua that she should have gone back around 4 o'clock.
It was rare to hear him speak so much for the first time, and Gu Xi could feel the anxiety and worry in his voice. She quickly said, "I'm fine, big brother, don't worry! But it really is something very serious..." She quickly told him what had happened, "I met Xiao Zhou, and he has already taken Fang Suihua to the town's police station. I'll stay and wait for you."
Shen Mingzheng's expression turned extremely serious, his jaw tightened, and he immediately said, "I'll take you back to the army first; the town's police station is short-staffed."
These days, a town's police station has very few personnel and insufficient manpower to handle this matter; the military has to take over and resolve it quickly.
Gu Xi nodded, which was why she stayed to wait for him. She needed to tell him about this, as well as Uncle Qiu. It wasn't convenient to tell Xiao Zhou about this, so she could only tell him.
After all, as a military family member, it's really not honorable to go to the black market to buy meat.
That's something he'll have to arrange.
Shen Mingzheng told her to get in the car, took the things from the bicycle into the car, then locked the bicycle and put it in the bushes by the roadside.
"I'll have someone come and take it back tomorrow."
Gu Xi had no objection to this. If there was a car to take her home, she would of course take it so that she could get home faster and save her two younger sisters from worrying.
On the way back, Gu Xi told Qiu Sanshu about meeting one of the human traffickers.
“...I’ve met them a few times before at Uncle Qiu’s place, and they didn’t seem like good people.” She said, her voice trembling with sadness. “If only I had known sooner.”
It's unknown how many innocent women and children have perished in the past year or so, all right under our noses.
If we had known sooner and reported them, we could have rid the people of this scourge and eliminated these scumbags and beasts sooner.
Shen Mingzheng glanced at her and saw that she was sitting in the passenger seat with her head down. He could tell at a glance that she was feeling sad.
He looked straight ahead and said calmly, "These people are usually very careful in their actions. The town is relatively close to the military base, so they won't cause trouble under the military's nose. How could they easily let others know?"
If she hadn't been so alert and heard the commotion, gone to investigate and stumbled upon the incident, who knows when it would have been discovered.
As for why these people appeared in the town, it is probably related to the presence of troops nearby.
The closer to the military base, the better the security, but sometimes it can be a blind spot. They might even hire someone to keep an eye on the military's movements to facilitate their actions.
There are many possibilities.
Gu Xi forced a smile, but was not comforted.
Although I know this is the truth, it still hurts to think about how many innocent women and children have perished.
I just hope that by uncovering this, we can get rid of these pests and save more innocent people.
Back at the military base, Shen Mingzheng drove his car to the front of the family compound.
After getting off the bus, Shen Mingzheng suddenly grabbed her, pulled her into his arms, patted her head, and said, "Xixi, don't overthink it."
Gu Xi leaned against him and responded softly.
He released her with restraint and said, "Go back first, get some rest tonight, don't wait for me."
He feared he wouldn't be able to go home tonight. Although he was worried about her, there was nothing he could do.
Gu Xi responded again, but did not rush to leave. Instead, she stood there and watched him hurriedly get into the car and leave.
She finally turned and walked into the family compound after the car disappeared from sight.
It was already past 10 p.m., and everyone was resting at this hour, so the residential compound was very quiet.
Gu Xi returned home and took out her key to open the door.
As soon as I entered, I heard the surprised voices of the Xu sisters.
"Big sister, you're back!"
The lights in the corridor were on, and the lights in the main room were also on. The two sisters sat in the main room waiting for her to come back.
They were pleasantly surprised to see her enter and rushed over to greet her. They took the things from her hands and asked in a low voice, "Sister, what happened? Why are you back so late? Are you alright?"
The two sisters looked at her with concern, scrutinizing her under the lamplight in the corridor.
When Gu Xi stepped into the light, the two sisters turned pale with fright when they saw that her clothes were dirty, covered in mud and grass, her hair was messy, and there were scratches on her clothes. They thought something bad had happened to her.
Gu Xi quickly reassured them, "It's okay, the mud on me was from someone else. I'm fine, nothing's wrong, don't scare yourselves!"
These are the mud stains and grass clippings that brushed against Fang Suihua's body when she was comforting her. As for the scratches on her clothes, they were from branches and leaves in the forest. There are many dead branches in the forest, and she would get scratched from time to time along the way.
However, she was thick-skinned and didn't feel anything.
Xu Yuansheng was relieved to see that she was doing alright, and quickly said, "Big sister, are you hungry? We saved some dinner for you, it's still warming up in the pot, I'll go get it."
Xu Huaisheng also said, "Big sister, let me get you some hot water to wash your hands."
Gu Xi knew that her two younger sisters were frightened by her late return today, so she let them do their thing and obediently went to wash their hands before sitting down to eat.
As she ate, she said, "Yuansheng, I bought some things from the county town, including pig's trotters and bones. Take them, wash them clean, and marinate them with salt so they don't spoil."
The weather has turned cool, so the meat shouldn't spoil easily, but if we don't prepare it, it probably won't taste very good tomorrow. It's better to marinate it with a little salt.
Xu Yuansheng glanced at her and felt that she was trying to distract him.
Even so, she didn't rush to ask anything. She told her older sister to eat in peace, and obediently carried the things she had brought back to organize them. Then she washed the bones and pig's trotters and marinated them with a little salt.
Xu Huaisheng sat there and asked Gu Xi, "Big sister, why are you back so late today? Did you see your husband? He was worried about you because you hadn't come back, so he went out to look for you."
"I saw him," Gu Xi said, swallowing the food in her mouth. "He drove me back."
Xu Huaisheng suddenly realized something, then asked, "Big sister, where's our bicycle? Didn't you ride it back?"
“I ran into your brother-in-law and left it by the roadside. Someone will bring it back tomorrow.”
"Oh, I see. It's good that it's not lost..."
"..."
Xu Yuansheng, who was pickling pig's trotters over there, couldn't help but roll his eyes. Sure enough, his little sister was too naive; she hadn't even gotten to the point of her question.
Forget it, we can't count on her.
After finishing her meal, Gu Xi sat for a while to digest before taking a shower.
The large pot of boiling water was more than half full, specially reserved for her. Gu Xi poured the water out and carried it to the bathroom.
Although she really wanted to wash her hair, it was too late, and she would have to wait for it to dry after washing it. She was so sleepy that she decided to wait until tomorrow to wash it.
After taking a hot shower, Gu Xi finally felt much better. She put on an overcoat and went to her two younger sisters' room.
It was getting late, but Xu Yuansheng and Xu Huaisheng had been waiting for her until now, and they were both very sleepy.
No matter how tired he was, Xu Yuansheng refused to sleep.
When Gu Xi came over, Xu Yuansheng lifted the blanket and let her get into bed. The three sisters snuggled together and talked.
"Big sister, what exactly happened today?" Xu Yuansheng asked.
Xu Huaisheng yawned as well, keeping his eyes fixed on Gu Xi, waiting for her answer.
Gu Xi didn't hide anything and told them what happened tonight. The Xu sisters turned pale and were terrified.
Xu Yuansheng nervously grabbed her hand to check: "Are you really alright?"
That was a vicious criminal gang, capable of murder and arson, how could I not be worried? No matter how strong her sister was, she was just an ordinary girl and rarely encountered such a thing.
"Don't worry, I'll be fine. You know how strong I am. I've been training with your brother-in-law for over half a year. I can take on ten men at once now. Taking on a few men is nothing."
She spoke so casually that Xu Huaisheng's tension finally eased a bit.
"How could this happen?" she said, both frightened and furious. "Those people are so wicked, utterly devoid of conscience..."
Having grown up in the village, she had never seen much of the world and was inevitably raised to be naive. The biggest event in her life was when her second sister was forced to marry a mentally challenged man. She never knew how terrible the outside world was.
Gu Xi put her arm around her and said, "Yes, it was really scary. You all need to be careful in the future, don't easily trust strangers, and run away as soon as you encounter danger."
Her two younger sisters are both very innocent and naive. They grew up in the village and have never seen the dark side of society. She is quite worried about them and hopes that they will live a peaceful and safe life.
Xu Yuansheng asked, "Is your brother-in-law not coming back tonight because he's dealing with this matter?"
"yes."
"I hope my brother-in-law can catch all those bad guys and rescue those who have been trafficked!" Xu Huaisheng said, clenching his fist.
After talking for a while, Xu Yuansheng suddenly narrowed his gaze, leaned closer to Gu Xi, and noticed a red and swollen scratch on her neck. He asked, "Big sister, why is your neck red?"
Gu Xi reached out and touched it, hissed, and frowned, saying, "It must have been scratched by a tree branch."
She was just a bit strong, not some agile special forces soldier. Walking in the dim woods, she was bound to get scratched by tree branches.
Upon hearing this, Xu Yuansheng and her sister became anxious again and quickly went to get medicine to apply to her.
She herself didn't care, but the two sisters cared a lot, afraid that if they left it unattended, she would feel bad tomorrow.
"Besides your neck, is there anything else?" Xu Yuansheng asked while applying the medicine to her.
Gu Xi said, "I don't know either, I feel uncomfortable all over."
Today was a whole day of running around without a break. I've exceeded my exercise limits, and my body is really exhausted. I can't say I feel comfortable at all.
Xu Yuansheng made her take off her clothes, leaving her only in her underwear. He noticed that she had scratches on her arms and shoulders, and although there was no broken skin or bleeding, the skin was already starting to turn red and swollen.
Her skin was fair, and even the slightest injury looked shocking and distressing to behold.
The two sisters carefully applied the medicine to her, and seeing her grimacing, they knew she was in pain.
"Big sister, you need to be more careful in the future," Xu Yuansheng nagged. "You're always like this, enduring everything on your own, never saying a word even when you're in pain. How can you be like this?"
Gu Xi said, "Okay, I know, I'll be more careful next time!"
"You must be careful, you can't hold it in, understand?"
"I know! I know!"
After applying the medicine, Gu Xi went back to her room to sleep.
She was really tired. After comforting her two younger sisters, she was about to collapse.
Back in her room, she curled up in bed and, without even having time to think, quickly fell into a deep sleep.
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