Xu Ningyan withdrew her leg and turned to sit down by the fire.
He took a piece of firewood, poked at the fire, and threw in a few more pieces. Seeing that the fire was burning brighter, he took out a steamed bun from his satchel, picked out a clean bamboo pole, skewered the bun, and put it over the fire to roast.
He gestured to Cao Yang, "Speak."
Cao Yang swallowed hard, shifted his position to find a slightly more comfortable one, and then slowly opened his mouth.
This story begins with Luojiazhai, the predecessor of Yanchi Brigade.
The ancestors of Luojiazhai were imperial physicians surnamed Luo, who left behind countless medical books and ancient prescriptions.
During the War of Resistance against Japan, the Luo family became famous in the province for their superb medical skills, which attracted the attention of the Japanese army from Japan.
The Japanese troops were a small squad stationed in Jingshan County. They were said to have received orders from above to obtain the Luo family's ancestral medical books and ancient prescriptions.
They surrounded Luo Family Village with their troops, wanting the Luo family to hand over their medical books and ancient prescriptions.
The Luo family naturally refused.
The Japanese soldiers were utterly depraved; in front of the men of the Luo family, they raped all the women in the family, not even sparing seven- or eight-year-old girls.
The men of the Luo family were almost all insane, determined to fight the Japanese army to the death. They were like doctors with miraculous healing abilities, no match for the Japanese army.
One by one, their legs were broken, and they were forced to watch.
The hands of the Luo family men had saved countless patients, yet they couldn't save their wives and daughters who were right beside them.
Some people died on the spot from vomiting blood, while others went insane.
In the end, only the head of the Luo family's direct line and his son remained. The two were given special attention and remained conscious and alive.
The Japanese soldiers threatened the two men with the lives of the Luo family's underage sons and everyone in Luo Family Village. They said that if they did not hand over the medical books and ancient prescriptions, the entire Luo Family Village would be executed.
Left with no other choice, the head of the Luo family and his son agreed to transcribe the Luo family's secret medical books and ancient prescriptions from memory.
The two made an excuse, saying that the Luo family's secret medical books and ancient prescriptions could not be memorized in a day or two, and that they were surrounded here and could not escape. They asked if the unimportant people could be released first.
All that's left is the Luo family members in the hands of the Japanese army.
The Japanese troops disagreed, but they did shrink the encirclement and moved all of them into the Luo family's mansion.
The medical books and ancient prescriptions were copied from memory over three days. During these three days, the Luo family lived in hell, and none of the women escaped the clutches of the Japanese soldiers.
The men had their legs broken and were left in the yard, their fates unknown.
Luo Hanlian's grandfather was originally the medicine apprentice of the Luo family patriarch. The whole family learned some basic techniques for processing medicinal materials from him. Because they were not direct descendants of the Luo family and did not live in the Luo family compound, they escaped a disaster.
Remembering the kindness of the family head, Luo Hanlian's grandfather took advantage of the fact that the Japanese soldiers were asleep at night and crawled through the dog hole to rescue the Luo family head.
The head of the Luo family gave the medical books and ancient prescriptions he had memorized to Luo Hanlian's grandfather so that he could take them with him and prevent the Luo family's medical skills from being lost.
Luo Hanlian's grandfather didn't want to leave and even wanted to take the head of the Luo family with him. However, the Japanese soldiers tried to break in, but the head of the Luo family blocked them. In the chaos, Luo Hanlian's grandfather could only grab a book at random and escape from the Luo family, hiding in the deep mountains.
When he came out, he found that Luo Family Village had been reduced to ruins.
The Japanese soldiers left, and the villagers disappeared as well.
He stood guard by the ruins, digging out many charred bones from the Luo family's courtyard every day. After careful examination, he found that most of them belonged to the Luo family, but there were also a few Japanese soldiers' corpses.
Later, some people from Luo Family Village who had previously hidden deep in the mountains came out, looking disheveled, and helped Luo Hanlian's grandfather collect the remains of the Luo family members and bury them all together.
Luo Hanlian's grandfather only then learned that the head of the Luo family had long been determined to die. After the chaos that day, the head of the Luo family had somehow poisoned the well water, knocking out the Japanese soldiers.
The head of the Luo family set fire to the Luo family mansion, burning all the Luo family members and Japanese soldiers to death.
Later, when the new Japanese army arrived, they ransacked the ruins, dug up the graves of the Luo family who had escaped and the graves where Luo Hanlian's grandfather had collected the remains of the Luo family, and scattered the remains on the ground, leaving them to rot in the wilderness.
Luo Family Village later became almost a ghost village, and no one dared to approach it.
It was Luo Hanlian's grandfather, along with the people of Luo Family Village who had survived by hiding, who collected the remains, burned them until only ashes remained, put them in jars, and buried them on the back mountain.
Luo Family Village was rebuilt.
Because the book that Grandpa Luo Hanlian took away in the chaos was a book on processing medicinal herbs, everyone relied on this book and their hunting skills to make a living and gradually return to some of their former state.
Luo Hanlian and Luo Hanqin are brothers; he is the younger brother, and Luo Hanqin is the older brother.
Luo Hanqin had a natural talent for processing medicinal herbs from a young age, having inherited the true skills of her grandfather, Luo Hanlian.
The book on processing medicinal herbs was passed down to Luo Hanqin. However, before Luo Hanlian's grandfather died, in a moment of lucidity, he suddenly said something like, "I took the wrong one! I took the wrong one! I took the wrong book!"
At the time, they didn't understand what book had been mistakenly taken. Only after the problem arose did they realize that Grandpa Luo Hanlian had grabbed a book at random in his panic, and it was probably the wrong one.
It's likely that the head of the Luo family had already made two preparations: either they would perish together, or even if the book couldn't be saved, the one handed over would be a mistake.
However, this is just their speculation. The people from back then are all dead, and no one knows what the head of the Luo family was thinking.
Luo Hanqin was speechless and unable to defend himself. In addition, some people said that he had offended a high-ranking leader and might cause trouble for the people of Yanchi Brigade. They also heard that he had been arrested by the Revolutionary Committee, paraded through the streets wearing a dunce cap, and had his head shaved in a humiliating way. He might even lose his life.
Luo Hanqin grew increasingly frightened. One night, he secretly ran into the deep mountains and was never heard from again.
Later, the Yanchi Brigade was implicated, as Cao Yang had mentioned before.
This kidnapping of Xu Ningyan was not a spur-of-the-moment decision.
Instead, the planning had already begun before the new year.
This story begins with Cao Yang's mother.
His mother was named Luo Jinman, and she was also from Yanchi Brigade. She was Luo Hanlian's aunt. Back then, Yanchi Brigade was well-known, and the Luo family lived quite well thanks to their skill in processing medicinal herbs, so she married into the county town.
Later, he was recruited into the supply and marketing cooperative and is now working as a warehouse manager at the Changning Street Supply and Marketing Cooperative.
Luo Jinman was the first to hear the news of Xu Ningyan's promotion and knew that she was in charge of the acquisition business of the two communes, Hongxing and Hongqi, and that's when she got the idea.
Over the years, because of the Yanchi Brigade incident, Luo Jinman has been worried about her family. She wanted to help them financially, but she was afraid that her husband's family would object.
She had interacted with Xu Ningyan during the last training session in the supply and marketing system. She felt that Xu Ningyan was just a young girl who got this job opportunity by chance. Now that she could become a permanent employee, she was probably feeling apprehensive and wanted to establish herself.
Instead of taking advantage of Xu Ningyan's lack of understanding of the intricacies, let her probe the higher-ups' intentions; perhaps that can resolve the predicament of the Yanchi Brigade.
Even if it doesn't work out, they won't suffer any losses.
So Cao Yang was asked to find a way to bring Xu Ningyan to the Yanchi Brigade.
First, tell Xu Ningyan about the tragedy of Luojiazhai, the predecessor of Yanchi Brigade, to arouse Xu Ningyan's sympathy, and then it will be easier to talk about the rest.
Unexpectedly, Xu Ningyan didn't fall for it at all. They became anxious, so they decided to invite her up the mountain to try and bribe her...
At this point, Cao Yang said with a wry smile, "It's not fair of us, but we had no other choice! The people in the production team are starving and freezing. You didn't see the children in the brigade, one by one..."
As he spoke, Cao Yang's eyes reddened.
Xu Ningyan laughed and slapped Cao Yang across the face. Cao Yang's eyes were no longer red, but his face was swollen. He stared at Xu Ningyan in astonishment: "You don't believe me?"
Do I look like a sucker? Or do you think I'm stupid?
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