Chapter 458: Help me bite off this damn rope on my hand! It’s strangling me!
After hearing this, Qian Duoduo felt a surge of anger in her heart, almost bursting through her throat. "Damn it..." She was about to curse, but Xiaohong shushed her in fear, her voice trembling: "Miss! Keep your voice down! Don't make a sound! Just now, when I woke up, I was so frightened and scared that I couldn't help shouting. The driver outside lifted the curtain and came in. Without saying anything, he slapped me hard several times..."
She subconsciously turned her head, and with the faint moonlight coming through the gap in the carriage, Qian Duoduo vaguely saw the red and swollen fingerprints on her cheek, and his heart suddenly turned cold.
Xiao Hong's voice was filled with fear: "My servant, I had no choice but to pretend to be dead and faint. That person went out cursing..."
Qian Duoduo swallowed hard, his dry throat felt like it had been rubbed by sandpaper.
A huge fear gripped her, "Damn it! What's this 'miracle of a living person'? This is simply a den of kidnappings! Yueyue, Yueyue, I shouldn't have disobeyed you, I shouldn't have been so curious..." Regret bit her heart like a poisonous snake.
Xiaohong sobbed in despair: "Miss, we were kidnapped in the afternoon. Look outside, it's pitch black. We don't know how far we have run, in the wilderness... Regent Princess, does she know we are missing? Can she find us?" The endless darkness and the unknown future make hope seem so slim.
Qian Duoduo bit his tongue hard, forcing himself to remain calm. He encouraged Xiaohong and himself, "Yes! I definitely can! If Yueyue finds out I'm missing, she'll dig deep to find me! The secret guards of the Regent's Palace... they're all top-notch experts, no pushovers! They... they must be on their way!"
Just as the master and servant were comforting each other and mustering up their courage, the galloping carriage suddenly stopped, the wheels rolling over the gravel with a harsh friction sound, and suddenly stopped!
The heavy coarse cloth curtain was roughly opened with a "swish", and a night wind mixed with dirt, livestock manure and coldness suddenly rushed in, making Qian Duoduo and Xiaohong shiver.
With the dim, flickering light of the oil lamp coming in from outside, Qian Duoduo saw with horror that the carriage seemed to be parked on the mud ground of a dilapidated farmyard.
The courtyard wall was low and crooked, and a few thatched huts cast hideous outlines in the darkness.
A burly man with a fleshy face was blocking the car door. With the light behind him, one could only see his yellow teeth in his grinning mouth and his eyes flashing with malicious light in the dark.
His gruff voice rang out with a sickening teasing tone: "Yo ho! You two little girls woke up pretty quickly, huh?"
Qian Duoduo's heart was pounding, almost jumping out of her throat. The strong desire to survive made her suppress her fear. Her voice was obviously trembling as she hurriedly said, "Good...good man! You...you just want money, right? Let me go! My family has plenty of money! I can give you mountains of gold and silver! As long as you let me go back, I will give you whatever you want!"
The burly kidnapper turned a deaf ear to Qian Duoduo's promise of money. The flesh on his face twitched and he revealed a hideous sneer.
Without saying a word, he thrust his big hand, as big as a palm-leaf fan, into the carriage, grabbed Qian Duoduo's bound arms, and pulled her out roughly as if she were a piece of cargo!
"Ah! Ouch!" Qian Duoduo was caught off guard. His arms were pulled with excruciating pain, and his feet were tied with ropes and unable to support himself. His whole body was dragged out of the carriage like a torn sack.
The icy air instantly enveloped her, followed by the dull pain of her body slamming heavily against the hard, cold shaft of the cart and the ground! She cried out in pain, tears welling up almost uncontrollably.
The body rubbed and dragged on the rough and cold ground. The thin clothes were no protection at all, and the delicate skin was burning with pain.
Qian Duoduo cursed in her heart, gritting her teeth: "Assholes! Just wait for me! When Yueyue comes, I'll see how I'll deal with you! It hurts so much..."
Xiaohong was not spared either, and was dragged down by another ferocious man in the same way. The master and servant were like discarded burdens, stumbling all the way, and were dragged and thrown into a dilapidated house that smelled of mold and dust.
"Bang!" The heavy wooden door was slammed shut, causing the wall to fall off.
The huge impact force caused Qian Duoduo and Xiaohong to fall heavily on the cold and hard ground again, and they let out suppressed groans in pain.
The door hinges made a harsh friction sound, followed by the rattling of iron chains and the sound of the iron lock falling with a "click", completely isolating the outside world.
With the dim moonlight filtering through the broken window, Qian Duoduo could barely see the situation inside the house: in the small space, besides the two of them, there were six other young women huddled there.
They huddled tightly in the darkest shadows of the corner, their faces filled with fear and despair, like a group of frightened quails.
Qian Duoduo endured the pain all over his body and asked in a low voice, "Hey, you... do you know where this is? Where are we being taken?"
The only response she got was oppressive silence and faint sobs.
After a long while, a girl who looked younger in the corner raised her tear-stained face, her voice broken and trembling: "We, we were sold. We were caught from the Baihua Opera House and were going to be sold to that dirty place. Woo woo... What should I do? I want to go home..." Her crying seemed to have lit a fuse, and the other girls couldn't help sobbing as well. The feeling of despair filled the cold air.
Qian Duoduo suppressed her annoyance and asked a few more questions carefully, and roughly figured out the situation: these women were indeed the same as her. They were deceived into the Baihua Theater under the pretext of "cooperating in the performance for ten taels of silver", and then fell into the trap in the "magic box".
They were all concubines' daughters from small families. They were insignificant at home and suffered such a disaster when they wanted to earn some money for themselves.
Listening to their sobbing, Qian Duoduo felt his head buzzing. He couldn't help but raise his voice a little, and said with a hint of forced confidence: "Oh! Stop crying! What's the use of crying! Listen, my family must have noticed that I'm missing! And my good sister, that's the Regent Princess! If she knew I was missing, she would dig three feet into the ground to find me! Don't worry, when they find you, none of you will be in any trouble!"
The four words "Regent Princess" seemed to have magical power, and the sobbing sound instantly became much quieter.
Several pairs of tearful eyes looked at Qian Duoduo, and a faint but real ray of hope finally ignited in them.
Qian Duoduo breathed a sigh of relief, but the posture of having his hands and feet tied was extremely uncomfortable.
She twisted her body with great effort and finally sat up like a worm. She turned her back to Xiaohong and urged her in a low voice, "Xiaohong! Quick! Help me bite off this damn rope on my hand! It's strangling me!"
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