Ah Li sighed, life is tough.
Unlike Ah Li, who slept comfortably, Xue Rongyu found that when she found the original owner's home, no one was there anymore.
Nearby villagers were saying, "Their whole family is dead. We don't know who they offended. Their bodies were already rotting before they were discovered."
Nangong Xuan asked, "Then why did their whole family die?"
"I don't know, but someone saw them bring back a girl from somewhere and lock her in a room. Oh, and someone also found a blood-stained dress."
Li Wenping listened to the man's words and went inside to find the blood-stained dress.
One room contained a lot of blackened bloodstains, and the other room was a woodshed.
Outside the woodshed, there was indeed a blood-stained dress that had been thrown out.
Li Wenping stared blankly at the dress, the one he had prepared for Xiaocao back then.
There were dark red bloodstains on the hem of the skirt and other parts of the skirt, and there was also a lot of dirt on the skirt.
No, it won't.
Li Wenping stepped back, looked at the villager, and asked, "Besides this family, is there any other girl?"
The villager thought for a moment and said, "No, it looked pretty scary back then, but nobody really looked closely. But it was probably all men, no girls."
Li Wenping didn't know whether he should breathe a sigh of relief or not. Xue Rongyu and Nangong Xuan had already walked up to him, standing on either side of him. Xue Rongyu asked, "Do you recognize this dress?"
Seeing that the three men were acting strangely, and that one of them was his son, the prime minister ordered an investigation into the true cause of their deaths.
Li Wenping said very slowly, "It was the dress I prepared for her that day."
Are you sure?
"Um."
Xue Rongyu and Nangong Xuan looked at the nearby villagers, then at the house, and said together, "Search, search the whole village."
This search revealed something extraordinary.
This village is a den of iniquity, where many women are forced into captivity and tied up in cellars. They are reduced to tools for childbirth, and are subjected to abuse at any time.
Fortunately, Xue Rongyu and her group came prepared this time, bringing quite a few people with them.
Several villagers were discovered by them locking the woman in her house, and they even tried to kill her, but Xue Rongyu killed them with a single sword stroke.
The people behind them dared not cause any trouble. There were quite a few women who were rescued. Some were pregnant, some were already delirious, and some even slit their throats on the spot when they came out. Their eyes had long lost the desire to live.
The person they were looking for wasn't among these people.
Li Wenping looked at them one by one, and none of them were small grasses.
He was panicked and scared.
Xue Rongyu and Nangong Xuan remained calm. Since neither of them could be found alive or dead, they could not afford to panic.
The Prime Minister looked at Li Wenping, who seemed on the verge of collapse, and he wanted to go up and hit him to wake him up. Where was his composure and steadiness? He was acting so outrageously for a village girl.
Xue Rongyu looked down at the sword hanging on his horse. He wanted to massacre the village; the village was rotten to the core.
At this moment, Nangong Xuan raised his hand, and the guards he brought drove the villagers to the center of the village and surrounded it.
Nangong Xuan also asked, "Where do you throw away the dead girls each time?"
After not hearing a reply for a long time, Nangong Xuan ordered someone to prepare firewood.
After an unknown amount of time, when a large number of dead trees and dry grass were piled up around them, someone said, "Throw them into the ravine."
At this moment, the Prime Minister coughed lightly and said, "I've heard that there are quite a few bandits in this area, and they all like to wear masks."
These two are ruthless, but they still have to put on an act when they're openly slaughtering a village.
Xue Rongyu thought for a moment and decided that he should put on an act. He picked up a face mask and covered half of his face.
Seeing this, the others also put on face masks.
Nangong Xuan and Li Wenping did the same. After putting on their face masks, they looked around. If they found anyone trying to escape or hiding nearby, they would shoot their arrows.
The prime minister lamented that he was getting old, and then he left with his entourage.
Bandits were entering the village behind him, and villagers were shouting for help, but he neither saw nor heard them, and had no idea what was happening.
Not long after, thick smoke rose from that sky, so thick it was almost black.
On the other side, Ah Li woke up and hitched the cart to the old ox, ready to go fetch water together.
The old ox didn't need to be driven; it just watched as Ahri placed several empty buckets on the oxcart and started walking forward.
Ah Li sat on the oxcart and noticed that there were still quite a few people scattered around the village.
The water at the water source was quite clear, and several people were also drawing water there.
The old ox stopped, and Ali carried the bucket over and picked up the ladle to fetch water as well.
Even if people nearby wanted to ask Ah Li where she was from, Ah Li remained silent, as if she hadn't heard them, so they didn't ask.
After filling the wooden buckets with water, Ali put them on the oxcart and drove the old ox back home.
See, this way you not only walk less, but also save energy.
However, when Ah Li got home, she found that the gate to the yard had been opened, and there were several people standing in the yard, including an old man sitting in a chair drinking tea.
The old ox didn't stop; it went straight into the yard.
Ali didn't even have time to get off the oxcart before she ran into the old man and the others in the courtyard.
The prime minister was wondering who stole the old ox, or if the ox had run away on its own.
As he looked at his old ox that had returned, the people on the oxcart, and the few buckets of water on the oxcart, he carefully examined Ah Li.
Could this be the village girl that those two ruthless people and his silly son like?
"Go up and help."
When the Prime Minister saw that Ah Li smiled politely at him but did not make a sound, he spoke to the person next to him.
So, Ahri noticed that while she was struggling to carry the bucket of water, others could lift it very easily, which made her a little frustrated.
The Prime Minister then walked over to Ah Li and gestured, "Where are you taking this?"
Ah Li pointed to the large water vat in the yard, and carried a bucket of water over there.
Just as Ahri poured in a bucket of water and walked away, the Prime Minister's men also brought in water and poured it in.
Ahri turned to look at the old man. Who is this person?
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