Heavy dark clouds hung over the sky like lead, shrouding the entire valley in shadow. Though it was only evening, there seemed to be no trace of sunlight at all.
Compared to before, the rainfall seemed to have lessened somewhat, but being soaked by rain for so long still made their bodies feel extremely uncomfortable.
In the dim mountain forest, a man draped in a black military overcoat climbed a muddy hill. He looked back at the village in the valley, now reduced to ruins, and narrowed his eyes slightly.
He turned around and continued climbing up the mountain, his gaze constantly sweeping over the surrounding earth and rocks as if searching for something.
The rain-soaked mountainside had become extremely soft. One wrong step could easily send someone slipping through the mud, or knock loose rocks that would tumble down the slope.
This was not a mountain in some tourist attraction, with solid, orderly stone steps or broad platforms for resting and sightseeing. There were only winding, rugged mountain paths and rainwater trickling down like streams.
Suddenly, he seemed to hear something and abruptly turned to look.
On the path he had taken, three figures were struggling to climb toward him. Deng Wei raised his head and shouted in a hoarse voice:
"Brother Shen... Brother Shen! Wait for us... We can't go on..."
Shen Qingzhu frowned tightly. "You? Why are you here?"
"Brother Shen, other people might not understand you, but don't we?" Li Liang smiled. "You said you weren't coming, but there's no way you could accept what the instructor said. You were definitely going to sneak off and look for that girl's parents yourself..."
"So we all slipped out while pretending to go into the mountains to use the bathroom," Li Jia added.
Shen Qingzhu stared blankly at