It's Stuck and Can't Come Down

Chapter 414: Once the Cow is on the Ox, it Can't Get Down

As Jiang You departed Lanwan Base, Xu Rizhao stood on the defense wall, holding the white cat. He found it somewhat unbelievable.

He had originally thought Jiang You's arrival at Lanwan Base would stir up quite a storm, perhaps even severely damage Lanwan Base before she left.

After all, it was always the kings fighting, and the pawns suffering.

But he never expected she would leave after only a few short days.

She arrived quietly and left quietly, without causing any trouble.

She even queued up honestly to enter the city and queued up to leave, unlike the envoys from the Three Great Bases who never queued when they arrived.

They always cut in line and demanded special privileges.

Thinking about it, she was actually quite polite!

Not only had she left, but before she departed, she had also taken away his biggest worry – those persistent nuisants from Longshan Town.

There were only a few people when they arrived, but a long line when they left.

For some reason, at that moment, Xu Rizhao suddenly felt that the lean figure riding the mutated calico cat seemed to transform into a sharp sword, piercing the daylight.

Xu Rizhao didn't know what she was looking for in Longshan Town.

However, based on her actions in Lanwan Base these past few days, she wasn't the merciless villain the outside world claimed her to be.

Even when she beat up those people from Longshan, she held back. Although it looked scary, there were no fatal injuries.

He couldn't stop someone like her from doing what she wanted.

He could only be thankful that she wasn't an utterly wicked person.

Those young offspring from Longshan, he had watched them grow up. They were a bit mischievous, a bit wild, a bit cheeky, and a bit thick-skinned, but they weren't bad people.

After all, in the entire Longshan, there were only these few dozen young and strong men. They bore the responsibility of everyone else's livelihood. If they didn't grow up wild, they would rot under the shade of the trees.

The laws of survival in the mountains had always been cruel.

Seeing those naughty monkeys obediently following the mutated calico cat, as docile as young sheep, Xu Rizhao's eyes felt a sting of emotion. He reached into his pocket for a handkerchief to wave goodbye, when a fair, plump hand reached out from behind and grabbed his ear.

The tearing pain at the base of his ear instantly pulled him back from his melancholy.

"Hey! Hey, hey, hey! It hurts, it hurts, it hurts!"

"Xu, my second brother said you don't sleep at night and call young girls to your room to discuss important matters, right? You even specifically sent him out, what, were you afraid he'd see something?"

Xu Rizhao quickly held his ear. "Wife, wife, how can you believe that little scoundrel? Let me explain!"

The woman was plump, in her early forties, with one hand holding his ear and the other on her hip, looking quite fierce.

But in Xu Rizhao's eyes, her round, full face was like a beautiful moon. Even her age spots looked like the exquisite plating of a Michelin chef.

Each spot was perfectly placed, not too much, not too little, adding just the right charm.

"My dear wife, don't you know me? In this life, besides you, when have I ever looked at anyone else?! That girl is as thin as a rack of ribs, how could she be as beautiful as you?!"

"Really?!"

"Really, Little Eighteen was there at the time, nothing happened between us! I wouldn't be so insane as to mess around in front of our grandson, would I?"

"That's true, with your mediocre skills, you'd just embarrass yourself if you went out!"

"Eeeh~"

Xu Rizhao hugged his plump wife, smiling bashfully.

The white cat had already disappeared without a trace.

The guards nearby, seeing this scene, were unfazed and tacitly looked away.

Meanwhile.

Nabar leaned on a simple wooden crutch under his armpit, following Da Zhuang step by step.

Adou had the lightest injuries. Jiang You had always been gentler with girls.

She had only given her two black eyes.

At this moment, Adou was supporting the severely injured Nabar, mentally cursing the woman on the cat's back.

She whispered into Nabar's ear, "Are we really going to take her to Longshan? Father and the others haven't seen outsiders for a long time. Grandmother said that the people on Longshan are all abandoned. She likes outsiders..."

Nabar's left cheek was swollen as if he had a ping pong ball stuffed in it, and his speech was somewhat slurred.

"Father's illness has been getting worse lately, and several elders are close to death. Lanwan doesn't have enough medicine for itself, and they won't give us any. But this woman has it!

And she has salt. She said she'll give us three hundred catties of salt. The village has run out of salt. Without salt, everyone will lose their strength, and without strength, we can't resist the beasts, which will be very dangerous.

...Besides, what else on Longshan, besides us abandoned people, is worth anyone's attention?"

Nabar stared intently at the straight back of the person on the mutated calico cat. "We can only take this gamble."

He didn't know if his choice was the right one.

But right now, he didn't seem to have any choice at all.

The woman had said that if he obediently led her to the village, she would give them antibiotics and three hundred jin of salt.

If he refused to lead, she would kill everyone and hang their skins on the walls as flags.

If the people he led out died, the old, weak, sick, and disabled in Longshan would have no hope of survival.

The choice she gave him was never really a choice.

Furthermore, judging by the woman's methods, he couldn't possibly escape.

The sun was setting in the west. After many days, Zhang Shuhui once again entered these mountains.

Her previously anxious heart seemed to gradually calm with each step. The answer had been decided.

No matter how much she struggled or panicked, it would be useless. The next step was to keep pace and move forward.

After entering the mountains, Nabar limped to the front of Da Zhuang.

"The path further in is difficult. I'll lead the way for you!"

Under Nabar's guidance, they walked until midnight before crossing two mountains.

Jiang You couldn't help but ask, "How much further is Longshan?"

Nabar pointed to a broken mountain peak in the distance.

"Do you see that broken mountain peak ahead?"

Jiang You thought that was Longshan, but the next second she heard Nabar continue, "That's Camel Peak. After crossing Camel Peak, there are four more mountains until Longshan!"

Back then, to prevent infected villagers from escaping, they had chosen the steepest, deepest, and highest mountain.

Nabar was used to the journey; before, it would take him several days and nights to get home after going to town to exchange for daily necessities.

Before the apocalypse, there were no zombies or mutated beasts, but the mountain nights were still dangerous.

He could only travel during the day when exchanging for supplies, and he had to find a place to rest as dusk approached.

Traveling in the mountains at night was a very unwise act.

Longshan was very high. When Nabar was a child, he would often crouch at the edge of the mountain peak, reaching out to touch the vast white clouds.

He had always thought he lived on the clouds.

His father said they were a village on the clouds, a unique village.

He believed this until he was ten years old.

Jiang You had always been very patient. She didn't rush, slowly following behind Nabar.

When these people left Lanwan, they had taken some things with them.

Some had old salt blocks in their pockets, some had needles, thread, and fabric on their backs, and some had food in their bamboo baskets, found or perhaps stolen from who knows where.

The road to Longshan was not easy. The shortest path they had cleared was along streams and canyons.

However, the canyons were steep, and the rocks were covered with damp, slippery moss, making it easy to roll down into the stream below along the steep slope if one wasn't careful.

Jiang You could have gone faster, but she didn't.

She also wanted to walk the paths these young people had taken to understand how they traveled back and forth between Longshan and Lanwan Base.

They lit a bonfire at night.

The young people from Longshan Town hunted in the forest and quickly caught a litter of mutated rabbits, a medium-sized wild boar, and a few small wild boars.

They skillfully threw the rabbits and the large wild boar into the fire, singed off the fur, and then used daggers to divide them into small pieces.

They placed large chunks on the fire to roast. Once cooked, they took out the damp, clumpy salt from their pockets, ground it, and carefully sprinkled it on the meat before eating.

"Aren't you going to eat these little wild boars?" Jiang You asked them.

Adou, gnawing on a half-cooked roasted rabbit, shook her head. She didn't want to bother with this pale woman who looked like a mushroom, but not replying would surely result in a beating.

"The little wild boars are still young. We can put them in the bamboo baskets and carry them up the mountain. Once they grow up, everyone in the village can eat them. They can grow to three to four hundred jin!"

Zhang Shuhui stared at these young people who were eating raw meat and drinking blood, and suddenly felt that Longshan might not be what she had imagined.

With Jiang You's permission, she took out a few jars of chili sauce she had made and let everyone dip their food in it.

Her chili sauce was fragrant and spicy, adding a lot of flavor to the bland meat.

Relationships between people draw closer over food and drinks. With the chili sauce, although the young people of Longshan were wary on their faces, they couldn't help but start eating.

The atmosphere became lively, and many people began to speak up.

Nabar used the tip of his knife to pick up some chili sauce and spread it on the roasted pork. After taking a bite, his eyes lit up.

He first looked around, then went to pee and cut a section of bamboo.

While Jiang You wasn't looking, he secretly used the tip of his knife to scoop some chili sauce from the bottle into the bamboo tube.

Another young man also spoke, "The path up the mountain is difficult. We have to climb with our hands. We can only bring things that can fit into a bamboo basket! We've even carried calves up the mountain. Once the calves are on the mountain, they grow up there and can plow the fields!

Once the cows go up, they can never come down..."

Nabar added, "People are the same..."