The woodshed's plank walls were flimsy. Through the cracks, she could see the snow in the courtyard reflecting the moonlight, deathly pale.
Two dark figures vaulted over the earthen wall and landed almost silently.
"This the place?" came a low voice, as rough as sandpaper scraping a tabletop.
"Yeah. Old Woman Liu said the girl was in the woodshed. Five years old, pretty. She'll fetch a good price down south." The other voice sounded even colder.
Nuannuan snapped awake, every hair on her body standing on end.
It wasn't the old widower from the next village.
They were human traffickers!
Liu Guifang had fooled everyone. Not only was she going to sell Nuannuan, but she had colluded with traffickers from out of town, planning to sell her somewhere so far away that she would never return in this lifetime!
"Squeak, squeak!"
The little mice beside her grew restless.
"Don't be scared." Nuannuan clutched the medal tightly, forcing herself to calm down.
That strange intuition told her she could control these little creatures.
"Go... bite through the bad people's bag," Nuannuan whispered to the mouse with the damaged ear.
Like a soldier receiving orders, the little mouse instantly stood upright and squeaked at the mice behind it. A dozen or so dark shapes slipped out along the base of the wall, heading straight for the main room.
At the same time, the woodshed's lock was pried open with a click.
A large hand reached into the darkness and clamped straight over Nuannuan's mouth.
A pungent smell of ether hit her.
Nuannuan struggled desperately, but against a strong grown man, a five-year-old's strength was practically negligible.
"Hold still!"
The man cursed and grabbed a burlap sack, about to pull it over Nuannuan's head.
Just then, Liu Guifang let out a sudden shriek from the main room, uglier than a pig being slaughtered.
"Ah! My money! My grain coupons! What goddamned rat chewed through my money pouch!"
The mice had moved so quickly that they had shredded the money pouch Liu Guifang hid beneath her pillow, reducing the cash and coupons inside to useless scraps.
The commotion startled the two traffickers, who had intended to take the girl away quietly.
"Fuck, is that woman trying to wake the dead?"
The scar-faced man cursed, his hands pausing.
That brief pause gave Nuannuan an opening.
Though she couldn't move her body, her mind was extraordinarily clear, and she focused directly on the large German shepherd chained in the courtyard.
Liu Guifang had specially borrowed this dog to guard against thieves. It was usually vicious.
Bite him! He's a bad man! Bite his leg!
Nuannuan screamed desperately in her mind.
In a corner of the courtyard, the large German shepherd had been cowering in fear of the traffickers' murderous aura. Suddenly, as though possessed, its eyes went bloodshot, and a low growl rose from its throat.
Snap!
The large German shepherd actually snapped the iron chain, which wasn't particularly thick!
"Woof!"
A dark shape lunged like lightning and sank its teeth into the calf of the scar-faced man holding Nuannuan.
"Aah-!"
The scar-faced man screamed and let go, dropping Nuannuan to the ground.
The large German shepherd tore at his flesh like a thing gone mad.
"Fuck! You beast!"
His accomplice reacted swiftly, drawing a sharp dagger and plunging it viciously into the dog's belly.
With a whimper, the large German shepherd collapsed into a pool of blood, but its jaws remained clamped tightly around that chunk of flesh.
"Move! We'll be in trouble if we alert the villagers!"
His accomplice kicked the dead dog aside. Ignoring the scar-faced man's injured leg, he snatched Nuannuan off the ground, shoved her roughly into the burlap sack, slung it over his shoulder, and ran.
Nuannuan only had time for one glance at the dog lying in its own blood. It had done that to save her...
Darkness swallowed her vision. The last thing she heard was Liu Guifang chasing after them, cursing, "Hey, hey! Don't break my door! Where's the money? You haven't paid me what you promised... Oh, my money pouch!"
She had no idea how much time had passed.
Jolting. Endless jolting.
The nauseating swaying and the roar of wheels against rails woke Nuannuan.
Everything around her was pitch-black, and the air reeked of sweat, urine, and mildew.
This was an enclosed freight car.
By the faint light seeping through the gaps in the car, Nuannuan saw children of all ages crammed around her. Some were unconscious; others were shedding numb tears.
Her hands and feet were bound with hemp rope, and a rag had been stuffed into her mouth.
Only the medal inside her clothes still pressed against her chest, reminding her that none of this was a dream.
It was her only source of support.
"Where are we going..." a little girl beside her asked weakly.
No one answered.
The car suddenly shuddered violently, and the train slowed.
The wind howled outside, louder and more violent than the wind in Li Family Village.
Nuannuan struggled to shift her body and edged up to the gap to look out.
Outside lay a vast white world.
It wasn't an ordinary snowfield, but an endless succession of enormous snow-covered mountains stretching beyond sight.
This was the uninhabited region of the far northwest!
To evade inspections, these damned traffickers had actually taken this death route, which only military freight trains occasionally traveled!
The train seemed to have been forced to slow to a crawl by the heavy wind and snow.
Just then, Nuannuan's gaze froze.
On a raised snowy slope not far from the tracks sat an enormous white figure.
It wasn't a dog.
The creature was frighteningly large, its snow-white coat marked with black rosettes. Far from looking bedraggled in the blizzard, it exuded the majesty of a king.
Its ice-blue eyes stared fixedly at the slowly crawling train.
That was... a snow leopard!
The king of all beasts!
Had the other children in the car seen it, they would probably have screamed in terror.
But Nuannuan didn't.
She felt no fear. Instead, she felt an inexplicable sense of... closeness?
The next second, a commanding, languid voice tinged with impatience abruptly thundered through Nuannuan's mind.
The voice seemed to belong to an ancient king, carrying an echo:
"Inside that tin can... why does it smell like nothing but two-legged cubs?"
"So hungry..."
"I want meat..."
Nuannuan's eyes lit up.
This big kitty could talk?
And there was no malice in its voice, only a pure... desire to chow down?
If... if I could get it to help...
Nuannuan glanced at the two traffickers guarding them. They were huddled in a corner, dozing, with knives tucked at their waists.
This was her only chance.
Nuannuan took a deep breath and closed her eyes. Drawing on every bit of the strange power that had just awakened within her, she called out in her mind to that white figure:
"Big kitty! I have meat! Save me!"
On the snowy slope.
The snow leopard, which had been about to turn and leave, stopped abruptly.
Its ice-blue eyes instantly locked onto this freight car.