Chapter 5 This is your destiny
The fog in the woods was about to dissipate, and the tall trees in front of me gradually became clear.
Juzi's legs were numb from walking so much. She didn't dare to look down at her feet. She knew that if she looked at those bloody feet, she would never be able to take another step again...
But what she wants most now is to run!
The sound of the branches and leaves under her feet became louder and louder. She could tell that she was still running. As long as she didn't stop, it would be fine! Juzi didn't dare to think about anything else. As long as she could move, there was hope.
The camp seemed to be getting farther and farther away, and she could no longer hear the woman crying in the shack. But the forest above her head was still as dark as before, making Juzi feel as if she would never escape from Lao Ba's control...
Suddenly, she felt cold all over and wanted to shiver, but she couldn't stop it. After a while, her teeth began to chatter uncontrollably.
Oh my god! It's over... She knew it was a drug addiction.
On the first night that Juzi entered the mountains, he was terrified and tossed and turned for half the night.
When it was almost dawn, she finally couldn't hold on any longer and fell into a drowsy sleep.
She dreamed that she was in a dark forest, running down the mountain alone, and flocks of frightened birds flew up from the surrounding woods from time to time. In front of her was a dense bush that looked like a bird-catching net. She felt like a fox, squeezing through the gaps between the branches and leaves. She felt that she was as light as a swallow. There was a blurry shadow of the trees in front of her eyes, and the sound of the wind whirred in her ears.
Suddenly, she felt a darkness in front of her eyes and a huge shadow covered her head, blocking her way.
When Juzi looked up, he saw Lao Ba standing on the hill in front of him with a grin on his face, like a giant crow, with his black collar spread out.
"Where are you running?" Lao Ba bared his yellow teeth, and a buzzing sound came out from between his teeth. It sounded like an animal imitating the "language" uttered by humans.
Orange felt dizzy and wanted to turn around and run back, but the bushes around her turned into a net and she became an animal in a cage, unable to move.
She screamed and struggled desperately. Just then, she was awakened by a hand shaking her hard: "Juzi, Lao Ba wants you to go." She heard Da Feng, who had just returned from Lao Ba's place, say above her head.
"What?"
"What? There's no point in asking. Go quickly! You'll be in trouble if you're late..."
Juzi jumped up from the straw mat, so frightened that she couldn't catch her breath. It took a lot of effort to avoid shouting out a terrified "Oh my God!"
She rubbed her sore and painful eyes tremblingly, and when she came out of the straw hut, it was already dawn.
Thick fog filled the air all around. The wolves that had howled all night were nowhere to be seen. The entire forest was unusually quiet, so quiet that every time Orange took a step, he was frightened to death by the noise of the weeds and leaves under his feet.
Lao Ba's shack was right in front of her, but she couldn't move her legs no matter what.
The old man's appearance appeared in front of her eyes, with a mouthful of rusty yellow teeth, two yellow eyes rolling around, and deep wrinkles on his forehead, revealing a cunning that was rare among mountain people. Not only that, Juzi also saw a bit of cruelty in his appearance that made people shudder.
The scene of Dafeng screaming in agony from being tortured by Lao Ba last night reappeared in her mind. Juzi felt her whole body go limp, her feet slipped, and she sat down in the bushes, her body immediately soaked by the cold dew.
Her eyes were fixed on the weeds in front of her, and she hoped that a poisonous snake would come out from it and bite her! She really wanted to die right there, rather than go to Lao Ba's shack and be abused by him...
Run away! A thought suddenly popped up in his mind, and Orange was frightened by this thought. Then, with strength from nowhere, Orange jumped up from the ground, turned around and ran into the woods!
I had just run a few steps when I felt my body become lighter, my vision went dark, and I fell into the grass.
Orange felt that one of his legs was bitten by some wild beast and he couldn't move at all.
She tried to struggle, but the more she struggled, the tighter her leg was bitten. After a while, her leg lost all feeling.
It turned out to be a snare for wild animals, and Orange's legs were being tightened just like the wild animal.
If I continue to struggle for a long time, this leg with poor blood circulation will probably become disabled...
The fear she felt at the moment made Juzi temporarily forget her fear of Lao Ba, and she began to lie in the grass and call for help.
"Xiaoduo! Come quickly!" She called Xiaoduo's name several times, but no one answered. She called Dafeng again, but still no one answered, "Stupid mother! Come and save me!"
Orange's cry echoed in the valley at dawn, sounding like the cry of an unknown animal, distant and unfamiliar. But everyone in the two shacks seemed to have died, and no one came out to rescue.
Orange was desperate.
She lay in the bushes, panting, staring at her swollen leg, at a loss as to what to do. The thin steel wire had cut deeply into her plump thigh flesh, cutting off the blood in her veins.
If I’m not careful, I’ll only have one leg left, and I’ll be like those deformed men and women in the village, leaning on a big wooden stick, or just crawling on my knees…
Imagining her young and beautiful body becoming unrecognizable, Orange was devastated.
Just then, she saw Lao Ba. The old man was wearing a black crow-like padded jacket. He bent down and crawled out of the shack and walked straight towards her!
Then, there was a feeling of dizziness, and Orange knew nothing.
In a daze, Juzi felt someone touching her all over.
She was suddenly awakened by fright! It was the mute woman who was bathing her .
There was only a small basin of water on the ground, and the mute was wiping her lower body with a black towel.
Orange suddenly found himself stripped naked and thrown on a wooden bed.
Lao Ba was sitting nearby, smoking slowly by the light of a small oil lamp. In his hand was something she had never seen before, a bit like a big pipe with a thick stem.
Of course Orange didn't know that it was actually a big pipe that came from nowhere.
Juzi was frightened by the scene before her. A scream came out of her extremely tense throat. The scream was as thin and sharp as a steel wire, and even she found it very irritating.
But Lao Ba and the mute didn't react at all. They were concentrating on doing their own things and were not moved at all.
Juzi jumped up from the bed, slid down naked and tried to escape, but the mute woman suddenly hugged him tightly and threw him back onto the bed.
Where did this dumb woman get so much strength? Juzi lay on the bed in amazement, she was stunned by what she saw.
Lao Ba sat there calmly, looking gloomy and calm.
He didn't even look at Orange, he just smoked his cigarette with relish. The cigarette gave off a strange, indescribable fragrance, completely different from the Toad cigarettes smoked by the men in the village.
Juzi pushed the mute away and looked for her clothes everywhere, but couldn't find them.
She was rummaging through , breathing heavily in anxiety.
"You go out first." Lao Ba said this without raising his eyelids. He smoked his cigarette with a "squeaking" sound and waved at the mute. As expected, the mute woman obediently took the basin of water and went out.
When Orange saw this scene, he was stunned...
Now, she and Lao Ba were the only two people left in the shack, and she was naked!
She subconsciously retreated , grabbing something and covering herself with it. She stared at Lao Ba, fearing that he would pounce on her like a hungry wolf and tear her to pieces.
Lao Ba finished his cigarette slowly, carefully put the pipe down, stretched his body, cleared his throat, and stood up from the wooden block that served as a chair.
Juzi was already shaking into a ball, her black eyeballs like a frightened little animal, moving slowly and fearfully following Lao Ba's every move, with a hint of unyielding despair mixed in with her.
Although she has no strength left, as long as Lao Ba wants to attack her, she will still use her teeth to fight him!
Ten or so agonizing seconds passed, but Lao Ba did not pounce on the cigarette like a hungry tiger. He slowly picked up the cigarette pipe, fiddled with it for a while under the light, and then handed it to Juzi:
"You should have a couple of bites too, to calm your nerves."
Orange took the thing completely subconsciously and put it into his mouth.
She tried to take a sip, and then another. The smell gave her a strange feeling. What was the use of this thing?
She glanced at Lao Ba from the corner of her eyes and found that he was looking at her with encouragement! That look was strange, revealing an eagerness for the meat in the pot to be cooked quickly.
Orange suddenly realized something. Wasn't the drug Lao Ba using?
When she thought of the anesthetic she had never seen before and mentioned in the stories told by the old people, her heart began to beat wildly.
She quickly threw the pipe aside, hugged her chest tightly with her arms, and shrank back into the corner of the bed.
"How are you? Are you feeling better?" Lao Ba's tone sounded somewhat flattering, but to Juzi, it was no different from a weasel singing a lullaby to a chick. She looked at him in silence, her eyes like a sharp knife, piercing straight into his wolfish ambitions.
Lao Ba moved the dim little oil lamp to the bedside and put it away carefully.
Then, incense was lit in various places in the room, and waves of depressing fragrance immediately filled the whole shack. But Orange didn't think the smell was pleasant at all, she just felt more and more suffocated.
At this time, she saw Lao Ba slowly taking things out of a broken cardboard box at the head of the bed.
At first, Juzi couldn't understand what those junks he was tinkering with were, but as she watched, her expression gradually changed.
Lao Ba threw those things in front of Juzi one by one . First was a long black cloth belt that was four fingers wide, wider than a waistband but shorter than a waistband.
Then there was a wooden stick that looked like a man's genitals, but it was longer and thicker. Orange looked at the polished wooden stick and immediately had some unspeakable associations.
At this moment, Lao Ba threw another thing over: a black hemp rope.
Juzi suddenly felt her heart tremble a few times, and then cold sweat flowed down uncontrollably. She glanced at Lao Ba, and the look in his eyes confirmed her uneasiness.
Orange grabbed the stick in his hand and raised it high above his head:
"What are you going to do?" she shouted at Lao Ba in a timid manner.
"It looks like you need to take a few more puffs!" Lao Ba turned around to look for his pipe, "Just a few more puffs will be enough."
In a flash, Juzi jumped up, stood on the bed and swung the stick at the back of Lao Ba's head. But her wrist lost feeling, and Lao Ba's dry big hand held her tightly, as easily as an eagle grabbing a chick.
Then, she was pinned down on the bed and tied up tightly in no time.
When Lao Ba was doing these things, he was as skilled as Ju Zi's father, who was a volunteer butcher in the village, tying up a fat pig.
Now, Juzi was lying on the bed, looking up at Lao Ba. She could clearly see his black crotch, which was floating above her head like a dark cloud.
His big yellow teeth appeared and disappeared as he cursed a lot of ugly words while busy hanging a rope on the wooden beam in the middle of the shack.
"You slut, you dare to kill me? I'll kill you first!" Lao Ba's words were like a strong gust of cold air squeezed out from between his teeth. Juzi felt that his naked body was frozen in an instant.
She really regretted that she shouldn't have rashly run to this damn place! She really shouldn't have risked her life just to be angry with Dalong!
But it was too late. Now she couldn't move at all and could only watch helplessly as she was slaughtered.
Tears welled up in her eyes, and everything in front of her became blurry. Lao Ba turned into a strange black shadow in front of her, swaying back and forth, getting closer and closer to her...
With a "whoosh", Orange flew into the air and was suddenly hung from the bed to the beam of the shack.
Her body was upside down, swaying in the air and drawing several irregular arcs. She felt that all the blood in her body was rushing into her head.
She tried to struggle with all her strength, but the swaying rope made it impossible for her to exert any strength.
Just as she was trying hard to distinguish the scene in front of her, she suddenly felt a darkness in front of her eyes. Lao Ba put the black cloth belt on her head like putting a blindfold on a donkey pulling a mill.
Juzi's breast felt like being stung by a bee, and it suddenly hurt. Then her lower abdomen, buttocks, and arms were all stung.
Juzi twisted her body desperately, but she couldn't avoid the damn sting. The pain made her scream loudly.
She smelled the faint aroma of her own burning flesh, just like the smell she smelled when she was a child roasting sparrows on the stove to eat.
Juzi understood that Lao Ba was using the incense stick to burn her skin!
She screamed and cursed, and Lao Ba increased the speed of burning her.
Suddenly, she felt a sharp pain in her lower body, and Lao Ba's dry eagle-claw-like fingers suddenly penetrated into her delicate body...
Following a miserable howl, Lao Ba let out a series of creepy laughs. The hysterical laughter reached Xiaoduo and the others' shack, and the women could not help but huddle together on the straw mat.
When the howling gradually weakened, Orange had fainted several times.
When she was finally let down from the wooden beam of the shack by Lao Ba, she was already dying.
Lao Ba used all his skills on her, including his yellow teeth, which were not sharp. He seemed to have vented all the hatred he had accumulated towards Juzi in Banpo Village.
Orange was lying on the bed, unable to move.
Lao Ba sat beside her holding an oil lamp, admiring the "masterpiece" he left on Orange from head to toe.
There were bloody teeth marks and black burn marks all over Juzi's butt, shoulders, and ribs. Her two white breasts, which were once regarded as treasures by Dalong, were also covered with bright red, purple, and ink-black scars.
Lao Ba's eagle claws stayed on her breasts the longest, and her nipples were already swollen.
Orange closed his eyes, his whole body soaked in cold sweat.
Now, she was no longer aware of Lao Ba's lustful gaze, and the only sign of her life at this moment was her heaving chest.
Lao Ba's eagle claws stretched out again and poked at Orange's wound again and again. Orange, who looked like a dead person just now, let out another scream.
"Scream! Scream again! I love to hear you scream!" He showed an intoxicated smile on his face, "Remember: the fact that I, Lao Ba, like you is your good fortune in this life! Don't be ungrateful. You sluts, all of you are so ungrateful..."
Juzi clenched her teeth tightly and dared not scream anymore, but she still couldn't help but let out a low moan.
After playing with the scars for a while, Lao Ba put down the light and said to her seriously:
"Listen, from now on, I will accept you as my believer. Today is a ceremony for you. You must come to atone your sins to me at least once a day! Remember, all of you women have committed heinous crimes. Before you can go to heaven, you must go through 81 trials and tribulations before you can be freed..."
At dawn, the villagers of Banpo Village suddenly heard a heart-wrenching cry. The sound came from Juzi's home and echoed in the ravine.
Xiaoduo's mother suddenly woke up the man sleeping next to her and whispered in surprise:
"Listen! It seems that Orange's grandmother is dying..."
The man muttered and turned over: "When you get old, this day will come sooner or later."
"Juzi and Xiaoduo haven't come back yet, and I don't know what happened to them. What if we can't find Lao Ba at night and have nowhere to stay? What if we run into a blind bear..."
"Humph, this ignorant girl, I'll break her legs when she comes back..."
"I don't know what's wrong with this girl. She keeps running to Lao Ba's shabby house. I'm worried that Lao Ba, the old bachelor, has bad intentions..."
"Why blame them? It's your girl who is shameless. How can a young girl follow a group of old women to sneak into a bachelor's house? It's really fucking embarrassing..."
"Why are you saying such harsh things? Xiaoduo must have been bewitched by Lao Ba's supernatural words... Fortunately, she hasn't taken Lao Ba's money yet. As for the oranges... I wonder how much money she got from Lao Ba!"
"What's going on?"
"Before leaving today, Juzi gave her mother a big envelope filled with money, all in one hundred-dollar bills!"
"How do you know it was given by Lao Ba?"
"Think about it, except for Lao Ba, who else in Banpo Village has so much money?"
"Who? Dalong! Didn't Dalong go to Harbin for business? Making a little money is nothing!"
"Dalong has never come back, and I haven't heard that he sent money back..."
"You old ladies just like to stare at other people's trivial matters!"
"Alas! Even if we work for a lifetime, we can't earn that much money..."
"Everyone has their own fate. Don't say anything. Just live your own life. Why are you jealous of others? By the way, the girl is grown up and can't be kept. Marry her off quickly. The longer you stay, the more trouble you will have."
"Don't worry. Not to mention that Xiaoduo doesn't want to, I just feel uncomfortable looking at that nagging Song Laonian. He is such a jerk. He is only forty years old, but he looks like he is in his seventies or eighties. He has no money and can't grow crops well. I'm afraid Xiaoduo will be wronged if she marries him..."
"You always spoiled her! Is she okay now? She ran away to the deep mountains and forests carrying me on her back! If she doesn't do well, she'll be fed to a blind bear. So you're not wronged?"
"Don't talk nonsense!"
The crying and screaming from Juzi's house gradually subsided.
Just as Xiaoduo's parents were about to go back to sleep, a series of loud knocks on the door began one after another from the north end of the village.
"Oh, the old lady is really dead! Listen, the people who came to announce the death are here." Xiaoduo's mother pushed the man again.
At this moment, there was a sudden knock on the door of my house...
