Recalling the fierce and resolute look in his eyes when he had fought desperately against her, even more vicious than her own—like a wild beast driven into a corner, madly counterattacking, pouncing at her with no regard for anything, even willing to pay with his life.
That completely reckless, heedless appearance was no different from a madman.
Had he been pretending all along? Pretending to make her lower her guard so he could escape?
"..."
Hmph! Quite good at acting, you cheap slut!
But so what if he was pretending? A mere man with no money, no connections, and all alone—wanting to escape this village and these mountains was nothing but a fool's dream.
Don't think that hooking up with some woman in the village meant she would help him. In reality, she was just playing with him.
Their village would never allow outsiders to escape.
It was obvious that in the end, he would still obediently compromise.
Yu Jia sneered coldly with disdain. You cheap whore, since you have the guts of a bear and the ambition of a leopard, don't blame this old lady. Once I get out, I'll definitely make you wish you were dead!
...
Having eaten and drunk his fill, Su Yu let out a satisfied burp and sat leisurely at the doorway, staring at the curtain of rain, lost in thought.
Time slipped by quietly. The night sky descended like a huge black velvet cloth, rapidly enveloping the entire land. The continuous pattering rain had also stopped at some unknown time.
Just as he stood up, lights began flaring up all over the village, converging toward one spot.
It wasn't far. After hesitating for a moment, Su Yu lifted his feet and ran toward that direction.
At the edge of the pond by the village entrance, a group of villagers holding torches stood in an angry circle.
In the center, a cage woven from bamboo strips sat quietly. Inside it, a pale-faced man was curled up.
The man's clothes were disheveled, his hair bun messy, tear stains still wet on his face. His eyes were filled with unwillingness and despair. He kept struggling, his pleas for mercy hoarse and desperate, but the surrounding accusations and curses drowned out his words like a tidal wave.
"Shameless adulterous husband, secretly messing around with someone, corrupting morals—disgraceful!"
"That's right, nothing but rotten goods. He should be drowned in the pig cage."
"Cheap slut, no sense of shame."
The surrounding villagers all wore faces full of rage. Most of them pointed fingers and spat venomously.
Among them, a middle-aged man was unusually agitated, his facial muscles twitching. With hands on his hips, he shouted sharply:
"Shameless vixen! You'll seduce any woman you see. You don't even know if that rotten cucumber of yours still stinks or not. Someone like you deserves to rot inside the pig cage and die a horrible death!"
He jabbed his finger directly at the man's face, instantly leaving several bloody marks. His eyes were full of disgust and cruelty.
"Yes, die a horrible death!"
Several men nearby refused to be outdone, gnashing their teeth.
"I… I won't dare anymore. Please, let me go… wuwu…" The man cried and begged.
But no one paid him any attention.
"I really won't dare anymore. I swear, really, really…" The instinct to survive made the man frantically try to crawl up and kneel to beg for mercy, but the cage restricted his movements, making his posture awkward and twisted.
Yet precisely because of this, someone became even angrier. "Slut, even at a time like this you're still twisting your body to seduce people. Go die!"
With that, the person bent down in anger, picked up a stone, and hurled it viciously at the man, instantly smashing a bloody hole in his forehead.
Seeing this, several people stepped forward and kicked the cage fiercely. Even as the man was kicked into the bars and blood spilled from the corner of his mouth, they showed not the slightest mercy.
Every kick seemed to carry both venting and pleasure. The screams of agony echoed in the night sky, chilling to the bone.
But the man paid no heed to these injuries. His heart was filled only with begging for mercy: "I didn't, I didn't! Spare me, Wife Lord, Wife Lord! I won't dare anymore. Please tell them to spare me!"
The middle-aged woman addressed as Wife Lord stepped forward and directly spat a mouthful of saliva. She cursed furiously:
"Cui Miao, I admit I've treated you well. Yet you dared to cheat behind my back. Now that you've been caught, you still have the face to ask me to spare you? Do you have any shame left?"
"Wife Lord, I really won't dare anymore, Wife Lord—" Cui Miao cried miserably. Several strands of blood-stained hair stuck to his face. Tears and snot mixed together, but he didn't care. His thin, weak hands stretched out from the cage, begging the middle-aged woman to speak up for him.
Chen Shuang ignored his pitiful and wretched appearance. She turned to an elderly woman over sixty and said in a deep voice:
"Village Chief, I, Chen Shuang, don't want this cheap thing anymore. Since he dared to do such a filthy deed, I leave him to the Village Chief to deal with."
Her tone was utterly heartless.
Cui Miao stared at her fixedly, roaring in despair: "Chen Shuang, no matter what, I gave birth to a daughter for you. How can you be so ruthless?"
"Yes, and it's precisely because you gave birth to a daughter for me that I didn't slice you into a thousand pieces when you cheated." Chen Shuang said viciously.
"You—" Cui Miao's eyes suddenly widened.
The scene fell silent for a moment.
At the Village Chief's signal, several sturdy women lifted the pig cage and walked step by step toward the pond.
Cui Miao's heart sank into the abyss with every sway of the cage. His voice had already gone hoarse from crying as he looked at the surrounding faces—some cold and indifferent, others filled with disgust.
Suddenly, he burst into loud laughter: "Hahaha! Hahahaha—"
"Cheap slut, you still dare to laugh! See if I don't beat you to death!"
Hearing that he could still laugh, some people in the crowd picked up stones and followed, aiming straight at his head and smashing them hard.
"Hahaha! What do I have to be afraid of laughing about?"
Cui Miao ignored them. His laughter grew increasingly wild, but his tone was filled with extreme hatred.
"You people of Hongye Village are nothing but demons wearing human skin! If Chen Shuang hadn't knocked me out and forcibly dragged me here three years ago while my family wasn't paying attention, would I have come to this disgusting place?"
"If she hadn't injured her body last year and become impotent, then come back every time to torture me madly as a way to vent, making me wish I were dead, would I have ended up like this?"
Cui Miao's voice trembled. "…From the very beginning, I was forcibly violated by different women one after another. I had no strength to resist. After Chen Shuang found out, not only did she not stand up for me, she tortured me even more brutally. So why shouldn't I simply stop resisting?"
"Since you're all beasts anyway, if I can't escape, then what's wrong with making myself suffer a little less and feel a bit better?"
"Hahaha, Chen Shuang, you're just a useless coward, hahaha…"
The moment these words came out, the men in the crowd froze in shock, while the women—whose private matters had been exposed—glared at him with icy cold eyes, especially Chen Shuang.
Cui Miao cried and laughed at the same time, his eyes containing overwhelming hatred as he stared fixedly at the furious villagers. "And all of you—accomplices who helped the tyrant! I had already run very far, yet you still wouldn't let me go and forcibly dragged me back."
"Clearly… clearly you all know what kind of rotten person Chen Shuang is, yet you think her actions are perfectly justified. You don't treat men as human beings at all. You… you will all face retribution sooner or later, hahaha—"
The more he spoke, the hoarser his voice became, choked with unwillingness and grief.