Chapter 224: Extra Story
It was a little after ten at night. More than three hours had passed since the incident, and the temperature on the ridge continued to drop. The rain turned into sleet, mixed with gritty snow that rattled against the top of the tent.
The shaman wrapped his coat tighter and carefully wrote, word by word, in the notebook he carried with him:
Living-body sealing of the ferocious slips. All five have lost consciousness. Bodies rigid. No heartbeat. No breathing. But this is definitely not death.
Beneath the words “definitely not death,” he drew two heavy lines.
He wasn’t an expert in studying human death, but he knew basic common sense.
They said that one minute after death, due to changes in the blood, a person’s skin would begin to discolor—but these five hadn’t. Their complexions remained vibrant, frozen in the faint smiles they wore at that instant.
About five minutes after death, with no blood pressure, the eyeballs would slowly flatten—but again, that hadn’t happened. Their eyes still seemed bright. When he leaned in close, the shaman could vaguely see his own reflection, phone held up as if taking a picture.
It was as if time were an invisible, secret river. Everyone else, bustling and crowded, walked along the riverbed from birth to death. But these five had suddenly been lifted out of the water.
The shaman looked toward the inside of the tent. Moving all five in had taken him tremendous effort—grunting and panting like a laborer hauling display statues. He had even arranged them according to their original positions and covered them with blankets.
Cao Jiefang had been quite excited at first, probably thinking he’d discovered a new kind of game. He paced around the five, stopping and starting, even nudging Cao Yanhua’s backside with his head. Eventually, he lost interest, crawled lazily under a blanket, and curled up against Wan San’s crossed legs.
Warm. Comfortable. A natural nest.
The tent flap hadn’t been fully secured. Wind seeped in from below, carrying distant, piercing wolf howls. The shaman grabbed a few firecrackers from the bag, lifted the flap, and tossed them all into the dwindling campfire.
The firecrackers turned out to be duds. Instead, a small firework in flashy packaging suddenly shot upward with a whoosh, like a sky rocket, exploding high above into a brilliant ring of light. It illuminated the outline of the ridge on that side, like lonely flowers pinned onto a phoenix.
The shaman waited for two days. Aside from sleeping, he updated his observation notes every two hours. Nothing changed—every entry read the same: same as above.
He hadn’t anticipated this situation and hadn’t brought much food. After a few meals of compressed biscuits, he ran out completely. The ridge top was exposed to the wind; even inside the tent, he shivered constantly. On the second night, he dreamed that many seasons had passed. Dust had piled thickly on the five of them, like plastic mannequins forgotten for years in an old warehouse. He used a blower to clear it away, the dust flying like snow, revealing their familiar faces—each still smiling.
At midnight, Tong County welcomed its first snowfall. It wasn’t heavy, just as Luo Ren had predicted. The three “phoenix heads” of Fengzi Ridge turned white first. The scavenged branches were damp, and the fire refused to catch. The tent was filled with condensation; nothing could dry. The temperature inside and outside was nearly the same.
After getting up, the shaman was so hungry he felt dizzy. He punched another hole in his belt and tightened it again. Rubbing his hands, breathing into them, stomping his feet, running in circles—he tried everything. Cao Jiefang, meanwhile, showed astonishing adaptability. Mountain chickens were cold-resistant and hardy; they could forage even at minus thirty-five degrees. When hunger reached its peak, the thought of Cao Jiefang crossed the shaman’s mind—then he gave it up. Three reasons:
- Cao Pangpang had entrusted him to find Jiefang a good home. A “good home” definitely did not mean his stomach.
- He was weak from hunger, while Jiefang seemed more agile than ever. He probably couldn’t catch him anyway—and rumor had it that when Cao Jiefang went berserk, his combat power was terrifying.
- Even if he did catch him and pluck the feathers, there was nothing here to cook with but fire. No seasoning at all. A chicken losing its life without being honored with KFC-level flavoring would be unbearably tragic.
The shaman told himself to wait a little longer. You couldn’t judge fortune or misfortune until night fell; nothing was certain until the very last moment.
He endured another night.
That night, it rained lightly, mixed with sleet. The tent was damp and freezing. Still, it was clearly that time of year—the weather forecast was probably repeating announcements about the first wave of strong cold air, reminding everyone to stay warm.
He couldn’t sleep because of the cold. His stomach twisted as if it had grown a mouth of its own, waiting to be fed. In the latter half of the night, he heard wolves again—much closer than the night before. He jolted upright.
They said when it was cold and snowy, and wolves couldn’t find food, they would take risks—attacking people or sneaking into nearby villages.
He gripped the stun gun and didn’t dare close his eyes again. Before dawn, the rain turned fully to snow. The soft sound of snow landing on the tent felt like a long, endless sigh from heaven and earth.
Finally, daylight came. He opened the tent flap to find the mountains blanketed in pale white. When he looked back at Luo Ren and the others, his heart jumped. He rubbed his eyes and looked again—yes, their faces all seemed to have a strange flush.
Had sensation returned? His heart pounded as he grabbed the notebook and rushed over. But when he saw clearly, his heart sank. He hurriedly lifted the blankets and checked their hands.
Frostbite.
The temperature was too low. With no movement and prolonged exposure to cold and damp, their surface blood vessels had constricted, causing redness and swelling.
All of them had it, to varying degrees. The girls were worse—Mu Dai and Hong Sha, especially—likely because women felt the cold more. The mountain temperature was dropping by the day, and strong winds worsened heat loss. The frostbite would only grow more severe: skin, subcutaneous tissue, muscle—even bone—could die.
They weren’t dead, but their bodies could still die. Like fragile reeds, one round of cold could cut them down.
Before entering the mountains, Luo Ren had handed him the decision.
You’ll have to decide—knock them out and tie them up, or… clean things up.
The shaman made his choice quickly.
Even if they never woke up, their bodies had to be protected. The priority now was to get out. Otherwise, the cold and lack of food would kill everyone.
He had to hurry to the village for help.
He fastened everyone’s collars, pressed them close together, wrapped them tightly in blankets, and stuffed every possible warming item inside. After crawling out of the tent, he zipped it shut.
Cao Jiefang had been wandering nearby. Now he waddled over, flapped his wings, and hopped onto the tent roof.
The shaman said, “I’ll take this as having released you back into the wild. Do whatever you want.”
He picked up a thick wooden stick, tucked Luo Ren’s dagger into his waistband, slung several strings of firecrackers over his shoulder, and hesitantly followed the path back. After walking a while, he noticed chaotic footprints in the snow—plum-blossom shaped, with sharp claws.
His heart sank. He rushed back. The little tent swayed in the wind; even zipped shut, it looked dangerously fragile. He hurriedly hauled over large stones and built a ring around the tent, blocking the zipper completely.
Cao Jiefang still stood on the tent, looking down at him. The shaman muttered, “If only you were a guard dog.”
Then added, “All that rice I fed you wasn’t wasted. Be smart—step up when it’s time, got it?”
He lit a string of firecrackers and walked away.
This time, none were duds. Behind him, explosions crackled loudly, scraps of red paper mixing with snow under sulfurous smoke. Cao Jiefang fled far away, squawking at the top of his lungs.
The shaman walked for more than six hours without stopping. By the time he reached the village, it was dusk. He went straight to Old Ding Nine’s house. The moment he entered, his legs gave out.
Dazed, he was helped onto the heated kang bed, wrapped in quilts, and given a few swigs of strong liquor. When he came around, the room was noisy—elderly men and women from nearby homes had gathered, sleeves tucked, there to watch the commotion.
Old Ding Nine said awkwardly that no one would enter the mountains—not for any amount of money. Even in good weather, villagers avoided the deep ridges. Now it was raining and snowing. Besides, he gestured to the crowd: there were no able-bodied young people left; all had gone out to work. If any of these elders got hurt in the mountains, it would be fatal.
The shaman didn’t argue. There was no time. “Then I’ll go myself. Get me some liquor, food, and frostbite ointment. And how do I get people out? Vehicles can’t get in—what do we do?”
The elders chimed in with ideas.
“Mules—use mules. I’ve got two. Cheap to rent, but stubborn.”
“If you’ve got strength, I have a handcart—the narrow kind. You can push or pull it.”
…
In the end, Old Ding Nine took him to the backyard and showed him a big dark-green ox.
“This ox is gentle and obedient. Whip its back and it’ll go straight. Left whip, left turn. Right whip, right turn. If you don’t mind, I’ll hitch it to a cart. It can pull four or five people, no problem.”
No objections. That was that.
Sam Williams On TYMIMA Chapter 152