Chapter 13: The Bridge

Shen Si grabbed Liang Dan’s arms firmly. Liang Dan struggled lightly, “Please don’t hurt the children!”

Yang Liuqing slapped the little boy across the face, waking him up. The moment the boy saw Yang Liuqing, he immediately reached behind his clothes for a hidden kitchen knife.

Before the knife could strike, Yang Liuqing snatched it away, casually tossing it to the floor. She then grabbed the bedsheet beneath the boy and pulled hard.

The boy quickly jumped off the bed, but Yang Liuqing caught him and wrapped him tightly in the bedsheet like a mummy, then threw him to the ground.

Liang Dan gave Shen Si a look. Shen Si cautiously released her hold, and Liang Dan nervously stood in place for a moment, but nothing happened.

The boy lay on the floor, glaring at Yang Liuqing and baring his teeth. “A grand sacrifice and yet so defiant? Kneel before the High Priestess and beg for mercy!”

Yang Liuqing slapped the boy’s face again. Shen Si quickly pulled Liang Dan into a protective embrace.

The boy spat out a mouthful of blood, speaking unclearly, “You wretches, I will sacrifice you to the River God!”

Yang Liuqing slapped him once more, and the boy coughed up a tooth.

Yang Liuqing’s tone was calm. “Have you calmed down now?”

The boy asked, “What exactly do you want?”

“Looks like you have,” Yang Liuqing smiled wryly. “Why are you the High Priest here?”

“Because I can connect with the River God,” the boy said. “I can communicate with the River God.”

Yang Liuqing asked, “Why can you communicate with the River God?”

The boy replied, “Because the legend says the River God favors children, and I’m the only child left in our village.”

“That can’t be right,” Yang Liuqing said, “There seem to be quite a few girls in your village.”

“There used to be a bunch of little girls,” the boy rolled his eyes, “But now, who knows where they all went—probably all dead.”

Shen Si asked, “Where is the river?”

The boy looked puzzled. “Isn’t it just outside the village?”

Liang Dan asked, “Why do you need to connect with the River God? What’s the purpose?”

The boy’s eyes darted around, and Yang Liuqing slapped him again. “Don’t try to deceive us.”

The boy spat out more blood. “We want to build a bridge, a bridge over the river that leads outside. That way, we can leave—we won’t be trapped in the village forever.”

Yang Liuqing said, “It’s just a bridge. Is it really necessary to sacrifice so many people for that?”

The boy glared at her. “What do you know, you’re just a woman.”

Yang Liuqing raised her hand, but the boy quickly added, “Every time we finish building the bridge during the day, it’s destroyed by night! Our bridge never lasts more than one night. Everyone in the village says we’ve angered the River God.”

Shen Si asked, “Your village must be quite old, right?”

The boy lifted his chin. “Of course. Our village has a history of hundreds of years.”

Shen Si frowned. “For hundreds of years, your village has had no bridge and no way to reach the outside world?”

The boy said, “We never had a bridge before, but we had a big boat. Recently, the boat was stolen, so now we have to build a bridge.”

“That’s odd,” Yang Liuqing smiled faintly. “Who would come to this remote, poor place just to steal your boat?”

The boy answered vaguely, “Some scoundrels, I guess.”

Liang Dan asked, “You said all women lie. Which woman lied to you?”

The boy frowned. “When did I say that? No one lied to me!”

Yang Liuqing left the room and dragged a man lying on the floor in the living room inside. The boy saw him and shouted, “Dad, what did you do to my father?!”

Yang Liuqing asked softly, “You have a good relationship, right?”

The boy quickly said, “I’ll tell you everything you want to know, just please don’t hurt my father. He’s a good man!”

Yang Liuqing sneered, holding a brick as if to smash the middle-aged man’s head.

“Don’t hurt my father! I’ll tell you everything!”

Yang Liuqing tapped the man’s face with the brick. “You say your father is a good man? I’m not so sure. Give me one example.”

The boy looked anxious. “My mother’s a big liar, a terrible woman. She abandoned us and ran away. It’s my father who never gave up on me! Without him, I wouldn’t be alive now. Maybe my mother would have killed me long ago!”

Liang Dan’s heart skipped a beat, a vague suspicion forming. “The one who stole the boat… was your mother?”

“Exactly!” The boy ground his teeth. “My mother ran away on a boat with the other women in the village. They took the boat with them, and now no one in the village can leave!”

Shen Si’s eyes widened, her voice trembling. “Your mother and those women—they aren’t originally from the village, are they?”

“Yes. They all married in from outside. Outsiders can’t be trusted—everyone in the village says so.”

Yang Liuqing kicked the boy hard in the chest. “Nonsense! You know perfectly well whether they married in or not!”

The boy was knocked to the ground, coughing up blood with a hoarse voice. “My mother did marry in. After she came here, she thought our family was poor and even tried to strangle me!”

Shen Si, filled with rage, rushed forward and grabbed the boy’s neck. “If your mother didn’t strangle you to death, then I’ll do it!”

Yang Liuqing grabbed Shen Si’s arm tightly and pulled her back. “Calm down. He’s an important NPC. We can’t kill him yet.”

Shen Si took a step back to Liang Dan’s side and grabbed her hand. “Hold me back—I’m afraid I’ll lose control and kill him.”

Liang Dan held Shen Si’s hand tightly, as if holding onto herself as well.

Yang Liuqing asked, “So, you want to build a bridge to go out and bring back the women who ran away?”

The boy collapsed silently on the ground.

Yang Liuqing pressed on, “Since there’s no bridge, where do the sacrifices from other villages come from?”

The boy trembled slightly, curling into himself. “My mother told me she would definitely come back, but she never did. I learned how to swim so I could swim outside.”

The boy blinked, tears falling onto his wrist. “Sisters, I’m sorry. I don’t know why you’re so angry. It’s all my fault—I just wanted to find my mother outside.”

Shen Si spat. “What a show. Only now pretending to be innocent. Isn’t that a little late?”

Yang Liuqing asked, “You swam outside to deceive them into coming back, but it didn’t work, right?”

The boy’s voice cracked with tears. “I didn’t expect people outside to be so heartless. They knew I was a poor child without a mother, yet no one wanted to come here and be my mother.”

The boy cried, “Luckily, the heavens finally opened their eyes somehow. Sometimes people suddenly appear at the village entrance, as if they fell from the sky.”