Chapter 91 : Discovering the Enemy’s Lair

“No wonder he looks so energetic. Many young ladies in the village are quite taken with him,” Wang Yunfeng teased. Thinking of Nangong Ruochen’s appearance, she figured his brother must be incredibly handsome too.

“Hey, isn’t that Shu Ruxue and Xue Zhigang? Didn’t they go to the hospital early yesterday? They’re just getting back now, and they still look so pale. It’s pretty scary.”

“It is them. You might not know, but Shu Ruxue withdrew 2,000 yuan the day before yesterday. They say it was a dowry from her parents. But less than a day later, the money was stolen,” another aunt added regretfully. They’d never seen that much money in their lives, not even 200 yuan.

“Oh my goodness! That’s a huge sum. I couldn’t earn that much even if I farmed for a lifetime. Shu Ruxue really throws money around.”

“Exactly. My family doesn’t even have 50 yuan in savings. Several of my sons are still single, and we don’t have the money to get them married. If we had that kind of money, my sons wouldn’t need to worry about finding wives.”

“I thought the Xue family had married into wealth, but this is a gold nugget that constantly loses gold dust. No matter how much you have, you can’t keep it if you don’t know how to manage it.”

“How did you hear that Shu Ruxue’s money was stolen again?”

“Well, my house is right next to the Xue family’s. Yesterday morning, they were planning to take Shu Ruxue to the hospital. Zhang Fengying agreed, but said they didn’t have any money. Shu Ruxue had no choice but to go back to get some, only to discover it was gone. She suspected the Xue family took it, and they got into a big fight.”

“Do you think she’s lying? She and that educated youth Shen are the only ones in the whole brigade who’ve been robbed and multiple times at that. Each time, it was a large amount.”

“Maybe she actually didn’t have the money but was too embarrassed to admit it, so she pretended it was stolen to keep up appearances.”

“But the 2,000 yuan dowry was real. I happened to be at the post office that day mailing a letter and saw her withdraw it with my own eyes.”

“The Li family really knows how to raise daughters, they’re full of schemes.”

“That’s right. Didn’t Li Yanyan also use tricks to marry into the Shu family in the capital and is now living the good life?”

As the couple approached, one of the aunts asked, “Zhigang, what’s wrong with your wife? Why does she look so pale?”

Xue Zhigang looked troubled too. The doctors said his wife had dysmenorrhea, but the medications didn’t ease her pain. After observing her for a day and trying several different drugs, nothing worked. The doctors were at a loss.

Staying in the hospital any longer was pointless and expensive, so they decided to go home. “We were just cooling off a bit. My wife’s ill, but the doctors couldn’t diagnose her properly, so we returned to the village,” he explained.

Shu Ruxue, leaning heavily on Xue Zhigang for support, was struggling to walk. All she wanted was to get home and lie down in bed. She didn’t hear a word of the conversation around her.

Yun Siying hadn’t expected much, she had only come over to hear some gossip. But seeing Shu Ruxue in such a miserable state with her own eyes left a strong impression. Plus, the aunts’ vivid imaginations amazed her. Just one theft had led them to spin so many stories. She couldn’t help but admire the thief or rather, the person who should retrieve the money and even hoped they’d make up a few more dramatic twists.

After enjoying the drama, Yun Siying headed back up the mountain. The persimmons she had spotted on the trees last night were still there, she hadn’t had time to pick them then, though she loved persimmon cakes.

Once she reached the spot covered by her spiritual power, she transferred all the persimmons from the tree into her space. On the mountain, she also found wild pears, wax gourds, and other fruits, which she collected into her space as well. 

Suddenly, her eyes lit up she had discovered several Ganoderma lucidum (reishi mushrooms). She transplanted the trees into her space but didn’t find any ginseng. Lately, she had been more focused on watching for wild animals and hadn’t paid much attention to herbs or mushrooms.

Wait a minute! That sneaky figure looked familiar. She looked closely, it was Li Gang. How bold of him, an ordinary farmer, to venture into the deep mountains alone?

Her interest was instantly piqued. She continued to monitor him using her spiritual power, and her steps gradually brought her closer to his location. Unfortunately, there was a mountain between them, but her pace was much faster than his.

She saw him walk to a stone wall behind an ancient tree and press a protruding spot. The stone wall automatically opened. Once Li Gang entered, Yun Siying’s spiritual power followed him inside.

What she saw was a long underground passage. Following Li Gang’s steps, she discovered more than a dozen people inside, all armed with guns, engaged in an urgent meeting.

They were speaking in a foreign, unpleasant language, but Yun Siying could understand part of it. The leader asked whether there had been any unfamiliar faces in the village and whether any of them were injured.

Someone reported that a strange man had visited the Youth Courtyard that day, and two educated youths who had been missing for several days had returned with injuries.

Hearing this, the leader became suspicious of Nangong Ruochen, Han Yuecheng. From their conversation, Yun Siying realized this was the group that had injured Nangong Ruochen and the others the previous day.

They decided not to leave the mountain for now. They instructed Li Gang to return to the village and not come back to the mountain anytime soon, they were under surveillance and it was too risky to relocate at the moment.

Deep within the cave, Yun Siying saw five men in white lab coats and over a dozen emaciated Dragon people (likely referring to Chinese people), who were clearly being used as test subjects. The doctors were injecting them with drugs, one glance made the horrifying reality obvious.

Faced with such a scene, Yun Siying who had grown numb from everything she’d seen felt a fresh surge of fury. This period of history reminded her of a dark chapter from her own country’s past, and she couldn’t bear to let these despicable people go unpunished.

She could have handled them herself, but it wasn’t that simple. The people inside needed to be protected, and clearly, someone powerful was backing these criminals.

Li Gang alone had already infiltrated the Shu family in Kyoto, and his eldest son was a platoon leader in the military. Their family alone could access plenty of confidential information. People like Li Gang were everywhere, hidden in plain sight, and only the military could fully root them out.

Inside the cave, there was a radio station, along with piles of gold, silver, jewelry, rice, flour, grain, oil, tobacco, alcohol, and other provisions. It was clear these had all been stockpiled. A spring ran through the cave as well. If not for Yun Siying’s unique abilities, these people could have stayed hidden here for a year or two without being discovered.

Yun Siying’s spiritual power enveloped the entire mountain. The internal space was enormous, with more than a dozen hidden exits like the one Li Gang had used.

She followed Li Gang, and just as he was about to leave the mountain, she knocked him unconscious, tied him up, gagged him, and hid him. She also confiscated two gold bars and a dagger he was carrying before leaving.

When she returned to the Youth House, she knocked on Nangong Ruochen’s door. Nangong Ruoyi opened it.

“Siying, you’re back.”

“Yes, Comrade Nangong. I need to talk to you about something.”

“Come in!”