s, glared and spat out, “Your family has such a large courtyard, with hot springs and valleys producing gold every day. You wouldn't be able to come up with even a thousand taels! No wonder your eldes..."What, the child is lost"

"How could a child be lost"

Hearing the noise from within each cave, villagers quickly scrambled down.

The elderly people were counting heads one by one, afraid that even their own children had disappeared. They took the opportunity to look for Gou Sheren and see if he was hiding somewhere.

Wu Sanniang and her husband had a hard life. When they were young, they gave birth to two children who didn't survive. They didn't have another child until they were in their thirties, when Dog-Sheng was born.

After Gou Sheng, another little girl was born. However, she passed away when she was two years old.

Gou Sheng'er is a truly unique individual, cherishing his own life more than anything else.

Even before, it wouldn't be the case that a child would go missing for an entire night without being noticed. After all, the cave is small, there are only two families, and two children.

But last night after changing caves, Gou Sheng kept playing with several half-grown children.

When they were sleeping, the two of them thought Gou Sheng disliked being crowded and went to sleep with his companions.

The only time they didn't bother, they didn't go cave by cave.

Not wanting to, this morning at mealtime, the two of them still didn't see the children come back, so they just called out a few times.

After all, no one has much food at home, so it's not good to let the child stay and eat for free.

Result, ask a cave, Gousheng is not there, ask another one, still not there!

"Gǒu rè ér, gǒu rè ér, nǐ zài nǎ'er Nǐ kuài chū lái a, bié xià mā ma a!"

Wu Sanniang's voice was hoarse from shouting, her eyes were red, and she was almost going crazy.

Wu San Shu also turned pale, clasped his hands together, and blindly beat his head, looking for his son everywhere.

The villagers gathered quickly, looking towards the village chief and Zhao Shu and a few others.

The village head waved his pipe and ordered everyone, "Scatter and search the area carefully. Even if we can't find the child, we have to find something."

A chill ran down everyone's spines, a sense of foreboding settling over them.

Such cold weather, children don't care if they are dragged away by beasts or trapped in a snowdrift, the outcome won't be good...

Besides the elderly who found it inconvenient to go up and down the hillside cave, children from all the families were also scattered around, shouting and searching for each other.

Soon, ten steps behind the shed, a villager found a slingshot.

Wu Sanniang rushed over and burst into tears, clutching her slingshot.

"This belongs to Goureng, Goureng's! He even sleeps holding it. Damn Goureng, where did you go If anything happens to you, your mother won't live either."

She was about to run toward the nearby stone, crying, but villagers quickly pulled her back.

The village chief frowned, and was about to speak when a feathered arrow suddenly shot out from the forest ahead.

Liu, the鏢頭 (biao tou), wanted to be the first to discover it. With quick eyes and hands, he pulled the village head aside, "Be careful!"

The village head stumbled and fell, the arrow whizzing past his shoulder and lodging itself deep in Sun Er Sao's back.

Sun's second sister-in-law had originally been bending over to persuade Wu San's daughter, but who would have thought there would be such danger.

She cried out in pain and fell straight to the ground.

"Retreat, fall back!"

Liu, the leader of the bodyguard squad, roared and pulled the village chief and Zhao Shu back.

The villagers panicked and scrambled to run back.

Li Lao Si and Jia Yi each grabbed one, bringing Wu San Shu and Wu San Ni back to their hut.

Everyone was terrified, hiding in their shelters, but the forest fell silent.

Tao Hongying half-hugged Sun's second sister-in-law and whispered, "There's a note on the arrow!"

Everyone followed the sound and breathed a sigh of relief.

That arrow was held in Tao Hongying's hand. It turned out that it wasn't inserted deeply enough; with just a little jostle, it had fallen out.

Sun's second aunt's cotton-padded jacket was stained with blood, but not much.

Li Lao Si grabbed the paper and unfolded it. It was simple, with only four sentences.

"Northeast thirty li, grain ten bags, silver one hundred, tomorrow noon to exchange children."

Dog Meat

This is... kidnapped!

Everyone was silent for a moment. They had thought that they were the only ones operating in these deep mountains and old forests.

Unexpectedly, not only were there other people, but they also easily kidnapped their children!

"We were careless! We settled here in this cave and thought nothing of it. We didn't even have people guarding day and night, so someone took advantage of that!"

The village head looked grim, filled with self-reproach.

Zhao Shu clenched his fists even tighter, "I was overconfident. When Liu Biao said this place was called 'Canned Bean Waist' and the closest to the outside, I should have reminded everyone..."

Li Laosi also frowned and replied, "We've been out here for so long, and we didn't even realize there were other people nearby."

At this moment, Sun Er's wife was carried back and found a divine doctor to treat her wounds.

Wu Sanniang cried until she had no tears left, her heart filled with despair.

"Ten bags of grain, one hundred silver taels My family doesn't even have that! How am I supposed to save Gou Sheng"

Wu San Shu hugged his head, squatting on the ground, wishing he could die from a head-on collision.

The son is still alive, that's good news. It's better than freezing to death or being taken by a wild animal.

But the bandits wanted something that the whole village couldn't come up with. How could they save their son

The villagers also chattered and anxiously came up with ideas.

"We don't have enough silver, so we put stones in the bag. When food is short, we stuff it with hay. Can we fool these bandits We just need to get Gou Sheng back."

"Are you blind, thinking you can get away with being a bandit They'll definitely inspect the goods!"

"Silence everyone!" Li Lao Er shouted, cutting off the crowd. Then he said, "Listen to me lay it all out from beginning to end, and then we'll decide how to save him."

He took a deep breath and continued, "Firstly, these people should know that there are people here. They came to take a look. Perhaps seeing us slaughtering pigs and cooking meat with many people, they didn't dare to show themselves. If my guess is right, Goureng probably went to urinate or pick up his slingshot, running to the perimeter, and was grabbed by these people."

"Possible! Yesterday was too chaotic, we were all down there, and there were things like axes. If the newcomers weren't many, they definitely wouldn't dare to act." The village head nodded, and the rest of the people also felt it made sense.

Li Lao Er, with his hands behind his back, added, "After they go back, they'll probably hear from Gou Reng that we're just refugees and won't want to waste their effort. They might send a message asking us to deliver something. If we have it, they might keep us all here and kill us before completely looting the place. But if we don't, they wouldn't bother at all."

Just from the way they shot arrows without even dodging the crowd, it's clear these people aren't ordinary refugees or fleeing soldiers seeking shelter in the mountains. They must be bandits, ruthless ones with countless bloody deeds under their belts who don't value human life at all.

The more people listened, the heavier their hearts felt. They thought this place was incredibly safe, but who would have thought that there was a man-eating tiger sleeping beside the bed!

They have always lived next to such ferocious bandits!

Uncle Zhao took a deep breath, “If the second brother is right, then we have no retreat left. We can only make preparations to fight with our lives. Not just for Gou Sheng, if we don’t eliminate this group of bandits, we will be in danger at all times.”

“Yes, and quickly!” Liu Biaotou also said, “They don’t even look at us refugees as if we are afraid to tremble. They think we will be scared and donate food and silver. If at this time, we follow the man who just sent the letter, sneak into their mountain stronghold, we can catch them off guard. At least there is a chance to secretly rescue Gou Sheng first.”

"Then let's go, the faster the better!" Li Lao Si suggested. "We need to prepare silver and grain, make it look like we're going somewhere important. If we're discovered, at least we can buy ourselves some time."ens to the princess, you'll all be beaten!"Two grandmothers and two maidservants immediately lifted their skirts and chased after them.Yi Zongguan then led the Marquis up the steps. As soon as the Mar...