A fierce wife enters the house: She helps up a house full of spineless people.

Stone and Shuanzi, standing nearby, frantically tried to pull at Chen Ergou's clothes. Their parents and relatives were still on the mountain. Did they want to kill the whole village by bringing people up there now?

The sudden tug on Chen Ergou's arm cleared his head a little, and his heart skipped a beat. He'd been so terrified by the knife that the words had just slipped out. Now, thinking about it, his entire family was on the mountain!

Hearing the commotion, the leader of the routed soldiers sneered and quickly finished the half-eaten piece of cured meat in his hand. He stepped forward and, without saying a word, swiftly brought down his knife.

Two muffled "plop" sounds.

The two brothers who were just pulling at Chen Ergou had two knives stuck in their chests. Their eyes were wide open, their bodies went limp and they collapsed. They twitched a couple of times and then went still.

Warm blood splattered all over Chen Ergou's face.

He froze, his mind went blank, and a foul-smelling liquid trickled down his trouser leg, forming a small puddle on the ground. He had wet himself in fear.

"Damn it, you dare to talk back!" The defeated soldier leader spat and kicked Chen Ergou in the stomach. "You! Lead the way! If you try anything funny, I'll chop you into mincemeat!"

Chen Ergou was kicked to the ground, then scrambled to his feet, trembling like a leaf. He stared at the blood-dripping knives in the hands of the fleeing soldiers, speechless, only able to nod frantically.

"Go! Hurry up!" The defeated soldiers couldn't wait any longer and came up to beat Chen Ergou again, urging him to lead the way.

Chen Ergou walked ahead, trembling, his mind a complete mess. He was filled with resentment, hating himself for his greed in coming down the mountain, hating himself for being such a spineless coward.

He can't take them to the cave in the back mountain! Absolutely not! His parents and wife are there; if he takes these bloodless killers there, the whole village will die.

But if he doesn't lead the way, he'll die right now.

Chen Ergou gritted his teeth, his eyes darting around in the darkness. He thought of the wild mountain at the east end of the village, called Broken Soul Slope. That place was covered with thorny wild pepper trees and bramble vines, with a deep ravine at its bottom.

"I'll go there!" Chen Ergou thought fiercely. "I'm not going to live anyway. Even if I die, I can't let the whole village be implicated!"

Having made up his mind, Chen Ergou led his dozen or so defeated soldiers toward Broken Soul Slope.

Duanhunpo is not far from the village, but the road is extremely difficult to travel. Just inside the mountain, there is a dense thicket of bushes.

"Ouch! What's that scratching me!" a fleeing soldier yelled, cursing as his face was scratched by thorny vines.

Chen Ergou quickly shrank his neck, pretending to be scared: "Grandpa, this mountain road is difficult to walk. The villagers specifically chose this difficult place to hide in to avoid the war. Please bear with us, it's not far ahead."

The defeated soldier leader sneered, "You'd better not try anything funny! Get out of here!"

Chen Ergou's heart was pounding. He had no choice but to grit his teeth and choose the most difficult and steepest places to crawl through.

The higher you go, the steeper the path becomes. The soil underfoot is loose and crumbling, and stones fall with every step. Thorny tree branches are everywhere, making a hissing sound as they scrape against your clothes.

Chen Ergou walked at the front, his body covered in several cuts, but he gritted his teeth and remained silent. He knew that in this place, one wrong step and he could fall.

He glanced back and saw the routed soldiers panting and cursing.

"Damn it, what kind of lousy road is this! Did you lead us astray?!" The defeated soldier leader finally couldn't hold back anymore, grabbed Chen Ergou by the collar, and slapped him across the face with the back of his knife.

Chen Ergou closed his eyes in fright, but in his mind he was calculating the distance. They were almost there; that slope ahead was the steepest part of Broken Soul Slope, with a deep ravine dozens of feet below.

"No...I didn't lead you to the wrong place, sir!" Chen Ergou stammered. "It's just ahead, just over this slope. The villagers are in the valley behind the slope!"

The defeated soldier leader looked at him with a skeptical look, then released his grip: "Hurry up! If I find out you're lying, I'll skin you alive!"

Chen Ergou continued walking. He knew in his heart that he wasn't going to survive. He remembered the angry face of the village chief, Chen Defu, who said, "You won't die from missing one meal! If you go down the mountain now and run into the rebels, you'll be dead!"

The village chief is right. He was a complete fool. He risked his life and even harmed his brother for a few bites of cured meat.

"Father, Mother, wife, I'm sorry," Chen Ergou murmured to himself.

Finally, they reached the edge of the steepest slope.

There wasn't even a place to put your feet; it was all big, slippery rocks and mud, and it was pitch black underneath.

Chen Ergou stopped in his tracks.

"Why aren't you moving!" The leader of the fleeing soldiers pushed him from behind.

Chen Ergou turned around, looked at the defeated soldier leader, and suddenly grinned.

"What are you laughing at!" The defeated soldier leader felt a chill run down his spine, sensing that something was amiss.

"I laugh at you beasts, you've been fooled by me!"

The fleeing soldiers' leader's face changed drastically, and he raised his knife to strike: "You bastard, you dare to lie to us!"

Chen Ergou also became ruthless. He didn't dodge at all, but instead, like a mad bull, he lowered his head and charged fiercely at the leader of the fleeing soldiers.

He used all his strength in that strike. The fleeing soldier leader was completely unprepared and was hit squarely in the stomach.

The two were already slippery, and this caused them to lose their balance.

"ah--"

The fleeing soldiers' leader let out a scream.

Chen Ergou clung tightly to his waist, and the two of them rolled down the steep slope like a big mud ball.

"Boss!" The fleeing soldiers behind him tried to reach out and grab him, but it was too late.

The slope was too steep, full of rocks and thorns. Chen Ergou felt as if he had crashed into a rock, his bones breaking. His body was covered in blood and gore from the thorns.

He was filled with regret. Why hadn't he listened to the village chief?

With a muffled thud, the two men crashed heavily onto the pile of rocks at the bottom of the ravine, and then fell silent.

"What...what should we do?" a defeated soldier stammered.

Another fleeing soldier peered down, but it was pitch black and he couldn't see anything except the sound of the wind.

"Damn it, this kid's insane! The boss's definitely dead!"

"Should we still search?"

"Search what the hell! There's not a soul in this godforsaken place. If we stay any longer, we'll all fall to our deaths! Let's get out of here!"

The remaining defeated soldiers didn't care about their leader's life or death and turned to run down the mountain.

Meanwhile, in the cave behind the mountain.

Chen Defu woke up and, as was his habit, lightly tapped the people around him, his brows furrowing tightly into a knot.

"Where's Er Gou? And what about Shuanzi and Shitou who were with him? Has anyone seen them?" He lowered his voice, but the anxiety in his tone was obvious to everyone.

In a corner, a man whispered, "Didn't he go to pee? Why hasn't he come back yet?"

Chen Defu's heart skipped a beat, and he thought to himself, "This is bad."

These bastards are really going to get us all killed!

He dared not delay for a moment and immediately called to several strong men: "Quick! Get up! Block the entrance! Cover the outside with branches, don't leave a single trace!"

The men inside the cave panicked and quickly moved stones and cut branches to completely block the already small entrance, leaving only a few ventilation holes.

"All men, get your weapons ready!" Chen Defu gripped a rusty woodcutter's knife, his voice low. "Stand guard at the cave entrance! If any rebels come up, we'll cut down one if they come in, two if they come in, we'll cut down both! For the sake of our wives and children, even if we die, we'll take one down with us!"

The men's eyes turned red, and they held hoes, machetes, and sharpened sticks in their hands, staring intently at the cave entrance.

The women and children inside the cave were so frightened that they huddled in a corner, covering their mouths and afraid to cry out.