Sold into a ghost marriage? Four-year-old and his thuggish father go on a killing spree.

Zhang Dacheng drove long distances for eight years, from Jiayuguan to Lanzhou, and from Lanzhou to Xi'an. He saw all kinds of road conditions and encountered all kinds of strange things.

But finding a half-dead little girl in a red wedding dress by the roadside was a first for him.

Just as dawn was breaking, the snow stopped, and a thin layer of ice formed on the road.

He was driving the factory's Jiefang brand truck, carrying a load of coal, out of the mine, passing through this section of provincial highway.

I saw a red thing in the snow by the roadside from afar and thought it was a bundle that some production team had dropped while transporting sweet potatoes.

As the car drew closer, he slowed down and peeked out the window.

It's not a bundle.

It's a person.

Zhang Dacheng slammed on the brakes with a "screech," and was thrown from the driver's seat.

He jumped out of the car, ran over in a few steps, squatted down, and flipped over.

A little girl, no more than five years old.

His face was frozen blue-purple and black, his lips looked like they were covered with a layer of ash, and his whole body was curled up in a ball, stiff and unyielding.

Then look at his clothes—he was wearing a tattered, bright red dress, made of silk, embroidered with mandarin ducks, but it had been torn into strips.

One foot was wearing an embroidered shoe, while the other was bare, the sole of which was as white as the belly of a dead fish from the cold.

There was a three-inch-long gash on his forehead, the blood had congealed and mixed with mud, turning a dark reddish-black color.

The fingernails of all ten fingers were curled up, and the fingertips were covered with dried scabs.

Zhang Dacheng had fought for more than ten years and had been wounded three times. He was not supposed to be afraid of blood.

But the moment he saw the little girl, his legs went weak.

"Damn it—who did this?!"

He reached out and checked the little girl's breath—she was still breathing, but as weak as a spider's thread about to break.

Without saying a word, Zhang Dacheng took off his military overcoat, wrapped the child up completely, and carried him into the driver's seat.

He turned the heater up to the maximum, then pulled out half a pot of cooled brown sugar water from under the seat, pried open the child's mouth, and poured it in little by little.

The little girl clenched her teeth tightly, and brown sugar water flowed down her chin and down her neck.

Zhang Dacheng got anxious and rubbed her face, her hands, and her feet that were white from the cold with his big hands.

After rubbing for a while, the little girl's eyelids finally twitched.

"Girl! Girl, wake up!"

Niannian was awakened by a sweet smell.

It tastes like brown sugar water.

When was the last time she drank something sweet? She couldn't remember. Maybe it was the summer before her mother fell ill, when she traded three months' worth of eggs for two ounces of brown sugar, made a bowl of water for her to drink.

She struggled to open her eyes.

In my line of sight was a dark face with a long scar running from the left brow bone down to the cheekbone.

It was a man, wearing faded military trousers, and smelling of a mixture of diesel fuel and tobacco.

Not a member of the Wang family.

A faint sob escaped from Niannian's throat.

"Don't be afraid, little girl, your uncle is a good man." Zhang Dacheng's voice was rough, but very low, as if coaxing his own child. "Whose child are you? Why are you running around on the road all by yourself?"

Niannian's lips moved slightly, and blood seeped from her chapped lips.

With the last of her strength, she uttered one sentence:

"Uncle... Chengjiawan... I'm looking for my dad..."

After saying that, she fainted again.

Zhang Dacheng was stunned for a moment.

Chengjiawan?

He's been driving long distances for so many years, he knows the place names in this area very well.

Chengjiawan is in Qinghe County, to the east, at least a hundred miles away from here.

His truck was heading north to haul coal from the mine to the steel plant in the county town.

He looked down at the dying child in his arms.

A red wedding dress, covered in wounds, with broken fingernails, lying by the roadside in the dead of night.

He was a soldier; he had seen death and man-made disasters.

It's obvious what happened to this child that it wasn't a good thing.

Zhang Dacheng made a decision.

He started the truck and, instead of heading north, turned southeast, heading towards Baima Town, fifteen miles away.

Baima Town is the largest market town in the area, with a supply and marketing cooperative, a health clinic, and people he met while traveling long distances.

The truck bumped along the icy road, with the heater humming in the cab.

Niannian leaned against the military overcoat, her whole body burning hot, her little face sometimes flushed red and sometimes pale, and she began to talk nonsense.

"Mom...don't leave me...Mom..."

Grandma... I'm afraid of the dark... Please don't close the coffin...

When Zhang Dacheng heard the word "coffin," his hands jerked violently on the steering wheel.

He gritted his teeth and floored the accelerator.

In a row of bungalows behind the Baima Town Supply and Marketing Cooperative, Aunt Zhao—Zhao Fengying—was cooking corn porridge in front of the stove.

She was a saleswoman at the supply and marketing cooperative, in her fifties, widowed, with only one daughter who had married and moved to the county town.

He has a fiery temper and a loud voice; when he curses, you can hear him three blocks away, but he's not a bad person at heart.

The long-distance drivers in this area all know her and often eat a hot meal at her place.

Zhang Dacheng parked the truck in the yard, and carrying Niannian wrapped in a military overcoat, kicked open Zhao Fengying's door.

"Aunt Zhao! It's a matter of life and death!"

Zhao Fengying was startled. She turned around and saw what Zhang Dacheng was carrying. The iron spoon in her hand clattered to the ground.

"Where did this child come from?!"

"I picked her up by the roadside. She's almost frozen to death and still has a high fever." Zhang Dacheng put Niannian on the kang (a heated brick bed) and lifted his military overcoat to show her.

When Zhao Fengying saw the tattered red wedding dress, her face changed instantly.

"This is... a ghost marriage?!"

"Most likely," Zhang Dacheng said in a low voice. "I don't think the child's injuries are from frostbite; they were inflicted by someone. His fingernails are all torn off, and he has a large gash on his forehead."

Zhao Fengying squatted down and carefully looked at Niannian's face.

The little girl had a high fever, but she was pretty and had a good constitution.

Her eyelashes were long and thick, tightly closed, and dried tear stains clung to the corners of her eyes.

Zhao Fengying's eyes immediately reddened.

She waved her hand, cursing, "Drive the car away first, and don't tell anyone about this. I'll go and invite Dr. Li from the clinic. Leave the money; I'll figure out the travel expenses."

Zhang Dacheng took out five yuan from his pocket and slapped it on the edge of the kang (a heated brick bed).

Five yuan was a lot of money these days; it was enough to buy twenty jin of cornmeal.

He hesitated for a moment, then took out two more coins, making a total of seven coins, and placed them there.

"Aunt Zhao, this girl said she's going to Chengjiawan to find her father. I know where Chengjiawan is in Qinghe County, but my car goes north, so I can't take her there."

Zhao Fengying glared at him: "Alright, alright, I know. Let's save the child's life first, then we'll talk about other things. You'd better get going; the mine is waiting for coal, and you won't be able to explain yourself if things get delayed."

Zhang Dacheng nodded, took one last look at the little girl on the kang (a heated brick bed), and turned to leave.

As he reached the door, he paused, turned back, and said, "Aunt Zhao, this child is tough; he'll survive."

The door closed.

Zhao Fengying quickly boiled a pot of water and wrung out a hot towel to wipe Niannian's body.

When she reached the back, her hand stopped—there were several old scars on the child's back, some of which had turned white, and some of which were bluish-purple.

It's not a new injury; it's the result of accumulated injuries over time.

Zhao Fengying, a woman of experience, felt a lump in her throat and cursed, "Beast."

She changed Niannian's clothes—it was an old cotton-padded jacket that her granddaughter had worn when she was little, patched but clean and warm.

I went to see Dr. Li from the clinic, who gave me an injection to reduce the fever and prescribed two packets of medicine.

After working for more than an hour, Niannian's complexion finally turned from ashen to light pink.

The fever has subsided somewhat.

His breathing has become steady.

Zhao Fengying sat down on the edge of the kang (a heated brick bed) and let out a long sigh.

Only then did she realize—whose child is this? How did he end up on the main road?

She looked through the tattered red wedding dress she had changed out of.

A small, close-fitting pocket was sewn onto the lining of the wedding dress.

Zhao Fengying reached in with her fingers and touched something hard.

She pulled it out and saw that it was a neatly folded strip of paper.

The note was blurred by sweat and snow, but the words on it were still legible.

It was written by a woman with charcoal, the handwriting delicate but trembling—clearly written in an extremely weak state.

There is only one line of text above:

"Gu Yanqiu, Chengjiawan Brigade, Qinghe County."

Zhao Fengying stared at the note for a long time.

Gu Yanqiu.

She didn't recognize the name.

But she knew that Qinghe County was 60 li east of Baima Town, a journey that would take a day by oxcart and half a day by tractor.

Chengjiawan Brigade, judging from the name, should be a production team under Qinghe County.

She turned the note over, and on the back was a line of even smaller writing, as if it had been added later:

"Niannian is his daughter; please, kind people, send her there."

Zhao Fengying's hands trembled slightly.

She glanced at Niannian, who was fast asleep on the kang (a heated brick bed).

The little girl's brows were tightly furrowed, as if she were still afraid of something in her sleep.

But her little hands gripped the corner of the blanket that Zhao Fengying had covered her with tightly, her knuckles turning white.

It was like grasping at the last straw in the world.

Zhao Fengying reached out and gently brushed the few blood-stained stray hairs away from Niannian's forehead.

"Poor girl," she muttered.

Then he carefully folded the note and stuffed it into the inner pocket of his cotton-padded coat.

The corn porridge on the kang (a heated brick bed) was still warm in the pot, and the fire in the stove flickered.

The snow outside the window had completely stopped, and the sky was bright. The sound of bicycle bells and people talking could be heard at the entrance of the supply and marketing cooperative in Baima Town.

A new morning has begun.

Meanwhile, amidst the howling north wind, Niannian was unaware that the man named "Gu Yanqiu" on the note was currently experiencing the most difficult winter of his life in Chengjiawan Brigade, more than a hundred miles away.

He didn't know he had a daughter.

He didn't know that his daughter had just crawled out of a coffin and walked barefoot in the snow all night.

He had no idea that this four-and-a-half-year-old girl was walking towards him step by step.

And this road is very long.

It's very far.

It's cold.

But you will eventually reach it.

Because she is Gu Niannian—a child who crawled out of a coffin, a child whose life was snatched back from the clutches of the King of Hell.

She will never let anyone put her back into the darkness again.

Never again.