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

"Dad, what exactly happened between you and Mom?"

Niannian spoke very softly, as if afraid of disturbing the people inside the house.

Gu Yanqiu's body stiffened.

He looked down at the little girl in his arms—

Tears still clung to her face, and her bright black eyes stared straight at him, filled with questions.

The brigade headquarters was extremely quiet, with only the crackling sound of kerosene lamp wicks burning.

Cheng Tiezhu walked in again from outside at some point, stood at the door with his arms crossed, and looked at the father and daughter with a complicated expression.

Gu Yanqiu opened his mouth, but did not answer immediately.

He slowly loosened his grip on Niannian, took a half step back, squatted down, and reached out to touch his daughter's head.

His hand had just been raised, before it even touched Nian Nian's hair—

Nian Nian shrank back a little.

It wasn't intentional.

It's a natural bodily reaction.

Just like a hand that has been burned by fire, it will automatically retract when it sees flames again.

Gu Yanqiu's hand froze in mid-air.

He saw Nian Nian's movements—

That fleeting moment of hesitation, the tense shoulders, the slightly raised elbow—

That's the defensive stance a child who's used to being beaten would adopt.

She was wary of his outstretched hand.

It's not that I'm afraid of him.

It's because I'm afraid of everyone's hands.

Gu Yanqiu's hand paused in mid-air for three seconds, then slowly, very slowly, lowered itself.

Those three seconds were longer than any three seconds he had ever experienced in his life.

Cheng Tiezhu saw this scene at the door, stepped in, and his gruff voice boomed out like a banging on a wall.

"Did you see that? Gu Yanqiu, open your eyes and look!"

Cheng Tiezhu pointed to the strip of cloth on Niannian's forehead, which was seeping blood.

"This is your daughter! Four and a half years old! She crawled out of the coffin!"

My fingernails were all flipped off, my feet were frostbitten, and I had a high fever for three days!

"I've traveled over a hundred miles to find you, my father!"

Cheng Tiezhu's voice grew louder and louder until it was almost a shout.

"Look at her! She's afraid of being touched! She flinches as soon as you reach out! This is what she's been taught! What she's been taught! A four-year-old girl driven to this state, and you, her father, are nothing but a coward!"

Gu Yanqiu did not refute.

His hands hung at his sides, his ten fingers slightly curled, his knuckles clenched until they turned white.

Those eyes, usually so lazy and lifeless, were now churning with something incredibly complex—not anger, not resentment, but something deeper than anger and resentment, something that could burn a person alive.

remorse.

Niannian stood there, watching Cheng Tiezhu scold Gu Yanqiu, and then looked at Gu Yanqiu who was squatting on the ground without saying a word.

She bit her lip.

Then, she took a step.

It's a very small step.

Heading towards Gu Yanqiu's direction.

Another step forward.

One more step.

Step by step, like a frightened kitten, she tentatively and cautiously moved toward the man squatting on the ground.

Gu Yanqiu looked up and saw Niannian walking over.

He didn't move.

He dared not move.

He was afraid that if he moved again, the child would shrink back.

Niannian walked up to Gu Yanqiu and stretched out a small hand wrapped in gauze.

The hand paused in mid-air—then gently, tentatively, touched Gu Yanqiu's face.

Gu Yanqiu had tears on her face.

Nian Nian's fingertips touched that tear.

Warm, rough skin.

She did not pull her hand back.

"dad."

Niannian's voice was very soft.

"Don't cry. Tell me, what happened between you and your mother?"

Gu Yanqiu closed her eyes and took a deep breath.

When he opened his eyes again, there was a bit more clarity in those cloudy eyes—like the silt at the bottom of a pond being stirred up, finally revealing a stone that had been buried for a long time.

"Your mother and I..." His throat sounded like it was full of sand, "We met in 1959. In the provincial capital."

Cheng Tiezhu's eyebrows twitched, but he didn't interrupt.

"That year I went to the provincial capital to do odd jobs, carrying paper in a printing factory. Your mother worked as a temporary copyist in the factory's library—she was educated and had beautiful handwriting."

Gu Yanqiu glanced down at the note on the table.

The light from the kerosene lamp shone on it, revealing the neat and upright characters, each stroke elegant yet powerful.

"Her handwriting..." Gu Yanqiu's lips twitched slightly, "Actually, I didn't teach her to write. She taught me. Back then, I couldn't even write my own name properly, and she taught me to recognize each character one by one."

He paused.

"But those few words on the note—'Gu Yanqiu'—were written by me, step by step. She said my name has many strokes and she always misspells it. So I held her hand and wrote it stroke by stroke. I wrote it many times."

His voice grew softer and softer, as if he were talking to someone who didn't exist.

"I stayed in the provincial capital for almost a year. That was the most human year I've ever lived in my life."

When he said this, Cheng Tiezhu's expression changed slightly.

"Your mother is beautiful." Gu Yanqiu looked at Niannian's face, his gaze sweeping from her eyebrows to her eyes, and then from her eyes to the corners of her mouth.

"You look just like your mother."

He reached out—this time, the movement was extremely slow and gentle, as if he were touching a piece of porcelain that might break at any moment—and his fingertips touched Nian Nian's cheek.

This time, Nian Nian didn't dodge.

Her shoulders twitched, but she gritted her teeth and resisted the instinct to take a half-step back.

Because this hand is different from the others.

Other hands reached out to grab her, pull her, or hit her.

This hand... is shaking.

It was even more afraid than she was.

"Then why did you leave later?" Niannian asked.

Gu Yanqiu withdrew his hand from Niannian's face.

He stopped talking.

The contents of those eyes surged again—like ripples spreading outwards from a deep pool where a stone had been thrown in.

"Because I..."

"Unworthy."

When those two words were squeezed out of Gu Yanqiu's mouth, it was as if he was cutting his own flesh with a knife.

"Your mother is an educated woman. Although her father was already past his prime at that time, he was still from a respectable family. What am I? A laborer from the countryside, barely literate, and unable to even earn enough work points."

"Some people told me that I'm just dragging your mother down by staying with her. They said that if it weren't for me, she could find a decent worker in the city and live a decent life."

He lowered his head, his voice breaking into fragments.

"I believe it."

"I think they're right. I can't give her anything. I can't even support myself."

So I left. Without even saying goodbye.

After he finished speaking, the brigade headquarters remained silent for a long time.

Cheng Tiezhu snapped the cigarette in his hand, scattering bits of tobacco all over the floor. He opened his mouth, hesitated for a long time, and finally just let out a "humph" through his nose.

Niannian lowered her head, her two little hands clutching the hem of her cotton-padded coat.

She understood.

A four-and-a-half-year-old shouldn't understand these things. But she did.

She raised her head and looked into Gu Yanqiu's eyes.

"Dad, was Mom already pregnant when you left?"

Gu Yanqiu's body trembled violently.

He closed his eyes.

"I have no idea."

These three words were the heaviest of all the words he had spoken that night.

do not know.

When he left, Song Wanqing was already pregnant—he may or may not have known—but he didn't stay to confirm it.

He fled.

He ran away like a coward.

Niannian stared at him for a long time.

Then she reached out her two small hands and grabbed Gu Yanqiu's clothes again.

"Mom doesn't blame you."

Niannian's voice was very soft, but every word was like a nail driven into Gu Yanqiu's ears.

"Before my mother died, she told me to come find you. She wrote your name and address on a piece of paper and sewed it into my clothes."

"If she resented you, she wouldn't have let me come."

Gu Yanqiu covered her face.

What seeped from between his fingers was a silent, intense sob that seemed to shake him to pieces.

Cheng Tiezhu couldn't bear to watch any longer, so he turned around and faced the wall.

This tough guy, who had served as a brigade leader for eight years, also had his Adam's apple bobbing up and down.

It wasn't because she was moved by Gu Yanqiu.

I was moved by that four-and-a-half-year-old girl.

She crawled out of the coffin, her fingernails all torn off, her feet frostbitten, and she had walked over a hundred miles—

They found a good-for-nothing.

But she didn't blame him.

She comforted him instead.

Cheng Fulai had already left at the door. Before leaving, he patted the door frame, as if he were patting it to himself.

Cheng Tiezhu waited for a while until Gu Yanqiu's crying gradually subsided before turning around and clearing his throat.

"Alright, stop crying. The child is stronger than you."

He glanced at Niannian, then at Gu Yanqiu, his brows furrowed tightly.

"I've accepted it, so I have. But there's something I need to make clear to you—how do you plan to raise this child?"

Gu Yanqiu raised her head, her eyes red and swollen, her face streaked with tears.

"She's my daughter. I'll raise her."

"How will you support yourself?" Cheng Tiezhu retorted without hesitation. "Look at the shack you live in. The walls are cracked, and the stove hasn't been used in six months. You earn less work points in a month than other people do in three days. How will you support yourself? How will you support yourself?"

Gu Yanqiu was speechless when asked the question.

Cheng Tiezhu's words were like knives, but every cut hit the mark.

Niannian stood between the two adults, her bright black eyes sweeping from Cheng Tiezhu's face to Gu Yanqiu's.

She didn't interrupt.

But her hand never loosened its grip on Gu Yanqiu's clothes.

Cheng Tiezhu sighed and lowered his voice: "You have to go back to the Gu family. No matter what your relationship is with your older brother and your mother, the child needs a place to stay. At least there's a house there to shelter him from the wind."

Gu Yanqiu's expression changed.

Looking back at home.

Those three words were harder for him than climbing over the mountain in front to the ravine behind.

Niannian could feel his body tense up, and his clothes were stretched and wrinkled.

"Dad." Niannian looked up.

Gu Yanqiu looked down at her.

"I'm not afraid," Niannian said.

These three words, spoken by a four-and-a-half-year-old child who had just crawled out of a coffin, carried immense weight.

Gu Yanqiu's Adam's apple bobbed.

He bent down and clumsily—extremely clumsily—picked up Niannian.

Niannian's body was very light, as light as a bundle of dry firewood.

It hurts my hand.

It made his heart ache in waves.

"Let's go," he said in a hoarse voice, "home."

Cheng Tiezhu watched the father and daughter walk out of the brigade headquarters. Nian Nian leaned on Gu Yanqiu's shoulder, her eyes looking over his shoulder and back at Cheng Tiezhu.

That look made Cheng Tiezhu pause in his tracks.

That wasn't a look of farewell.

That is—"Just you wait and see."

Cheng Tiezhu stood at the entrance of the brigade headquarters, watching the two figures disappear into the night of Chengjiawan.

In the distance, a few dogs barked.

The wind made the flag in front of the brigade headquarters flutter loudly.

Cheng Tiezhu threw the cigarette butt on the ground and stomped it out.

He turned and went back into the house, where he saw the note still on the table.

Song Wanqing's handwriting. The strokes are straight and even. The last few characters are crooked and uneven.

It was written by a woman who was about to die.

Before she died, she placed all her hopes on a man who had abandoned her.

Because that man was her daughter's only blood relative.

"Those people from the Gu family..." Cheng Tiezhu muttered to himself, frowning.

He thought of the temperament of Wang Guifang, the old lady of the Gu family—that woman was as protective of her food as a mother hen, and she couldn't tolerate even one more bite of food from her own bloodline, let alone a stranger who suddenly appeared and whose identity was unclear.

Then there's Gu Yanchun, the eldest son of the Gu family—that guy is incredibly shrewd. He always has a smile on his face, but his mind is full of schemes and tricks.

Cheng Tiezhu folded the note and put it in his pocket.

He had a premonition—

This matter is not over.