36: Chapter 36: Searching Up the Mountain 36: Chapter 36: Searching Up the Mountain In the thick mountain forest, the rain woven into a massive curtain lashed painfully against the face, blurring vision.
Wufu carried Ah Jiu on her back, a bamboo basket in front, laboriously making her way down the mountain.
The unconscious weighed the most, her small frame struggling with the weight of a fully grown person was indeed challenging, not to mention trekking through the rain.
Forget it, consider it weight training.
Wufu let out a breath, lifted her hand to wipe the rain from her eyes, and slowly moved forward.
Ah Jiu, dazed and barely conscious, just managed to crack open her eyes and saw only a profile, lips pursed, resolute.
He opened his mouth but said nothing, and passed out again.
Wufu, hearing her name called, was startled.
“Wufu, where are you?”
The calling grew clearer, and straining her eyes, she saw a lean figure in a straw raincoat, holding something in their hand.
Before Wufu could make out who it was, the person fell down but quickly got up again, covered in leaves and mud, in a sorry state.
It was Madam Zhou, her mother!
Watching her approach, something warmed in Wufu’s heart, and she hurriedly responded, “Mother, I’m here!”
The straw-coated Madam Zhou paused, then hurried over.
“It’s raining, how come you’ve come up here?” Wufu frowned and asked, seeing her mother’s sorry state, dirtied face, and scratches, her heart felt both sour and pained, yet mostly moved.
She must have come looking for her out of worry, right?
Indeed, Madam Zhou, running up without stopping, began rambling, “You know it’s raining?
Why didn’t you come back earlier?
With such heavy rain, you scared me to death.” While talking, she waved the item in her hand, which turned out to be another straw raincoat.
Just as she was about to drape it over Wufu, she noticed the person on her daughter’s back, a man?
Madam Zhou turned pale, her hand holding the raincoat stiffened, and she instinctively took a step back, “What, what is this?”
What happened, and why was her daughter carrying a man on her back?
“Oh, I rescued someone,” Wufu explained, “Mother, shall we get down the mountain quickly?” The rain was too heavy.
Madam Zhou was on the verge of saying something, but seeing the person hanging limp, not sure of the circumstance, should they bring him down the mountain?
She wanted to object, but seeing her daughter’s face, she felt her objections were stuck in her throat, unable to utter a single word, her hands and feet restless with anxiety.
“Mother, use the raincoat in your hands to cover him,” Wufu noticed the raincoat in her hand and mentioned it again.
Madam Zhou hesitated for a moment, but still draped the raincoat over, saying, “Wufu, let your mother carry him?”
A young lady’s reputation is important.
What if people see this?
“You can’t, take the bamboo basket for me, let’s go!” Wufu put down the basket she was carrying in front of her and took a step forward.
Madam Zhou quickly picked up the basket, supporting the person slumped on Wufu’s back, and the mother-daughter pair trudged down the mountain, one step deep, one step shallow.
Fortunately, they weren’t far from their home at the foot of the mountain.
When Wufu managed to get the person into their house’s woodshed, her legs gave in, and she collapsed to the ground, gasping for air.
This was Madam Zhou’s requirement: under no circumstances could a foreign man enter the house they lived in.
Even now, had it not been for the pouring rain and the absence of people around, she categorically would not have dared let Wufu bring someone in.
“Wufu, what are we going to do with this person?” Madam Zhou asked, pointing at the man.