Chapter Thirty-Seven: Wild Skirmish in the Open Fields

The woman was still in a daze, her tears smudging her makeup, looking as disheveled and miserable as one could be. Hu Bi guessed that Zheng Nanfang and the others would be arriving soon, so he stopped wasting time. He opened the car door, pointed at the woman, and said, "I'm not forcing you. It's your choice. Hang yourself or get in the car. I can't promise I can get you and your kid into the Upper City, but I'm not taking your stuff for free. As long as I live, you'll live too."

"Big brother... I..." The woman finally snapped back to reality, understanding the intentions of this wild outlaw. Her eyes were filled with a mixture of sorrow and surprise, as if she had survived a disaster and found some relief in it.

"Enough talk, hurry up, or some other convoy will beat us to it." Hu Bi shoved the woman into the car, glanced at her pale chest, licked his lips, then slammed on the gas and sped into the forest, where dawn was just breaking.

...

The first part of the woods was not as difficult to drive through as Hu Bi had imagined. The vegetation at the forest's edge wasn't dense, and the trees were small, so driving wasn't much of a problem.

The real trouble began a few hundred meters in. The deeper they went, the thicker the vegetation grew. The trees were old and thick, most of them needing two people to encircle their trunks. The canopy blocked out the sky, and countless vines crisscrossed the forest.

Hu Bi decided not to push his luck, stopped the car in a relatively open spot, took his gun and knife, and followed the woman to where the car had crashed.

"Hey, what's your name?"

Maybe it was because he'd been around Zheng Nanfang for a while, but Hu Bi had started asking people's names too.

The woman, wrapped in a shirt and staggering, looked back at Hu Bi and forced a pitiful smile. "Wenwen."

"Alright." Hu Bi nodded, feeling a bit awkward. After asking her name, he didn't know what else to say. Introducing himself was out of the question.

They walked in silence for more than ten minutes, stumbling through the undergrowth, until they saw a gully in the distance. Just as the woman had said, the van had plunged nose-first into the ditch, its rear end sticking up to the sky.

"This is the place." The woman pointed ahead, slowing her pace, and started to sob again.

Hu Bi was growing impatient, but considering the woman's husband’s body was here, he refrained from scolding her and let her vent her emotions.

They drew closer to the gully. Hu Bi drew his pistol and scanned the area. Aside from some brake marks and scattered footprints, there was nothing unusual. He sniffed the air and caught the scent of leaking fuel.

He concluded the woman had told the truth, relaxed a little, holstered his pistol, drew his machete, and shattered the rear window with the handle.

Inside, it was a mess. Just as the woman had said: bottled water, compressed biscuits, dried meat, pickled vegetables, homemade cigarettes—piled nearly to the brim. But because of the accident, everything had spilled towards the front, burying the seats.

"Did you get your husband out?" Hu Bi peered into the driver's cabin, but there was too much debris to see anything except the cracked windshield.

The woman shook her head sadly. "I couldn't move him."

"We'll get the supplies out first, then burn the car—consider it a cremation." Hu Bi rolled up his sleeves and started hauling supplies. He muttered, "Guess I've done all I can here."

"Thank you, big brother." The woman stood behind the car, staring blankly at the front, lost in thought.

There was a lot of stuff, all scattered throughout the car. Everything was useful or edible. Hu Bi didn't want to leave anything behind. But he only had two hands, and crawling half into the car made it hard to reach everything.

"Hey, come help out!" Hu Bi crawled out, annoyed. "I'm too big to fit in there. You climb in and hand me the stuff."

The woman glanced at the front of the car, hesitated, and said, "I... I don’t want to go in..."

"Stop making a fuss." Hu Bi glared at her, reached in to lift the hatch, and forcibly dragged her over. "Step on the back seat, grab what you can and toss it out. I'll find us a bag."

"There’s a bag over there." The woman suddenly perked up and pointed near the driver's seat. "It's underneath. I'm not strong enough to pull it out. If you get the bag, I’ll go in."

Hu Bi shook his head, inwardly cursing the woman's trouble and uselessness. He couldn't understand how Zheng Nanfang could stand traveling with three women and still enjoy it.

Annoyed as he was, the work still had to be done. Hu Bi leaned in, but the slant of the car made it awkward. He dragged himself along the edge of the trunk, inching forward.

"Hold onto my leg so I don't slide in," Hu Bi called out.

"Okay, I got it," the woman replied, running over and wrapping her arms around his legs.

Hu Bi braced himself at the edge, reached for the cloth bag wedged among the debris, and gave it a tug—it was heavy.

---

Hu Bi frowned. Something didn’t feel right. He was about to say something when a sense of alarm flashed in his mind. He whipped out his knife and stabbed toward the driver's seat.

At the very moment he struck, the woman clutching his legs gave a mighty heave, and Hu Bi, along with the bag, was thrown into the van. The rear door slammed shut behind him.

"Son of a bitch!" Hu Bi instantly realized he'd been set up. He drew his gun and fired, shots punching holes in the car's rear, but the woman was already gone.

Knife in one hand, gun in the other, Hu Bi listened for movement outside and poked the driver's seat with his blade—there was no body. He cursed under his breath, stowed the machete, clamped the gun between his teeth, and, using the back seat for leverage, hauled himself up and hooked his arms over the shattered window, pulling half his body out.

Thud.

As his torso cleared the window, his face met an iron bar.

His vision blurred. Pain exploded in his head like a truck had hit him, and the gun was yanked from his teeth. His jaw throbbed, and stars burst behind his eyes as he crashed back into the car.

“Is he dead?”

“He should be. Go finish him off.”

As he lay there, head spinning, Hu Bi heard a man and woman talking outside the window. He pressed a hand to his forehead and felt wet heat—at least his skull wasn't cracked.

“Damn it, ambushed in a ditch,” he cursed. He knew he was in trouble—trapped in the car, gun in the enemy's hands, no room to dodge. He was as good as dead. He lay still, deciding not to move.

But no shots came.

Hu Bi opened one eye. No one was at the window. Then he heard a familiar engine roar—Redbird. They’d driven off?

Still alive, he saw a chance. Ignoring the pain in his skull, he rolled over, heard footsteps returning, and realized this was his only chance to escape. He clawed aside the debris beneath him, squeezed through, and smashed out the front windshield, tumbling out with a cascade of supplies nearly burying him again.

He made it out, drew his knife, and ducked into the space between the car and the gully.

Footsteps returned. The man exclaimed, “He’s gone!”

“Let him go. If that blow didn’t kill him, it crippled him,” the woman replied, her tone now cold and vicious, a far cry from the weeping figure she'd been moments before.

Hu Bi sneered in the shadows. He cursed his own stupidity for falling for such a trick, but he was already plotting his revenge.

The pair seemed unconcerned. The woman scanned the area while the man gathered supplies.

Because the windshield had been smashed, most of the goods had fallen into the ditch. The man had to climb down and collect them.

Hu Bi held back. He knew the woman had the gun, and with the gully so narrow and her above, he’d be an easy target.

The man passed alarmingly close to Hu Bi, but it was dark in the woods, and they assumed he’d fled. They never thought to check the gap beneath the car.

Hu Bi ignored the man, instead watching the woman’s shadow for an opening.

The man filled a bag with supplies and returned to the edge of the gully. “Wenwen, give me a hand.”

Hu Bi held his breath, watching the woman’s shadow shift as she bent to grab the bag. He silently counted down, and as she said “Push it up,” he sprang from the shadows, ignoring the man, and leaped up, grabbing the woman’s ankle and yanking her and the bag into the ditch.

Cries and groans filled the air as the three of them tumbled together.

Hu Bi and the woman scrambled to their feet first. Hu Bi swung his knife to strike, but the woman fired a shot.

Blood blossomed from his shoulder, and Hu Bi was knocked to the ground. Before he could get up, the man tackled him from behind, locking his arm around Hu Bi’s neck.

“Shoot him! Kill him!” the man screamed, but he was no match for Hu Bi’s strength—even wounded and enraged, Hu Bi was far more powerful than this frail scholar.

The woman had fired once, but she was still shaken. She ran over to finish the job, but saw that Hu Bi was already standing, the man hanging off his neck like a koala, feet off the ground.

She raised the gun to aim, but the man’s body made a perfect shield. She shouted, “Let go!”

Hu Bi, furious, gave a cold laugh. Now you want to let go? Too late!

---

With this in mind, he suddenly dropped to one knee, grabbed the man’s arm that was choking him, and reached back with the other hand, his bear-like paw clamping onto the man’s face.

The woman couldn’t see what was happening and tried to circle around for a clear shot, but the ditch was too narrow—she’d need Hu Bi to move aside to get past.

But Hu Bi was like a crazed bear now. The man had lost all control and was being swung around like a puppet, his stomach lurching.

The woman knew he couldn’t last much longer. She gritted her teeth and pulled the trigger, but the shot caught the man in the buttocks.

Hu Bi was startled—this woman was ruthless. Not daring to struggle further, he took a few running steps and then threw himself backward to the ground.

The woman thought she heard bones crack.

Weighing nearly two hundred pounds, Hu Bi’s suplex broke several of the man’s ribs, nearly squeezing the life out of him.

Terrified, the woman ignored her companion and fired several shots at the ground.

Hu Bi, prepared for this, rolled the man beneath him as he landed, and the bullets all struck the man’s back—he was doomed.

Hu Bi spat out blood, grinned savagely, and rose to his feet, eyes blazing. “Come on, sweetheart, let’s keep going.”

The woman pulled the trigger again, but only heard the click of an empty chamber.

Hu Bi laughed. He’d fired a few rounds in the car, and the woman had emptied the rest. The gun was out of bullets.

He gave her no time to recover. With a roar, he pounced like a bear, tackled her to the ground, and raised his massive fist to strike.

But this seemingly delicate woman was just as fierce. Instead of shielding herself, she clawed at Hu Bi’s crotch, clamping down on him with all her strength.

“Aaaargh!” Hu Bi’s roar turned into a strangled gasp. His raised fist froze mid-air, his bloodied face twisted with pain as he tried to pry her hand away. But the woman was determined to take him down with her—no matter how hard he tried, she only squeezed harder, her nails nearly breaking.

Hu Bi had survived countless gunshot and knife wounds in the Lower City, but this was the first time his manhood had come under attack.

“Let go, you bitch!” Hu Bi was frantic. He’d only meant to teach her a lesson, but now she had him in a death grip, and he was truly enraged. He reached for the machete on the ground.

The woman, sly as ever, saw his move and squeezed even harder. Hu Bi gasped in pain, nearly collapsing on top of her. He punched her in the forehead, but she took the blow without flinching, refusing to let go.

“You filthy animal...” Hu Bi was nearly in tears, unable to break free, his lower body in agony, his punches growing weaker. He felt like something was about to burst. In a desperate move, he twisted and landed a blow between the woman’s legs.

Now they were both hurt.

A man built like a bear and a voluptuous woman both curled up on the ground like boiled shrimp, clutching themselves and wailing in pain.

Hu Bi, tough as he was, at least had the protection of thick, dirty jeans. The woman wasn’t so lucky—her sensitive spot, covered only by a skirt, took the full force of his blow.

“You bastard... hitting a woman there... you perverted swine...” This time, the woman was truly crying—from pain.

Hu Bi was in no better shape. Through gritted teeth, he spat back, “You treacherous bitch, I tried to help you and you set me up.”

Thinking of her deception only fueled his anger. Ignoring the pain in his groin, Hu Bi staggered over to her, face twisted with rage. “Faking a pregnancy to trick me? I’ll show you pregnant!” With that, he punched her hard in the stomach.

The woman nearly doubled over, gasping and retching bile onto the ground.

“I give up. Just kill me,” she said, tears and snot streaming down her face, but her words still defiant. “Do it. Make it quick.”

“In your dreams! I’ll show you what it means to wish you were dead!” Hu Bi, beside himself with fury, yanked her arms behind her back, dislocating both shoulders with two sharp cracks. He tore open her skirt, forced her legs apart, and, unbuckling his belt, spat, “If my manhood’s ruined, I’ll use your mouth as my chamber pot!”