At Medical Station 209, Han Qingyu and the others had given up searching the surrounding area.
Too much time had passed; Wu Xu had most likely moved far away by now, and they had already searched every possible nearby location several times over.
For now, their only remaining hope was Plague Chicken's sickeningly mushy idea.
"It's already been a whole day, though," He Tangtang said. "Looks like your terrible idea didn't work either."
"Whether it works or not, we keep trying. It's not like you guys have a better idea anyway." Wen Jifei turned to Han Qingyu and asked, "Wu Xu won't starve to death going into the city, will he? With that taciturn nature of his, he'd never bring himself to beg... He won't turn to robbery, will he?"
"No. A man who insisted on paying me when I returned his spear and gave him two tubes of ointment has his own principles. If he gets hungry, at most he'll head into the mountains. He knows how to forage."
As someone else who was skilled at finding food in the mountains, Han Qingyu added, "What worries me more is that someone might see he's never been to a city and try to push him around. Society is pretty rough these days, after all... And given Wu Xu's worldview and conditioned reflexes, once things cross his tolerance limit, his idea of fighting back would probably be killing people. He'd just slaughter everyone without uttering a single word."
"Pushing him around" was, of course, an understatement. Wu Xu wasn't naturally ruthless either, but who could say for sure? In reality, bad people these days were far worse than one might imagine.
The others began imagining the scenario Han Qingyu described, growing increasingly uneasy.
All they could do was pray to the heavens that he met good people and came back soon. Otherwise, the mess would truly be an absolute nightmare to resolve.
...
The black spear was wrapped tightly in broad, long grass leaves and vines, carried in hand like a stalk of sugarcane—as it had been for a whole day now.
His clothes were decent enough. Although he had returned the coalition autumn combat uniform, Wu Xu was wearing the designer tracksuit He Tangtang had lent him earlier; his own black clothes had been discarded back in Nepal, and he couldn't very well run off naked.
In fact, Wu Xu had only hitched along with a vehicle leaving the medical station the previous night to get out of the mountains, arriving in the city just this morning.
Before this, his only experience with cities had been passing through on the truck bound for Nepal. As a result, everything in this remote little county town left Wu Xu feeling somewhat bewildered and uneasy.
There was no curiosity; most of the time, he wasn't curious about or interested in anything.
The only problem causing Wu Xu anxiety and helplessness was that no one here seemed to know where this "City of Iniquity" was, or how to get there.
Wu Xu had asked many people since leaving the mountains, and the vast majority said they had no idea and had never heard of it.
Only one middle-aged man wearing glasses, who looked like a pedantic scholar, had asked back in confusion, "Are you talking about a prison? Visiting someone?"
Wu Xu thought about it and said, "No."
Another man with an oily sheen on his face had squinted with a strange smirk and asked, "Look at you acting all refined and proper—are you talking about a city with no clothes? Some place where people strip naked, like a red-light alley?"
Wu Xu thought about it and said, "No."
Aside from that, Wu Xu had also discovered that finding food in the city was harder than in the mountains. Getting drinking water was hard too; the gutters here all reeked.
He had no money on him.
Planning to leave town and head into the mountains to spend the night, Wu Xu was currently standing beneath a bulletin board at the entrance of a roadside alley. It was raining, and there was shelter here.
He had no change of clothes.
The rain was fairly heavy, having poured since dusk until around eight in the evening.
Even so, the old, narrow street before Wu Xu remained bustling in the rain. Although there were few vehicles in the small town, once darkness fell, many vendors wheeled out tarpaulin-covered carts along the street, selling all sorts of rice, noodles, fried dishes, and snacks.
Directly across from Wu Xu was a wonton stall: a sheet-metal cart with burning coal beneath, steam billowing from the pot, and an old man and his granddaughter behind it.
The grandfather stood wrapping wontons and greeting customers, while his granddaughter, around seven or eight years old, sat on a small stool beside him. Whenever customers came, she helped hand over bowls and spoons; when there were none, she kept her head down doing homework.
Over the past few hours, she had occasionally looked up to glance at Wu Xu standing across the street.
Her grandfather had done the same.
Wu Xu, however, hadn't looked at either of them.
The rain let up a little.
There were no customers at the stall for the moment, but the old man still boiled a bowl of wontons. Once cooked through, he ladled them out into a large bowl already prepared with seasoning, then added half a bowl of hot water to bring out the broth.
"Put a spoon in," the grandfather said, gesturing to his granddaughter. "Take it over to that older brother across the street. I've watched him standing there for quite a while. Remember to tell him it's free."
The porcelain spoon clicked as it dropped into the bowl.
"Okay." The little girl stood up, glanced across at Wu Xu, wiped her hands on her clothes, and held the upper rim of the bowl with both hands. Waiting for a lull in pedestrian traffic, she hurried across the street.
"Here," the little girl said, holding up the large bowl as she looked up at him.
Wu Xu looked down at her and said nothing.
"Big brother, you must be hungry, right? This is for you to eat—it's free." As she said it was free, the little girl shook her head for emphasis, her ponytail swishing behind her.
"Go ahead and eat, young fellow! I just happened to make too many on a rainy day like this," the old man called out with a warm smile from across the street. "When a man's far from home, who doesn't hit hard times now and then? Eat up!"
Wu Xu hesitated, then shook his head. "No need."
"But it's burning my hands," the little girl whined coaxingly, looking aggrieved.
Seeing her knit her brows, Wu Xu had no choice but to reach out and take the bowl first.
"Hehe." The little girl giggled while pinching her earlobes with both hands, then clasped them behind her back. "Eat up, big brother... I'll wait here for the bowl."
With that, she stepped beside Wu Xu, turned her face up to look at him, her eyes and mouth beaming.
"...Thank you." Wu Xu lowered his head and took a sip of broth. It was very hot, very warming.
"Try a wonton," the little girl suggested, standing on tiptoe as she nudged the spoon around the rim into Wu Xu's hand.
Wu Xu leaned his spear against the bulletin board. "Mm." Taking the spoon, he scooped up a wonton and put it into his mouth.
"Hehe, our wontons are delicious, aren't they?"
"Delicious."
"Mm! But you're so tall, big brother. Talking to you makes my neck sore. How about you squat down to eat?"
"...Okay."
Wu Xu squatted down and ate the wontons, feeling a little self-conscious.
"I don't have any money right now," he stated once more on his own initiative.
"It doesn't cost any money!" the little girl said. Then she looked back at the bulletin board behind him, looking slightly embarrassed, and whispered, "Is that sugarcane? I actually really love sugarcane too, but I can't eat very much—just a little piece is enough."
"..." Wu Xu thought for a moment, then understood. With a slightly awkward look in his eyes, he said, "This isn't sugarcane."
"Oh, hehe." The little girl gave an embarrassed chuckle. Amused with herself for being greedy, she giggled for a good while, then whispered, "Don't tell my grandpa, okay?"
Wu Xu nodded and finished the wontons in silence. Only when handing back the bowl did he suddenly ask, "Will you keep the wonton stall open for longer?"
"Mm, we'll keep it open. Till pretty late," the little girl answered, though looking somewhat confused.
"Then wait for me a little while."
Having said that, Wu Xu stood up, picked up his spear, and left the street.
He left the little girl holding the empty bowl with a bewildered look on her face.
Once he reached a secluded spot, Wu Xu broke into a sprint. He remembered seeing an incompletely harvested sugarcane field at the foot of the distant mountains on the city outskirts before entering town. Although it was just leftovers from the harvest, if he picked through them, he should still be able to find some that were edible.
Just like that, in a little under an hour, through the curtain of rain, the grandfather and granddaughter saw Wu Xu return. Covered in mud and rainwater, he carried a bundle of sugarcane—at least twenty-odd stalks—over his shoulder. Walking up to their stall, he set it down. "Thank you... sugarcane."
"This... you... Oh, young fellow, why do you have to be so stubborn and honest..."
The old man had a helpless look, seemingly wanting to decline, but Wu Xu had already turned around, preparing to leave.
After taking about two steps, his footsteps paused.
Chapter 153