The Fortunate Lady and Her Mountain Man

Chapter 194: Chapter 194: A Scary Face

With every shout, Hu Dacheng threw a punch.

The boy was built like a young bull. Though not yet a man, his strength was not to be underestimated; even Hu Liang couldn’t beat him in an arm wrestle.

Faced with Hu Dacheng’s flurry of kicks and punches, the vagrant made no attempt to fight back. He simply covered his head with his hands, his tall frame curled up in the corner, neither dodging nor crying out.

Hu Dacheng hated this man with a passion!

He had been on edge ever since Dabao went missing, and now all his pent-up emotions erupted, channeled through brute force and unleashed upon the vagrant.

Hu Liang stood to the side, making no move to stop him.

In his eyes, kidnappers were despicable creatures who deserved to be beaten to death.

The sickening thud of each blow landing sounded painful even to a listener.

Ji Huan watched for a moment before noticing something and turning her gaze to Dabao.

Dabao was staring at her profile without so much as a blink, as if the scene of one man beating another had nothing to do with him.

Ji Huan froze, a sense of helplessness washing over her.

’This child... he’s even more cold-hearted than I am.’

"Dacheng, stop," Ji Huan said. "He’s not the one who took Dabao."

Hu Dacheng’s fist stopped mid-air, but his resentful gaze remained fixed on the vagrant.

Hu Liang voiced the question for him.

"How could it not be him? Isn’t it plain as day?"

In his mind, the vagrant was clearly in league with the two kidnappers. He must have scouted the area beforehand and called his accomplices to carry out the abduction. When they were discovered, they split up. The other two created a diversion to draw the villagers’ attention, while this man brought Dabao here.

Hearing Hu Liang’s speculation, Ji Huan felt a little exasperated.

’All this effort, so many people involved... This isn’t kidnapping a child, it’s a treasure heist.’

"What was the situation when you first came in?" Ji Huan asked Hu Liang.

Hu Liang hadn’t really paid attention. He thought for a moment before answering, "I just saw the vagrant and Dabao side-by-side over there..."

"He wasn’t holding onto Dabao, or covering his mouth, was he?"

Hu Liang hesitated, then shook his head. "I guess... no, he wasn’t."

"Well, there you have it."

It was no wonder the two brothers had mistaken the vagrant for a kidnapper. She had thought the same thing at first, after all.

But when she had picked Dabao up just now, she’d noticed a problem.

Dabao had twisted his ankle; it was swollen into a small lump.

Besides, knowing Dabao, if this vagrant had truly meant him harm, the boy would never have stayed so quietly by his side.

When Dabao saw her, he just looked aggrieved. His emotions were relatively stable, not like someone who had been coerced.

Ji Huan pieced together a rough theory.

Ji Mingfang’s sudden appearance must have distracted the kidnappers. Dabao seized the opportunity to escape and tried to run home.

But in his panic and fear, the child wouldn’t have remembered that no one was home and that he didn’t have a key.

He was running frantically on unsteady feet, and as he passed the low shack where the vagrant lived, he must have stumbled and fallen.

The vagrant probably realized bad guys were chasing the boy, so he picked Dabao up and headed into the back hills.

That’s why when Ji Liansong and Ji Xuelan gave chase, they saw those two kidnappers loitering near her house.

They must have been looking for Dabao, too.

If the vagrant had been one of them, then given Dabao’s condition at the time, it would have been like a lamb to the slaughter. He would have been long gone by now.

Hu Dacheng still argued stubbornly, "Then why did he run up the mountain? Wouldn’t it have been better to run into the village and call for help?"

"The mountain was closer. He couldn’t be sure when the kidnappers would leave, so the safest option was to hide well."

"But, with so many people searching and shouting for him, why did he stay hidden...?"

Ji Huan pointed upward. "We’ve been in here for a while. Have you heard any noise from outside?"

Logically, Widow Xie, Shi Yong, and the others had to be searching nearby, but not a sound could be heard inside the cave. All noise seemed to be completely blocked out.

Ji Huan looked at Dabao. "Am I right? Is he a bad man?"

Dabao finally glanced in the vagrant’s direction.

It was only a single glance before his eyes returned to Ji Huan.

He nodded, then shook his head.

The nod meant she was right.

The shake of his head meant the vagrant was not a bad man.

"All... all right..."

It seemed they really had beaten up the wrong person.

Hu Dacheng sheepishly lowered his fists.

He scuffed the tip of his foot on the ground and said awkwardly to the vagrant, "Sorry about that. But you can’t really blame me. You didn’t say anything, so how was I supposed to know? Besides, you’re a big guy. How could you be scared of two crooks...?"

"Dacheng!" Hu Liang shot him a glare. He’d beaten the wrong person and still had the nerve to complain.

Ji Huan walked over, still holding Dabao. The vagrant seemed to flinch reflexively, his hands still clasped over his head in a posture of complete submission.

Ji Huan studied him carefully, but his face was obscured by a messy tangle of dirty hair, making his expression impossible to read.

Being closer, Hu Dacheng simply pushed the hair covering the man’s face to either side.

First, he froze.

Then, as if his hand had been scalded, he let out a yelp and jumped back.

His eyes looked like he’d seen a ghost.

A horrifying face was revealed to the four of them.

Hu Dacheng started screaming uncontrollably, and even the braver Hu Liang was badly frightened.

Ji Huan was facing the vagrant directly, so the shock was even more visceral for her.

The man’s face was a dense web of knife scars.

The wounds had already scarred over, leaving a mass of reddish-brown welts that looked like centipedes crawling on his flesh. In the torchlight, the sight was especially terrifying, like something straight out of a horror movie.

The vagrant kept his head lowered and didn’t immediately try to pull his hair back over his face, as if unaware of the horror it would instill in others.

Ji Huan snapped out of her stupor, her lips twitching into a stiff line.

"So, you’re not a simpleton after all. You can walk?"

A flicker of anger had been smoldering within her.

It was partly indignation at being deceived, but also a lingering fear.

Just imagine: an able-bodied man pretending to be crippled and simple-minded, loitering right at her doorstep. If he was only trying to swindle some food and drink, that would be one thing. But if he had harbored any malicious intent, she and Dabao, with their pathetically weak fighting skills, would have been completely at his mercy.

However, from the looks of it, the vagrant seemed to know right from wrong. For the simple fact that he had saved Dabao, Ji Huan decided to let bygones be bygones.

Besides, he probably pretended to be crippled out of desperation.

’With a face like that, he’d have a hard time begging for food on the streets. He’d be lucky not to get chased away. Otherwise, he never would have ended up in Dafeng Village... ’

Ji Huan didn’t get a response from him, not that she cared.

With a "Let’s go," she was the first to turn and head toward the cave entrance.

Hu Liang and Hu Dacheng followed with the torches.

Once outside, they realized the vagrant hadn’t come out.

The group exchanged glances and went back to where they had left him.

The vagrant was bracing himself against the wall with one hand, shuffling along little by little.

Ji Huan’s gaze shifted downward and froze.

The vagrant was putting all his weight on his right leg. His left leg, he was dragging.

Hu Dacheng whispered, "Why is he still pretending?"

Ji Huan shook her head and said to him, "You were the one who beat him up, so you can be the one to help him back."

Hu Dacheng’s face instantly soured, his reluctance plain to see.

Nevertheless, he obediently went over, draped one of the vagrant’s arms over his shoulder, and pinched his nose. "Y-You be careful! Don’t you drag me down with you if you fall."

As he spoke, he craned his head far to the side, not daring to look at the vagrant.

It certainly took courage to look that face in the eye.

Ji Huan whispered a few words to Hu Liang, who then stepped forward and pulled the vagrant’s hair back down to cover his face.

It was late at night, and it wouldn’t do to frighten people when they went outside.

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