Chapter 393: Face

The sky was just beginning to brighten, and the sound of roosters crowing could be heard from afar from time to time.

Covered in dust and dirt, Duan Rong crawled out from a dirt hole; his hair, face, and neck were all covered in fine bits of soil.

He had an iron shovel tucked into his waist. As he climbed up, Ximen Kankan and Liu Shushan were sitting there catching their breath, both of their foreheads covered in a thin layer of sweat, their eyes weary from exhaustion.

Four or five days had already passed, and the inner rooms on both the east and west sides of the main hall were piled high with the excavated dirt.

Actually, it was fine at the beginning; the tunnel wasn't long, and the two of them could easily haul out the dirt Duan Rong shoveled. But as the tunnel grew longer, their workload doubled accordingly.

The tunnel was cramped, and carrying a basket of dirt out each time was quite physically demanding. The key was that Duan Rong dug very quickly, and the two of them had to take turns just to barely keep up with his progress.

Watching Duan Rong crawl out, both of them let out a sigh of relief. This night of labor had finally been endured.

In a corner of the main hall, there was fresh water that Liu Shushan had already drawn. Although this house hadn't been lived in for several years, there was a quite sturdily built deep well in the courtyard.

Duan Rong used the fresh water in the basin to wash his hands and face. His neck and body felt as itchy as if they were being pricked by hair, and he knew it was the irritation from the dirt.

While wiping his face with a towel, he turned around and shrugged his shoulders, shaking them; immediately, there was a rustling sound from inside his clothes.

Ximen Kankan and Liu Shushan looked at him, and all three of them smiled slightly.

On a wooden table that had warped over time, with one corner tilted upward, they took out their dry rations.

Actually, the dry rations Liu Shushan had prepared were quite good, with sesame cakes, dried meat, and some pickled vegetables. They drank fresh water and began to eat.

All three were hungry, and they ate in silence; the sound of chewing filled the quiet house.

Liu Shushan swallowed a piece of cake with some pickled vegetables and glanced at Duan Rong, who was sitting opposite him with a grave expression.

Over these past four or five days, many of his thoughts had been slowly changing.

He had initially thought Duan Rong's strategy was absurd, but over these few days, Duan Rong had worked silently and diligently every day, and he could sense a kind of self-confidence from Duan Rong—a confidence born from careful consideration and the certainty that he could control the direction of events.

Furthermore, Duan Rong had him buy that large sack of things, yet much of it hadn't even been used yet. Duan Rong's plan was definitely not as simple as just digging a tunnel across.

If it were just a matter of digging a tunnel across, even if they rescued Shen Yanliu, how could they guarantee that none of them would be exposed?

If Shen Yanliu were rescued, Chen Xun and his men would be the first to latch onto Shen Mizhi, and Xiao Yu had returned to handle the case with Shen Mizhi; if one thing led to another, wouldn't they all be pursued?

Although Liu Shushan was certain that Duan Rong must have a clever plan in mind, he himself could rack his brains and still not figure out how they could rescue Shen Yanliu without attracting pursuit from Chen Xun and his men. This seemed fundamentally impossible!

As Liu Shushan thought this, Duan Rong had already finished eating. He wiped his mouth, gulped down some more fresh water, and went to lie down on the pile of hay in the corner to sleep.

Early morning, inside the rear hall flower room of the Prefecture Government Office.

Chen Xun had already risen early. While eating breakfast, he looked over the several depositions and the attached materials in his hand.

These were the detailed materials Li Hong had investigated regarding the father-daughter relationship between Shen Yanliu and his daughter.

What caught Chen Xun's attention most was a point in the deposition of Qiuhun, Shen Mizhi's personal attendant.

According to Qiuhun, when Shen Mizhi felt distressed, she had a tendency toward self-harm, and there were several scars on her arms that she had inflicted herself. It was just that Shen Mizhi never let her tell anyone about this.

By the time Chen Xun finished his breakfast, he had already read through all the investigative materials.

His fingers tapped lightly on the rosewood round table, and he pondered with deep, thoughtful eyes.

"Could it be that this girl is harboring resentment toward her father in her heart?" Chen Xun speculated, his eyes flickering.

There was another detail in the materials: Shen Mizhi's mother had passed away from illness when she was young, and at that time, Shen Yanliu had not been by their side.

Chen Xun suddenly muttered to himself: "Put yourself in her shoes. Such a father, such a dead end. Giving up on the rescue and drawing a clear line, although it would bring the infamy of being unfilial, is still better than ruining one's own life."

When Chen Xun walked out of the flower room, he had already put the matter of Shen Mizhi aside in his heart. Although he still instructed Li Hong to notify the people over there to keep a close watch on Shen Mizhi, he no longer felt this was any abnormal sign.

It turned out that it wasn't that the situation was abnormal; it was that the person was abnormal.

Late at night on the ninth day, after many consecutive days of labor, the tunnel was finally dug to the predetermined position ahead of the deadline.

With his Divine Sense Projection, Duan Rong enveloped the surroundings; here at the end of the tunnel, he was only about half a zhang away from the target prison cell above.

But now was not the time to dig through; the timing was not right, and he still had much preparatory work to do.

Duan Rong then retreated from the tunnel and, in the night, took Ximen Kankan and Liu Shushan away from the place and returned to Liu Shushan's Separate Courtyard.

All three were covered in dust and dirt, and their clothes, shoes, and socks were filled with soil debris.

Liu Shushan found three clean sets of clothes, and the three of them stripped naked right by the well and began to bathe.

While scrubbing soap on his body, Ximen Kankan stared at Liu Shushan's dark buttocks and said, "Shushan, your physique is still quite good, it's just that your buttocks are small and thin!"

Liu Shushan glared at him and said, "Get lost. Stop commenting on my buttocks."

Ximen Kankan picked up a towel and, while scrubbing himself, began to whistle. As he whistled, he started to sing: "Liu Shushan's buttocks are white, the older he gets, the richer he'll be. Liu Shushan's buttocks are black, the older he gets, the more he'll enjoy life."

Liu Shushan's complexion immediately became even darker than his buttocks.

Just as Ximen Kankan was singing happily, Liu Shushan suddenly kicked Ximen Kankan, causing him to stagger, and this kick left a black mud footprint on Ximen Kankan's big white buttocks.

Because of their bathing, the area by the well was already quite slippery. Ximen Kankan barely managed not to fall; he reached back to touch his buttocks and found his hand covered in black mud.

"Alright! You started it!"

As Ximen Kankan said this, he wiped his buttocks with his towel and flung it at Liu Shushan's face. The two of them immediately began chasing each other around the courtyard, naked.

After playing around for a while, they suddenly discovered that Duan Rong, who had been by the well, was gone. They walked over to look and saw that one of the three clean sets of clothes that had been hanging on the tree by the well was missing.

The two of them stopped playing, immediately rinsed themselves off, put on their clothes, and came to the hall.

As they walked into the hall, they saw that Duan Rong had already emptied everything out of the sack and seemed to be sorting them there.

Just then, a Personal Attendant came over and said that the wontons and steamed buns had been bought.

It was already late at night, and the restaurants had long since closed, but there were still stalls selling wontons on the street. When Liu Shushan went to get clean clothes for the three of them, he had instructed the Personal Attendant to go to the street and buy some back.

Liu Shushan walked out of the hall and took the food; the Personal Attendant then exited the Separate Courtyard. Liu Shushan had already instructed them that they were not to enter unless summoned.

Just as Liu Shushan brought the food in, Ximen Kankan took it and began slurping it down. Having eaten dry cakes and dried meat for eight or nine days, he had long since felt like vomiting; eating these hot meals now, even if they were just wontons and steamed buns, felt as good as Eight Treasure Gourd Duck.

"These wontons are really good. Duan Rong, if you don't eat, there won't be any left in a moment," Ximen Kankan shouted at Duan Rong.

Duan Rong slowly stood up, walked sideways to the table, and looked at the things laid out on the ground.

The things that had originally been in the sack were now neatly arranged on the floor by him; a dense array of items almost filled a corner of the Main Hall.

Duan Rong sat at the table, slurping wontons while his eyes remained fixed on the items on the ground, a look of contemplation occasionally flashing in his eyes.

Ximen Kankan turned his head to look at the things on the ground, then looked at Duan Rong, and stopped talking; he could feel that Duan Rong was under quite a lot of pressure at this moment.

Tomorrow will be the tenth day, and Duan Rong's plan has clearly reached its final, critical juncture.

After they finished eating, Duan Rong crouched back in the corner and began tinkering with that pile of things.

Liu Shushan asked, "Brother Duan, do you need the two of us to give you a hand?"

"No need. Go and get some rest."

Ximen Kankan and Liu Shushan were indeed tired; for the past eight or nine days, they had been engaged in high-intensity labor, so the two exchanged a glance and went off to rest.

Duan Rong tinkered there for a long time before suddenly coming into the courtyard; he found some dead branches and dry leaves, gathered them into a pile on the open ground at the entrance of the Main Hall, and lit them with a Fire Folder.

He then placed a small porcelain pot on top of the woodpile to heat; inside the small porcelain pot were already one black and two waxy-yellow objects, and as the pot heated up, it emitted a sizzling sound of hot oil, wisps of blue smoke began to rise, and the entire courtyard became permeated with a nauseating, foul odor...

As the temperature rose, Duan Rong continued to add various things into it...

The next morning, Ximen Kankan and Liu Shushan, having had a sleep, came to the Main Hall again and found that Duan Rong was still tinkering there. It was just that his main workspace had shifted to the open ground at the entrance of the Main Hall, which had already been left in a mess by him, and the air was filled with waves of strange odors; Duan Rong's eyes were bloodshot, clearly showing that what he was making was very taxing on his mind.

Ximen Kankan and Liu Shushan stood there, but Duan Rong walked past as if he didn't see them at all; he was seen shuttling back and forth, constantly picking up this and then picking up that.

Standing there, the two felt they were in the way; at this moment, they couldn't even bring themselves to ask if Duan Rong needed an assistant, because the objects covering the ground were in such a chaotic mess, yet Duan Rong was shuttling through them rapidly, picking things up and putting them down, and after watching for a while, they felt dizzy and dazzled—how could they possibly help?

The two quickly retreated from this area, leaving this space for Duan Rong to be in alone.

This was the way that made him most efficient.

It was not until noon that Duan Rong finally stopped; he was seen peeling a layer of skin off a wooden carving.

It was a lifelike human face; although it was still just a skin, the features already looked quite three-dimensional, except that on the right cheek of the skin, there was a small hole the size of a mung bean, which at first glance looked like a fly was crawling there.

And the wooden carving from which the skin had been peeled was carved onto a wooden post; if someone were present at this moment, they would be able to see that the wooden carving was precisely Shen Yanliu, with features that were vivid and lifelike, and an expression that was deeply incisive.

Looking at the skin in his hand, which was slightly translucent in the midday sun, Duan Rong suddenly gave a wicked, evil smile, his eyes turning red.

(End of this chapter)