Release that Man

Those who had any experience of suffering from a bad connection on the phone must have felt this pain before. Inside an elevator, underground, or in places with bad connectivity, even when you wanted to make an important phone call, you looked at the empty phone signal helplessly. That feeling of urgency and helplessness, as long as you had experienced it once, you would remember it for life. As a person who trampled on the electronic world and relied on the internet and phone signals to do his job, Anthony’s hatred for this backward place only grew. He had been too focused on his work earlier to realize what was being said. But now that he thought about it, the term ‘underground cellar’ managed to pull his hatred level through the roof.

“How deep is this cellar? Do you think the place is heavily sealed? Based on your observation, do you think the depth will interrupt the transfer of signal information?” Anthony puffed up his cheeks unhappily and looked at Su Zheng with resentment.

Su Zheng was sitting next to Ye Shuang. When she heard the question, she hugged her knees and rested her chin on them to think about it. “I couldn’t tell how deep it was from the outside, but it looked quite spacious. Plus, isn’t the purpose of making a cellar for it to be sealed? Otherwise, the things could have been placed outside.”

Anthony groaned. “I knew it! I knew that would be the case!”

Then he pushed the laptop away and bounced up from the ground. He stomped angrily. “That’s why I hate your country’s cellars! Why is there a need for such a backward architectural design? Why does such an evil space exist? To store food? Couldn’t you have used the fridge‽”

“The fridge is not large enough.” Ye Shuang sighed. “Calm down, Tony. That is not the key question. You’re so agitated because you’re worried the cellars are the signal collection blind spot?”

“Of course!” Anthony sat back down with a defeated sigh. He pulled back the laptop and continued to work unhappily. The heavy sound of the fingers landing on the keyboard expressed his dissatisfaction. “There are several issues with underground cellars. First, they normally only have one exit. There has to be a clear path at the entrance. Secondly, the signal coming from underground will not be collected remotely. In other words, if there’s a problem there, we will have to search through them physically one by one.”

“The situation really could not be worse.” Ye Shuang sighed again, feeling her mood drop to rock bottom. It crushed her whole spirit. “This sounds like it’s going to be a fight, but I’m running out of juice. Is there really nothing to eat?”

The topic skipped so fast that Su Zheng looked at her with worry. “Brother Shuang, are you sure you don’t need me to steal some potatoes for you?”

“A man can stand to be hungry for one or two meals.” Anthony shrugged it off and was still focused on the problem of the cellar. “I don’t think I’ve prepared nearly enough. Which one of you can help me install a signal pole?”

“The size of the signal pole and the signal receptors that you’ve dropped aside, even if the villagers are blind, it’s too late to put in the pole now. Look, there are people coming back from the village already.” Su Zheng grabbed the binoculars, leaned on the ground, and glanced at Nature Village. Then she slid back down to sigh. Her tone was heavy with regret. “There goes the chance to steal the potatoes.”

Anthony pulled on his hair. “Enough, can we please stop talking about potatoes?”

“…You two continue, I’ll go find some grass.”

…

Ye Shuang finally surrendered to hunger and decided to leave, handing over the planning for their next step of action to the other two. As the main combat force, she felt like she had to maintain at least some kind of strength to face the possibility of a fight. Therefore, Ye Shuang decided to go and dig something to eat. Of course, she would not go and dig at someone’s cellar. Nature Village’s biggest selling point was their farming produce. Every family had a plantation, a farm, or a fish point. At worst, she would pay them twice the price for the items she ‘borrowed’. First, she had to guarantee that she would not die from hunger. For the first time in her life, Ye Shuang was actually on someone’s farm stealing their vegetables. She consoled herself as she waded into a corn field…

“What are you doing? You… No, please don’t…”

“Shut—”

“Help! Help… Ahhh!”

“Shut up, or I’ll kill you!”

Holding an ear of corn in her left hand and pulling on another ear with her right, hearing the background sound that was filled with countryside accents, she suddenly realized that the world was really filled with surprises.

A corn field, a kindling storage room, a wild forest… the common places where sexual attacks happened according to Chinese movies… that was not a lie.

Was this the punishment for her stealing the corns? Should she have gone to the cellars to steal some cabbage? She merely thought that the field was closer!

Ye Shuang was mixed with anger and sadness. Even though the best choice at this moment was to slip away without being noticed, as a female, to do nothing when one heard the occurrence of such a tragedy was difficult. Biting the corn in her mouth, Ye Shuang hesitated for two seconds before she turned around and rushed toward the source of the commotion. Soon, before a piece of squashed land, she saw a girl with ponytails and a voluptuous figure, so much so that her shirt was stretched around her chest area. Her clothes were torn halfway through, and a man used one of his hand to press the girl to the ground while the other was pulling on the girl’s clothes.

It seemed like she was not too late.

Ye Shuang sighed in relief and rushed over with quick steps. She kicked. In the girl’s shocked gaze, the kick landed on the man’s waist. Before the latter realized anything, he was sent flying four meters through the air. He landed on a piece of corn stalk. Then the pain came from his waist and elbow. The man was writhing in pain, curled on the ground, moaning, unable to get up.

Ye Shuang had tried her best to control her strength. She glanced at the man but did not say anything. Then, she squatted down to check on the girl. “Are you okay?”

The girl with the ponytail was still in shock from what had happened. Even when facing Brother Shuang’s handsomeness, she involuntarily curled backward. Her body crawled two steps backs, and she kept her hands around her chest. As she spoke, her tears slid down her face. “I… I… I’m fine…”

“Good.” Ye Shuang did not pressure the girl. She allowed her time to calm down. She thought about it and extended her a hand. “Do you need help getting up? Do you want me to escort you home?”

The girl hesitated for a while before slowly reaching out her hand. “Thank you.”.