章 6: Lost freedom
Disorientation and unending weakness, along with a piercing pain coursing through his body, are all that Liu Jin feels as he slowly begins to regain consciousness after what seems like months.
"You, boy... you're finally waking up?" Liu Jin hears a hoarse voice amidst the sharp noise filling his ears.
"Haha, it's truly impressive that someone so injured is still alive if you ask me," Liu Jin struggles to open his eyes to see the source—a grizzled old man speaking in front of him. "...You really have a heaven-given gift, boy. Believe me, many old perverts would pay a fortune for that virility!"
He can't clearly discern the old man's appearance because his vision is blurry, and the morning sunlight streaming in seems to burn his retinas. One thing he does notice is that he's in an open-roofed cart moving slowly along a rough dirt road.
"Shut up, you old bastard!" An irritated voice comes from the right of the man driving the cart.
Jin tries not to let his confusion overwhelm him and looks around as his vision clears. He sees various men of different ages with dead, pained eyes, dressed in rags and bound by chains around their necks, arms, and legs.
"What?... Where am I?" Liu Jin asks, confused, but he realizes he cannot move when he notices he is chained like the other men around him.
"Hehe, you're an unlucky young man, I'd say. You'll probably be bought as a slave for manual labor with that strong body of yours," the old man says, a desperate and hopeless expression on his face. "...An old beauty like me will definitely end up in the hands of some lustful lady!"
"I told you to shut up, you old piece of shit!" The young driver turns and hits the old man on the head with a stick, knocking him unconscious but not killing him.
Liu Jin watches the entire scene, trying to overcome his shock while looking around the cart for a familiar face among the wounded and injured men. Unfortunately, he finds no one he recognizes.
"Goddamn annoying old man. Maybe I'll buy you just to make you a eunuch!" the cart driver says while continuing to beat the old man to vent his anger.
Seeing the old man getting beaten again after provoking the cart driver, no one raises their voice to help in this every-man-for-himself situation. Some even start to wonder if the old man enjoys getting beaten since this is the fourth time he's put himself in this position.
But Liu Jin, seeing this, doesn't even think about interfering to save the old man as he normally would. Being an experienced man who has seen countless people in the old man's situation, he knows the old man is provoking his own death on purpose.
And so it is for many brave or unyielding individuals who, after living a lifetime of freedom, refuse to be enslaved even if the alternative is death.
"Leave the damn old man alone Le Wu. Even if he's not worth much money, if he dies, his value comes out of your pocket..." The middle-aged, overweight man next to the driver says with a beer-roughened voice.
"Ba Fu do you think I'm joking about making this old man a eunuch? I'm dead serious!"Le Wu says but stops beating the old man and returns his attention to the dirt road ahead.
"Good luck spending half our salary buying a useless old man," Ba Fu says with irony, mocking his partner. "And also becoming the joke of everyone after spending so much money on a useless old man. Haha!"
"For me, I'm saving up to buy a pretty girl, and I heard they caught some really young ones this time!" Liu Jin hears the conversation filled with disgust and contempt in his heart.
He can also see a mix of these emotions along with hatred and fear on the faces of the other passengers in the cart, who, after seeing the state of the poor old man, don't dare even to breathe loudly.
"Damn, this salary really sucks. How many months have you been saving up? Three or four?" Le Wu asks in doubt.
"You don't have much experience with normal, honest mortal jobs, but this salary is several times better than theirs..." Ba Fu takes a swig from a beer-filled canteen. "...But being a raider is much better since you get to keep a share and have fun with the girls before handing them over to us transporters!"
Le Wu nods his head before looking at the old man's legs—or better put, his single leg, as the old man is missing his right leg.
"But the downside is you might get hurt and not be able to be a raider anymore," Le Wu says with some fear, of hitting on a not fully healed wound.
"Haha, the whore who took my leg got a real screwed-up end, I guarantee you that!" Ba Fu says, seemingly in a good mood but still with a look of rage on his face.
Liu Jin, hearing this, remains silent while trying to memorize the voices and faces he briefly saw of the two so that when the day comes, he can definitely remove them from this world.
Of course, he doesn't just listen to the conversation without doing anything useful. He is now carefully squeezing his right hand as much as possible, almost to the point of dislocating it and his wrist, while trying to free it from the shackles without anyone noticing.
This is a trick he learned from a man who worked as a magician and illusionist before being sent to the gulag for his "connections" and "sympathies" with the bourgeoisie. In other words, most of his shows were attended by the Russian Empire's high class.
"Hey boy, don't worry if you buy me..." *cough* "...I can easily fuck you in the ass every night. I know you'll love that," *cough* a weak, hoarse voice sounds amidst deplorable coughing.
"Hahaha," he laughs loudly in scorn as the young man looks back, already knowing who the voice belongs to.
It's the old man who had been beaten unconscious multiple times, and now that he's awake again and heard their conversation, he didn't wait a moment before starting to talk shit.
"You old bastard, now I'll beat you to death for real!!" Le Wu shouts, his face red with anger as he swings his club at the old man's head with murderous intent.
Ba Fu next to him just watches silently, drinking from his beer canteen while Le Wu repeatedly strikes the old man's head, which no longer moves as it bleeds profusely.
"You young ones really like to waste good money for nothing..." he says, no longer bothering to advise the troublesome young man who isn't willing to listen.
"It's not a matter of money but my honor and authority that this old man keeps offending!!" Le Wu doesn't stop mercilessly beating the poor old man, who is probably dead at this point.
Liu Jin remains silent, saying a quiet prayer for the old man's soul, whose name he doesn't even know, while looking at the lifeless body that still has a faint smile from his last moments.
"What great honor, beating up poor old men who can't even defend themselves, hahaha," Ba Fu laughs without bothering to look back while keeping an eye on the cart ahead.
"You're too old to understand..." Le Wu says indignantly but doesn't dare provoke his traveling companion.
That's because Le Wu knows that even with only one leg, if he tried anything with Ba Fu, who seems just like a fat, middle-aged drunkard, he could easily be beat in to a pulp without not even be able to resist.
In fact, he wouldn't admit it out loud, but he wouldn't risk fighting the old man he just killed if he weren't bound in chains from head to toe, not out of cowardice but for self-preservation.
"Your good years are over, and now it seems you've forgotten how to maintain authority—!" Le Wu tries to argue for himself while looking back at the path but is cut off by the cart in front stopping suddenly.
Ba Fu next to him instantly grabs the reins from Le Wu's hand and pulls with all his might to stop the horses before they collide. "Damn kid, that's why you pay attention to the road instead of beating the prisoners!!"
Le Wu is speechless since it was Ba Fu's job to watch the prisoners, but because the drunkard wanted to keep drinking the whole way, he had to do both jobs. Yet somehow, now he's to blame when things go wrong.
"What... what happened for the caravan to stop so suddenly?" Le Wu asks, not voicing his indignation with Ba Fu out loud.
"Hey, you bastards, what happened up there?" Ba Fu shouts angrily at the drivers of the cart in front, who also seem a bit confused.
"Some prisoners up front escaped, I think!" the driver ahead responds, uncertainty in his voice.
"Damn it!! What a bunch of incompetent idiots!" Le Wu is quite irritated because in situations where slaves escapes, all the mortals in the caravan responsible for the transport are punished together.
It may seem unfair, and it really is in his view, but there's nothing they can do about this rule implemented by the Rank 2 demonic Gu Master in charge, who cares little for fairness.
In fact, although they can beat and abuse the slaves in the carts as they please and act arrogantly in front of innocent mortals, they themselves are not much higher in the social hierarchy, being servants in all but name.
"Do we have to help in the search?" Le Wu asks, looking at Ba Fu's missing leg.
"Only one of us. I'll keep an eye on our prisoners so we don't have more escapes," Ba Fu says simply, continuing to drink his beer without even bothering to look at the prisoners.
"So be it..." Le Wu simply obeys, starting to climb down from the cart.
But unbeknownst to both of them, at this very moment, Liu Jin, who had freed his hands from the shackles long ago, is now lying on the cart floor with some other prisoners.
The reason is obvious—the sudden stop of the cart, which, although not strong enough to throw him to the ground as it did the weaker, near-death men, he threw himself down on purpose with a single goal in mind: to free his legs.
And at this very moment, he's doing that as quickly as possible, taking advantage of the fact that his feet are tied with iron chains instead of shackles, making his job much easier.
"You stay quiet, I'll help..." Liu Jin murmurs to one of the strong-looking young men in the cart who is conscious enough to see him freeing himself.
"Thank you... argh..." the ordinary-looking young man says, suppressing sounds of pain as Liu Jin squeezes his hand to free him slowly to avoid making a fuss, causing even more pain, not that he is in a position to complain.
"Now... I just have to free as many as possible..." Liu Jin murmurs as he dislocates the young man's hand and removes it from the shackle. "And then I have to find the cart with Gi'er and mother..."
"And then escape...!" Liu Jin murmurs, his eyes filled with determination, as he dislocates the young man's other hand and frees it from the shackle.
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