Only then did Gu Mingsong notice there was another girl crouched in the corner.
The one who hadn’t made a sound the whole time, head tilted back, staring at the sky, her eyes practically screaming “I want to run.”
Qiao Yurou froze too.
Even Qiao Yuxin and Gu Mingyang, who’d been looking down at their marriage contracts, turned to look.
Huo Zheng’s fingers, holding the cigarette, paused imperceptibly.
Everything she’d just done, from start to finish, hadn’t escaped his eyes.
From the moment he appeared, his gaze hadn’t rested on the two girls who’d eagerly come forward.
Instead, it had landed first on the one crouched in the corner, curled into a ball, the quietest, and the most conspicuous.
She was wrapped in a scarf, only her eyes visible. Red from the cold, yet impossibly bright.
He’d seen it clearly.
The first glance she’d cast over, her gaze had passed over everyone, locking precisely onto Gu Mingsong.
In that instant, her eyes had lit up.
That amazement, satisfaction, even a faint hint of anticipation, not a bit of it hidden, like a frozen river cracking open in March.
Only when one of the girls stepped forward to claim Gu Mingsong did the light in her eyes snuff out, as if someone had flipped a switch.
When the second girl claimed Gu Mingyang, the last bit of forced hope on her face shattered completely.
Finally, her gaze had crept, slow, reluctant, like walking to her own execution, over to him.
That expression—
Huo Zheng pressed his tongue against his cheek, nearly laughing. She looked like she’d seen some kind of flood-beast, wilting on the spot, eyes hollow, utterly done with life.
Disdain.
Blatant, undisguised, written all over her face.
As if he were a dish served at a banquet and she’d taken one look and thrown down her chopsticks.
Huo Zheng stubbed out his cigarette, his knuckles tightening slightly. In all his years, this was the first time someone had looked at him like they wanted to bolt on the spot.
Interesting.
“Little Sister Xiaoyu.” Qiao Yurou hurried over, her voice gentle, like tea brewed three times over, weak and affected.
“What nonsense are you saying? Mom and Dad told us again and again to come seek refuge… to fulfill the marriage contracts. We absolutely can’t go back now. How can you just leave?”
Qiao Yujie sneered internally.
The actress was at it again.
She braced against the wall and slowly stood up. Her legs were still numb, but she couldn’t lose the upper hand. She brushed off the military coat, dust that wasn’t even there.
She looked up at the pitted dirt road they’d come by, seriously evaluating the possibility of going back.
Money, she had some.
Besides the thousand yuan dowry her parents had given her, there was the bankbook Grandma had secretly slipped her.
In theory, she was a little rich woman.
“I’m not talking nonsense. I’m talking sense.”
The smile on Qiao Yurou’s face froze, then snapped back into place. But underneath, she was brimming with smug satisfaction.
Watching Qiao Yujie’s utterly done expression, her lips curved up involuntarily. The suffering from her past life… finally, someone else was bearing it.
Seeing this, Gu Mingsong stepped forward, his tone warm as a cup of hot tea in winter.
“It’ll be dark soon. The roads aren’t safe. There are wolves and bears out there. You three should come back to the military district guesthouse and rest for the night. Whatever plans you have, we can discuss them tomorrow.”
“Wolves… wolves? Bears?” Qiao Yujie froze. What flashed through her mind wasn’t wild beasts, but cartoon wolves chasing sheep and talking bears.
But in that moment of distraction—
She thought she heard, from the distant, layered twilight of the mountains, a long, mournful wolf howl.
Awooo—
Mixed with the howling north wind, stretched and distorted, yet so real that the hairs on the back of her neck stood up instantly.
The sound didn’t seem far.
She shuddered hard.
This time it wasn’t an act. The cold was seeping out from her very bones.
Go back?
How?
This wasn’t the mountains of 2026. No paved trails. Wild animals could appear at any moment.
This wasn’t the roads of 2026 either. No streetlights. Only pitted mud. One wrong step and you’d tumble into a ditch.
And this definitely wasn’t the 2026 China, the safest society in the world. Highway robbery was common. Getting snatched into the mountains was a real possibility.
This was 1975.
An era she’d only heard about in history books and Grandma’s stories.
Instantly—
She lowered her head and burrowed her face into her scarf.
She stopped talking. She’d follow their arrangements.
But she absolutely refused to look at Huo Zheng.
Not even out of the corner of her eye.
One look and her eyes hurt, her chest hurt, every rebellious bone in her body screaming run.
Seeing that she was no longer insisting on leaving, Gu Mingsong breathed a sigh of relief. He turned to his cousin, still leaning against the pillar.
“A-Zheng, go help the young ladies with their luggage.”
In his eyes, Qiao Yujie was just a little sister. Being scared by A-Zheng was perfectly normal.
After all, Huo Zheng had never been popular with girls, not since he was young. Of course, he’d never bothered to try.
Huo Zheng didn’t answer.
He pressed his tongue against his cheek, suppressing an inexplicable irritation, and a trace of… disappointment? So faint he almost didn’t notice it.
He strode over.
He lifted two large burlap sacks in one hand and the wooden trunk that clearly wasn’t light in the other, effortlessly, as if he were carrying two balls of cotton.
It was heavy, though.
With those thin arms and legs of hers, he had no idea how she’d managed the journey.
Passing by Qiao Yujie, he paused.
He looked down at her.
She was burying her face in her scarf, as if trying to shrink entirely into her military coat, like a startled quail.
Huo Zheng’s mouth twitched.
Was he really that terrifying?
At the guesthouse.
Gu Mingsong checked them into three rooms and told them to rest. He’d come back at mealtime to take them to the cafeteria.
The three brothers walked back to the barracks in silence, their footsteps echoing dully on the hard-packed earth.
The north wind carried sand, stinging their faces.
Gu Mingsong pondered for a moment, then looked at his younger brother first.
“Mingyang, what do you think of the Qiao girl?”
Gu Mingyang scratched the back of his head, smiling a little helplessly.
“Bro, you know I never planned to marry this early. But… Yuxin seems pretty quiet. Doesn’t look like the type to cause trouble. We’ll see how it goes.”
He spoke frankly.
About this sudden marriage, he couldn’t say he was resistant, nor could he say he was looking forward to it.
Since Grandpa had given the order, and the Qiao family had fallen on hard times, looking after her was the right thing to do.
Feelings? They could be cultivated slowly.
Gu Mingsong nodded and turned his gaze to Huo Zheng, who hadn’t said a word.
The twilight deepened. Half of Huo Zheng’s face was hidden in shadow, his jawline pulled a little tight.
“A-Zheng.”
Gu Mingsong paused, his tone carrying an elder-brother concern. “What do you think…?”
Huo Zheng didn’t answer immediately.
He was thinking—
The shock and disgust in her eyes when she realized her fiancé was him.
The way she’d crouched in the corner, head tilted back, staring at the sky, that utterly done-with-life expression.
The way she’d asked “could you send an ox cart to take me to the station,” scared to death but forcing herself to stay calm.
And—
The light that had blazed in her eyes the first moment she saw Gu Mingsong.
Like fireworks bursting in the night sky.
Too bad they hadn’t burst for him.
That inexplicable irritation surged up again.
“What do you mean, what do I think?”
Huo Zheng tugged at the corner of his mouth, his voice lazy, carrying its usual impatience.
“Cut the act.” Gu Mingsong asked directly.
“I’m asking if you’re in or not. She came all the way from the capital to seek refuge with you. You’re really going to let her go back?”
“When did I ever say I’d let her go back?” Huo Zheng kicked a small stone off the road. It hit the trash can dead-on.
“She’s the one who wants to run.”
“Then what do you mean?” Gu Mingyang leaned in, all gossip. “Zheng-ge, don’t tell me you’re… looking down on her?”
Huo Zheng shot him a sideways glance. “Me, looking down on her? Didn’t you see? She didn’t take a fancy to me.”
He paused, then added, “She looked at me like she’d seen a ghost.”
Gu Mingyang burst out laughing.
Gu Mingsong’s mouth curved up too, but he quickly suppressed it.
He understood.
It was the girl who hadn’t taken a fancy to him, not the other way around.
That meant there was hope.
“What about you, Big Bro?”
Huo Zheng turned the question back on Gu Mingsong.
“You’re really willing to let the family arrange things, marry someone you’ve never even met?”
Gu Mingsong was calm.
“Things are unstable everywhere right now. The Gu family stands out too much. It’s hard to find a match of equal standing. The Qiao parents have been sent down. Marrying her actually keeps things low-key. Nothing bad about it.”
He paused, his tone light, as if stating a fact that had nothing to do with him. “Marrying anyone is the same.”
The result was the same anyway.
He couldn’t say he was opposed, but he couldn’t say he liked it either.
Huo Zheng clicked his tongue twice and said nothing more.
He’d originally planned to scare the other party off.
If she wasn’t willing, the old man couldn’t do anything to him.
The worst-case scenario was getting the marriage certificate and living separate lives. He wasn’t about to compromise and settle down with anyone.
But now…
He looked down at his wrinkled uniform and sniffed his collar.
Yeah.
It did smell a bit.
He’d go back, take a shower, change his clothes, then go have a clear talk with that little girl who disdained him.
As for what exactly he’d say?
He hadn’t figured that out yet.
But he couldn’t let her think he was just some dark, smelly savage.