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Xia Zhiyao curled up on the bare wooden bed, wrapping her arms tightly around her knees.
The room was silent, but the quiet brought her no comfort.
That man...
Xia Zhiyao closed her eyes, and the image of the man lounging in the chair, idly flicking a lighter open and shut, resurfaced in her mind.
He had been incredibly tall. Even while sitting, he exuded the oppressive presence of a towering mountain, crushing anyone who stood before him.
Most terrifying of all were his eyes.
Dark. Bottomless. Completely devoid of emotion.
When he looked at people, it wasn't as though he was looking at fellow human beings. It was as if he was looking down at ants beneath his feet.
There had been an absolute indifference toward life in those eyes.
Someone like him was even more frightening than Master Ba, whose cruelty was worn openly on his face.
If I fall into his hands...
Xia Zhiyao shivered and forced herself to stop thinking about it.
She lifted her head and surveyed the room.
The walls were unusually high. Near the ceiling was a tiny window, barely larger than the palm of her hand. A filthy sheet of plastic covered it, fluttering with a soft rustling sound whenever the wind blew.
What's happening outside?
She clenched her teeth.
Waiting here for death wasn't an option.
She had to find out what kind of place she had been brought to.
Barefoot, she climbed down from the bed. Fighting through the dizziness brought on by hunger, she gathered every bit of strength she had left and dragged the wooden bed beneath the window.
She climbed onto it and stretched up onto her tiptoes.
It was just high enough.
Her eyes reached the bottom edge of the window.
There was a small tear in the grimy plastic, just large enough for her to peer through.
But that single glance dragged her into an even deeper hell.
Beyond the window stretched a vast dirt courtyard enclosed by towering barbed-wire fences. Powerful searchlights flooded the grounds with an eerie white glow.
A crowd had gathered in the middle of the yard.
Some people whistled.
Others shouted and cheered.
They sounded as excited as spectators watching a sporting event.
At the center of the crowd lay a frail figure, sprawled face-down on the ground.
It was a girl.
Judging by her slender back, she couldn't have been very old. The clothes on her body had already been shredded into rags by thorns, and one of her legs was bent at a grotesque angle.
It was obviously broken.
She desperately crawled forward, digging all ten fingers into the dirt as she dragged herself onward, leaving a long trail of blood behind.
“Run! Come on! Keep running!”
A burly guard with a brutish face stood beside her, gripping two thick iron chains.
At the other ends of the chains were two massive black German Shepherds, each nearly half the height of a grown man.
They were specially trained attack dogs.
Their bloodshot eyes gleamed with savage hunger. Long tongues lolled from their mouths as saliva dripped steadily onto the dirt below.
Their backs were arched.
Deep growls rumbled from their throats.
Their paws scraped impatiently against the ground as they struggled to restrain their bloodthirsty instincts.
The girl on the ground turned her head, revealing a face smeared with blood and mud.
She was begging for mercy.
Although Xia Zhiyao couldn't hear what she was saying, she could read the movement of the girl's lips.
“Help... Please... Help me…”
No one paid the slightest attention to her desperate pleas.
The spectators, however, burst into even louder laughter and cheers.
The guard holding the dogs bared his teeth in a vicious grin before suddenly releasing the iron chains.
“Release them!”
At his command, the two black beasts lunged at the helpless girl like bolts of lightning.
“AHHHHH!!!”
The scream that followed was so shrill it barely sounded human.
It pierced straight through Xia Zhiyao's ears.
The few tattered scraps of clothing still clinging to the girl were ripped away in an instant.
Blood and flesh sprayed through the air.
The two savage dogs tore into her with frenzied violence, shaking their heads as they ripped chunks of flesh from her body.
At first, the girl struggled desperately. She screamed in agony while trying to protect her throat with both hands.
But it wasn't long before her cries weakened.
Her struggles gradually became nothing more than unconscious spasms.
In the end, the only sounds that remained were those of the dogs tearing flesh and crushing bone.
Crack.
Crunch.
The sickening sound of bones snapping left Xia Zhiyao frozen in place.
Her stomach lurched violently.
“Blech”
She jumped down from the wooden bed and stumbled toward the toilet. Bracing herself against the wall, she vomited uncontrollably.
Her stomach had long since emptied itself.
All that came up was bitter yellow bile.
Tears streamed down her face, mixing with mucus, while her throat burned with searing pain.
Her entire body shook uncontrollably.
Her teeth chattered loudly.
A living, breathing person...
Had just been fed to the dogs.
The people watching had laughed.
They had cheered the dogs on.
Xia Zhiyao collapsed onto the floor, her body limp.
Would I die too?
Would I end up just like her... reduced to a mangled heap of flesh, with even my bones crushed and swallowed by those dogs?
She didn't dare think any further.
If that powerful man had taken an interest in me... maybe that would have been better than staying here.
Even dying at his hands would have been better than being violated by these monsters before being thrown to the dogs.
But he was already gone.
There was no point dwelling on it anymore.
Drained by terror and gnawing hunger, Xia Zhiyao eventually drifted into a heavy sleep.
Just after dawn the following morning, the lock clicked open from outside.
A beam of bright light spilled into the room.
Xia Zhiyao instinctively raised a hand to shield her eyes.
A figure stood silhouetted in the doorway.
She couldn't make out the person's features, only that the figure was much slimmer than the male guards.
The newcomer walked inside and gently set a wooden bucket on the floor.
As Xia Zhiyao's eyes adjusted to the light, she finally saw that it was a local woman.
She appeared to be in her thirties. Her skin was dark, her face expressionless, and she wore a traditional local wrap skirt.
The woman scooped a bowl of plain white rice from the bucket, topped it with a few leafy vegetables, and placed it on the wooden bed.
She also set down an unopened bottle of mineral water.
Food.
Xia Zhiyao's body reacted before her mind could.
She practically crawled over on her hands and knees, snatched up the bowl, and, without caring whether it was hot or clean, grabbed fistfuls of rice with her hands and stuffed them into her mouth.
She didn't even have time to chew before swallowing it whole.
The dry, hardened rice scraped painfully down her throat.
She quickly twisted open the bottle of water and gulped down more than half of it in a few desperate swallows.
The cool water flowed over her parched throat, bringing a sharp but welcome sense of relief.
For the first time since arriving here, she felt alive again.
The woman stood quietly to one side, watching her devour the food without the slightest change in expression.
“Eat,” the woman said. “That's your ration for today.”
Her Chinese carried a heavy local accent, but it was still understandable.
Xia Zhiyao finished the bowl in only a few bites, even scraping up and licking the last grain of rice from the bottom.
Looking up, she asked hoarsely, “The... the girls who came here with me... where are they?”
The woman tilted her head toward the doorway.
“It looked like two of them were taken to Master Ba's room last night.”
Xia Zhiyao's heart sank.
The woman continued, “As for the rest, they'll all be going through the process today.”
“The process?”
Xia Zhiyao immediately seized on the unfamiliar term.
“What process?”
The woman replied, “Master Ba said you're still useful. You don't have to go.”
That wasn't an answer.
It only plunged Xia Zhiyao into even deeper fear.
“W-What... what does that mean?”
Still useful?
Were they planning to harvest my organs?
“If Mr. Shen hadn't taken an extra glance at you yesterday, you'd already be running the train by now.”
Running the train?
What did that mean?
The unfamiliar phrase echoed again and again in Xia Zhiyao's mind, filling her with an overwhelming sense of dread.
She wanted to press the woman for an explanation.
The woman who had brought the food had already turned around and walked away.