Taking advantage of Xiaoman's house being intact, they first roughly cleaned away the dust and settled here to rest.
Most satisfyingly, there was also a mountain spring beneath the stone wall. Xiaoman's grandfather usually covered it with a stone slab, and now that it was opened, the water was clear and bright, free of ash.
The group immediately set about cooking over the fire—the feeling of having narrowly escaped death was truly wonderful!
Xiaoman's Grandmother dug out the grain sack from the soil, mixing the family's last remaining white flour into a pot of paste, adding salt and seasonings, then generously drizzling in a few drops of sesame oil.
After the great fire, everyone was exhausted and hungry, and this pot of flour paste tasted incredibly fragrant.
After the meal, they spread bedding on the ground and collapsed into a deep sleep almost instantly, resting in disarray.
Outside, dawn was approaching, but smoke still lingered, shrouding the entire sky in a haze of ash and flames, casting a gray pall over everything.
After only a brief nap, everyone woke up again. Although they had escaped the mountain fire, two urgent problems still lay before them.
First, they needed to figure out the situation in the village—whether it was refugees or marauding soldiers who had burned it down.
If it were marauding soldiers, Xiaoman's grandfather suggested that during the day, they should avoid lighting fires for cooking and refrain from moving around conspicuously to avoid attracting those soldier-bandits.
If it were refugees, the problem would be less severe—they likely would have left after burning the houses.
Then there were the other families who had moved up the mountain with them—had they survived the fire? Was any food left behind?
Although it might seem opportunistic, if anyone had been injured or killed in the fire, they were all Xu clan members, bound by blood, and it was necessary to help collect their remains.
Additionally, they needed to extinguish the remaining embers around them to prevent the fire from reigniting.
There was much to do, and they would have to tackle it step by step.
Jiang Zhi decided to take Er Rui with her to check on the other families first—if anyone was injured, they would need to be rescued.
Xiaoman and Xiaoman's grandfather would stay near the house to put out the fires, also looking after the elderly and children at home, ready to hide if anything happened.
However, the mountain path they had previously blocked had collapsed and was no longer passable, so they couldn’t take the same route down the mountain.
If they tried to detour through the fire-ravaged mountains, it would waste too much time and be unsafe.
Unexpectedly, Xiaoman's grandfather had prepared a backup plan when he sealed the path.
Taking advantage of the early hour, he led Jiang Zhi and her son to a steep slope and took out a knotted rope.
Xiaoman's grandfather said, "Er Rui's mother, as long as you tie this rope to a tree, you can bypass the landslide by going down this steep slope."
Jiang Zhi looked at the rope, her lips twitching slightly—this was practically scaling walls and cliffs.
Xu Errui held the rope hesitantly. "Uncle, I can manage, but my mother…"
He and Xiao Tian had followed their father up the mountains to burn charcoal since childhood, so climbing up and down was easy for men. Although his mother was skilled at work, she was still a woman and had never walked along such cliffs.
"It’s nothing, just going down a slope!" Jiang Zhi took the rope, tied one end to a burnt tree, wrapped the other end around her waist, grabbed the rope, and slid down the steep slope.
In her previous life, she had followed her grandfather up the mountains to gather herbs since childhood and was long accustomed to such situations.
If there were wild grass growing on the slope, she could climb without even needing a rope.
But now, her hands were out of practice, and she had to consider others' feelings—she didn’t want to scare anyone.
Everyone knew Granny Jiang was stubborn and would insist on doing things she was told not to.
Jiang Zhi’s actions didn’t raise any suspicion from Xiaoman's grandfather or Xu Errui, who could only watch as she descended the slope.
The slope was steep, almost vertical, and without a rope, no one would dare to walk it.
With the rope knots and solid ground underfoot, it wasn't as difficult as imagined as long as they kept calm.
The two descended the slope steadily and hid the hanging rope in a nearby rock crevice.
Xu Errui led the way, hurrying toward the charcoal sheds where the other families lived.
These two families' charcoal kilns were located lower than their own and relatively closer to the village. They would have noticed the fire earlier and should have been able to escape.
Walking through the burned forest, although occasional wisps of smoke still rose from the ground, the overall situation was better than Jiang Zhi had imagined.
She had thought that just after a mountain fire, flames and burning trees would be everywhere.
But here, the tall grass had already been cut by villagers to build shacks, and many miscellaneous trees had been felled.
Now, only the hard, fire-resistant blue oak trees remained in the forest. The flames had stayed low to the ground, coming and going quickly, leaving even the ash layer thin.
Rounding a bend in the mountain, two charcoal kilns came into view.
Xu Errui, walking ahead, gasped softly, "Oh no, Zhao Li's shack has burned down."
Even without him saying it, Jiang Zhi could see the grass hut still emitting black smoke.
Not just this one—another grass shack not far away had also burned, with no signs of any attempt to fight the fire.
Xu Errui stopped, hesitant to approach. He pointed toward the front of the shack. "Mother, look there… is that a person?"
Jiang Zhi held him back. "Er Rui, look carefully. Is it someone from the village?"
In the ashes in front of the shack lay a person face down, their features unrecognizable. Only the barely distinguishable clothing indicated they were a farmer.
Cautiously, the two approached. Xu Errui used a stick he had picked up to nudge the person's leg.
Oh no, it was stiff. They had died at least before midnight.
A dead person was less frightening than a living one. Summoning their courage, Jiang Zhi and Xu Errui turned the body over, revealing a face—charred but still recognizable—marked with knife wounds.
Xu Errui began to vomit. "It's Zhao Li's father!"
"Quick, look for the others!"
Suppressing the urge to flee, Jiang Zhi looked toward the collapsed shack.
There wasn't much to search inside—the wooden-walled shack had burned to little more than a pile of ash.
But these were two families, with seven or eight people in total. With only one body found, where were the others?
After searching around both shacks, Jiang Zhi and Xu Errui finally noticed something.
Beneath a smoldering wooden pillar from the collapsed shack, a pair of thin, small feet—likely a woman's—were visible.
Jiang Zhi and Xu Errui lifted the pillar, revealing a woman, nearly naked, cleanly severed in two by a blade.
"It's Zhao Li's wife!"
"Ugh!" Jiang Zhi also vomited—not from disgust, but from the intense fear causing stomach spasms.
Now, whether it was refugees or rogue soldiers who had burned the village no longer mattered. Jiang Zhi only knew that the two of them were in grave danger here.
If the perpetrators hadn't left and were lying in wait nearby, they would be walking right into a trap.
"Quick, we need to leave now!"
She gave Xu Errui, who was still crouched and vomiting, a kick, then turned and ran up the mountain.
Xu Errui, equally terrified, stumbled after her.
Without a second thought, they ran straight to where they had descended earlier, intending to find the rope and climb back up.
But before ascending, Jiang Zhi had a thought. She first found the old mountain path, then followed it to the section blocked by the landslide.
Due to the wildfire, the area was already covered in a layer of ash. She didn't even need to search carefully before spotting a set of messy, fresh footprints in the loose soil.
Jiang Zhi gasped sharply—someone had tried to climb the mountain but was blocked by the collapsed earth and rocks.
Thinking of the burning thatched hut and the woman who had been cut in two, she felt a chill run down her spine.
If Xiaoman's grandfather hadn't pried loose the rocks to block the mountain path some time ago, her entire family would surely have been lost last night.
Unable to ascend the mountain, these people had burned the village and set the hills ablaze.