Chapter 3: Pioneers of the Lost

Five years ago, in a small mountain village.

This was the poorest place around, where nearly seventy percent of men were bachelors, and every single wife in the village had been purchased from elsewhere. There wasn’t a single local woman left—whether beautiful or plain, they’d all left because life here was just too harsh.

So, the village chief made a decision. Each man would chip in some money, pooling their savings to buy a few wives for the village.

Fifty thousand yuan. Three female college students. That worked out to just over sixteen thousand each. Maybe they were walking down the street one day when someone grabbed them and shoved them into a van. Maybe they got tricked here by someone they met online. Whatever the case, they ended up here. The three girls cried, begging the villagers to let them go, saying they could give each man fifty thousand yuan if only they’d set them free. That way, every one of them could afford their own wife.

Some villagers actually believed them, others didn’t. They turned to the village chief, who scoffed, “That’s just nonsense. We’ve got thirteen single men here—thirteen times fifty grand, you know how much that is? Even the richest guy in town only makes fifty thousand in a month. College must’ve scrambled their brains.”

Everyone agreed. The chief really knew what he was talking about. After all, it’d taken the whole village half a lifetime just to save up fifty thousand.

A few months went by, and one of the girls finally couldn’t take it anymore. When no one was watching, she smashed her head against a wall and died.

A human life—just like that. For the villagers, it also meant a loss of sixteen thousand yuan, and not even a child born from it. The two remaining girls were watched much more closely, chained in a pigsty. The pigsty had a dirt floor—there was no way to kill oneself against that.

Li Cunzhuang was an honest and simple farmer. He’d handed over his share of the money, just like everyone else, so the two remaining college students were also considered his wives by village rules. Li Cunzhuang spent most of his days watching over the girls, making sure they didn’t run or try to kill themselves. He was especially fond of one of them—her name was Zhang Xutong.

Zhang Xutong told Li Cunzhuang the world outside was vast and full of good things. She spoke of a little box, neat and square, that let two people talk to each other from opposite ends of the village. Li Cunzhuang laughed. “No need for boxes. I’ve got a loud voice—folks on both ends of town can hear me.”

Before long, Zhang Xutong got pregnant.

She told Li Cunzhuang the child was his. He just grinned, all silly and proud. Then she warned him: if he couldn’t take her away, sooner or later one of the other men would kill the baby inside her. Li Cunzhuang believed her, given that the other girl, Zhang Hui, had already lost her baby.

Zhang Xutong swore she loved only Li Cunzhuang. None of the other men held any interest for her. She said she dreamed of a life in the city, just the two of them, in a place she already owned. How nice that would be—having a real wife instead of just another mouth to feed.

Li Cunzhuang was swayed. There was a world of difference between having a wife and truly having one you could keep every day.

He agreed. One day, when it was his turn to watch over the two girls, Li Cunzhuang whispered to Zhang Xutong, “I’ll get you out of here.”

Zhang Hui pleaded, “If you’re planning to run, please take me with you.” Zhang Xutong hesitated, then told Li Cunzhuang, absolutely not—she couldn’t come. Trying to escape with two girls was already risky enough, let alone three. Besides, if both girls got away, the village would have no wives left at all. Li Cunzhuang considered this, and felt Zhang Xutong was really looking out for him, and even for the village.

He stuffed a towel in Zhang Hui’s mouth, tied her hands and feet to keep her from alerting anyone.

The last words Zhang Hui managed before her mouth was gagged: “Zhang Xutong, may you never know peace.”

No one could have imagined that honest, obedient Li Cunzhuang would ever help Zhang Xutong escape. By the time they found Zhang Hui bound and gagged, Li Cunzhuang and Zhang Xutong were already long gone. They’d traveled for two days, by ox cart, motorcycle, and finally car.

It was Li Cunzhuang’s first time seeing a big city, and his first time on a train. While they were on the train, Zhang Xutong bought Li Cunzhuang a cup of instant noodles. Afterwards, she said she needed to use the restroom. As he tasted the noodles for the first time in his life, he thought he could eat these every day forever.

But when he looked around, Zhang Xutong was gone.

Just like that, he didn’t see Zhang Xutong for three whole years.

Li Cunzhuang didn’t hide a thing from us. Like a swollen balloon, he spilled everything as we pressed for details. He said he stayed in the city for three days looking for Zhang Xutong, but she’d vanished without a trace. He foraged leftovers from trash bins, slept on the street.

That was his first taste of life as a drifter. To his surprise, the leftovers in people’s trash were tastier than anything he’d ever eaten back in the village.

Unable to find her, after searching every trash bin in the city, Li Cunzhuang found his way back to the village.

That same day, the villagers gathered, cursing him, saying that for all his apparent honesty, he was rotten to the core. Zhang Xutong had tricked him and gotten away right under his nose.

Li Cunzhuang broke down in tears, overcome with grief.

The villagers said he couldn’t just be let off the hook. Unless he could afford to buy another wife, they’d make him pay. But Li Cunzhuang’s family had nothing left, so instead, they decided to ruin him.

He could never be a man again. Driven out, as he fled down the mountain, he broke a leg. Later, that broken leg was replaced with a wooden one, and he became a true wanderer.

“Is Zhang Hui still in the village?” Team Leader Shao fell silent for a moment, then asked his first question—about Zhang Hui.

Li Cunzhuang nodded, a little smile on his lips. “Seems she’s still there. Been a long time since I went back.”

Team Leader Shao said, “Mary, send a team to that village and find Zhang Hui. If she wants to come back… just bring her back.”

Li Cunzhuang went on with his story.

Just like that, over four years slipped by. Then one day, he caught sight of Zhang Xutong again. The odds were almost laughably low by then. He was hobbling along on his wooden leg, unable to catch her. After that, he started drifting near wherever Zhang Xutong turned up, until last night, when, in the pouring rain, he found her again.

This time, he swore he wouldn’t let her slip away.

On that stormy night, Zhang Xutong had no idea where she was going. Li Cunzhuang gritted his teeth against the pain in his prosthetic leg, stubbornly following her. A raging wind had snapped the power lines, and what little streetlight there was flickered and died. The only thing guiding him forward was the flash of lightning illuminating her shadow just ahead.

Lightning streaked across the sky one after another—the downpour was torrential. Suddenly, Zhang Xutong’s silhouette vanished between strikes of lightning. Just a split second, but how could a living, breathing person disappear right before his eyes?

He crept ahead, searching. Finally, he found Zhang Xutong—or rather, her body.

She was hanging from a barbed wire fence, with a wooden plank below her, and a chair set on top. He stood on the chair, staring up at her. The longer he looked, the angrier he felt. Zhang Xutong had lied to him. There’s nothing worse than a liar, and in his whole life, Li Cunzhuang had never once told a lie.

But now, having finally found Zhang Xutong, he felt nothing. The urge to find her had always been there, but now, nothing remained. He didn’t care who killed her, or even whether she was truly dead. All he wanted to ask was whether she ever really loved him.

So he retraced his steps, slogging back to his battered shipping container. He was soaked through, so he stripped off his clothes and tried to sleep. He was still half asleep when we found him.