After the man left, Xiao Chengli quietly opened the door and looked around. Only then did he realize that he had been taken to a guesthouse. Xiao Chengli was immediately happy, opened the door and walked out.
When he passed the service counter, the waiter called him, which scared Cheng Li, thinking that the waiter was in cahoots with the man.
His mind started working quickly. His mother said that good children should not lie, but he had no choice but to lie now, otherwise he would not be able to escape.
There happened to be a middle-aged woman eating sesame cake outside. When Cheng Li saw the sesame cake, he couldn't help but think of Cheng Qiao. His mother would always make some sesame cakes for them, saying that it was a specialty of Huizhou.
So Xiao Chengli thought that the person who ate the sesame cake must be a good person, and he pulled the middle-aged woman's arm without hesitation: "Mom, take me home."
The middle-aged woman was stunned for a moment and looked at Xiao Chengli suspiciously. This look made her heart beat much faster. It was so easy to get it.
"Good boy, do you want to eat some sesame cakes? Mother will give you half one."
The middle-aged woman broke the sesame cake in her hand in half and handed it to Xiao Chengli. Xiao Chengli hurriedly took it, but he didn't notice that the powder under the middle-aged woman's fingernails had already splashed onto the half sesame cake.
When he woke up, he was lying on a big kang with a dozen children, both boys and girls, beside him.
Little Cheng Li knew that he was in trouble. He had fallen into the den of human traffickers. In trying to escape from the wolf's den, he ended up falling into the tiger's mouth. He wondered if his parents, grandparents, and younger brothers and sisters would be worried.
"How did you get in here?"
A girl nearby saw little Cheng Li open his eyes and hurried over. There was no fire in the kang and the whole room was as cold as an ice cellar, but this handsome little brother was like a stove, warming up her frozen body.
"Are you cold?"
When the girl saw that Xiao Chengli had woken up, she felt embarrassed to stay with him and could only move to the side. However, as soon as she left Xiao Chengli's side, she shivered with cold and even her voice trembled.
"Yeah, little brother is hot."
"Then come closer. We can get warmer if we lean against each other."
The little girl's eyes curved as she quickly leaned over, absorbing the warmth emanating from Cheng Li, and at the same time told Cheng Li:
"My name is Wu Xiaolin. Wu means mighty, Xiao means dawn, and there are two trees next to the character Wang. I am from the capital. Someone covered my mouth with a handkerchief, and I found myself here when I woke up."
"My name is Cheng Li, Cheng for future, Li for dawn. I walked into the trap myself."
Wu Xiaolin was stunned for a moment, not quite understanding what Xiao Chengli meant, but she didn't ask him obediently, and instead whispered in Xiao Chengli's ear:
"Cheng Li, I got here a day earlier than you and have been here for three days. This is the den of human traffickers. If someone comes to buy a person, they will be brought here to see each other, and if they like someone, they will be taken away."
"Do you know where this is?"
The little girl shook her head. She woke up here and someone brought her meals every day. She also went to the toilet in this room. They were all children anyway, so there was nothing to be shy about.
"No one bought you in three days?"
"I'm six years old, so I'm quite old. People like to buy small ones, preferably for one or two years old, or two or three years old. If I'm over five years old, few people are willing to buy them."
Little Cheng Li was shocked. Boys over five years old would be a little better off, but little girls would definitely be in trouble. They might be sold cheaply to people in poor mountain villages as child brides. In this way, their lives would become tragic.
“Is there anyone on guard at night?”
The little girl shook her head. She didn't know. It was too cold at night and there were only a few thin quilts. They all huddled together and even hid their heads under the quilts so that they could keep warm.
Little Cheng Li sat up and began to observe the room. The room was quite large, with large kangs on both sides. The older children were on his side, and the younger children were on the opposite side.
Those children must have taken medicine. They were all sleeping soundly, and the quilts they were wearing were much thicker than mine.
There are two windows on the big kang opposite, but it is winter now, so the windows are closed, and there are also several wooden boards nailed to the windows in a haphazard manner, obviously because they are worried that they may escape.
Little Cheng Li stared at the two windows in a trance. He had been extremely strong since he was a child and could even compete with Li Huan. Of course, he had no idea that Li Huan was giving in to him, so he thought it would not be difficult for him to open the window.
The difficulty lies in the fact that he doesn't know where this place is. If he escapes, he doesn't know if there is anyone guarding him. And even if there is no one guarding him, where should he escape to.
Suddenly, little Cheng Li's ears moved, and he quickly lay down and made a "hush" gesture to Wu Xiaolin. Wu Xiaolin's eyes flashed, and she quickly closed her eyes and pretended to sleep.
Not long after, the door was opened and a familiar voice was heard. Little Cheng Li secretly hated this woman for drugging him and bringing him here.
"Hey, wake up, wake up."
Xiao Chengli's pink cheeks were slapped red, and he could only open his eyes and look at the woman in front of him. The woman looked at Xiao Chengli with a smile and was very satisfied with his appearance.
"How old are you this year, kid?"
"Eight years old."
"What do you do at home?"
"Who are you and why did you knock me out?"
"Who am I? I'm a human trafficker. I knocked you out so I can bring you back and sell you to make money."
"How much do you want?"
"As for you, five or six hundred dollars is still worth it."
"Aunt, please let me go back. I'll ask my mother to give you the money, okay?"
"You're an idiot. If I let you go, I wouldn't have worked for nothing. Return the money your mother gave me. It's good that you didn't beat me to death."
"I'll fight you."
Little Cheng Li was furious. He jumped up from the kang, grabbed the woman's arm and bit it.
"Ah... relax, relax."
The door opened again, and a man walked in. He grabbed Xiao Chengli's hair and pulled him back. Xiao Chengli felt pain and had to let go.
"Pah..."
Little Cheng Li was slapped hard on the face, and the woman quickly stopped him: "Don't hit my face, it's my only valuable face."
"Little bastard, I wanted to give you something to eat, but you still have so much strength, I'll starve you for two more days."
The two of them went out, closed and locked the door. The girl quickly got up, took out a handkerchief from her pocket, and carefully wiped the blood from the corner of Cheng Li's mouth.
"You're stupid. We're all locked in here. What's the point of biting her?"
"Can the window be opened?"
Wu Xiaolin shook her head. She didn't know that she only drank a bowl of thin porridge every day and was so hungry that she didn't have the energy to do anything else.
Little Chengli got out of the pit and ran to the window opposite to look out, but the outside of the window was covered with newspapers and he could not see anything.
He pulled the wooden boards nailed horizontally to the windows towards himself. Perhaps it was because of his great strength or because the boards were rotten, but he actually broke them in the middle.