In the warm but dim nest, the misty water vapor was mixed with the fragrance of Japanese soap. Accompanied by the sound of water, the Qiu family brothers who lined up to ask Zhao Jinyu to help shave their hair and fluffy beard were already naked, and each of them wiped the dirt accumulated on their bodies with a white towel that Japanese filial to them.

As the pots of dirty water were poured out of the ground nest by Wei Lan and replaced with clean hot water, the four brothers of the Qiu family also seemed to be clean.

However, the frostbite everywhere on their bodies and the red envelopes bitten by fleas and bed bugs became more conspicuous because they washed away the dirt on their bodies.

While they lined up to find Hu Bazhi to apply frostbite cream, Wei Ran and Zhao Jinyu also carried the pine needles and squid grass on the earthen kang, and even the four little brothers who took off their clothes and jackets to the outside of the ground nest, spread them on the snow and let the low temperature help kill the biting insects and the unhatched insect eggs inside.

It was also taking advantage of this busyness that they also learned from the Qiu brothers' story that it had happened several years ago that they had met Zhao Jinge and others.

At that time, Zhao Jinge led the Anti-Japanese Allied Forces to kill some Japanese soldiers. Later, because of the Japanese's encirclement, the Anti-Japanese Allied Forces led by Zhao Jinge had no choice but to continue to move and fight guerrillas in order not to bring danger to their village. The villagers in that village took the initiative to ask six or seven seriously injured Anti-Japanese Allied Forces to stay and take care of them.

In order to avoid being discovered by the Japanese and traitors, the people in the village organized old and young men to dig such a shack here in the early spring to specifically accommodate the wounded. The four brothers of the Qiu family were arranged to take special care of the wounded.

According to Boss Qiu, his father and Xiao Sier's father are both hunters in the village. They are responsible for delivering food to the wounded and guarding around the ground nest.

Especially the seemingly straightforward Xiao Sier was actually a natural sharpshooter. The shot that Xiao Sier shot at Wei Ran was two or three hundred meters away with the broken gun.

The father of the Yongwen and Yongwu brothers was a local doctor, especially the taciturn bravery. Although he was young, he had learned his father's ability to cure his illness. According to the assignment at that time, Yongwen was responsible for finding medicine in the mountains, Yongwu stayed in the shack to take care of the wounded, and boiled medicine and changed the medicine for them.

Originally, all of this was the most perfect arrangement.

But shortly after Zhao Jinge and others left, the Japanese and puppet troops surrounded their village and forced them to hand over the Anti-Japanese Allied Army soldiers who might have been hiding here.

That was just an excuse. In the end, most of the elderly and children in this village died under the Japanese butcher's knife.

Most of the remaining young and middle-aged people were killed or injured because they picked up the hunting rifles and even the farm tools they were in hand to resist.

A few who survived were captured and sent to the Japanese circle or the mines controlled by them.

Even their village was burned clean with fire - just like the sorghum near the Temple of the God of Wealth.

Without the support from the village, the already seriously injured Anti-Japanese Allied Forces soldiers also died one after another, leaving only a few rifles and a few bullets for the four brothers.

Since then, the four Qiu brothers, who had no idea where to go, believed that they had joined the Anti-Japanese Allied Forces and worked hard to survive while waiting for Zhao Jinge to bring people back.

They even relied on those broken guns and shot a few shots at the passing Japanese puppet troops and even bandits, but they never dared to go back to their village to take a look.

In such a dark day, these four brothers had been persisting for nearly three years! In other words, they were only thirteen or fourteen years old at that time!

It was through their natural narrative that Wei Ran and the other two realized a problem. When Zhao Jinge and others led the team away, they were injured and followed Yang Shiyi to find his uncle!

In other words...

Zhao Jinyu took out the triangular team flag in his arms. In other words, this flag may be just an excuse for them to leave the battlefield and survive.

This belated truth is undoubtedly painful compared to Zhao Jinyu. He is increasingly sure that he has become a deserter.

But compared to these, another thing that made Wei Ran sigh even more is that the wounded people who stayed here actually included Lao Zhang, the deputy captain of the guerrilla first team!

During the extremely long silence, Hu Baqi, who helped the four brothers of the Qiu family apply homemade frostbite cream, got up and walked out. When he came back, he had already added a wolf-skin bag filled with various cobblers' houses.

Just like when he first met the Anti-Japanese United Army team outside the Temple of the God of Wealth, Hu Bazhi sat on a bench beside the mud stove, using the leather material cut from the animal skin blanket, and urgently sewed a leather hat, hand stuffed and slim shoes.

Zhao Jinyu, who also didn't know what to say, gritted her teeth and carried back all the frozen pine needles, dead grass, and ragged clothes outside. After slapped the snow, she put it back on the kang. Then she brought back a basin of snow on the ground and swept it carefully with a handful of pine branches silently.

"Boss Qiu, please change these clothes." Wei Ran pointed to the Japanese cotton coats that Zhao Jinyu had just brought back, "Put your torn clothes outside."

Without waiting for Boss Qiu to agree or refuse, Wei Ran continued, "Keep your word, each person has a Japanese 38th cover, and those bullets belong to you."

"Really?!" Boss Qiu asked immediately in surprise.

"Really, how can this be fake?" Wei Ran forced a smile and asked me to take a photo of you later?

“Take a photo?”

"All the soldiers of the Anti-Japanese Allied Forces need to take a photo."

Wei Ran looked at Zhao Jinyu and Hu Bazhi, and continued with a smile, "One one for each person, I can write a letter for you. I can write it to anyone you want, I will write it for you."

"We've long lost our home"

Qiu Yongwu, who had been taciturn before, picked up a skilled lashuan for the 38th bulb, said, "The relatives at home were also killed by the Japanese, and we don't know who to write to."

"It's not so good," Qiu Yongwen also said, "You can't write it and burn it for them, there's not even a grave."

When he said this casual answer like a joke about hell, he also silent again.

After a long time, he spoke again, "Then at least take a photo..."

"After taking photos, we will be soldiers of the Anti-Japanese United Nations League?" Xiao Sier asked excitedly.

"right"

The person who answered the question was Zhao Jinyu, "As long as you take a photo, you will be a soldier of the Anti-Japanese United Nations League."

"Then we are happy to take a photo!" Xiao Sier said immediately, then turned his head and asked, "I said nothing wrong this time, right?"

“Yes”

Boss Qiu also fiddled with the 38th National Gallery that he gave him and said, "We are happy to take photos and are willing to be soldiers of the Anti-Japanese Allied Forces."

"I..."

Wei Ran took a deep breath and walked quickly towards the door of the shack as if he was running away, "I'll get the camera."

Leaving the warm but depressing shack, Wei Ran took a few deep breaths to let the cold air enter the lung cavity and take away a little gloom.

After a while, he took out the camera and prepared, and then he called the four brothers of the Qiu family to walk out of the shack. At the door of the shack, he took photos of them one by one and took an extra group photo of them.

"Are we the members of the Anti-Japanese Allied Forces?" Boss Qiu couldn't help asking, "Can we look at the photos we took?"

"Not yet"

Wei Ran said apologetically, "You have to wait until you wash it out before you can see it."

"Then just wash it?" Xiao Sier said immediately, "I'll go and boil water for you."

"It's not washed with water." Wei Ran suppressed the increasingly rich bitterness in his heart, "I have to wash it with medicine."

"Then do you have any potion?" Yongwen asked as well.

"No...No"

Wei Ran shook his head with difficulty, and the faces of the four brothers of the Qiu family were full of frostbite, and there was a disappointment that was not hidden.

Just at this moment, Unakan also shouted at her reindeer sled and ran back. Seeing this, Wei Ran subconsciously raised the camera and pressed the shutter at Unakan under the curious gaze of the four brothers of the Qiu family.

"I picked up a few pheasants and hit a fool roe deer." Unakan said, and he stopped shouting at the reindeer.

He looked at the silly roe deer. He had no gunshot wounds on his body, but there was a bow and arrow that had not yet been drawn on his neck. Its body was also holding a not-so-large iron pot upside down, and Unakan also carried the hunting bow belonging to Hu Bazhi on his back.

"I also found a village without anyone else."

Unakan raised his hand and pointed in a direction, "I pulled out an iron pot in a broken house."

After saying this, the curiosity on the faces of the four brothers of the Qiu family was replaced by sadness, and Boss Qiu muttered vaguely, "That's our village."

Shaking his head at Unakan, who looked surprised, Wei Ran changed the subject and said, "I'll kill it for you."

"No, I can do it myself. Please help me clean the pot."

Unakan said, jumping off the sledge and pulling a knife out of the birch bark scabbard around her waist, and then the work of peeling and dividing the flesh began.

Sorry, he looked at the four brothers of the Qiu family who were at a loss. Wei Ran moved the iron pot, the size of a tire in the later generations, pulled off some pine branches from the pine trees not far away, and washed the rust stained on the iron pot, as if it could remove the shame.

Compared to adults like Wei Ran, the four brothers of the Qiu family who were already adults were young and unhappy. Seeing that neither of them needed help, they simply separated the pheasants and squatted beside Unakan. While watching her kill the roe deer, they swallowed their saliva and were busy plucking feathers for the pheasant.

After a while, Zhao Jinyu also walked out with a broken dustpan with some snow-filled dust, helping to start his work together.

Amid the expectations of the four brothers of the Qiu family, Wei Ran was the first to clean the big iron pot, put a sharp pot of clean snow back on the ground, and put it on the mud stove.

At this time, Hu Bazhi was still busy sewing leather hats and other objects on the edge of the mud stove, and did not seem to care what Wei Ran and others were doing.

Wei Ran sighed silently. He knew that Hu Bazhi probably remembered his family.

With the busyness of everyone and the expectations of the four brothers of the Qiu family, the internal organs of the robe that were not easy to preserve and some parts of the scrubbed with snow were put into the pot first. The serious meat that was relatively easy to preserve was buried in the snow pit at the door of the ground nest, and some deliberately left in the water were hung on the other side of the door.

"There must be a wolf coming over at night."

Unakan said confidently, "As long as you shoot a shot or shoot an arrow at the wolf in the crack of the door, you will have prey all the time."

"This method is too dangerous, be careful when going out." Hu Ba, who had just been busy by the mud stove, said without raising his fingers.

"If you stay away, you can't kill you"

Unakan retorted, "And the wolf is smart, he won't dare to come after a few fights."

"Wolves are also prone to revenge," Hu Bashi reminded.

Seeing this, Wei Ran and Zhao Jinyu looked at each other. They wisely did not join the debate between the two hunters. They just found a wooden pier to sit on the edge of the kang, helping Hu Bazhi sew those cold-proof objects together, just like they did back then.

Seeing this, Unakan also kicked a wooden pier and sat down, and started working hard.

The four brothers of the Qiu family looked at each other, and the boss Qiu pointed to the mud stove and said, "Yongwen, stay here to help watch the fire, Yongwu, go find a broom to brush their animals."

"Boss, where is me?" Xiao Sier asked impatiently.

"Please take the scoop and let's go around." Boss Qiu said, holding a snowboard and carrying a large 38-meter-long cover to drill out of the ground.

Hearing this, Xiao Sier happily took the new rifle, patted the Japanese ammunition box on her belt, proudly picked up the ski, and followed Boss Qiu to leave the shack where the meat fragrance began to spread.

This chapter is not finished yet, please click on the next page to continue reading the exciting content later! In the busyness of everyone, a leather hat and hand squished one after another. Hu Bazhi also sewed and patched up the old silk shoes of the four brothers of the Qiu family, and added a thick wooden sole.

"Your best, brave, come here to try it." Hu Bazhi greeted and handed the two pairs of squid shoes to the brother, "Try it with your hands and leather hats!"
To be continued...