chapter 19

Ai,” Huo Ran had laughed for half a day, feeling that he’d laughed himself tired, laying back down with the sleeping bag pillowed under him and sighing, “You really are a dumbass.”

“You tell me honestly,” Kou Chen zips his pants properly, picking a jacket out to change into, “Earlier on did you think that I was about to start jerking off in front of you?”

“No!” Huo Ran glares at him, “I’m a fucking normal person, I wouldn’t think it’d be that ridiculous!”

“Oh,” Kou Chen shuffles over to sit next to him, “Then what did all you normal people think it was?'”

“I didn’t even have the time to think okay, the whole time there was only one line in my mind,” Huo Ran says, “‘What’s this dumbass gonna do again?’ But at the last second I guessed a bit, I wondered if you were wearing some Death God underwear or chipmunk underwear something like that…”

“Fuck,” Kou Chen laughs, “I’m not that much of a dumbass.”

“Your ‘crotch spewing chick’ performance was dumber! This was some peculiar train of thought!” Huo Ran sighs, thinking before asking, “How old were you when you performed this exclusive for your dad?”

“4? Or 5?” Kou Chen thinks a little, “In any case it was before elementary.”

“Why did your dad hit you though, when a child is that young, being a little cheeky is pretty normal,” Huo Ran turns to look at him, “But if you did that at this age and he gives you a beating you after seeing it that would be normal.”

Kou Chen laughs for half a day, taking the chick keychain over, holding it out in front of him: “Cute isn’t it?”

“Get it away!” Huo Ran glares at him.

“Aiya, RanRan-gege is despising us now,” Kou Chen squeezes the chick, attaching the keychain onto his own backpack.

Huo Ran doesn’t speak, there simply was nothing to say.

“My dad, right, is pretty artistic, since his childhood he’d always had a piano dream, but because of all sorts of misfortune he didn’t get to learn, so he’d hoped that I’d fulfill his dream for him,” Kou Chen says, “So I’d been sitting in front of the piano every day since I was 3…”

“You even know how to play the piano?” Huo Ran was shocked into sitting up.

Kou Chen gives him a look, then waves his hand: “Why would I know how to play that thing, I can’t.”

“You’ve been learning since you were 3, you can’t?” Huo Ran was a little perplexed.

“Even if I started since I was 1 I’d have to be willing to learn don’t I,” Kou Chen raises his brows smugly, “Nobody should think to force me to learn stuff I don’t want to learn, I’ve been this strong-willed since I was 3!”

“And after? What’s this gotta do with the chick?” Huo Ran asks.

“Who said this has anything to do with the chick, I only bought that chick last year,” Kou Chen looks at him sideways, “This intellect.”

“Not as high as yours,” Huo Ran nods.

“That day I just didn’t want to play the piano, I didn’t want to use even one finger, and after I hid one of the chicks my sister was raising in my underwear,” Kou Chen rubs his nose, “I told my dad ‘the chick bit my pee pee*, I can’t play the piano’.”

[*tl note: he actually says 小鸡鸡 (xiǎo jī jī) which literally means ‘chick’, and ‘chicken’ is slang for dick if anyone has forgotten…]

“…This he can’t beat you to death*,” Huo Ran really wanted to laugh, yet felt that he shouldn’t laugh.

[*tl note: I’m not completely sure about this explanation, but while the literal tl is up there, what it means should be something like (from kou papa’s pov) ‘see whether i can beat you to death’ or ‘can’t I beat you to death?’, it’s sort of like a rhetorical question]

This would already count as one of Little Kou Chen’s tragic tales, a 4-5 year-old child, was forced into a corner, thinking of a plan that he thought was badass yet logical.

But he still wanted to laugh.

Kou Chen sighs: “So I just almost got beaten to death, he chased me hitting from inside the house to the yard, when I climbed the railing my butt got caught by the iron nail, so I was just nailed onto the railing like that without actually falling down, it was my dad that got me back…”

Huo Ran couldn’t keep it together, letting a laugh out extremely unsympathetically, he quickly starts waving his hand while laughing: “Sorry, I didn’t mean it, I just couldn’t hold it in…”

“I want to laugh myself,” Kou Chen laughs along.

“Is the Death God to cover up that nail hole?” Huo Ran asks.

“No, is that necessary using such a large tattoo to cover up such a small scar,” Kou Chen disdained, “I just wanted to tattoo a Death God is all, the scar from the nail is on my buttcheek, do you want…”

“No!” Huo Ran cries out in terror, “No! I’m not looking, there’s no need! You don’t need to be so polite!”

“Pussy,” Kou Chen gives his evaluation.

“Would giving your buttcheek a look make me not a pussy?” Huo Ran says, “What exactly is your brain made up of.”

“That’s what my dad said too,” Kou Chen laughs, but very soon he heaves a sigh, “Which is why since I was young nobody wanted to play with me.”

“Mn?” Huo Ran was stunned.

“I was too annoying when I was little, talkative too, and didn’t like to be managed,” Kou Chen faces away as he reminisces, “My personality also wasn’t good, the neighbours’ kids got beaten up by me a few times, and when their parents came to look for trouble with me, I even hit the parents.”

“…Could you beat them?” Huo Ran asks.

“I couldn’t, but others’ parents also hadn’t dared to hit me too hard, a kick, a shove, a slap and what not,” Kou Chen says, “Anyways I was fighting elementary up to middle school.”

“Only up to middle school?” Huo Ran questions.

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Kou Chen gives him a look, smiling: “The way I fight now is different from before, in the past if you just looked at me I could’ve gone up to hit you already.”

“Then you would have gotten beaten to death by me,” Huo Ran sneers.

“You can’t beat me,” Kou Chen says, “Really, don’t compete with me.”

Huo Ran recalls Kou Chen’s ‘Fly for Laozi’ kick, nodding: “Fine then… So now have you grown up and become more mature so you don’t fight every day, and switched to fighting every other day?”

“Still my dad, this person wears the skin of an artistic youth, but works as a Rainy Night Butcher*,” Kou Chen’s expression was a mix of grief and resentment, “He brought me to the market, found someone’s sausage-making work station, and showed me that super huge meat mincer, put half a pig in and it comes out as minced pork right away, have you seen it before?”

[*tl note: refers to a hong kong serial killer]

“I’ve seen it on TV,” Huo Ran says, “He put you inside?”

“Are you intellectually disabled!” Kou Chen shouts.

“I was just asking conveniently,” Huo Ran says.

“My dad said, ‘son, do you see, you’re not even as big as half a pig, if I hear anyone say that you’ve been fighting again, I’ll put you inside’,” Kou Chen’s expression was grave, “Enough for a family of 3 to eat up till New Years’… and when I counted, a family of 3? That really is putting me inside…”

Huo Ran who failed to hold it in almost laughs his mucus out, facing away to laugh half a day: “Even something like this could scare you?”

“It can though, I don’t even know why, maybe because it was perceived too directly holy fuck, that machine, just standing by the side I felt like I could get sucked in, super scary,” Kou Chen rubs on his arms.1

“Then the… fighting incident this time, we have to call our parents in,” Huo Ran was suddenly a little worried, “What are you gonna do?”

Previously Kou Chen had said that his dad was already used to it, but what it seemed to mean was, even if he was used to it, there was still the possibility of him turning Kou Chen into half a pig that came with a Death God on its butt.

“How bout you do me a favour,” Kou Chen says, “You make a trip down to my house when its time, and talk to my dad, tell him that I did it to uphold justice, actually I don’t really care about what’s justice and what isn’t, I just couldn’t stand to watch and wanted to beat them up, but you have to help me tell…”

“Okay, I’ll help you tell him… Xu Chuan and the others could also help you tell though, why me?” Huo Ran asks.

“My dad’s seen them both, he’s long determined that the two of them aren’t a good bunch, you’re different, you look exactly like a good student, and you’re even the basketball team captain, my dad thinks that students that can be some sort of leader are all good kids,” Kou Chen says.

“Okay then,” Huo Ran agrees.

Kou Chen doesn’t speak anymore, laying down next to him, using his arm as a pillow, and the two of them watch the roof of the tent together.

The roof of this tent was transparent, one could see the outside, it was probably for getting people to think that laying in the tent to watch the stars was romantic, but in actuality this thing couldn’t see jack shit at night, it was just to fool lil noobs like Kou Chen’s group.

Even though at the moment the sky wasn’t dark yet nothing could be seen, there were only the water droplets left behind by the rain, streaming down lane by lane.

Normally when he came out by himself and ran into this sort of situation, he’d usually set an alarm to nap for half an hour, but today there was an extra person in the tent, so even if he wanted to nap, he couldn’t.

So just daze for a while then.

“I just thought up a problem,” Huo Ran turns to him after dazing for a moment, “You were upholding justice though, why do you have to say that you just wanted to fight.”

“It’s really not like that,” Kou Chen says, “The reason I find them an eyesore might be because they’re bullies, but I… in the past I’d never gone up to lend a helping hand because someone had gotten bullied, I didn’t really have friends anyway, so I didn’t bother with those trivial issues in school.”

“No friends?” Huo Ran looks at him.

“Definitely no friends in elementary, I fought every day, middle school and high school first year, I always had a group of people beside me, it looked like I had friends everywhere,” Kou Chen says, “Actually they were just scared of me, after transferring to your school, only Xu Chuan and ChaoRen count as my friends.”

“Oh,” Huo Ran responds.

“Now I can probably count Xu ZhiFan and the few of them in,” Kou Chen gives him a look, “Don’t know if I can count you in.”

“What’s that mean, is there some assessment mechanism?” Huo Ran was baffled.

“Then the two of us count as friends right? You’re not my granddaddy or daddy or uncle or uncle right?” Kou Chen asks.

Huo Ran heaves a sigh.

“Come come come, get up,” Kou Chen sits up, tugging his arm to pull him up.

“What do you want?” Huo Ran sits up rather reluctantly.

Kou Chen doesn’t speak, and with a raise of his arm, hugs his shoulder, then turns to stare at him.

“What do you want?” Huo Ran looks at his arm, then looks at him, “If you want to say something then say it.”

“All good,” Kou Chen pats his shoulder with satisfaction, removing his arm.

Huo Ran was just about to speak, when he hears the sound of footsteps outside, the tent was then unzipped by someone, and Kou Xiao sticks her head in: “Ai, RanRan, will there be wild animals here?”

“What’s wrong?” as soon as Huo Ran hears this, he quickly shuffles outwards.

“There was some noise in the woods over there, is there some animal? Mongolian gazelle?” Kou Xiao’s face was full of nervousness.

“There aren’t Mongolian gazelles here, the human activity is too much in this area, animals usually don’t come over,” Huo Ran puts his shoes on, exiting the tent, and seeing Old Yang standing at the edge of the woods looking in, he quickly gives a shout, “Don’t go in by yourself!”

“I’m just looking,” Old Yang says, “I wouldn’t dare go in.”

Huo Ran returns to fish a small black-colored pole out from his backpack: “I’ll go take a look.”

“Is it a snake?” Kou Chen eyes the pole, “Fuck, you’re fucking out for a trek and you even bring a baton?”

“Not a snake,” Huo Ran gives a flick of his arm, and the pole extends a section with a ka, “What kind of snake could make such a loud noise that could be heard even here?”

“Is there another?” Kou Chen asks, “Give me one.”

“You can take a trekking pole,” Huo Ran says.

“Fuck,” Kou Chen was dissatisfied, but still takes the trekking pole after some hesitation.

“What we heard earlier seemed to be the sound of branches breaking after getting stepped on,” Old Yang says, “But when we came outside we didn’t see anyone, normally if it were villagers or other trekkers, they wouldn’t hide from people right?”

“Mn,” Huo Ran gives a few looks into the woods, it was now already October, the woods weren’t very thick, at a glance one could see pretty far in, but he didn’t see anyone, “I’ll go look.”

“I’ll go too,” Kou Chen follows.

“Then I’ll also…” Old Yang also moves forwards.

“Okay,” Kou Xiao says, “All of you go, don’t need to bother about me, every single thing here, tents baggage food and what not, leave them all to me, this fragile girl, if there’s any sort of danger, even if I have to fight to the death by myself I’ll protect the campsite for everyone!”

“Fuck,” her words make Kou Chen laugh, “Can’t you just say that you want someone to stay behind to keep you company?”

“Can’t you all just say you want to join in the fun?” Kou Xiao gives him a sideways look with her arms crossed.

“Yang-ge how about you keep Jiejie company,” Huo Ran says, “I’m familiar with this area, there won’t be any problems, it might be a small animal, I’ll just go check.”

“Yang RuiDong you follow RanRan, Kou Chen stay with me,” Kou Xiao says, “How can we let 2 high school students into the woods by themselves.”

“Our RanRan’s been scrapping the wilderness for food by himself since elementary,” Kou Chen says, “Old Yang don’t be a burden, I’ll go.”

Huo Ran didn’t mind their debate, simply taking the baton and heading towards the edge of the woods.1

These people said that they’d gotten a little nervous after hearing noise, but generally speaking still felt that this was a long-distance excursion.

Only Huo Ran was internally aware, although he had picked the route with a lower level of difficulty to enter the mountains out of a number of others, they’d already walked an entire day, the Bai Mao Po area was already very secluded, even if there was a village 2km away, that village only had 20-30 people, with a small snack bar that sold some expired instant noodles and expired red lumps that looked like ham sausages but in actuality didn’t have any sort of meat taste, unknown brands of bottled water, the kind that before he drank he still had to put in sterilizing medicine strips for his peace of mind, and a snack bar like this was only opened because there were trekkers that would go there to resupply.

This place was already close to the concept of ‘deep within the mountains and forests’, hearing any sort of abnormal noise, would cause Huo Ran to be on alert.

The result of the debate was probably that Kou Chen had won, in any case when he walked into the woods, Kou Chen followed in behind him, his trekking pole constantly poking into the dried grass and fallen leaves on the ground.

Probably afraid of stepping on a snake.

“Anyone there!” Huo Ran gives a shout.

“Are you a villager?” Kou Chen follows and also shouts.

The rain had already stopped then, the surroundings were very quiet, without even the calls of birds, there was only the sound of Kou Chen poking into the grass.

After walking about 30 metres inwards, the surroundings had become dark, Huo Ran pauses to look around: “Let’s go back, they probably heard wrong or it was a small animal.”

“How so?” Kou Chen asks.

“There aren’t any tracks that have been trod out on the ground, there will always be trails in places where villagers often walk on,” Huo Ran says, “There would also be animal tracks in places large animals often walk on, but here there’s nothing at all, so it was probably a small animal passing by.”

“Oh,” Kou Chen lowers his head to look at the road, “I’ve gained new knowledge.”

The two of them walk out of the woods slowly, Kou Xiao and Old Yang were both standing by the woods staring in their direction, and seeing them come out, immediately asks: “Is anything up?”

“No,” Kou Chen says, “We just…”

The statement had yet to be finished, when Huo Ran hears the sound of footsteps behind stepping onto fallen leaves, the noise wasn’t much, and it sounded rather far away, but the sound was exactly the same as the ones they had made when they’d stepped into the wood earlier.

Huo Ran turns around with a start.

“There’s a person!” Kou Chen keeps his voice low.

“Villager!” Huo Ran sends a shout into the woods.

“Ah!” someone responds from the depths of the woods.

Huo Ran heaves a sigh in relief, giving Kou Chen a look.

“Gave me a fright,” Kou Chen puts something in his hand back into his pocket.

Huo Ran reaches a hand into his pocket to feel around, and it turns out to be a dagger, he looks at Kou Chen: “And you say I brought a dagger when I come out?”

“Then what should I have done, you didn’t share half the baton with me, so I could only look for something myself,” Kou Chen answers very serenely, but there was a hint of smugness in his tone.

As the footsteps in the woods slowly got closer, Huo Ran feels some anxiety again, it sounded like there was quite the number of people, 5-6 people in the least, normally not this many villagers would come to the woods together to play.

“Something’s… not quite right,” Huo Ran reminds with a quiet voice, then turns to look at Old Yang, “There’s too many people.”

“Other trekkers?” Old Yang asks in a low voice, then gives Kou Xiao a push, “You go back to the tent.”

Kou Xiao was very cooperative, immediately picking a thick piece of wood off the ground, squeezing her way back into the tent.

Just a moment later, the people in the woods walk out, and sure enough there were a number, Huo Ran counted, there were six, all male, judging by their appearances and apparel they indeed were villagers, two of which were holding wooden rods in their hands, and another even held a coil of rope.

“Campers?” one of the villagers ask whilst looking at them.

“Yes,” Huo Ran nods as he smiles, “Are you hunting?”

“…Mn,” the villager stares at them expressionlessly for a moment, pointing at the baton in his hand, “What are you holding that for.”

“For self-defense,” Huo Ran swiftly puts the baton away, “We heard the noise earlier, and thought it was a wolf, we were a little scared.”

“Wolves don’t come to this area,” the villager was still staring at them, “How many of you?”

“Just the few of us,” Kou Chen looks over at Huo Ran and Old Yang, “The others with us haven’t arrived yet actually, they set off late.”

A few villagers exchange looks, then stared at them a little more, nodding their heads, and not saying anything else, they turn to walk back in the direction they had come.

After walking a stretch, they turned to give them yet another look.

“Fuck,” Kou Chen waited until they could no longer be seen, before starting to speak, “What’s going on? Why did I feel like there was gonna be a robbery?”

“Can’t say for sure,” Huo Ran furrows his brows, “Sometimes villagers just aren’t too friendly, or I should say… the way they express themselves is like that, they like to ask about things, but when they ask it sounds like they’re interrogating…”

“How about them then?” Old Yang looks in that direction.

“It’s possible they were on their way back after going to that side of the woods to set up animal traps,” Huo Ran says, “Probably scared we would report them, usually they wouldn’t do anything, especially since Kou Chen said we still have people coming, later there should also be other trekkers coming by.”

“What about now?” Old Yang asks.

“Let’s get cooking*,” Huo Ran says.

[*tl note: literal: bury a pot and make rice’

“Okay,” Old Yang smiles as he nods.

Talking about food always makes people happy.

Huo Ran himself was happy, after all he was already a little hungry, but just as he’d taken a step towards the tents, his hand is grabbed by Kou Chen.

“Mn?” Huo Ran looks back.

“Is it that, that, slough!” Kou Chen was frozen on the spot, clutching his hand in a death grip, his eyes indicating downwards.

Huo Ran quickly glances downwards following his gaze: there was a lump of mulch film that had already shattered into bits after being exposed to the elements.

“It’s not,” Huo Ran wanted to retrieve his hand, but Kou Chen wouldn’t let go, so he could only first bend down to pick that lump of decaying mulch film up, “It’s mulch film, do you know what a mulch film is? It’s what villagers use to cover vegetables.”

“Mulch film?” Kou Chen swiftly sweeps a glance onto his hand, then flings his hand away with a start, giving two loud dry laughs, “Oh! Mulch film huh fuck! Mulch… Who fucking threw mulch film here huh! Fuck!”

Huo Ran holds his laughter in.

“Cook cook!” Kou Chen walks towards the tents in large steps, he takes two steps then turns back to point at him, his expression vicious, “If you dare tell anyone about this you’re finished.”

“Will you make me fly?” Huo Ran says.

“I’ll fucking make you fly to the moon!” Kou Chen turns back after he finishes, walking away in strides.