Searching for Treasures in the Clouds

Her clothes and body always exude a light fragrance, like a human perfume, with its own top, middle and bottom notes. The smell is like flowers blooming in the morning dew, fresh and sweet, intoxicating, and like the often silent Buddhist bells in the temple, quiet and solemn when silent, and exciting when ringing, the long and lingering sound will echo in the heart for a long time and cannot be dispersed. This mysterious and subtle smell is difficult for Yunjixing to describe, and there is nothing comparable to it. In short, he especially likes to smell it, and every time he gets close to Yu Ru and smells it, he doesn't want to leave.

This smell made him feel peaceful. Now, resting his head on Yu Ru's legs, he could clearly smell it. His mood unconsciously became more stable, and his breath was no longer disordered and rapid, but there was still a heavy airflow rushing to his throat and mouth, which made him feel extremely bloody. He leaned against Yu Ru quietly like a baby, with one hand on her calf, holding her, as if holding the support of this life.

Yu Ru patted his back gently, slowly soothing him. Her expression was calm and peaceful, but her eyes were empty and lacked spiritual support.

Many things have been blown away by the wind, and drifted very far away. Those distant pasts are as vague as the past in her memory. It's not that she has let it go, but she is unwilling to face it. Her emotions have made a choice before her. Looking at the past, half of it is unbearable woven by bad words and curses, and the other half is hazy and blurred vision. So she is only accompanied by wailing and confusion day and night. If she wants to find a little happiness, she has to climb mountains and cross rivers.

She often thought, she was tired enough, why did she have to be so tired? Why couldn't she stop? On the other side, the lines of code jumping on the computer were carrying the passion of reality; on the other side, her scarred body was buried with the violence she had suffered from the outside world for more than ten years.

Her wish was to survive in the chaotic world, not to seek fame and fortune among the princes, but she always encountered power unexpectedly. Well, since she was here, she would follow the example of a duck or a crane and change herself first. However, she wanted to risk her life for the country's urgent needs, but somehow she ended up being a pest that everyone wanted to kill; she wanted to be a righteous man, but after all the arguments, she became a clown that everyone pointed at; she wanted to be an ordinary person and live an ordinary life, but after all the efforts, she became a captive of others' fists and feet.

Yu Ru suddenly fell into a dark hole of emptiness and nothingness. Fragments of her memory flew around in the hole, slowly piecing together her past and the truth she had to face.

When she was seven years old, or to be exact, not quite seven years old, but six and a half years old, she was caught by a human trafficker because she was catching grasshoppers alone near her home. The human trafficker was a woman who looked tired and exhausted, and she clearly remembered that she was holding a baby in her arms.

She was squatting by the bushes, catching grasshoppers, when suddenly a faint female voice came from behind her, "Hey, little friend, I heard there's a longan garden nearby, do you know where it is?"

Yu Ru looked back and saw a woman holding a child, standing hunched behind her. Because she was a stranger, she immediately stood up alertly and backed away from her.

"who are you?"

"Little friend, I'm just passing by here to visit my relatives. I don't know the way, so I wanted to come over and ask you if you know it."

Yu Ru looked her up and down without saying anything, his eyes fixed on the child in her arms.

Seeing her curiosity, the woman squatted down and took the initiative to show her the child in her arms. "Little friend, this is my child. I am so tired holding him. Please help me. I just want to find a place to rest quickly. I just want to know where to go to Longan Garden. I am not a bad person. Don't be afraid."

Yu Ru approached her cautiously, stretching her neck to look at the child in her arms. It was a one or two-year-old child, looking very small, chubby, with a rosy face, very cute. This child made her relax her guard, and she grinned, "Auntie, your child is really small."

"Yes." The woman also laughed, "He just turned one a few days ago."

"Oh, so what longan garden are you going to?"

"Have you heard of Tomita Ryugan Garden?"

Yu Ru shook her head, "No, go ask someone else, I don't know, bye."

After saying that, Yu Ru turned around and was about to leave. The woman hurriedly said, "Hey, hey, hey, kid, don't leave yet. Do you know Fuman Lychee Garden?"

Yu Ru stopped and looked back. She thought for a moment and nodded.

"Little boy, can you take me there?"

"No." Yu Ru shook her head. "My grandma said I can't follow others. She will scold me. If you don't know the way, just ask others. In the evening, many people will go home after planting vegetables here. You can ask them."

"Little friend, my child has a fever and can't wait until the evening. I have to go to my relatives quickly. If you know anything, can you take me there?"

Hearing this, Yu Ru walked back to the woman, stretched out her hand and gently placed it on the forehead of the child in her arms, then her face was shocked, "It's so hot, your child really has a fever!"

"Yes, take me with you. People with a fever will become stupid. We really can't wait."

Yu Ru still remembered how she felt when she had a fever last time. She couldn't remain indifferent to a child younger than her having a fever, so she agreed to the woman's request. In fact, the lychee orchard was not far away, only about 200 meters away, and she thought she should be able to go home soon.

Unexpectedly, because she was kind enough to lead the woman, she was forcibly taken away halfway.

Her home was in the countryside, with few people around. There were not many pedestrians on the road, and those who did were elderly people with poor hearing and eyesight. Therefore, no one could hear her cries for help, and she was kidnapped. It was not until she got on the traffickers' car that she realized that the child the woman held in her arms was not hers, but was also kidnapped by her. After she was caught in the car, she was forced to drink some unknown liquid, and then she fell unconscious in the car.

When she woke up again, she was already in a different place. She was handed over to the second group of human traffickers and sold to another province where her personal freedom was controlled.

In human trafficking, boys are often more popular than girls, so in order to sell her for a good price, the second wave of traffickers shaved her head and changed her into boys' clothes so that she could pretend to be a boy. Perhaps because she looked too weak, the seller looked down on her and thought she looked like a sickly child and difficult to feed, so he changed his mind and did not want her. The second wave of traffickers then looked for buyers everywhere, and finally found a black-hearted factory that specialized in shoveling and digging coal backed by a mountain.

All the people working in that black-hearted factory were illegally brought in, with no salary, and no way to leave, so they had to work until they died. Most of the people working there were street vagrants and some disabled people, as well as many children like Yu Ru, and some even had intellectual disabilities so severe that they couldn't take care of themselves.