Do you support them?

  Zhen Ming walked out from behind a warehouse by the riverbank, looking in the direction where the man in black had disappeared, his eyebrows furrowed deeply.

  He stealthily boarded the ship, and by the moonlight, he vaguely made out the scene on the deck of the Lou boat.

  On the deck of a large transport ship, more than ten people were lying horizontally and vertically.

  None of them had intact limbs, either their hands and feet were cut off or their heads were severed, the blood under the moonlight was black.

  Dead silence, terrifying.

  The moonlight is hazy, the river wind is gentle, and there are no other people on the riverbank. It can be seen that within the sphere of influence of the salt gang, few people dare to approach easily.

  Zhen Ming bitterly took out the ultra-generational mobile phone from his pocket, unlocked the screen, and opened an app called "Sound Wave Infrared Detection".

  A colorful picture appeared on the screen, vaguely showing a topographic map of about 100 meters in diameter.

  There are more than a dozen stationary red small dots on top, with colors ranging from deep to light. Some of the red circles gradually change color from deep red to pale red until they completely turn into a pale blue similar to the background, representing one by one life slowly disappearing.

  The smartphone is equipped with a military-grade infrared temperature sensor, which can display the temperature differences within a hundred meters in different colors. Small red dots indicate high-temperature objects, light blue indicates the surrounding constant temperature, and dark blue indicates areas with low temperatures.

  On the screen, in addition to a dozen or so pale red dots scattered around the edges that gradually faded away, there were also a dozen or so deep red small dots clustered together.

  Apart from this, there is no sign of life anywhere else.

  Having grasped the approximate location of all living things on the boat, Zhenming reluctantly put his phone back in his pocket, slowly rolled up his sleeves, revealing a small black box-like object on his arm. With one hand holding the button on the black box, he walked step by step, cautiously towards the cabin door.

  In the cabin of the junk, corpses lay scattered about in every direction, blood splattered everywhere.

  Treading on the thick blood underfoot, Zhen Ming struggled to walk to the side of Pei Qian's body, which was like a rotten mud. He squatted down and searched his body for a while, but except for a few hanging decorations and a few pieces of broken silver, there was nothing else.

  He looked around again, but found nothing, turned around and slowly went downstairs to the lowest cabin of the ship.

  The lowest hold was damp and gloomy, with a pungent smell of mold. Moonlight came in through the only small window in the cabin, making it possible to see the entire layout of the cabin.

  A dozen burlap sacks were piled up in a corner of the cabin, from which faint cries for help from women could be heard.

  After confirming that there were no other living things around except for the people in these sacks, Zhen Ming put down the hidden weapon on his arm and walked to the front of those dozen sacks.

  He cut open the burlap sack's closure, revealing inside a dozen or so young women wearing nothing but their underwear, with extreme panic on their faces.

  At this time, a faint male voice suddenly came from beside: "If you are thinking for them, it's better not to untie them."

  Zhen Ming's eyes narrowed as he instinctively rolled up his sleeves, turned around and fell to the ground, aiming the hidden weapon on his arm at the direction of the sound.

  The other party in the darkness did not take any further action. From his voice, it can be heard that he is very weak and powerless at this time, not like a threatening person.

  He stood up, walked cautiously to the front of this man, took out his mobile phone, and under the bright light of the screen, a man who was bound like a rice dumpling, covered in wounds, and on the verge of death.

  This man's appearance is not yet thirty years old, roughly the same age as him, with a square face, sword-like eyebrows, and sharp eyes. Despite being beaten all over his body, he still has a strong appearance, with a rather hard-boiled pride.

  Zhen Ming painfully pulled out a dagger from his waist, this was the only dagger he had forged with tungsten alloy two days ago. With a light cut, the rope tied to the man's body snapped loudly.

  The man obviously didn't expect that Zhen Ming would let him go without even asking a question, and after glancing at the dagger in his hand, he looked up with a surprised expression and asked: "Brother, why did you untie me without even asking?"

  Zhen Ming bitterly reinserted the dagger into his waist and said, "Those who oppose the Salt Gang are my friends. And looking at you now, I don't think you can do anything to me."

  The man smiled weakly and struggled to get up, perhaps because he had been bound for too long, his blood circulation was poor, and he fell twice. He refused Zhen Ming's help and leaned against the wall of the cabin, panting heavily.

  Only then did he discover that his legs had been pierced by a sharp object with two large holes, which had become infected and inflamed, emitting a foul odor.

  It's rare for him to still be able to speak with a smile on his face.

  The other party looked at him and asked: "Brother, what's your name?"

  "My surname is Zhen." Zhen Ming was bitter that the other party did not report their name and did not know the other party's details, nor did they report their own name.

  Perhaps feeling the bitter fate, the other party's face showed a hint of apology: "Zhen brothers, sorry to say that I am an escaped soldier being pursued by the authorities. I dare not reveal my name easily, lest it implicate you, brother. It is not intentional disrespect, but gratitude for saving my life will be repaid heavily in the future."

  Zhen Ming sighed and said: "No need, it's just a small effort."

  The man asked: "Brother, you came here, aren't you looking for someone?"

  Zhen Ming shook his head: "Want to find a sale contract." "Then brother came to the wrong place." The man said weakly, "This is the salt gang's Luohe branch warehouse, except for women who were kidnapped from various places, there is nothing else. I think brother is also a kind-hearted person, otherwise you wouldn't have wanted to release these unfamiliar women earlier. It's just that if brother doesn't have a good way to settle them, it's best not to touch them, otherwise you won't be able to help them and will harm them instead."

  "What's going on?"

  The man seemed to have heard a stupid question and was shocked, saying: "Could it be that brother doesn't even know the details of the Salt Gang, yet he rashly came to their lair to cause trouble? If you are recognized by the people of the Salt Gang, no matter how great your skills are, I'm afraid you will still find it difficult to defeat them with their numerical superiority."

  Zhen Ming bitterly nodded and said: "I don't know much about the Salt Gang, but I'm not stupid enough to let them know who I am."

  "But you didn't even cover your face."

  "They can't see what I look like anymore."

  The man was taken aback, then suddenly came to his senses and said in a low voice: "These bastards are indeed guilty of death. Even if you don't kill them, brother, I will come back and kill them all once I recover from my injuries!"

  "It wasn't me who killed him..." Zhen Ming hesitated for a moment, "To be honest, I'm currently suppressing my nausea and will probably throw up soon."

  The man did not take the words of warning to heart, and seemed not to believe that someone would vomit because of a few dead people. He pointed at the women who were staring at them in terror and said: "These women are all salt gangs gathered from various places, preparing to be sent to major brothels in Luoyang for a high price. They will temporarily stay here without any danger. However, if they escape, first, most of them are ladies who do not leave their boudoirs, second, they have no special skills, and apart from selling their bodies, they have no other means of survival. Even if they escape the salt gang's clutches, they will be caught by Luoyang's rascals and sold to lower-class brothels, where their fate will be even more miserable. Compared to being sent by the salt gang to high-end brothels for training and becoming famous courtesans, letting them go would actually harm them."

  Zhenming was bitter and heard one array silently.

  The man sighed: "Actually, this is also an unavoidable thing. On a day like today when the rain is heavy and chaotic, for these poor and weak women to be able to find a place to settle down is already a blessing. Even if you want to help, brother, it's not necessarily possible. Without the Salt Gang, other gangs will still come in and they will ultimately escape being sold into brothels."

  "Are they just going to leave them like that?"

  "Why don't you ask your brothers if they are willing to go with you."

  Zhen Ming painfully walked up to one of the women and untied the cloth from her mouth.

  Sure, here is the translation:

  As expected, just as the man had said, when Zhen Ming asked them if they were willing to follow him, not a single one nodded in agreement.

  The man saw that he had a pitiful heart and could only say: "Brother, if you really can't bear it, there is actually a way to save them."

  "What's the solution?"

  "Buy them at a high price, marry them as concubines, and make them your women. You support them."

  Zhen Ming was startled and his voice rose by an octave: "You're kidding, right?"

  "Li never jokes."