Elena was sleeping soundly when she was suddenly shaken awake by Roan: "Get up, someone is here!"

  Elena bounced upright instantly. Before she was even fully awake, she was pulled by Roan toward the backyard.

  In the pitch-black night, they only looked for the darkest places to hide.

  The newcomers were a couple.

  "Honey, I’ll feed the chickens, you feed the pigs."

  After a while, a light turned on, followed by the sound of chickens being picked up and clucking noises.

  "Eh? Why aren't the chickens eating?"

  "Chickens go blind as soon as it gets dark. Turn the light up brighter, or use two lamps."

  Then came a sound of searching for things and moving objects.

  This time, the man spoke first.

  "Oh, the pigs aren't eating either. There’s still old food in the trough? Honey, did my mom feed the pigs before we left?"

  "Oh, no. Your dad and mom were running with the kids even faster than me. There are still corn bits in my chicken trough too."

  Both of them said in unison: "Someone has been here?"

  Their voices were deliberately lowered: "Honey, in this pitch-black house, could someone be hiding?"

  "What nonsense are you talking? Who would come to hide in our house? Let’s go, let's go into the room to talk."

  After a sound of walking, the couple went into the house.

  Then, there was no sound for a long time.

  Roan and Elena quietly moved to the front yard, ready to escape at any moment. Fortunately, the back and front yards of this house were connected.

  Luckily, it didn't take long before the couple left again.

  "Honey, give me a kiss before you go."

  "Mwah! Is that enough?"

  "Not enough, kiss me again."

  "Mwah. You even want kisses while walking, honestly."

  "Anyway, there's no one around..."

  Listening to the two of them talking, kissing, and chatting as they gradually walked away, Elena and Roan finally returned to the room. However, they didn't dare to turn on the light, and could only use the little moonlight from the windowsill to see where the bed was.

  The two of them sat on the edge of a bed and chatted.

  "Still dare to sleep?"

  Elena first shook her head, then realized Roan couldn't see her shaking her head, so she answered: "I don't dare anymore."

  "How about we go to the main road and hitch a ride?"

  "I'm not going. Your injury hasn't healed yet; don't fall into some big puddle without a change of clothes."

  "True."

  The conversation fell silent again in the dark. Roan had no choice but to pick at the bed board with his fingernails, making a slight "scritch-scritch" sound.

  Is he afraid I’m not safe alone?

  So he doesn't dare go back to his own bed?

  Elena thought quietly. With a man sitting next to her, she was too embarrassed to lie down.

  "By the way! I think we were discovered."

  Roan stopped picking at the bed board: "How is that possible?"

  "They went silent after entering the house. They must have discovered the food we didn't finish. When they were walking, they talked while moving; they were definitely saying it to us..."

  Roan took over Elena’s words, mimicking a girl’s voice and continuing: "We're leaving! You two can have babies however you want, just don't break our bed!"

  "So annoying!" Elena punched Roan next to her, though it only hit his shoulder.

  "Hehehe..."

  "Hehe your head!" She really didn't expect that Roan, who was usually so quiet, could also crack this kind of dirty joke.

  She finally realized that Roan wasn't actually antisocial; he just had too many secrets in his heart.

  "By the way, they said your dad is a Division Commander. Why don't you escape to the other side?"

  "It’s not that I haven't thought about it. But in this situation, illegal border crossing can result in being shot on sight. I'm not afraid for myself, but I didn't want my younger brother and sister to take that risk."

  "True."

  "Also..." Roan fell silent for a long time after saying this.

  "What?" Elena couldn't help but ask.

  "My father is actually a traitor on this side."

  "Oh."

  "And, I am a socialist person; I don't want to join capitalism."

  Elena thought about it and felt he was right. From her experience of living twice, no matter what "ism" it was, what mattered was the governing ability and whether it was people-centered.

  From the perspective of a person from the future, in the future, rural residential land and farmland would be distributed equally to the peasants, and there would be no property tax or farmland tax—on this point, socialist peasants in the future wouldn’t necessarily be worse off than those under capitalism.

  But those days would still take a while.

  Maybe a year, maybe two.

  The life in this lifetime was already a bit different from her previous one, such as this mutiny.

  Thinking this way, this Roan either had a sort of wise-yet-humble foresight, or his ideals were very firm. she began to secretly admire Roan.

  Roan didn't know Elena was thinking about these things and continued: "Do you know why I know the black market?"

  "I don't know."

  "Those people in the black market do smuggling. In the past, my mom often asked them to write letters to me, and the letters even had money from that side tucked inside."

  Elena did remember that Roan’s records only had his father Antonio’s name, but no mother.

  She didn't expect his mother was still around, and on that side.

  "Is your mom also in the black market? Then why doesn't she come and pick you guys up? I see them moving goods by boat quite easily."

  "It's not possible. She is in the National Security Bureau. Besides watching others, she is also watched by her colleagues. People in the National Security Bureau are to be shot if they show any sign of betrayal."

  "I mean, the National Security Bureau on the other side."

  At this point, both fell silent. Roan let out a long sigh. "Sigh..."

  To change the subject and make Roan feel lighter, Elena took the initiative to ask: "Your mom must be very beautiful, right? I think Sofia is very pretty."

  Actually, she wanted to say that all three of you siblings are very good-looking, but she was too embarrassed to say it out loud.

  "No, it's my dad who is good-looking. My mom suffered a lot to marry my dad back then. My dad joined the army, so my mom insisted on joining the army too. My dad went to the front line, and my mom insisted on going to the front line too. In short, to marry my dad, she was willing even to die."

  "The result..."

  "What was the result?" Elena was a bit panicked, not wanting to hear a bad result, but also curious.

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  "The result was, I heard they got divorced over there. Mateo told me, he’s the boss of the black market, and he found out through Leo’s wife."

  "Leo’s wife?" Elena’s head got even bigger.

  "Yes. I’ve called her Auntie since I was a child. She is also over there, and I heard she has a good life. But her relationship with Leo was very bad. Both parents were high-ranking officials; they were the product of an arranged marriage from before they were born."

  "Arranged before birth?" Elena cried out in surprise.

  "What’s so strange about that era?" Roan thought for a moment, appearing to have made a great resolution before continuing: "Leo and her had no common language at all. They would argue and fight at the drop of a hat. When the war reached its seventh year and it looked like this area was about to have a ceasefire, she took the two children and fled to the other side. The last time I saw her was right when I had just joined the army."

  "It was me who used a bit of influence and asked my comrades to deliberately overlook the check so she could escape... When she left, I met her one last time... At that time, she was covered in wounds from a whip. Truly, there was blood on her face and hands... One child was 8 years old and could walk on his own, and one was only 6 and she had to carry him... I brought her a large bag of medicine. I had no money then, so I got it on credit from a pharmacy."

  "From then on, I guess Leo’s father must have hated me to the core."

  "Maybe the reason I’ve always been without an identity is because of him."

  Roan fell silent again after saying all this.

  "Is he a very high-ranking military officer?" Elena couldn't help but ask.

  "Of course, one of the biggest generals."

  "Then is Leo really crazy or faking it?"

  "Faking it." Roan sighed again: "He said it was because my father was labeled a traitor that he went crazy. Do you believe that?"

  "That reason..."

  "It’s probably to protect me. If he didn't fake being crazy, he’d have no reason to stay here. If he wasn't here, his father would definitely have killed me. His father actually has a battalion permanently stationed on this side; on the surface, it’s to protect him, but in reality, it’s to kill me."

  Roan gave a bitter smile.

  "Hehe."

  "Then how come you aren't dead?"

  "I’ve long since become well-acquainted with them. They even help me fight."

  "This..." Elena understood instantly. The young master is here; the old man is far away. Is it likely they’d listen to the old man and kill the person the young master is close to?

  "His father’s family lives in the capital. Have you been to the capital? I’m talking about Aurelia, not Port Sol."

  "Never been," Elena answered sadly. In her past life, she had seen Aurelia many times on TV.

  But the big northern city was far too distant for her.

  The key point was, her parents didn't love her, so how could they have ever taken her on a long trip.

  "Before the war, my parents took me to Aurelia once a year. There were many people there. There is an ancient Helios Palace, and a zoo... the rest, I don't remember much."

  "Do you think there’s a possibility that our two sides will make up one day? For example, being able to visit relatives on our own?"

  "Definitely." Elena is a person from the future and knows they will make up in three years, so she blurted it out.

  But she wasn't sure if this lifetime would be faster or slower.

  "That would be great. Then I could take my younger sister to that side for medical treatment."

  The night was very deep. Unfortunately, neither of them had a watch, so they didn't know exactly what time it was.

  A faint sound of footsteps came from outside, seemingly a cat or a dog. Roan became alert and once again pulled Elena toward the backyard.

  Unfortunately, just as they reached the main hall, a dozen flashlights lit up.

  "You were so invested in your 'love talk' that we heard everything! Hahaha."

  "Speak, who on earth are you people, and what are you doing in our house in the middle of the night?"

  "They don't have guns; don't be afraid of them."

  ...

  Maybe they were too invested in the chat just now. Elena really didn't expect that so many villagers had already sneaked into this house, carrying hoes, wood-cleavers, and so on.

  They even all brought flashlights?

  Flashlights were still quite expensive things at this time. Well, it makes sense; if the villagers escaped up the mountain together, how could they not bring flashlights.

  "Hey, what are you still standing there for? Quickly say if you are spies! Otherwise, we won't let you leave."

  "I bet they are spies. They were talking about the other side just now."

  "You are the spy!" Roan roared in the local dialect. He pulled out the ID card he had just processed. "Look, look, look, I am a Beldora person."

  A woman about thirty years old walked over and shone a flashlight on the ID card.

  "Eh? He actually is a local." By her voice, she was exactly the woman who had asked for a kiss earlier.

  "Hubby, they are good people. Put the hoes down."

  Elena had no choice but to recount the process of their escape from the county town from beginning to end. Of course, she didn't mention the mental hospital or the underground tunnels. The general idea was that they didn't want to participate in the war, and even more so didn't want to betray their country.

  Elena also specially explained that they felt they couldn't eat the villagers' food for nothing, so they had specifically fed all the chickens and pigs in the village once.

  "Oh? So that’s how it is."

  The villagers one after another put down their weapons, because the chickens and pigs in their houses really had been fed by someone.

  Someone even gave Elena advice on how to return to Beldora tomorrow.

  "The soldiers are all squeezed into the county town right now; you surround me, I surround you. Tomorrow, get up before dawn and go wait by the main road. Every morning at 6 o'clock, my nephew drives a truck past. Just say you are a friend of Marcus from Oakwood Village, and he will let you on the truck. The last three digits of the license plate are 665, got it?"

  Roan took advantage of the faint glow from the flashlights to see the man clearly, shaking his hand: "Big brother, thank you so much. Once things settle down, I will definitely come to see you."

  The hostess introduced herself as Tessa. She pointed at the dining table and laughed at Elena: "Your man made the dishes? They taste worse than our pig slop, ahahaha."

  She finished and then muttered to herself: "A man who still makes dishes for you while injured is a good man; you should cherish him."

  Elena: "..."