Chapter 232 - 222: 2 Houses
Chapter 232: Chapter 222: 2 Houses
The car stopped about twenty minutes later. It seemed this gang was quite cautious, choosing not to do their dirty work near their own lair.
The first thing Tang Mo saw when she got out of the car was a high wooden fence. It was taller than a person and topped with tangled barbed wire.
At the entrance, several equally tall and burly men sat on chairs with their legs crossed, smoking cigarettes.
Cigarettes were a luxury in this post-apocalyptic world. It looked like they’d managed to get their hands on plenty of good things; they were rolling in it.
"Brother Hu, look at the woman I brought back this time. She’s quite a looker, isn’t she?"
The man from the car got out and spoke, full of pride, to a man with an earring sitting in the center of the group by the entrance.
The man took the cigarette butt from his lips, then stood up and sized Tang Mo up from head to toe.
Then he nodded, satisfied. The woman they brought back this time was different from the previous ones—all filthy, sallow, and emaciated. One look was all it took to see she was premium quality.
"Pass the word: no one is to touch this woman. I have my own uses for her."
Brother Hu was clearly the leader of this small gang. For this place to have survived so long, they had undoubtedly encroached on other people’s territory.
And Tang Mo was the "gift" Brother Hu intended to use to curry favor.
"Throw her in that building too. Give her some decent food; don’t you dare let her get thin on me."
Upon hearing the mention of "that building," the little girl’s shoulders visibly flinched, as if she had recalled something terrible.
Tang Mo could feel that the building was a terrifying place for the little girl.
Tang Mo was led through the high fence, feeling like she was walking into a pre-apocalypse prison.
The area inside the fence wasn’t very large and was roughly divided into three zones.
Closest to the exit were a few buildings with people coming and going. They were mostly men. Seeing a strange woman brought in, their eyes seemed to glow with a green light, like a pack of ravenous wolves.
The buildings in the middle zone were clearly a cut above the rest, much more luxurious in both size and exterior decoration.
Tang Mo couldn’t guess their purpose. ’Perhaps that’s where Brother Hu, the man from the gate, lives?’
After walking for a while longer, she saw two dilapidated buildings huddled together, standing forlornly in the far corner of the compound.
Perhaps calling them buildings wasn’t quite right. They were more like two massive, rectangular warehouses, each one or two hundred square meters in area.
The buildings had windows, but they had all been sealed shut with iron plates and nails. Not a single ray of sunlight could penetrate them, making them resemble giant, sealed containers.
Each warehouse had only one door, which served as the only exit. A massive lock hung on the outside, meaning it could only be opened from without.
The man unlocked one of the warehouses first and shoved the little girl inside.
"Big Sister, my name is Little Bun!"
The little girl shouted this out, mustering all her courage in the final second before she was pushed inside.
The large door was slowly shut. Tang Mo peered through the closing gap, but could only see darkness. There seemed to be a single, faint light inside, but not a trace of sunlight.
A single door, separating the inside and outside into two completely different worlds.
There wasn’t much time for Tang Mo to get sentimental, however. She was quickly shoved into the adjacent building.
"Just stay put in there and behave yourself. Don’t go causing any trouble for me."
The man warned her.
"As long as you keep your head down, you won’t want for food and drink."
Looking at Tang Mo’s clean face, the man fought the urge to reach out and caress it.
But then he remembered Brother Hu’s orders and thought better of it.
Around here, anyone who disobeyed Brother Hu met a nasty end. Women were the one thing they weren’t short on. It wasn’t worth breaking a taboo and pissing off Brother Hu for this one.
After the main door shut, Tang Mo squinted, taking a moment for her eyes to adjust to the dim surroundings.
Once she could see again, she took a careful look around.
The entire warehouse was rectangular, divided into two zones.
One zone was a dormitory, filled with nothing but bunk beds. Each bunk just had some simple straw, a sheet, a blanket, and a pillow.
Perhaps because water was scarce, the sheets, pillowcases, and blankets were all solid black to hide the dirt, making the atmosphere feel even more oppressive.
A quick scan revealed about a hundred beds, roughly half of them occupied.
The other zone consisted of a row of tables against the wall, presumably for the women to eat or wash up. Many basins were placed under the tables, but there were no chairs.
The arrival of a new person didn’t seem to elicit any particular reaction from the others inside.
Everyone just went about their business as usual.
In truth, there wasn’t much to do while locked up in here, aside from lying on one’s bunk.
There were no forms of entertainment whatsoever. Life was so dull that there was nothing better to do than sleep.
Normally, a new arrival should have provided this group of women with some fresh entertainment and gossip. The fact that it was so quiet was actually abnormal.
Tang Mo could feel many pairs of eyes sizing her up, but no one had approached to speak with her yet.
There were about forty-odd people in the warehouse, all of them women ranging from their teens to their thirties.
Tang Mo didn’t have to think twice to know what kind of place this was.
It seemed this gang’s business model was quite diverse—a warehouse of children, a warehouse of women. They hadn’t missed a single opportunity for depravity.
Tang Mo found an empty bunk in the farthest corner and settled in.
The corner was damp and dark. Since there were still plenty of empty bunks, no one wanted to stay there, which was why the bunks next to Tang Mo were all vacant.
Tang Mo had already emptied her personal backpack, which had been confiscated.
She quietly climbed onto the top bunk, then used her Space to swap the bedding with a sheet, pillow, and comforter of the exact same color.
Thankfully, they were solid black, so she could find an identical replacement. If they’d had a unique pattern, she would have had no choice but to make do.
She also slipped a soft mattress pad under the sheet. Only then did Tang Mo feel much more comfortable.
She lifted her wrist to look at her ID Watch. It was still functioning.
She glanced at the other women. Their wrists were bare. Little Bun hadn’t been wearing an ID Watch either.
It seemed this gang had a special method for removing ID Watches. No wonder they dared to act so brazenly, harming women and children so close to Huaxi City.
In the eyes of those men, Tang Mo had come willingly. She wasn’t forced. It was the first time they had ever encountered such a situation.
She hadn’t resisted or struggled in the slightest, which had made them forget the step of removing her ID Watch.
Tang Mo slid her ID Watch further up her wrist, covering it with her sleeve.
"Hey, kid. Judging by the looks of it, you’ve been in a situation like this before?"
Just as Tang Mo was about to lie down, a woman who looked to be in her thirties walked up to her bunk to talk to her.