The little boy trembled outside the kitchen, watching his friend being brutally chopped up by the headmaster.
It was human flesh, the flesh of his best friend.
The headmaster and the other aunties chopped it up and mixed it with celery to make dumplings, and the meat inside was not pork.
The little boy teared up as he watched this scene, but he was powerless.
Whenever his friend fell ill, this was what would happen to them, being chopped up and turned into dumplings.
During dinner, the headmaster smiled at a group of skinny and tall children and shouted, “Darlings, today the headmaster has made your favorite dumplings.”
Oh yeah!
We have dumplings to eat!
The children cheered, their little faces beaming with joy.
Only Lu Zhan, who was hiding in the back, looked at the dumplings the headmaster was serving with a terrified expression.
Then one by one, they were placed in front of them on the table. Soon, it turned into a large bowl of dumplings.
And inside the dumplings was Da Niu, his very best friend, now gone.
Lu Zhan didn’t eat. Taking advantage of their inattention, he lowered his head and discreetly put the dumplings in his pocket while pretending to eat.
As he watched them almost finish the dumplings in their bowls, he also put the dumplings from his bowl into his pocket.
After a brief rest, they would eat some apples and then go back to sleep.
With two apples in his belly, Lu Zhan felt only half-full, and then he returned to the sleeping area with twenty or thirty other children.
Lu Zhan watched as they all fell asleep. Then he quietly went to the yard with a small shovel and dug a small hole. He carefully put twenty or thirty dumplings into it and covered the hole before returning to his room. He lay on the bed, but tears uncontrollably streamed down his face.
He wanted to leave this place.
The headmaster and the other aunties here were all crazy people.
Sometimes they would put a little feces in the food or cook porridge using urine. He was so disgusted that he would rather eat some apples than touch that food.
It was smelly, foul, and disgusting.
As for why the headmaster did such things, it was because the headmaster and the other aunties had also experienced such things before, so they wanted them to experience the pain they had suffered.
Lu Zhan longed to eat delicious food. He didn’t want to eat that kind of smelly, foul, and disgusting food. Unfortunately, he couldn’t leave.
The front gate was securely locked, without any gaps. Their activities were usually limited to the yard, the kitchen, and the sleeping area.
Those children favored by the headmaster here received better treatment.
They ate fragrant rice and well-cooked braised pork, which was something he didn’t dare to imagine.
He filled his stomach with fruit every day, but he couldn’t bring himself to eat that food.
The other children had already gotten used to it and didn’t think much of it. As long as they could eat their fill, it was enough for them.
And these children, including Lu Zhan, were all abandoned by their parents and thrown in here. There were boys and girls, and they weren’t very old.
The youngest was three years old, and the oldest was only six.
Lu Zhan was just a little over four years old, but he was a sensible boy. He understood some things and could understand what was being said.
When Lu Zhan went to sleep at night, he had a nightmare. He dreamed that he had turned into a monster.
He had a big mouth with sharp fangs at the corners, and his eyes turned gray, looking extremely eerie.
Lu Zhan didn’t know why he had such a dream, and it was a terrifying one.
He slept restlessly, whimpering and groaning. It was obvious that he was scared by the dream.
In his dream, everything was chaotic and noisy, with reluctant faces appearing.
Many people were running around in a panic. Fear filled their faces. Behind them, there were strange sounds following them.
Their appearances were completely unrecognizable and looked so terrifying that it made people unable to help but wake themselves up.
As he looked around in complete darkness, he felt a bit eerie.
Lu Zhan knew, but he didn’t say anything.
