1942, Northern Shanxi. When the last mouthful of fried noodles was fed to the child, Izuku knew that the life of this "family" was cut off.
The man and his father-in-law died on the way to the west exit. Now, the driving tax bangs on the door. All she had left was a pair of small feet, two young children, and a jujube comb left by her mother in her arms.
The west exit road is paved with bones. Killing the tiger's mouth is the gate of hell. In the collapsed city gate, facing a wall of "figures" who were etched by time and shouting silently, she handed over the only thing she had.
She pawned the comb. In other words, all the memories of love and tenderness sealed inside were pawned.
What she got in exchange was the child's slim chance of survival, and her own stone-like body, just for survival.
From the Yellow River to the wilderness, from broken soldiers to wolves. Carrying her child on her back, she crawled towards the north where it was said she could survive. The feet are festering and the world is fading. Only the comb in her arms that no longer belonged to her emitted a slight warmth on the night of her death, urging together with the eternal "shadow":
Go. To the north. Get our children out of here.
This is not just an epic story of a mother's survival.
This is a woman who, on the edge of the cliff of history, personally cut out the "human heart" and replaced it with "animal bones" to complete the continuation of life.
It was also decades later that her descendants deciphered the shocking transaction about memory, emotion and survival through old papers and data.
Mountains and rivers serve as evidence, and souls serve as evidence.
She pawned all her softness in exchange for a spine that could survive the hell on earth.
