This night was incredibly long for Yang Dong and for everyone waiting at the Yang Family’s house; no one could sleep.

Before the day even broke, smoke started coming out of the chimney at the Yang Family’s house.

Considering that the villagers helped search for the missing person on the mountain, they must be exhausted and hungry by now.

Therefore, providing food was essential.

Not only was it necessary, but more had to be prepared since if the person wasn’t found, the search would continue throughout the day.

Luckily, the Yang Family usually had ample food reserves, with plenty of rice and wheat flour, and just after the busy farming season, they also had several sacks of cornmeal stocked up.

Everyone got busy preparing.

Finally, the sound of the courtyard gate was heard.

Upon hearing the gate, Alu was almost the first to rush out, seeing Yang Gang entering the courtyard, she quickly asked, "Second Brother Yang, is there any news about my young lady? Is my young lady found?"

This matter concerned everyone deeply, and after Alu rushed out, others followed out of the house, seeing the expression on Yang Gang’s face, guessing that nothing was accomplished throughout the night.

Sure enough, they saw Yang Gang shake his head, "No."

Upon hearing these two words, Alu nearly collapsed, retreating several steps, luckily caught by Xiaoxiao who rushed over.

Alu felt her young lady was likely in dire straits, and worried about how to explain to the Li Family, she burst into tears, "Mistress Yang, what should I do? What should I do?"

That helpless look was unbearable for anyone to see.

At this moment, Xiaoxiao’s mood was also heavy; although she hadn’t known Li Chuntao for long, she was originally her best friend, and during their interactions, Li Chuntao’s thoughtful concern for her made Xiaoxiao dearly fond of the simple and kind girl.

How could she not be worried, how could she not be sad?

But she knew it wasn’t time to give up yet; no news meant good news, much better than news of finding a corpse.

She spoke to comfort Alu, "Alu, don’t worry too much, it’s inconvenient to search for people at night, now it’s daylight, everyone will look again, surely she can be found, if not, we’ll expand the search area, go to other villages, let everyone search the back mountain again."

At this moment, Yang Gang also spoke to comfort, "Yes, don’t be too anxious, it was hard to see at night, we only searched the outskirts and haven’t gone deeper, it’s almost dawn, we plan to go further in."

Yang Gang spoke as he turned to Yang Ming’s mother, "Mother, quickly make some food, everyone is hungry, there’s no strength to go up the mountain."

"The food is ready, I’ll go get it."

Yang Ming’s mother said as she went inside to fetch it, both the eldest daughter-in-law and second daughter-in-law also followed inside to prepare.

Soon the prepared food was brought out, with a rather diverse selection, virtually using all available materials from the house: steamed sugar buns, baked sugar pancakes, scallion pancakes, and cornmeal stuffed buns, with vegetable filling, and meat filling.

Due to going up the mountain, it wasn’t possible to carry dishes, so they had to make things like these, which were equivalent to having both food and a dish, much better than having to choke down those dry and hard buns.

For this rural area, the food prepared by the Yang Family was considered quite good.

When leaving, everyone knew they had to go into the mountain, so they brought water, but after a whole night, the water was already long consumed.

Therefore, aside from fetching food, Yang Gang also had to carry water up, hence two young men also came back along with him.