This indigenous captive is already so thin that he's skin and bones, with joints wrapped in dark brown skin, and ribs clearly visible in his chest.
He looks slightly older than the indigenous youth beside Chen Zhou, body curled painfully like a shrimp inside the canoe, eyes tightly closed, appearing as though he's been dead for some time.
Chen Zhou tried to feel the captive's breath with his hand without an iron glove, found he still had faint breathing, and pulled him out of the canoe onto the sandy ground.
...
During Chen Zhou's act of dragging the captive, the indigenous youth remained quite docile.
His eyes were fixed on the unconscious captive, repeating the same sentence, almost sobbing, with an expression particularly sorrowful.
Chen Zhou kept observing the youth's behavior and realized, seeing his expression, that this emaciated captive was someone very close to him, and thus he felt assured to let go, ready to see if there was any chance to save the captive.
...
