Liu the Butcher is a character mentioned though not directly appearing in the story. He is a butcher in the market who trades grain for women during the famine. He is known to have tortured and killed four or five women, and he butchers and sells their meat as pork. He offers fifty jin of corn for a pretty girl, and Old Madam Han plans to sell Han Luoxue to him. He represents the extreme depravity of the times, where human life is traded for food and violence is normalized. His reputation terrorizes the villagers.
