Lu Yan displayed his one hundred meter sprinting speed.
This series of movements was like that of the floating clouds and surging waters¹; it was unknown to him, but this athletic physique and carefree departure of his left a deep imprint in the eyes of the buddy that he had ruthlessly abandoned, delivering a mental assault worth 10,000 damage to his buddy with the surname Xiao and the given name Heng.
[1]: An idiom describing swift movements.
“F*ck,” Xiao Heng came back to his senses and cursed, “The f*ck are you running for?”
Lu Yan already felt that something was amiss as he sprinted halfway through; he felt that something alongside him wasn’t quite there despite his smooth escape.
But he didn’t have the time to consider that much.
That was, until he himself had realized that, as he charged through the exit of the parking lot, the buddy who he had reached an agreement to “run together once I count down from three” had somehow not been able to catch up with his pace.
Lu Yan stopped in his tracks and glared at Xiao Heng at a distance from the exit of the parking lot. The gap between them could be described as a distance as wide as the Milky Way.
……
Lu Yan refuted him: “......F*ck me! What are you doing there charging ahead, didn’t we both decide to run together!”
Decide to.
Decided?
Xiao Heng recalled back to the look Lu Yan had just a moment ago; Lu Yan nodded at him after he finished dropping secret hints with their gazes, which evidently meant: I’ll count down from three and together, we’ll charge ahead and give them a good beating.
When did he say we should escape together?
The veins on Xiao Heng’s forehead began to throb after he realized that their brain circuits weren’t on the same page at all. Although it was really stupid to initiate this kind of conversation in a situation like this, he couldn’t help but say: “Weren’t we supposed to charge ahead together ah!”
The distance between the two of them was really quite far, both needing to shout their lungs out in order to get the message to the other.
Lu Yan: “What’s the need with ‘charging ahead’! Who’d be willing to charge ahead alongside you?!”
Xiao Heng: “Are you a dog?”
“Who are you ridiculing?!”
“You.”
“……”
Lu Yan simply wanted to turn around this instant and leave.
He had traversed through Jianghu² for many years.
[2]: Experienced much.
He himself had gained prestige within the morally sinister land of Xiacheng District only because of his relentless effort, but never because of his fists.
He wasn’t an idiot.
“They’ve got five people, we’ve got two,” Lu Yan pointed at the five burly fellows in front of Xiao Heng and said, “Don’t you think that this matter needs to be thought of for a little more?”
Xiao Heng: “……”
The five burly fellows, who were befuddled by the two, stood still. It all happened so abruptly that the one who was originally counting the amount of cash in his hands had already forgotten how much he had counted up to. They looked at the one at the exit of the parking lot, and then at the one in front of them. After a while, they finally spoke up and asked: “Who are you two ah? What are you planning to achieve here?”
Xiao Heng didn’t reply.
Lu Yan watched as Xiao Heng undid the buttons on his fittingly tailor-made coat, taking it off and then nonchalantly throwing it aside to the seat of the motorbike.
“What are you doing?”
After taking of the outer layer coat, Xiao Heng lifts his hands to pull loose the tie on his collar. Lowering his eyelids to speak the first half, then lifting his gaze to look at the people in front and spoke with an unfaltering tone, “To screw you.”
After taking off his outer coat, Xiao Heng lifted his hand to loosen the tie around his collar. He lowered his eyes to speak out the first half of his sentence, and then lifted his gaze to look at the people in front of him and finished in an unfaltering tone, “Screw you.”
This Bking ah.³
[3]: Bking translates as b king, meaning it is mostly ridiculous, it describes a person who is full of cool in every gesture. Ps: ‘Bking’ is interpreted from the original context.
Lu Yan was astounded by this arrogant, Bking-like⁴ attitude of Xiao Heng’s.
[4]: Original: 逼王. The author is trying to say Bking with a Chinese style.
The outer coat that Xiao Heng originally wore was excessively formal; it was so formal that it was in stark contrast to his surroundings, making him look out of place. It appeared as if he was supposed to be driving a luxury sports car and dashing on the streets right now instead of being here and facing off five burly fellows.
He blended in a bit with the atmosphere after getting rid of his attire.
“Don’t be so absurd, you brat!” Despite not understanding the current situation, the man who took the cash, whose hot-bloodedness as a member of society was set ablaze, tucked the money into his trouser’s pockets, spitted on the ground and exclaimed: “Craving death? Don’t just assume that us brothers are easy to be trifled with, why don’t you go out and inquire what my backings are like!”
The guy hadn’t even finished speaking when he received a head-on punch —— Xiao Heng’s strike was aimed directly at his nose bridge.
Before the man could even react, two trails of blood slowly came dripping down from his nose.
“Don’t you know what my backings are like?” Xiao Heng suddenly delivered another punch, taking advantage of the opportunity to seize the other person’s wrist, dragging him towards himself as he enunciated each word before taking action: “I. Am. Your. Daddy.”
Xiao Heng probably felt that the tie on him was still affecting his movements even if it had been pulled loose, so he simply tore the tie off of his collar after he finished beating up the first guy.
As Lu Yan observed Xiao Heng, judging from his appearance, it felt as if a certain blood stream within Xiao Heng’s body, which had ceased before, was once again revived.
The man, who had already been shoved onto the floor, lied there and huddled up. He endured the agonizing pain and reprimanded: “The hell are you guys doing there staring dazedly for!”
Only then did the four people on the side react, folding up their sleeves and charging forward.
The scene was utterly chaotic.
Although Xiao Heng had the ability to fight, fighting one versus five couldn’t be considered as effortless, especially when this bunch consisted of ‘specialists’ within the debt collection company, thus having combat skills that couldn’t be underestimated.
Lu Yan, who was standing at the exit of the parking lot, was having an internal dispute with himself.
Should he give a hand or not?
……
Where’s the need to fight, why can’t we escape first before discussing anything else?
Lu Yan thought it over once, but in the end, he heaved out a sigh. At first, he intended to drag in a nearby person before joining in to give some assistance.
However, he wasn’t able to spot anyone suitable for the job nearby.
Lu Yan looked around a few more times as he stood at the parking lot’s exit. His gaze finally settled on a trash bin beside the bushes, with a line of words imprinted on the green barrel: 120L moveable trash bin.
Xiao Heng’s never been engaged in such an exciting fight like this one his entire life.
This excitement neither came from the fact that the fight was taking place in Feng Huang Plaza’s underground parking lot, nor was it from him having to face off against five big fellows. No, it was when he was in the middle of a fight, and in an effort to tilt his head to dodge an incoming fist, he caught sight from the corner of his eye a large, green trash bin, as tall as half the height of a person, hastily coming at them from the direction of the parking lot exit.
Lu Yan pushed the trash bin and cut through the battle circle. This series of actions of his was concise, rapid, ruthless, and accurate —— he then directly shoved the nearest person into the trash bin.
Xiao Heng: “…”
The five burly fellows: “…”
Ten minutes later.
The dust settled.
Lu Yan sat on the motorcycle, finding a pack of cigarettes after searching around and picking a stick out with his mouth.
The welcome song meant for greeting guests floated from Feng Huang Plaza’s entrance to the parking lot.
“Fresh blossom combine with exquisite wine to rejoice along with the lyrics.⁵
[5]: Lyrics from 迎宾曲（电影《客从何来》插曲
……..
C’mon, c’mon, c’mon, c’mon, c’mon.
Let’s join hands with our friends~~”
When the noisy voice began singing “Let’s join with each other’s hands,” he picked up a cigarette and asked Xiao Heng: “Do you smoke?”
Xiao Heng grunted out an “Un.”
Lu Yan was too lazy to search for the pack of cigarettes again, so he directly just gave him the one that was already in his palm.
“Nice movements,” Lu Yan retracted his hand and placed it on top of the motorbike, “Practiced?”
“Played boxing before.”
Xiao Heng didn’t speak much and lowered his head to light the cigarette. A portion of the skin by the corner of his lips, as well as the corner of his eyelid, had been wounded. His whole body seemed to have cooled off again the moment he lowered his head and smoked, bringing him back to the way he was before the fight.
After a few seconds, Lu Yan heard Xiao Heng offer some praise for him: “Your trash bin-pushing posture was quite exceptional as well.”
Lu Yan: “……”
Xiao Heng turned his head to the side and added: “Both heaven-awestricking and earth shattering.”
“F*ck,” Lu Yan stretched out his hand, “No more smoking, give me back my cigarette.”
“Not giving back.” Xiao Heng said.
There were still five burly fellows lying paralyzed on the ground in front of them.
In the dim underground parking lot, five people were curled up on the floor, all with not-so-pretty expressions on their faces after having lost the fight, not to mention their unseemly and disheveled attires. One of them even had a few vegetable leaves stuck to their hair, like stems clinging onto it.
The one who had vegetable leaves couldn’t take it anymore; he plucked out the leaves from his hair that exuded a strong rotten smell and, in an unnatural Xiajin District accent and a tone that made it seem as though he was on the verge of collapsing, asked: “Da-ge, can the two of you stop chatting… what are you guys even planning to do after all that ah!”
“The lady from a moment ago.”
Only then did Xiao Heng look straight at them: “How much cash does she owe you?”
The several people who were beaten up were disoriented from the fight, and it took them a while to react to who this “lady” was. “She originally borrowed six, six hundred thousand, and counting the money from those past few years in total, she still lacks one, one million and two hundred thousand.”
“……”
“Those loan sharks are all math prodigy ah,” Lu Yan was left speechless, “Even having the nerve to say a million and two hundred thousand so easily?”
It wasn’t that Lu Yan didn’t know anything about what usury was.
He’d witnessed someone who owed a loan shark company helplessly walk up to the sixteenth floor and leap off the roof in front of the police.
But Kang Ru’s affairs were still inevitably shocking when exposed and brought forth like this. To return 600,000 throughout these years with 1.2 million still remaining, it was unknown how much it would be if this 1.2 million mark continued to pile up… The underground parking lot they were currently at was no more than 200 meters away from where Kang Ru did her “work” in Feng Huang Plaza to pay off the bills.
A thought occurred concurrently in both his and Xiao Heng’s mind: Kang Ru truly didn’t even bother with the money Xiao Qishan gave her.
The reason she brought the child to the Xiao household must’ve been because she had wanted to let the child live in a much more relatively normal environment, even if it was as an illegitimate child. At the very least, it was much more ideal compared to a prostitute who was constantly being burdened by debt collectors.
Lu Yan watched as Xiao Heng fished out his wallet from his outer coat after finishing his cigarette halfway.
Lu Yan: “You want to repay the bills in her stead?”
Xiao Heng couldn’t open his mouth while he had a cigarette in it.
“You have enough cash ah,” Lu Yan couldn’t get his head around the world of rich people. Why carry around an extreme amount of cash on hand, it was beyond his cognition. Patting on his pocket, he said, “If there’s not enough money, I could compensate you…”
There were two dollar bills inside his pocket.
One was fifty bucks, and the other was five bucks.
Seeing his reaction, Xiao Heng deliberately followed up with a question: “How much can you make up for?”
To hell with recompensing.
Lu Yan took his hand out of his pockets, looked at him and said: “I’ll compensate you with my kind regards.”
Translated by: Piggybank
Edited by: Muku/Yukki