Chapter 19: Conflict

An Jie couldn’t bear it anymore. His top and bottom eyelids longed for each other and if he continued to keep them apart, he would be like Fahai who sealed away the lovers1.

The biology teacher of senior year’s Class Two was a legend, on average taking five seconds a word; someone uncertain of her past might even suspect she had a background as Dan2. Sometimes he would finish playing a round of chess with Morpheus and come back after half an hour, only for her to still be on the same topic…

He piled up the messy exercise booklets and test papers on his desk before curling up and lying down, officially declaring his death.

The weekend had been tough on both his body and his soul. First, he had to babysit the Mo girl, and then he had to follow Mo Cong around the city for half the night. Yesterday, he only managed to come back past midnight, and as he packed, he realized that half of his homework was incomplete, and so he had to study assiduously, fighting to keep awake. In the end, he hadn’t even managed a whole hour of sleep. In his dreams, he was still battling a parabola without coordinate bounds, and every time he drew the bounds, the parabola would move away again and again.

Even by the time his alarm clock went off, he still hadn’t been able to draw them out.

Though both of them were fooling around at ungodly hours, he couldn’t understand how Mo Jin was able to be so full of energy all the time. Just this morning, he fell into her hands, and she buzzed around his ears until they arrived at school.

An Jie thought sorrowfully, he really was old.

An Jie had been away from this circle for more than ten years. Apart from a few old folks in the business, he was completely unfamiliar with the current situation. He knew that the business with Mo Cong might be related to their Shui Shi, Zhai Haidong, though, and hence, he got some words out of Zui She. After that and many days tailing Mo Cong, he more or less got the hang of the complicated situation in Beijing…

But thinking about the tailing, he became angry again. Mo Cong, that little bastardー it wasn’t like he was a woman, yet for some reason, his intuition was as sharp as one. The moment he started following him, he would sense it like a psychopath. He looked behind him whenever he had the time, he had eyes on all sides and ears that listened everywhere, and he was cruel enough to make his driver drive in circles, greatly increasing the difficulty of the job for An Jie, the unprofessional secret agent.

Which then… resulted in his learning effectiveness from morning on going down in a straight line.

If he slept through another few classes, the class teacher would probably invite him to the office for a talk. 

Still dazed, someone nudged him lightly. An Jie had completely woken up the moment the person reached over, but he had felt that warm and safe atmosphere and remembered that he was disguised as a flower of the country, sitting in a brightly lit classroom.  

And so, cooperatively, he slowly ducked to the side, his elbow sliding down the table, before pretending to have been shocked awake, opening his eyes and looking up. He was met with a slightly malnourished but quite pretty face. 

In order to prevent the students sitting at the back from slacking off in their studies, and the students who sat at the sides from damaging their eyes, the class teacher of Class Two switched the seats of everyone apart from those especially short-sighted and especially short every two weeks. The ones at the back were moved forwards and the ones at the sides were moved to the middle. After a change, the person sitting next to An Jie was coincidentally that girl who was looting through his garbage in the middle of the night.

He only found out that she was called Yang Jinling after picking up her homework book in the morning.

Yang Jinling pursed her lips, glancing at the lectern, her meaning clear. An Jie realized that he was caught by the teacher; for some reason, he found it quite comical, but he held back his laughter.

The biology teacher called as if trying to raise the dead, “An Jie, Mr An Jie, are you awake?”

An Jie pulled his hair out of his eyes and stood up shakily with a suitably bewildered expression. “Huh?”

A few people looked back and laughed with low voices. Senior year was no easy time, it would be a waste to let go of anything even slightly funny without entertaining themselves.

Yang Jinling carefully nudged her exercise book towards him, lowered her head, and whispered, “Page thirty-five, question two… page thirty-five, question two…”

Her voice was small but An Jie caught it with his exceptional hearing. He glanced down at this kind-hearted girl at a loss.

You should help people to the end, send the Buddha to the west! Page thirty-five question two… how would I know which book’s page thirty-five it was?

The biology teacher slowly pushed up her glasses, put down the book in her hand, and gave an impromptu lecture on study attitude with her long, drawn-out voice. “Students, I know biology doesn’t count for as many marks compared to your Chinese, mathematics, and English, but…”

Alright, from here on out, we’ll omit around five thousand words.

Finally, she took a breath and nodded to An Jie. “Alright, are you awake now? If so, sit down and listen properly.”

And he had thought that he would have to stand until the end of class. Looks like there were benefits to being good-looking.

Sitting down straight-backed, An Jie opened up a random book, occasionally pretending to glance at the blackboard and the teacher with thoughtful eyes, then lowering his head to write something in Martian, making the teacher think he was taking careful notes as his mind drifted further and further away.

That ‘Si-ge’ of Mo Cong’s had been in Beijing for quite some time, but he had been a mere thug for the entire duration until his ancestors couldn’t watch anymore and sent a ‘chancellor’ in his way, allowing him to slowly rise to the top. But looking at who he was trusting, it was clear he could not become a great man.

In An Jie’s opinion, that young man Mo Cong hid his talents well, and really was a genius on the inside, almost shockingly clever. If the defects in his personality could be corrected in time, then he would for sure be successful in the future. But that was in the future.

He was still very naive now. 

Apparently, some crew under Cao Bing had been careless some time ago and an undercover agent had managed to get in, almost their entire stock getting pinched as a result. Now with nothing to sell, Cao Bing had gotten his eyes on the Eastern suburb— buying the land was an act, but starting a new base there might not have been.

Zhai Haidong was slowly retreating behind the stage and wouldn’t have cared about this monkey thing, but everyone knew that the old gun Zhai had started in the eastern suburb, and even if he no longer acted on the surface, no one knew what he was doing underneath. For Cao Bing to advance into such an area wasn’t something that would be tolerated.

At a time like this, what did it mean for that whatever-he-was-called old rat to suddenly jump out?

An Jie thought that just from that area, even though Mo Cong was young, he understood what was going on much better than his Si-ge. He knew that it was a trap laid down by Zhai Haidong, to use them as weapons against Cao Bing.

But what followed that unsettled An Jie. With Si-ge’s abilities, it didn’t matter whether or not he understood; now that Mo Cong was locking the old rat up, waiting for Cao Bing to show up, he was obviously going for friendly cooperation and mutual benefit.

He thought he understood the situation more than anyone, refusing to back down like a newborn calf that was unafraid of the tiger, insisting on causing a ruckus, going against Shui Shi, Zhai Haidong— did Zhai Haidong have such a large heart?

An Jie chuckled bitterly. Other people might not know what was hidden behind Shui Shi’s kind and benevolent square face, but he was more than clear…

Otherwise, why would he say that Mo Cong, that foolish child, was too smart for his own good? He didn’t know what it meant to hide one’s strengths and bide one’s time.

An Jie sighed inwardly. Mo Cong, Mo Cong, should that time really come, don’t blame your Uncle An for pulling apart your stage.

==========================

For the past few days, Mo Cong couldn’t shake off the feeling of being stalked and it made him feel as if he was having a nervous breakdown. It was only when he saw An Jie with his dark circles as a result of his idiotic sister Xiao Jin’s pestering that his swaying mentality was somewhat satisfied.

He agreed that An Jie was good-looking, so he thought that he would look even better without that elderly expression on his face.

It seemed that even Mo Jin could do a few things in her life that didn’t frustrate other people.

—This ungrateful snake didn’t realize at all that his happiness was built on another’s pain. 

But regardless, in the end, Cao Bing finally was unable to hold himself back from talking to Si-ge. As expected, the foreign devil was still just a foreign devil and couldn’t be relied on when it counted; Chen Fugui hadn’t even done a single thing for him, fostering Cao Bing was no different to fostering anyone else, done for the cash first.

The other party had invited Cao Bing to meet in the evening. To show that the past was in the past, that he had the heart to carry the world along with his sincerity for cooperation, Si-ge decided to bring the old rat along with him.

He also followed to keep an eye on the situation, staying out of sight and sticking to the crowds. Black sleeves were not to be worn under the sun.

Everything went along smoothly and the atmosphere was pushed to a climax when the old rat was pushed on stage, gagged and bound. From Cao Bing’s expression, that idiot was very satisfied. Mo Cong watched as he stood up, took a gun out from his pocket, and pointed it at the old rat’s head, and knew it was time for him to leave, having succeeded.

Now that Cao Bing was cooperating with Si-ge, it appeared to outsiders that his crisis had been resolved. Chen Fugui naturally had nothing to say about this, but as for later… that would be for later. There was always time to deal with people like Cao Bing.

Mo Cong motioned at Si-ge and turned to leave, not wanting to see the revolting scene of the old rat’s head being smashed into a pulp.

At that critical moment, a shriek sounded from behind followed by curses. Mo Cong was shocked; turning around, Cao Bing had collapsed on the ground, a bullet wound in his leg as he howled like a butchered pig. The attacker’s gun was probably muted; no one could find where the enemy was.

Mo Cong widened his eyes and looked to Si-ge who shook his head slightly with a stony face. It seemed he too didn’t know what was going on- someone had laid a trap!

Cao Bing’s followers couldn’t take it, they swarmed over and held up Cao Bing, their loaded guns all pointed at Si-ge.

The happy guest and host were about to turn into a murderer’s banquet.

Author’s Notes:

I realized that some fans reported that the relationship between the gangs is too messy, so I organized them as below:

Red: Si-ge

Blue: Cao Bing

For various reasons, Cao Bing has gotten onto Si-ge’s bad side. Cao Bing vs. Si-ge.

Mhm, then because of bad leadership, a traitor in the form of the old rat appeared. The old rat then sought refuge in Si-ge, carrying some leverage against Cao Bing.

As for what the leverage was… Ahem, the old rat didn’t say.

So the current fight on the surface is still Cao Bing vs. Si-ge (+rat)

Chen Fugui is behind Cao Bing, so Cao Bing overestimated his power and got onto the bad side of the big boss, old gun Zhai. For cause and effect, please refer to this chapter.

So from Mo Cong’s analysis, the old rat was pushed out by old gun Zhai to stir up trouble between Si-ge and Cao Bing in order to get rid of Cao Bing by using Si-ge.

Mhm, in other words, Mo Cong saw beyond the obvious and realized the hidden element of this fight- 

Old gun (using Si-ge) vs. Cao Bing.

Alright, that’s all… it looks so complicated…

Vera’s Notes:

Your editor is actually fairly certain a muted gun is still pretty loud. A silencer barrel helps the noise, yes, but it’s still recognizable as a loud gunshot; maybe in a very rowdy atmosphere, it wouldn’t be as obvious, but it’s nowhere near silent.