Chapter 27: Blood

14TH SEP 2022~ VERALUCTL

Mo Cong thought expanding one’s vocabulary really was important. When the gun first sounded, he couldn’t find a word in his mind to describe how he felt.

For Si-ge to ask him out without reason was strange enough, but he had still gone, if only because he had never doubted Xu Si from a trust built up over years.

He had thought that perhaps Si-ge was trying to get him to sit through some boring dinner party, or give him some ugly ladyboy, or even that he was just bored out of his mind and wanted someone to pass his time… It wasn’t impossible.

But he had never thought that what awaited him was a passionate bullet to the back.

When Si-ge insisted on doing something stupid despite his advice, when Si-ge unintentionally or otherwise cleared his connection with him, Mo Cong had felt displeased…

But he had still been willing to trust Si-ge – but there was no point in saying anything about trust now. The only meaningful thing he could do was run.

People had potential. Even Professor Mo could run at state-recommended standards when being chased by monsters, let alone the agile Chancellor. He couldn’t describe how he felt and ended up not thinking at all. Not thinking about who wanted to kill him, and not thinking about why Si-ge would do this, focusing everything on the movements around him.

As long as he could leave this place and approach a street with people, even if it was just a small alleyway filled with delinquents, they wouldn’t dare to shoot… After all, it wasn’t worth it to get the police on them for him.

Unperturbed in the face of danger and clear-headed — even if An Jie couldn’t stand him, thinking he didn’t know how to act, he had to admit that Mo Cong was talented.

After twenty minutes, Mo Cong broke out of the encirclement and achieved his first gun. He let out a small breath – apart from a scrape on his shoulder from a bullet, he had yet to receive any serious wounds.

Yet it was at that moment – and those stink bugs still refused to give up – that two people came out from both sides of the alleyway at the same time, guns in hand. Fuck, no way you would fire! Mo Cong paused for a moment, watched as the two approached from either end, then suddenly grabbed a crevice in the wall, vaulting himself over quickly with the power of only one arm – he would have to risk being hit on his legs!

Those two weren’t slow movers and immediately, someone pulled the trigger, but no gunshots were heard. Mo Cong only felt a sharp sting at his ankle and felt his heart sink – of course, no one dared to fire bullets here, but even worse, those were anesthetic guns in their hands.

Are you treating me like some wild animal? Damn you!

Mo Cong’s feet had just landed on the ground when immediately, a gust of wind blew at him; someone was waiting here for him with a knife – Mo Cong dodged and kicked the ambusher down, then without giving them any chance to fight back, added another punch to their abdomen, one hand choking their throat and the other taking over the knife they had dropped from pain.

The man who was being choked gasped for air. He felt as if those beast-like eyes of the person in front of him in the dark were glowing a lurid red, just like a monster of legend.

Mo Cong’s cheeks convulsed as he slashed the knife down the person’s throat, blood from the arteries splattering onto his face. He wiped it viciously and kicked away the corpse on the ground.

A silent slaughter commenced in the dark, many versus one… or rather, one versus many.

But not long after, Mo Cong felt his strength falter, numbness climbing up slowly from his ankles to his legs, his waist, his arms… even his vision began to blur.

It was at that moment that a heartrending pain came from his back; someone had stabbed him. Taking advantage of the pain, Mo Cong revived his spirit and used his foot as an axle to slash his knife backward. A hoarse scream sounded along with an overwhelming smell of blood.

Mo Cong ground his teeth then suddenly stabbed himself, his mind clearing up, and sprinted away.

He walked and stopped, stabbing himself whenever he couldn’t hold on anymore, but the amount of time the pain could keep him conscious was getting shorter and shorter.

Finally, Mo Cong stumbled into an abandoned warehouse and curled up in the corner. The sound of jumbled footsteps soon followed. After a pause, they began to search, the footsteps coming closer and closer…

Mo Cong chuckled bitterly, his consciousness fading.

After some time, the effect of the anesthetic seemed to have faded a little. The first thing Mo Cong did as he recovered was to feel for the knife in his hand. He let out a brief sigh of relief when he felt that familiar cold touch. Then he carefully adjusted his body and opened his eyes.

He was still in that dark warehouse, many strange-smelling cardboard boxes on his body. He listened carefully to his surroundings: it was extremely quiet.

After a while, Mo Cong finally moved cautiously and climbed out from his hiding place. The entire warehouse had been flipped upside down; it seemed that someone had swept across a pile of cardboard boxes that happened to land on and near him. Thankfully, Mo Cong had completely fainted and didn’t make a sound. In fact, he was hidden even better by those boxes.

He silently called it a fluke and crawled outside.

All his wounds finally started hurting now and the heavy blood loss made his feet so weak that he would fall if he wasn’t careful. He gritted his teeth, his consciousness starting to fade again, but for some reason, his heart repeated, I need to go home, I need to go home, I need to go home…

Like a child that had been wrongly punished.

In his life so far, Mo Cong had experienced two betrayals that had carved into his heart – the first was his blood-mother; the second was Si-ge whom he had treated unrepentantly like his blood-father.

How ironic…

His body followed the instinct to avoid harm and return home, but in his head, there were flashing images. Li Biyun’s arguments, her betrayal when he was young, his comprehension of his father’s cowardice and worthlessness as he grew older; watching Xiao Jin’s actions grow more and more outlandish and watching the thing buried in Xiao Yu’s heart multiply, and later, watching himself fall into a nightclub, get drunk like a dog, attract a bunch of hooligans… and watching Si-ge reach out to save him.

Mo Cong thought, his gaze slack, Si-ge had saved him. Just that one phrase had made him willingly enter this circle and sell his life for him… The feeling was complicated. He felt that he owed Si-ge, but before that, he had owed no one anything, only what others owed him.

And in that world that breathed in darkness and corruption, there were different kinds of men. They were cunning and vicious, they fought with their lives, they abided by the law of the jungle, they might even grow out of their humanity, become less than animals. But no matter what, they were strong… They weren’t like Mo Yannan who only knew how to apologize and follow behind others, not like Mo Yannan who only knew how to flip through books and materials, unable to do anything himself.

Sometimes he worshipped them and felt a wonderful desire to conquer and challenge rise up.

But that sentence from Mo Jin echoed untimely in his blurring mind– “He’s my dad, my only dad!”

Suddenly, he was overcome with sadness.

Because Mo Yannan was already dead… The people from the research centre had come several times with only one message. Even though he was missing in name, they all knew that he had already died.

Just like that, Mo Cong’s father one day had suddenly left his body to the great desert, to the creatures in the desert… and become a pile of white bones.

Mo Cong finally couldn’t keep moving, falling to the ground with weak knees, the knife he had held this entire journey slipping out of his hand, making a clear thud somewhere.

In his daze, a light seemed to strike his face. Someone approached him carefully and hesitantly patted his face.

They seemed to say something but he couldn’t hear it, nor see their face. Mo Cong struggled to open his eyes but the strength in his body could only allow him to open up a small slit, unable to focus. He could only barely recognize the thinness of this person, loosely wearing a slightly tattered jacket… what Mo Yannan had looked like several years ago as he stood at the end of the alley and watched as Li Biyun left, that overwhelmed man’s fingers curled around the frayed edges of his coat, that wasting body wanting to straighten his spine… but unable to.

Mo Cong called out lowly, “Dad…,” then lost consciousness.

The first thing An Jie saw as he came back that night was this scene of horror; it was quite a shock to his nerves. With one glance, he saw the knife that Mo Cong had dropped, frowned, and kicked it to the side with the tip of his foot before carefully examining Mo Cong’s wounds.

Thankfully they were all knife wounds. This kid was smart, he should know how to make the people trying to kill him not dare to open fire. An Jie patted his face. “Wake up, are you dead? If not, make a sound… Mo Cong? Mo Cong?”

Mo Cong seemed to have forced his eyes open a slit and stared at him in a daze. Suddenly, an almost childish smile appeared at the corner of his mouth and he called out, his voice quiet and muffled, “Dad.”

An Jie paused and looked down again, but Mo Cong had completely lost consciousness.

An Jie sighed with a bitter chuckle and picked the knife up from the ground, packing it into his backpack before lifting him up. “Your dad? Even if your dad didn’t die in the desert, he would have died from anger because of you.”

He looked down at the blood on the ground and wondered how many innocent neighbors would be terrified tomorrow morning – what went around came around.

You brat, you deserved this for hanging out in the mafia!

Rip Mo Cong.