The moment Ming Rao saw Yan Yuchuan, he immediately realized where that faint sense of familiarity had come from.
This Lin Zhimiao and the bespectacled Lin Zhihao at the school gate this afternoon they had to be siblings, brother and sister. With two faces carved from the same mold, they were most likely twins.
Ming Rao hadn’t expected that Yan Yuchuan, the one who’d been secretly irritating him all afternoon, would cross his path a second time.
What a persistent ghost!
Over there, Lu Feiyang’s wrist was still held high in the air by Yan Yuchuan. He rose from his seat, his expression arrogant, yet the corners of his mouth trembled slightly.
Yan Yuchuan was taller than him and held complete physical dominance. Lu Feiyang strained with all his might, his bones aching from the effort, but his wrist couldn’t break free from the other’s grip.
Boss Meng caught the tense, combative atmosphere but couldn’t quite figure out the situation. He steeled himself and put on a show, bellowing: “Why can’t you dance? Young Master Lu already said he’d teach her personally, and even if she dances badly, she won’t be blamed. What more does she have to worry about?”
Yan Yuchuan glanced at him and replied politely, “When we applied for this job, we weren’t told we’d have to do anything beyond bartending. I’m afraid we can’t comply.”
“You ” Lu Feiyang’s other hand clenched into a fist and swung straight at Yan Yuchuan’s chest, but Yan Yuchuan dodged with quick reflexes. Lu Feiyang lost his balance and crashed headfirst into the corner of the table, toppling over in a clumsy heap.
With the violent impact, the glasses on the table came crashing down. A full glass of cocktail, crimson as blood, soaked his expensive polo shirt in uneven patches, leaving him looking as pathetic as a stray dog.
Lu Feiyang struggled to his feet. That blow had struck him right in a vulnerable spot. He clutched his groin, his features twisted in pain, and it took considerable effort before he could stand steady. His eyes blazed with fury as he roared, “Fine, fine!!! Playing hero to save the damsel, are we? How fucking touching. I should’ve kicked you out of Port Harbor this afternoon crawl back to your rat hole!”
Port Harbor looked glamorous on the surface, but it was a gilded cesspool beneath black and white colluding, officials and criminals in cahoots, the privileged lording it over everyone while ordinary people could only scrape by in the cracks. Old Meng had kept this bar running only thanks to Lu Feiyang’s protection. If he offended this patron, his business was done for.
Boss Meng scrambled to apologize: “Young Master Lu, please don’t be angry, don’t be angry. These two are new today said they’re from out of town with no money. I only took them in out of pity and hadn’t gotten around to teaching them the rules. I never expected them to be so blind as to offend you.”
Hearing this, Ming Rao felt a slight pang in his chest: No money?
Because they’d spent it all compensating him for his lens?
Well, that wasn’t his fault he’d said they didn’t need to pay. It was Yan Yuchuan who insisted on being stubborn.
Ming Rao tried to shake off the faint guilt creeping up on him, then heard Boss Meng say to Yan Yuchuan: “You, what am I supposed to say about you? Barely here a few days and you’re already causing me trouble. Fine, fine you don’t have to pay for the glasses you broke either. Pack your things and get out!”
Yan Yuchuan opened his mouth as if to speak, but Lu Feiyang’s voice cut in loudly: “Leave? You still want to leave?!”
Old Meng changed his tune faster than the weather: “Right you are! So ungrateful, daring to cause trouble for Brother Lu don’t even think about leaving!”
With that, Old Meng summoned four or five professional thugs. No matter how skilled Yan Yuchuan was in a fight, he was outnumbered, and within moments he was bound up.
The other patrons in the bar had been enjoying the spectacle, but seeing things take a dark turn and not wanting to witness a bloodbath, they began filing out.
Old Meng panicked and groveled to Lu Feiyang: “Brother Lu, look we’ve got him tied up for you now. Please have some consideration for us; we still need to run our business. How about this you take this somewhere else, somewhere else. We’ve got plenty of hands here; I’ll send a few more over to back you up.”
“Back me up? You think I can’t take him?”
Old Meng pretended not to have seen his earlier humiliation and quickly piled on the flattery: “No, no, of course you can take him,who could possibly be a match for you? Tell you what, I know a quiet spot where anything goes, just behind this street. This place is too cramped for you to really cut loose anyway.”
Before Lu Feiyang could answer, Old Meng had already dispatched seven or eight thugs to surround Yan Yuchuan and Lin Zhimiao, escorting them out of the bar like they were warding off plague spirits.
Seeing Ming Rao still sitting motionless in his booth, Lu Feiyang smacked the back of his head: “What are you spacing out for? Let’s go.”
Ming Rao was still mulling over whether to return the money to Yan Yuchuan when he snapped back to reality and saw that his companions at the table had all drifted away at some point.
The moment he stood up, a sharp pain tore through his stomach, but he watched the group ahead growing farther and farther away. Afraid of being left behind, he gritted his teeth against the pain and quickened his pace to catch up.
Lu Feiyang asked casually, “Where’s that pile of scrap metal of yours?”
By this point, Ming Rao’s lips had gone pale from pain, and he managed a strained reply: “Ah, what?”
“The thing you’re always carrying around to take pictures with.”
“That’s not scrap metal,” Ming Rao wanted to angrily rebuke him, but he simply lacked the strength. He pointed at the camera bag he carried with him. “It’s in the bag.”
“Good enough.” Lu Feiyang smiled enigmatically, which inexplicably sent a chill down Ming Rao’s spine.
The “quiet place” Old Meng had directed them to was an abandoned warehouse in a dark alley behind the bar.
The warehouse had two floors, divided into many compartments separated by wooden planks. The floor was littered with discarded crates, all damp and rotting, giving off a musty smell of moldy wood that worsened the nausea in Ming Rao’s stomach.
They found a relatively clean compartment on the first floor, where Yan Yuchuan and Lin Zhimiao were each bound to a rusty iron pillar, their mouths stuffed with rags.
Lu Feiyang patted Ming Rao’s shoulder. “The camera, take it out.”
Without asking, he snatched Ming Rao’s camera bag and pulled out the collapsible tripod.
Lu Feiyang was a big, rough man with no patience, and he fumbled with it for ages without getting it set up. Ming Rao couldn’t stand watching, so he set it up himself, only then thinking to ask, “What are you going to do?”
Lu Feiyang gave a mysterious smile. “Something fun.”
With the tripod set up, Lu Feiyang looked through the camera, then asked Ming Rao, “Got any lights?”
Ming Rao happened to carry a handheld fill light, which he handed to Lu Feiyang. Lu Feiyang glanced at it and said, “Hold onto it.”
Once everything was ready, Lu Feiyang stacked two crates on top of each other to use as a seat, crossed his legs, and said, “Alright, since you’re all so deeply devoted to each other, I’ll grant you that wish. After we film it, we split the profits I take eighty percent, you take twenty. How about it? Deal? Nod if you’re in.”
Ming Rao’s eyes widened in disbelief as he finally understood what Lu Feiyang meant by “something fun.”
Lu Feiyang wanted to film that kind of video?!
With his camera?
Starring Yan Yuchuan and his girlfriend?!
Ming Rao was too shocked to think, standing there dazed as a human light-stand.
So what was he now Yan Yuchuan and his girlfriend’s lighting technician?
No, the camera was his, and the tripod was his too. He was practically the backbone of this operation!
Lu Feiyang whispered something to one of his thugs, and the burly man’s expression immediately turned odd. He walked up to Lin Zhimiao and said, “Sorry about this, little sister,” though there wasn’t a trace of apology in his eyes.
Lin Zhimiao shook her head frantically, the cloth stuffed in her mouth muffling her choked, suffocating sobs, her terrified gaze darting around erratically.
Suddenly, her eyes landed on Ming Rao’s face.
Even now, Ming Rao couldn’t tell if it had been his imagination. But at that moment, he clearly felt Lin Zhimiao looking at him with desperate pleading among everyone there, she alone sent him a signal for help.
Perhaps it was because Ming Rao had a delicate, handsome face that gave off a harmless impression; perhaps the bewildered look on his face made Lin Zhimiao sense a hint of compassion; or perhaps it was something else entirely. Among so many unfamiliar faces, Lin Zhimiao chose Ming Rao, grasping at straws and placing all her hope on him.
Such a sacred and precious trust Ming Rao didn’t want to betray it, so he shouted, “Wait.”
All eyes turned to him.
Only then did Ming Rao belatedly start to worry.
Honestly, he didn’t want to fall out with Lu Feiyang. Lu Feiyang’s father was an old friend of Ming Yiqing’s, someone who had gone to great lengths for him during his hardest times. When Ming Rao first started freshman year, his father had specifically told him to look after Lu Feiyang and get along well with him.
Even though he and Lu Feiyang had little in common and their personalities didn’t quite mesh, Ming Rao had always tried his best to play the role of his good brother. His family already doted on him endlessly; he didn’t want to fail even this small request.
On top of that, Lu Feiyang was very popular. If Ming Rao offended him, he’d end up offending a whole crowd of people. Ming Rao didn’t want that he was afraid of being left out, afraid of not fitting in, afraid of having no one to eat lunch with, afraid of walking alone down that long road between campuses for cross-campus classes.
After mulling it over, Ming Rao said, “Strip him first.”
He was looking in Yan Yuchuan’s direction.
Lu Feiyang looked confused, so Ming Rao added, “Having him do it isn’t that more exciting?”
Lu Feiyang grinned in approval. “See, this is why you’re always snapping pictures here and there it wasn’t for nothing. You know how to play!”
Soon, Yan Yuchuan was stripped bare, revealing a lean, taut physique. His body bore many scars some fresh from today, but most were old wounds, dense and overlapping, truly shocking to behold.
Ming Rao seriously wondered if this guy had fought in underground boxing matches before, how broke could he have been?
The thug asked, “What’s next?”
Ming Rao swallowed hard and glanced at Yan Yuchuan. Even when his dignity was being trampled in the most brutal way, Yan Yuchuan’s head never bowed, and his spine remained ramrod straight.
Ming Rao forced himself to stay calm: “Just untie him.”
The thug looked doubtful: “Untie him?”
Ming Rao coaxed him: “What, you think anyone wants to watch them tied up? Who’d enjoy that?”
“But what if they run?”
“With this many people surrounding them, how far could they get?”
Ming Rao felt a bit guilty even as he said it, but at that moment Lu Feiyang spoke up with absolute confidence: “No problem. I’ve got a way to make sure he can’t run.”
Then, from somewhere, he produced a spray bottle and sprayed it right in Yan Yuchuan’s face.
“There, untie him now.” Lu Feiyang smiled with sinister glee. “With this stuff in him, he’d go into heat even for a sow. I don’t believe you can keep playing the gentleman now.”
The thug untied Yan Yuchuan, and sure enough, under the drug’s effect, all the blood rushed downward. Yan Yuchuan lost his previous composure within moments his face flushed crimson, and he could only brace himself against the ground with his hands, panting raggedly, completely undone.
When the thug had stripped Yan Yuchuan earlier, Ming Rao had deliberately avoided looking at that area. But now, with the drug in effect, it was impossible to ignore.
Whoa that’s big.
Ming Rao mentally measured it seemed a lot bigger than his own.
He had to admit, he felt a small shock to his system at that moment.
Time ticked by, minute after minute. Yan Yuchuan was clearly at his absolute limit, yet he remained motionless, not even touching himself.
Both of them were men, and Lu Feiyang had personally experienced the potency of that drug. He never expected Yan Yuchuan to endure it this long, and couldn’t help but feel a grudging respect.
Xiang Zhan asked, “Feiyang ge, what do we do? He won’t give in.”
Lu Feiyang was racking his brains when suddenly, a sharp siren blared in their ears.
“Holy shit!”
“P-police?!”
“What do we do? Should we run?”
Lu Feiyang shouted at the top of his lungs: “Run what? What’s there to be afraid of with the cops? Have you got no spine?”
His father was on brotherly terms with the local beat cop, so there really wasn’t much to fear. But what he hadn’t anticipated was that the moment he finished speaking, figures suddenly emerged from the stalls all around him some barefoot, some bare-legged, some completely naked, hunched over with their heads down as they fled in panic, bras and underwear scattered all over the floor!
“…”
Lu Feiyang was speechless.
So this was the “quiet spot” Old Meng had pointed him to?
Turns out it was a hookup hotspot?!
Now he understood why the sirens were blaring. This abandoned warehouse area had clearly become a key patrol zone for the morals enforcement unit, and the sirens were specifically meant to warn the men and women seeking thrills here meaning “Run! Don’t make me come catch you!”
Logically, Lu Feiyang knew his family could smooth this over in minutes, but getting caught as a public example by the morals squad would still be pretty embarrassing. Plus, seeing everyone else run triggered a herd mentality. Finally, Lu Feiyang waved his hand dismissively: “Forget it, forget it. Let’s get out of here first.”
The group scattered like birds and were gone in an instant.
In the panic, Ming Rao ran a few steps with them before remembering he’d left his camera and tripod behind, so he turned back.
Yan Yuchuan hadn’t had time to get dressed yet he’d first untied Lin Zhimiao. His face was flushed bright red, and he said in a barely audible breath: “You go first.”
“Chuan ge, but you”
“Go.”
Lin Zhimiao kept looking back with every step, running off with tearful eyes.
Ming Rao was still packing up his camera and tripod, but his stomach was churning more and more, and his head was growing heavier.
The sirens drew closer and closer, and Ming Rao’s hands grew clumsier. He couldn’t take the time to pack carefully he shoved the tripod haphazardly into the camera bag and was about to make a run for it.
Just then, his vision went black. A rough, powerful palm covered his eyes, and a cloth wad was shoved into his mouth. The damp, foul stench assaulted his stomach lining, but with his mouth gagged, he couldn’t vomit and couldn’t scream.
Ming Rao’s mind went blank. With his sight gone, his other senses sharpened.
He felt his hands and feet being bound tightly… then his legs were dragged along the ground, the metal buckle of his jeans scraping against the floor with a harsh, piercing screech.
The police siren grew nearer, then farther, and finally faded into silence.
He felt his feet leave the ground, and moments later, his back slammed hard against a solid, damp floor. A click sounded by his ear like a door being shut.
When his vision returned, Ming Rao had no idea where he was. But the cloth had been removed from his mouth.
That was even more terrifying: didn’t it mean this was a place where he could scream his lungs out and no one would hear?
When his eyes finally refocused, Ming Rao saw someone crouching beside him.
Yan Yuchuan was looking down at him, his icy gaze sending chills down Ming Rao’s spine.
Ming Rao trembled in fear: “W-what are you doing?”
“Isn’t that what you said?”
“Huh… what did I say.”
Yan Yuchuan tilted his head and reached out to touch Ming Rao’s neck.
“Let me take it off more thrilling that way.”