Chapter 5 Good People Among Bad Guys

Uncle You has been detained, but Jian Zhen is unaware of it.

On the way to the hospital, she kept explaining to the taxi driver why she couldn't pay.

"Who goes out with only their phone and no cash?!" the driver angrily complained to her.

Jian Zhen protested, "Master, there are people like this everywhere now, and there will only be more in the future. This is the trend of the times."

You Yu, sprawled all over the back seat, let out a soft hum in agreement. Only then did the driver remember there was such a living creature in the back seat, so he quickly turned his head and angrily complained, "How dare you make a girl pay!"

You Yu blushed and remained silent. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Jian Zhen taking off her watch and heard her use it as collateral to avoid the risk of the driver taking them directly to the police station.

The driver was still muttering, "Who knows if your watch is real or fake..."

Jian Zhen's patience was almost exhausted. Her face fell as she looked at him and said, "I bought this watch four years ago when I was studying in Switzerland. I can't find the invoice, but such a niche brand doesn't have counterfeit products. If you don't believe me, stop the car now and search online. You may not be good at mobile payment, but you can always use a search engine."

The driver shut his mouth, no longer daring to provoke her.

After hearing this, You Yu felt even worse. He silently turned his head to the inside and shed a few tears while facing the artificial leather seat back.

He didn't cry when he was beaten, nor when he was threatened with having a finger chopped off. But now, thinking of Jian Zhen—who lost the copyright to his paintings, his cell phone, and the watch he had worn for many years in just one night—a sense of guilt welled up from the bottom of his heart, quickly shattering him like an empty beer bottle.

Jian Zhen didn't turn around, but if she glanced up, she could see him quietly wiping away tears in the rearview mirror.

"Hey—" She rolled down the car window to let some fresh air in, staring at the streetlights rushing past outside, pretending not to notice what was happening in the back seat.

When he got off the bus, there was no trace of Yu having cried, except for a stuffy nose.

"Do you have a cold?" a nurse in the emergency room asked.

You Yu lay face down on the hospital bed and shook his head cooperatively: "No."

"You got beaten up?" The nurse lifted the shirt off his back and took a look.

Yu Yu remained silent, as if admitting that "being beaten" was more shameful than being beaten itself. The nurse then cast a suspicious glance at Jian Zhen to the side.

Jian Zhen took a half step back: "Why are you looking at me? I didn't hit him."

The nurse, too lazy to delve into the background of the two young men, loosened her grip on You Yu's shirt and said impatiently, "Go get an X-ray first!"

Jian Zhen turned back into the emergency room and asked a few questions about the medical process. The nurse spoke quickly and with a high density of information. She thought Jian Zhen would take out her phone to write it down or record it, but when she turned her head after speaking, she found Jian Zhen with her hands in her pockets, looking down at You Yu, who was wriggling on the hospital bed.

Nurse Huo Dadao: "Hey—did you remember that?"

"I remember," Jian Zhen looked up at her, bewildered, and replied.

"Tch—" The nurse rolled her eyes and turned away from them.

Compared to taking on a group of people in the billiards hall or proving her innocence in the taxi, being looked down upon by the nurse made Jian Zhen even angrier. She didn't even know what she had done to offend the nurse and get a disdainful look from her for no reason.

Despite her anger, Jian Zhen was still grateful that the person had explained the process clearly. The most pressing issue now was the lack of money. She told You Yu to wait another ten minutes while she went to the information desk to make a call.

When the call reached Director Jian, Jian Zhen cleared her throat, leaning against the cold marble tiles of the triage desk, and said, "Dad, I'm at the hospital now—"

Director Jian dotes on his daughter far more than Deputy Secretary You dotes on his son. In recent years, Deputy Secretary You has been sent to assist underdeveloped areas and has had even less time for his family. Therefore, when Director Jian was in his car with his father to take You Yu home, Jian Zhen compared his own situation with You Yu's and came to the heartless conclusion: "You Yu, you live like an orphan."

You Yu was taken aback, while Director Jian, gripping the steering wheel, coughed lightly and subtly changed the subject: "Zhenzhen, what kind of people do you think set you up and framed you?"

When it comes to this, Jian Zhen gets really excited. Having been exposed to this kind of thing since childhood, she is exceptionally sensitive to capturing information from the "scene of the incident." In addition, she is an artist by training, so she can accurately recreate the appearance and characteristics of strangers. After her eloquent explanation, even people who have never participated in gambling can feel as if they are there.

Director Jian sighed and said softly, "These underground billiard halls in the city really need to be dealt with."

"Exactly." Jian Zhen snorted, snorting. Tattooed arms, just wait and see!

No one knows a daughter better than her father, so Director Jian immediately comforted her, saying, "Don't worry too much about copyright issues. They don't have much legal effect. Even if they did, a contract signed under duress in this situation cannot be used as evidence."

"Really?" Jian Zhen breathed a sigh of relief, then thought of the person who suggested that she use her paintings as collateral—could he have known all along that the contract was invalid and was just trying to find a way to get her and You Yu out of trouble in time?

After dropping off You Yu, only the father and daughter remained in the car. Jian Zhen then made the request that had been lingering in her mind: "Dad, could you help me investigate someone?"

"What do you mean?" Director Jian had a bad feeling and pressed, "Who is it?"

“A good guy among bad guys, he helped me and You Yu a lot today.”

"What's your name?"

"I don't know. If I knew, I would have gone to find him myself. It's precisely because I don't know that I need your help to find out where he is~"

“Daughter, I can’t help you with this. This is an abuse of power… But try to think positively. You think that person is great now, but maybe it’s precisely because there’s a distance between you two right now that things might fall apart once you get to know each other.”

"Oh." Jian Zhen wasn't entirely satisfied with the answer, but she couldn't ask for anything more.

The father and daughter remained silent until they arrived home. When they turned off the car in the underground parking garage, Jian Zhen unbuckled her seatbelt and was about to get out first when Director Jian called out to her, "Zhenzhen, Uncle You has been detained."

"Huh?" Jian Zhen gripped the seatbelt and turned her head, taking two seconds to realize what being detained meant. She exclaimed in shock, "No way, why? When did this happen..."

Director Jian only answered her last question: "It's been a while, and You Yu should have known about the cross-regional interrogation long ago."

“No wonder…” Jian Zhen murmured to herself.

Before Director Jian could finish speaking, he sighed and continued, "I heard today that he... committed suicide out of guilt. You Yu probably doesn't know yet."

Jian Zhen stared blankly at her father, who stood like a statue, as if someone had grabbed her by the neck. She couldn't even make a sound.