Chapter 33

The competition was scheduled to begin at 12:00 sharp. Before going on stage, Pei Huai spent a short while exchanging information with his juniors. Afterward, he paused in thought: what piqued his interest was the so-called new stuff served in this bar.

This matter is probably more critical than imagined.

"No general description?" he asked.

Xiang Mingqi spread his hands helplessly: "No. Before I successfully infiltrated the enemy, you were hit on by a perverted old man, and that's all."

Pei Huai walked past him in silence.

In this situation, the Bangkok hotel only does one thing: create the conditions. They identified their target in the bathroom. There were two of them, and judging by their footsteps, they weren't walking side by side, but one behind the other. They even opened the door to check if any other cubicles were occupied before entering.

When it happened, Pei Huai sat astride Xiang Mingqi's legs with his back straightened, and put his arm around his neck.

They were in the utility room. Because Xiang Mingqi didn't want the newcomers to see his shoes through the seams, he was held in his arms by the base of his legs.

The latter's other arm clasped his waist, holding him tightly. Even as his limbs swayed, Pei Huai was still alert to his surroundings, so much so that he didn't notice that he was pressing his chest close to the younger generation's face.

Xiang Mingqi shyly turned his head away, but accidentally grabbed his chest. The elastic muscles squeezed inwards, revealing their perfect shape. He grasped his senior's waist and couldn't help but bury his head in that firm chest and took a deep breath.

Then the back of his hand was twisted hard.

Xiang Mingqi raised his head and smiled in a trance.

"Don't touch me." The senior said in a low voice with a frown.

The smile faded into a blush that stretched from cheeks to ears. Xiang Mingqi remained silent, hugging him and sniffing carefully: it was the scent of soap. In the narrow gap between the side of his neck and the hollow of his shoulder, the scent was especially clean and refreshing, and never greasy.

He couldn't help but look up and peek over a few times.

The senior was biting his lip, his brow furrowed in a subtle frown, though it wasn't obvious from his expression. But Xiang Mingqi could guess that, given his brother's temperament, he must be tormented by shame.

Suddenly, footsteps passed by several unlocked cubicles. Xiang Mingqi raised his knees to his abdomen, retracted his feet, and wrapped Pei Huai tightly in his arms with his hot body.

His palms were sweating, he knew that if someone opened the door they were in, all their efforts would be in vain.

The footsteps paused in front of the door for a few seconds, pushing the unlocked door panel open half a centimeter.

“Squeak—”

This sound seemed to have touched a nerve in Xiang Mingqi. He clenched his fists and stood up to move. However, Pei Huai leaned down before him and calmly blocked his mouth with a kiss, letting the screams melt between his tongues.

He kissed him, holding the back of his neck and chin, kissing him deeply and softly.

"That's the storage room," someone warned from a distance. "Don't go there. There's a lot of dusty stuff in there, and it's dirty. No one will be there."

"knew."

The person who opened the door turned around and walked into the compartment opposite.

When the kiss ended, Xiang Mingqi's head was still dizzy and swollen. This kiss had such magic without deepening, it was so soft and crisp that it made his spine feel numb.

It was not until Pei Huai pinched a small piece of flesh on the back of his hand, signaling him to relax, that Xiang Mingqi moved his hand from his waist and placed it on his chest.

He rubbed it while daydreaming.

Pei Huai pinched his thigh hard and ignored him, listening carefully. The two people were talking not far away, so it was not difficult to hear the general content.

"Hey, how's this batch of goods? Have you done all the testing? This one's a virgin, so it's going to be tough. If it works, I'll pay you double." This is one of the people who spoke. He sounded like a buyer, and he was extremely eager.

"Don't worry."

He was answered by a young, deep male voice, with the aura of a teenager.

"Here's a piece of advice for you, kid. You'd better be sure to drug the person. I've been kept by that woman for almost weeks. If I don't deal with her, my wife is about to give birth, and she'll be discovered if I go out to play again..." Unfortunately, after this sentence, a lot of the content was unclear.

Not long after, the door hinge creaked amidst the noise, as if someone had left the compartment and was about to go out. It seemed that the two people were talking very quickly. Pei Huai's fingertips were about to reach for the handle, but he held it in mid-air and did not move.

Because one of them stopped very steadily outside the utility room.

The voice, clearly that of the buyer, complained in the distance, "Hey, what are you doing? Why aren't you leaving? You're not going to change your mind, are you?" Pei Huai leaned forward to retrieve his weapon from his shoe belt, then gestured toward Ming Qi. Ming Qi nodded, then boldly nuzzled his senior's lower lip with the tip of his nose.

"Reward." He mouthed, "Brother, I want a reward."

Pei Huai was stunned for a moment.

"If I do well, you have to kiss me." The smile on his face was bright and clear. Before Pei Huai could reject or accept his proposal, a voice finally sounded outside the cubicle.

"There's someone inside." The door was thrown open by the force that followed, allowing the shadows outside to block their way in a cunning way. A leather-booted foot pushed into the narrow gap, and a black glove gripped the edge of the door.

At the same time, a scorpion claw knife pierced the man's hand, within a few centimeters, forcing him to retract his hand instinctively.

Seizing this opportunity, Xiang Mingqi elbowed forward to break through the narrow door and used the momentum to rush out. But before he could stand firmly or look closely, something cold quickly approached his neck.

Like... slashing?

Pei Huai had anticipated this and grabbed the back of his collar, pulling it - the speed and strength of his reaction were unstoppable. With his elbow facing outward and the claw knife held horizontally, he used the torque to block the dagger that was coming towards his vitals.

The inner blades met, trembled, and then twisted their wrists to press closer, making a sound that made one's teeth ache.

"Don't be stupid." Pei Huai tilted the blade and knocked the dagger away with a tricky extended move. "No matter who you face, don't forget to leave yourself a way out." As soon as the work instructions were finished, Pei Huai no longer looked at him, rotated his claws into a straight grip, and lowered his eyes to examine the figure who stumbled and crawled to pick up the knife.

He didn't pursue him because, to him, the man wasn't qualified.

—He wore a black hooded jumpsuit and had a sturdy build. To help him crouch and expand his field of vision, he used his palm to push aside his hair, revealing his youthful face and the wolf-like tattoo on his throat.

"Who are you?" He stared back fiercely.

However, Pei Huai didn't have time to speak. Meanwhile, Xiang Mingqi successfully apprehended the buyer and found a bag of colored powder in his pocket. "Alright, you two beasts actually drugged me! I'm going to call the police and have you arrested. Oh no, they'll arrest me too."

"...Where's the cat?" Ignoring this unexpected existence, Pei Huai stepped forward, with the claw-shaped blade approaching the man's throat.

The hooded youth feigned surrender, as if he knew he wouldn't kill him. He sneered, raised a spray canister from his sleeve, and sprayed it in his face. Pei Huai stepped back, dodging quickly, but even so, the pepper spray still rubbed half his face.

Pei Huai paused, hastily tugging at the man's hood. The man disappeared in a few seconds.

"Brother!" Xiang Mingqi felt as if his heart was being bitten by something. With a snap of his hands, he forcibly broke the buyer's wrist bone. Amidst the miserable wails, he rushed over, hugged Pei Huai almost uncontrollably, and pinched his chin to check his injuries.

He haphazardly brushed away the wet hair on the right side of his head with his hand, his neck muscles and blood vessels tensed with anxiety.

"Does it hurt?" He knew his voice was shaking. "Brother, did he hurt you?"

"He didn't spray me." Pei Huai gently opened his hand.

"Really?" Hearing this, Xiang Mingqi quickly ran to the faucet, wet a towel, and wiped his face. Looking at his long eyelashes that were slightly drooping from the wetness, he still asked worriedly, "Is your eye okay?"

The senior calmly pressed down his icy hand.

"I already told you."

Xiang Mingqi calmed down only after confirming that he was fine. He stood sideways with his head down, not knowing what he was thinking about. Only his eyes revealed a vague chill.

The person ran away, but the one who fell into their hands could not withstand the pressure and confessed everything.

In less than three minutes, the bag of powder and the shady business surrounding the bar were shaken out.

This colorful powder is a candy sold exclusively at Centipede Girl. Unlike online medications, it's more potent, relaxing the muscles while also increasing libido.

"It contains some flunitrazepam." Pei Huai pinched a little onto his fingertips and sniffed it. "The dosage is very precise. It must have been tested many times." He glanced at the man at his feet and asked, "Haven't you considered that the person taking it might suffer cardiac arrest?"

"How could that be? I only use a little each time. The probability of something going wrong isn't that high, right? Besides, I won't be the only one enjoying it then. I..."

Pei Huai raised his foot and stomped down slowly and forcefully on his face. The movement of his ankle made each crushing blow extremely heavy.

A voice interrupted sarcastically, "Wow, you're such a pervert and disgusting person. Do you think everything's fine just because nothing happened? Do you think this was a consensual relationship? Fine, we're not going to hand you over to the police anyway. We'll call the victims and have them lynched one by one."

"No, no, my wife..."

"--Oh, now you're thinking of my wife. Eating the same kind of rice as someone like you is simply an insult to my henpecked husband. I'll call your wife in a minute." Xiang Mingqi relied on his speaking speed to successfully suppress the other party's panicked desire to interrupt. Then, he touched the goose bumps on his arm and turned to his senior who remained silent. "By the way, brother, when you mentioned multiple experiments just now, were you hinting at that person testing drugs on the missing cats?"

Even though he didn't get a response, he was still very sure that he had guessed his senior's thoughts, so he sniffed with a sad face: "What should we do? We let him get away. Wuwuwu Zhuangzhuang, rest in peace, I will always remember you."

Pei Huai simply shook his watch towards him, pointing to a flashing and moving red dot on the full screen.

"I taught you to always have a backup plan."