Chapter Fourteen: Deep-seated Illness
"Have you found it?" Lu Ming sat in his office chair, his upper body as straight as ever. His knuckles tapped the solid wood tabletop rhythmically and slowly. There was a slightly gloomy and aggressive look in his eyes as he looked at his subordinates who were waiting for his report.
Why did Su Yi agree to the Lu family's demands?
The man paused for a moment, then answered truthfully, “We understand that… Mr. Su Zhengde, your father, disappeared in the second year after you went to school in the city, and he is still on the missing persons list. He was a gambler and an alcoholic, and he didn’t get along well with his neighbors. Everyone thought he might be being chased for debts and retaliated against, so nobody really cared.”
"But actually, during the days when Su Zhengde disappeared, you took a long-distance bus back. That station would register passengers' ID cards on paper, and the records from that year were destroyed eight months ago. Furthermore, we observed that the wild graves on the desolate mountains around that county town had been disturbed, and the time coincides with the time the records were destroyed..."
Therefore, it is likely that the mainland authorities investigated what happened back then and monopolized all the evidence, including the travel records and Su Zhengde's remains, to blackmail Su Yi into participating in his actions.
All of this seemed somewhat absurd—to let someone with no experience take charge of a significant operation seemed madness. But Lu Ming had no doubt about the authenticity of this matter. He knew very well that what Lu Fang truly cared about was not money, fame, or power, nor even killing and drugs, but rather the mark on the killer's own soul—hesitation, contradiction, indifference, struggle, and even depravity.
This is "art" to him.
His second year of school should have been around the time he dropped out.
“If I had met him sooner…” Lu Ming sighed and gently closed her eyes. “I need to keep a close eye on what’s happening in Country Z and prepare myself. I’m going there in person.”
"Yes, Mr. Lu."
Z Country
Su Yi's hair had grown a bit longer, but it was still just shoulder-length. Despite the tropical climate of Z country, he wore only a plain white shirt, the top two buttons undone, revealing glimpses of his delicate collarbone and fair neck. He sat at the bar; in the six months since we last met, his features had become even more striking, as if splashed with ink, dazzling even in the dim light. It was hard to pinpoint exactly what had changed, but the way he sat there gave the impression that he was different from before, as if every bone in his body had been removed and his inner self replaced.
He lowered his eyes, seemingly deep in thought, before him a cocktail unique to the area, made with "water of life" and several alcoholic beverages. After a few drinks, his internal organs ached, but he didn't ask the bartender to change the recipe.
He was talking to the bartender when a man walked past him. Just as the man wiped himself down, Su Yi picked up the nearest bottle, spun around in his chair, and suddenly leaped up, smashing it hard against the man's temple.
The glass bottle shattered instantly, shards of glass flying everywhere. The man, his face covered in blood, rolled on the ground, howling in pain. Su Yi, however, didn't even glance at him. She pulled her phone and wallet from his sleeve, smoothed out the wrinkled fabric around her waist, and turned to leave.
The man was dishonest and had taken advantage of him by touching him, which wasn't a heinous crime. But that bottle would have given the man at least a concussion. However, Su Yi felt no guilt, even a quiet indifference—where was he? A bomb dropped here would wipe out every innocent soul within a ten-mile radius.
As he walked away, the three pairs of eyes watching him each had their own thoughts.
Hotel room.
Facing Lu Fang across the screen, Su Yi injected a vial of pale pink, transparent liquid medicine into his forearm vein. He then involuntarily raised his head, letting out a soft, pleasurable moan as he breathed heavily. Like a small beast driven by primal instincts, all sense of propriety and shame vanished like leaves in the wind, as he stretched out his limbs oblivious to his surroundings.
In the third month of taking the medication, in addition to oral administration once or twice a day, Su Yi had to undergo intravenous injection of a high concentration of the drug once a week to maintain a normal life. Now, in the sixth month, this frequency has changed to once every three days.
He couldn't refuse; he would die—even the strongest will in the world cannot overcome physiology, just as one cannot overcome death.
For a full five minutes, the effects of the drug wore off, and Su Yi slumped to his knees in front of the camera, his eyes still glazed over, his sweat-soaked black hair matted and sticking to his face, looking extremely disheveled.
Unlike his usual tenderness and comfort, today Lu Fang merely watched coldly, as if observing a disobedient pet, and made a gesture. Zhang Mingcheng, who had been standing in the corner, immediately stepped forward, grabbed Su Yi by the collar, half-lifted him from the ground, and swung his arm, delivering a powerful and crisp slap across Su Yi's face. Five clear finger marks immediately appeared on his smooth face.
"Sir... ah—" He barely managed to open his mouth before he was given no chance to beg for mercy. As a mechanism on his body was activated, he let out a piercing scream and rolled to the ground, struggling. Through his sweat-soaked, semi-transparent clothing, the rise and fall of his chest was faintly visible. To call it "heart-wrenching" would be no exaggeration.
It lasted for nearly three minutes, and when it finally stopped, he was almost fainting. But Zhang Mingcheng kicked him in the lower back, forcing him to struggle to his feet and kneel down again.
Was it embarrassing? Was it humiliating? Did he regret it? Su Yi couldn't answer; he was no longer able to think.
“Mind your own business.” Lu Fang, usually so economical with words, finally spoke. “Just bear with it a little longer. You’ll soon be back with your true ‘master.’ By then, I probably won’t have another chance to do anything to you—if he doesn’t either.”
Su Yi gritted her teeth and answered him in a breathy voice, "Yes... sir."
December 10th.
Nearly eight months have passed since Su Yi first met Lu Fang. More than five months have passed since he arrived in Country Z.
Now, what lies before me is the way home, yet it seems not.
The goods were counted and loaded onto the trucks—a total of three small trucks—by dozens of people the night before departure. There were no checkpoints along the route from country Z to the domestic distribution point, so the goods didn't need to be disguised; the net weight was all that was being checked. However, Su Yi still didn't have a clear grasp of the specifics and couldn't estimate the weight.
"The first two cars will follow me at five in the morning. You wait until seven in the afternoon. If there are no unusual developments, then we'll set off," Su Yi explained concisely. Zhang Mingcheng didn't say anything. He had to admit—putting aside all the rights and wrongs, Su Yi seemed to be a born master of this art, a half-madman. Although he had learned gentleness and frugality after spending so much time in the cage, given the wilderness, he could show everyone his innate strength and claws.
Su Yi felt his pocket and found it empty, so he turned to Zhang Mingcheng and asked, "Do you have any cigarettes?"
Zhang Mingcheng casually tossed the entire pack of cigarettes over. Su Yi picked one out, lit it with a lighter, took a deep drag, and white smoke billowed from his nostrils. Su Yi returned the pack, strode into the passenger seat of the truck, closed his eyes, and waited to depart.
Starting at eight o'clock, the blazing sun beat down directly into the carriage, making the leather seats feel almost melted. After driving for several hours, it was around ten in the morning, and both of us were feeling a little dizzy.
"Let's stop for ten minutes in the shade ahead, I need to use the restroom," Su Yi said. The driver was more than happy to oblige and quickly did so—it was a small road through the rainforest, and the extent of the surrounding rainforest was unknown, but they had already been driving through it for over an hour. Su Yi walked a bit into the woods by the roadside, finding a slightly sloping spot where he could just see the truck through the dense foliage. The driver was leaning against the hood, smoking.
Su Yi secretly calculated: the bomb's maximum blast radius was ten meters; planted on the front of the car… enough to obliterate the driver completely. At 10:40, he quietly pressed the remote control button in his pocket—bang! A towering flame spread through the lush forest; even from a hundred meters away, he felt the air in front of him become scorching hot.
The vast area affected by the bomb explosion was something Su Yi, who had no experience with such things, had overlooked. He looked around. If he followed the road, he would definitely be caught; if he went into the woods… it seemed he would still be a fish to be slaughtered in the face of wild beasts and poisonous plants.
"Mr. Lu, it wasn't one of our people!" Several miles away, Lu Ming, dressed in a black silk shirt and wearing sunglasses, sat quietly in his SUV listening to his subordinates report on the source of the explosion.
"In the past," Lu Ming said succinctly.
It truly felt like it had fallen from the sky.
Hearing the sound of a car behind him, Su Yi instinctively drew his gun and fired at the SUV. The bullet struck the metal with a screeching sound, leaving a deep dent in the car. The rear window slowly rolled down, and Lu Ming glanced at him. From a distance, Su Yi couldn't see his expression.
Su Yi stood there, letting him walk over and take the gun from his hand: "Get in the car."
Before he could move, two men came forward and dragged him into the car. His hands and feet were bound with leather ropes, so he couldn't struggle.
Lu Ming picked up a sharp knife from beside her, and with a gentle flick of the gleaming steel blade, she sliced through the thin layer of clothing on Su Yi's right arm.
"No..." Su Yi panicked and tried to back away, but there was no way to avoid it.
"Bear with it." Lu Ming pressed down on his right arm for a while, and after finding something hard, the thin, sharp tip of the knife pierced into the skin and muscle. The flesh inside was torn into a ball, but the amount of bleeding was not large.
"Ah..." Su Yi groaned in pain, tears streaming down his face, his complexion turning ashen. He dared not struggle, for who knew if the blade would penetrate further? A small blue chip, no bigger than a fingernail, still covered in flesh and blood, was ripped out—it was a human GPS device. Lu Ming wrapped it in paper, threw it out the window, and said nothing.
Su Yi's eyes were covered, and the pain in his arm gradually subsided with time and the effect of the ointment.
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