After hanging up the phone, I still sat next to the iron gate, leaning against the wall and dozing off. These days, people have been in and out of the cage. Most of those who left were assigned to a different prison at the time of trial. Almost no one was acquitted. Those who left would breathe a sigh of relief, feeling lucky that they finally escaped from Ma Wulong's clutches. Those who came in were new prisoners, who were violent because of crimes of injury. At first, they were always unwilling to accept Ma Wulong's status as the head of the prison, and many of them cursed and swore, but after being punished by Ma Wulong, their tempers became much softer...
Ma Wulong was the only person who was qualified to own that chair. He sat on it to rest during the day and lay on it to sleep at night. An ordinary chair was also a symbol of status. There were many fights in the cage for this chair. When Ma Wulong was bored, he would call me over to chat and ask me, "When will you be sentenced for your crime?"
I said, "The guy whose testicles I kicked is still recuperating in the hospital. He will cooperate with the police investigation in a few days. When the investigation is finished, I will be sentenced. Brother Ma, what about you?"
"I don't know." Ma Wulong said, "I will be tried together with the guys next door. The crime of murder is more or less troublesome. It will take two or three months to go through the procedures. It's so troublesome. It's better to kill them with a single knife. I'm not allowed to take a shower here all day. I'm going to get lice." Then he really reached into his clothes and touched it.
I moved a little further away from him and continued, "Yes, murder cases are definitely troublesome and cannot be sentenced casually. Brother Ma, if I make the judgment before you do, I'll ask you to take care of my friend."
"Don't worry." Ma Wulong said, "You go and live there first, I will be there soon. If anyone bullies you, I will remember it in my heart, and I will avenge you when I get there." His words were very heroic, revealing a sense of transcendental self-confidence.
"Hehe, then I'll have to rely on Brother Ma." It's a blessing in disguise that he already has a backer before going to jail.
Ma Wulong was in good spirits these days, often changing his tricks to play with other prisoners in the cage, which amazed me. But I stopped begging for these people, and instead looked at them with a very cold attitude. The more I did this, the more respectful they were to me. It was really strange, and it made me understand more about human nature.
Ma Wulong would pull me aside and tell me some stories from his past when he was free. It turned out that all of them were born by the Black Water River, which is the southernmost part of Beiyuan City. It is a garbage river that is used to dump sewage and wastewater. It is surrounded by chemical factories that emit yellow smoke. There is a stench like dead rats floating there all year round. Those who live by the Black Water River are all poor people. As the saying goes, poor mountains and bad waters produce unruly people. The Black Water River is home to the most gamblers, drunkards, hooligans, and scoundrels in the city. The children here seem to be more barbaric from birth than those in other places. Of course, there have been many big hooligans who are famous in Beiyuan.
Ma Wulong was just an ordinary gangster living by the Blackwater River. He relied on his strong physique to gather a group of brothers to live in the underworld. Unfortunately, living in the underworld requires not only a strong body, but also an extraordinary brain. As a result, Ma Wulong and his gang encountered obstacles everywhere and did not live up to their expectations. They could only do small jobs to help people collect debts. And they were not good at collecting debts. They only used hard methods, such as throwing paint on people's doors, chopping off people's little fingers with a knife, and running to the police station every few days.
There was another reason for the escalation of the matter this time. Ma Wulong heard that it was very profitable to contract projects, so he asked a friend to help him find a project. Unexpectedly, the friend he asked was also found by someone else. He was just a middleman, fooling both sides and only caring about making more money. Not only did he falsify the materials and pass off inferior products as good ones, he also often delayed paying Ma Wulong and his friends the project money.
Ma Wulong was not a fool, and gradually realized that it was his friend who was playing tricks. However, he did not want to fall out with this friend, so he repeatedly invited him out for drinks and tried to persuade him to do things in a down-to-earth manner. Unexpectedly, the friend saw Ma Wulong's attitude and thought that Ma Wulong was afraid of him, so he became even more aggressive and refused to give Ma Wulong a penny.
Ma Wulong was so angry. How could he not get paid when so many people were following him for meals? Finally, one day, he and his friend had a fight because of a conflict. Neither of them was a good person, and they soon started fighting. After three or four rounds of fighting, people on both sides were seriously injured, and the hatred became deeper and deeper, almost to the point of not giving up until the other side was killed, which led to the tragedy that followed. Ma Wulong said that when he cut off the friend's arm, the friend knelt on the ground and cried and begged him to show mercy, saying that he would never dare to cheat again...
Ma Wulong talked about a lot of things about the project, but I didn’t quite understand what he said at the end. But I did understand his last few words: “If I had been so aggressive and fierce from the beginning, he wouldn’t have dared to cheat me. So, don’t be too kind, or those bastards will take advantage of you to climb up.”
Bad Youth
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