episode 18
"I'm sorry, I was a little out of line just now. I hope you don't mind."
On the way back from the beach, He Xun rubbed his temples, his easygoing expression returning, and said to Song Liuguang with a slightly apologetic tone.
"Won't."
Song Liuguang clutched the empty Coke bottle tightly, his expression even more dejected than when he was secretly taking pictures downstairs at Qilixiangdu. After a long silence, he asked again, "What you just said... was it all true?"
“I have no reason to lie to you.” He Xun took a deep breath, stopped, and gave a slightly mocking smile in the moonlight. “Song, Liu, Guang.”
He never expected that investigating Ding Xiabing's matter would uncover so much more, bringing this old story to the forefront.
Back then, Mo Wenjin caused the deaths of Song Liuguang's parents on the spot due to drunk driving. Now it's Song Liuguang's turn to use his professional position to settle things himself.
Justice delayed is justice denied, but the parties involved must always be judged personally.
“Here’s what I’ll do. I’ll give you some time to think it over. If you don’t give me an answer by this time tomorrow, I’ll replace you.” He Xun patted Song Liuguang on the shoulder. “But I believe that no one knows better than you how to profit from this matter. I found you not only because I discovered that you have some connection with Mo Wenjin, but more importantly because I value your abilities.”
"No need to think about it anymore, I agree to cooperate with you."
As he spoke, Song Liuguang suddenly looked up at the dark night sky, raised his middle finger, and cursed, "Fuck Mo Wenjin!"
After yelling, Song Liuguang sighed, looking like a fish out of water, his expression a mixture of contradiction and helplessness. He squatted on the ground, pressed his hands against his forehead, and said in a muffled voice, "To be honest, Brother Xun, I'm not as noble as you. If you ask me how much I want to avenge my parents whom I've never seen since I can remember, to be honest, I haven't thought that much about it. I only agreed to cooperate with you... I was just thinking about how to squeeze a lot of money out of him first. You know, people in our line of work are just trying to make more money."
He Xun looked noncommittal.
Even though the other party's thoughts are somewhat dark, they are absolutely true.
When the surging resentment dissipates like the receding tide, all that remains in the mind is a helpless grit of teeth and a sense of letting things slide and looking forward.
Or perhaps they are only interested in making money.
But the fact that Song Liuguang could feel even the slightest bit of guilt and unease about this already surpasses that of most people who only have physiological organs and no heart.
"how?"
He Xun leaned against a tree trunk by the street, the coconut tree leaves casting a shadow on him that was deeper than the night. He crossed his arms and looked down at Song Liuguang, whose every move was filled with inner turmoil and contradiction: "Do you think I'm noble?"
"Isn't that noble?" Song Liuguang looked up, a hint of surprise in his expression, and asked, "To lend a helping hand to strangers, if that's not noble, then what is?"
“In a sense, nobility is also selfishness.” A hint of mockery flashed in He Xun’s eyes as he exposed himself in the night. “In other words, I am actually a very selfish person. More than one person has said this about me before, and I admit it.”
Song Liuguang suddenly didn't know how to respond, and could only silently look up at the person in front of him.
He Xun didn't look at him, but gazed into the distance, his eyes unfocused. Rather than being in a daze, it was more like he was immersed in some dark memory.
Song Liuguang felt a sudden, inexplicable stirring in his heart.
He finally sensed something incongruous about He Xun's outstanding appearance: a kind of resolute determination.
He didn't know what He Xun had been through, but he felt that although He Xun had the looks to be someone who should have been pampered from childhood, he always exuded an indescribable sense of determination.
It seemed like he was determined to live only this one day, and to die only after completing this task.
This conjecture sent a chill down Song Liuguang's spine.
He stood up abruptly and couldn't help waving at He Xun, trying to pull He Xun back from another world he didn't know: "Hey, hey, I don't understand this at all. It's getting more and more philosophical. You liberal arts students always have such a set of theories. Anyway, I don't care about selfishness or not. As long as you deal with bad people, it's noble, great, and correct."
He Xun finally composed himself, pushed away Song Liuguang's waving arm, and laughed and scolded, "You're like an idiot."
Song Liuguang felt a sense of relief and chuckled a few times.
The two walked forward in tacit agreement for a while, when Song Liuguang suddenly seemed to remember something. He withdrew his big white teeth and stared at He Xun with an unusually serious expression: "Now I only have one question to ask you."
"What?" He Xun glanced at him sideways.
"Since you clearly came to find me, why did you deliberately scare me in the first place?! And even said you were going to scatter my picture down from the building!"
He Xun looked at him with a rather strange expression: "I did it on purpose."
He added at the end, "It's quite interesting, don't you think? Especially since it can bring out your 'scattering flowers' skill."
After saying that, he turned his head away seriously, only the crescent-shaped curve of his upturned eyes revealing that he was suppressing a laugh.
Song Liuguang: "...Damn it."
That's interesting!
"Alright, alright, stop wasting time here and go back to sleep."
As soon as He Xun finished speaking with a smile, a tall and unusually familiar figure walked out of the gate of the seaside hotel not far away.
He squinted and instinctively hid behind a tree trunk.
Who is it?
Song Liuguang noticed his subtle movements and followed his gaze. When he saw who it was, he said unsurprisedly, "Who do we have here? Isn't this Mo Shilin from Yuntu? Still out socializing so late? You know, these rich people are quite patient. You might think they spend most of their time at night indulging in song, dance, and debauchery, but actually, they spend most of their time negotiating business."
"What do you call this? This is what it means when someone more talented than you works even harder than you. How terrifying is that!"
Because most celebrities in the industry have wealthy patrons, Song Liuguang has also secretly photographed many business people, and he knows most of their schedules very well.
He Xun's delicate eyebrows furrowed slightly as he recalled the schedule of Mo Shilin that he had learned from Mu Xianglu that morning.
Tsk.
The other party does indeed have a dinner party at the seaside hotel at 8 pm tonight.
Not only that, he also received the important task of delivering milk to Mo Shilin from Aunt Mu. Fortunately, he deliberately made an excuse because he was going to see Song Liuguang that night, otherwise he would not know how long he would have been at the dinner party.
Because it was a private dinner, Mo Shilin was dressed less formally tonight. The casual suit still made his broad shoulders and long legs look even better. The jacket was unbuttoned, revealing a pearl-white shirt underneath. He also wore his half-black-rimmed glasses on his nose, and his thin lips were slightly upturned. If you didn't pay close attention to his demeanor, you would think he was a male college student from some university.
After a few rounds of polite conversation, the unfamiliar middle-aged man who had escorted Mo Shilin out returned to the hotel. Mo Shilin did not immediately get into the car, but instead, as if sensing something, suddenly glanced in He Xun's direction. His phoenix eyes behind his glasses seemed to be filled with ice, as if they could pierce through the dense foliage and thick tree trunks.
He Xun shuddered, and like a cat, he took a few steps back without making a sound, then grabbed the hem of Song Liuguang's T-shirt and pulled her a little further in.
"Yes, yes, we need to hide."
Song Liuguang also suddenly realized what was happening, lowered his voice, and said in a whisper that only he and He Xun could hear, "This guy investigated me a few days ago and almost made me lose my job."
He Xun keenly sensed something and frowned, asking, "Why are you investigating me?"
"Ahem, don't mention it. It was about what happened at the K Congress building before. I had a little dispute with him."
"A minor dispute?"
He Xun suddenly thought of the sensational news headline that had gone viral on the internet a few days ago.
He raised his eyes slightly, a forced smile on his face, and sized up Song Liuguang: "Ah~, so it's you."
He paused subtly, then asked, "Didn't you film the rest of the content?"
"Hey, don't even mention it." Song Liuguang said with a regretful look. "I didn't expect the two of them to not actually fight. Now that I think about it, I guess he thought the people outside were unclean. You know what, Mo Shilin's self-control is really quite good."
“Unlike… his beastly uncle.” Mentioning Mo Wenjin, Song Liuguang couldn’t help but grit his teeth. “He could probably beat someone out of a mineral water bottle from a junkyard.”
He Xun turned his gaze away from the man in the distance, and then a wicked thought popped into his head.
"Although only two of those photos were released, based on my experience, I think you definitely wouldn't have only taken two."
He looked at Song Liuguang with a half-smile.
It took Song Liuguang two seconds to realize he was referring to Mo Shilin's photo at the K-League headquarters. "What do you want to do?"
"Send it to me," He Xun said succinctly.
"I didn't know you were such a gossip, Xun-ge."
Song Liuguang looked knowing. He put his arm around He Xun's shoulder, took out his phone, unlocked the screen, and quickly opened an app that wouldn't leave any chat history. "No problem, no problem. Although all the photos in my camera were forced to be deleted by Mo Shilin's people, I still have backups. I'll send them to you now... Hey, we don't have each other's contact information yet, right? Let's add each other. Should I scan your QR code or will you scan mine?"
"Thank you." He Xun smiled. "I'll sweep you."
"Okay, do it yourself." Song Liuguang handed his phone to He Xun, subconsciously glancing around. Seeing that Mo Shilin had already looked away and was leaning against the car making a phone call, Song Liuguang's throat, which had been hoarse from talking for so long, started to feel hoarse again.
He licked his dry lips, glancing at He Xun, who was engrossed in adding his contact information—and the can of cola in his arms seemed to be itching to get a taste.
"Brother Xun, are you still drinking that Coke? If not, don't waste it."
As he spoke, Song Liuguang took out a can of cola.
These two cans of cola were originally bought for Song Liuguang in advance, so He Xun had no reason to disagree and raised his arm to let him take them.
But with a crisp snapping sound as the aluminum alloy pull ring popped out, He Xun's eyelids suddenly twitched.
He abruptly raised his head and grabbed Song Liuguang's arm, his eyes filled with a rare look of terror: "Wait a minute—"
But it was too late.
The dark red cola liquid shot into the sky like fireworks, then glided in a semi-circle like a shower of 150 Gemini meteors, landing on the windshield of Mo Shilin's black Porsche 911, a car that cost seven figures and which even if he and Song Liuguang were washed clean and sold ten times, they still couldn't afford. The cola meteors that hit the windshield then quickly and stubbornly splashed out in an umbrella-like pattern, perfectly demonstrating the concept of "hitting rock bottom and bouncing back," finally landing directly on Mo Shilin's handsome face that was universally admired.
Caught off guard by a sudden, unfamiliar attack, the usually composed and nonchalant CEO Mo visibly paused in the darkness, a rare look of innocent bewilderment crossing his handsome face.
If you open your eyes wider, you can see a drop of Coca-Cola slowly sliding down the edge of his glasses.
He Xun: "......"
Song Liuguang: "..."
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