CH 5

TL: Hua

After that, Shen Boyan really didn’t play any tricks. The two finished their dinner with “mutual respect.” Before parting, Shen Boyan sent Xia Shu’an to the door.

The car arranged by the hotel has been waiting for a long time. The black silhouette was hidden outside the opulent lights of the lobby, as if hibernating. Xia Shu’an had already gotten into the car, still holding the medicine that he had not had the chance to use in his hand.

Shen Boyan stood one step away from him. His shadow was pulled into a long line by the light, and his dark pupils became deeper and deeper with some hidden desire. He looked at Xia Shu’an and said slowly, “I heard that President Xia is still running around looking for funding. He’s a senior in the business world. I believe there will be someone willing to help. Then see you next time, Mr. Xia.”

After he finished speaking, he didn’t give Xia Shu’an any time to react. He patted on the car door, signaling the driver to go.

Xia Shu’an swallowed his words again.

“…”

Alright, then I’ll wait for you to take action.

…

The timeline continued to extend forward along the old memories, and after another week, the matter of borrowing money and repaying the debt still had no progress. Both Xia parents looked very haggard.

On this day, father Xia came home late at night and was about to go back to his room when Xia Shu’an suddenly stopped him: “Dad, I have something to tell you.”

“What’s wrong, Xiao An?”

Father Xia turned back slightly as he watched his son approach and stretched out his hand, revealing two tickets. “Dad, these are two movie tickets. You and Mom haven’t gone out together for a long time; go out tomorrow, have a meal, and watch a movie.”

“Xiao An, I—”

“Dad!” Xia Shu’an raised his voice, stepped forward, and held Father Xia’s hand: “I know it’s not easy for you and mom during this time, but mom is in poor health and can’t contribute, so she’s even more anxious than you when seeing you working so hard. In the past few days, I have never seen a smile on her face.”

“The money matter cannot be resolved in a day or two, but our family will have to live together healthily and happily in the future, so take a day off to spend time with mom and relieve the depression in her heart.”

The Xia parents have been married for many years. They only have one child, Xia Shu’an, and never had other thoughts that they shouldn’t have. Their feelings are evident. After hearing his words, Father Xia had mixed emotions for a while and finally nodded: “Yes, I’ve been worrying your mother these days.”

Xia Shu’an chuckled and held his hand: “Let’s spend a good day with her.”

After sending Father Xia back to the room, Xia Shu’an’s face gradually sank. In his last life, it was tomorrow. This young master, who had always been well-clothed, suffered the first big setback in his life, which also made him encounter that evil fate.

This time, even if the future cannot be changed, he still has to protect his family.

The next day, Xia Shu’an woke up early. They have now moved out of his aunt’s house and live in a rented house. Although the place is small, only their family lives there, so it’s more comfortable.

Apart from this, they now only have one old store. The old store was opened in the alley, and the furnishings were simple. Looking at this ordinary old store, no one would believe that it was once related to the famous Xia enterprise.

This is a shop passed down from his great-grandfather, so it’s considered an ancestral business. Last night, Xia Shu’an called and apologized to the customers who had made an appointment in advance, and then he called the store staff to tell them that the store will be closed tomorrow so they don’t need to come over.

After arriving at the store, he hung a sign of temporary closure at the door. When he opened the door, a few regular customers from nearby came over, pointed to the sign on the door lock, and said, “Is the store not open today?”

“Yes, the store is closed today; you can come back another day ….. Come back next week.”

After Xia Shu’an finished all this, he estimated the time and made a call with the telephone in the shop.

“Hello, is this the police station? I want to make a report. I just saw several people with iron bars coming our way. We have a lot of customers eating here, so I’m a little scared.”

After hanging up the phone, Xia Shu’an sat in the store, looking at the clock on the wall. About ten minutes later, the closed door was pushed open from the outside with a bang, and a few gangsters walked in swaggeringly.

“Why are you closing the store? Do you know that owing money and not paying it back is shameful? So you want to shrink inside the store like a shrinking turtle?”

Xia Shu’an stood up and looked at the sticks in their hands with some vigilance: “What do you want?”

“What do we want?” The leader threw his stick to the ground with a bang, saying, “It’s only right to pay back what you owe; what do you think we want?”

Xia Shu’an took a step back and said, “If I owe money, of course I will pay it back, but I haven’t heard of being forced to reason with a stick.”

“Boys.” The man raised the stick in his hand.

Xia Shu’an immediately said, “I have 20 million on hand—”

The man was taken aback. He didn’t expect that the people in such a small shop could easily take out tens of millions. This was different from what their employer had promised, and he wasn’t a fool. Upon hearing this, he vaguely said, “You owe hundreds of millions. What can a mere tens of millions do?”

“So which debtor asked you to come over to collect the debt? I don’t remember owing anyone hundreds of millions.”

“You—” The man couldn’t think this far, so he became furious and shouted at Xia Shu’an: “Stop talking sh*t! Just f*cking pay back the money!”

As he spoke, he was about to smash a vase next to him. The vase was personally selected by Xia Shu’an’s great-grandfather. It has been there since the store opened, and it is considered the treasure of the store. Before Xia Shu’an realized it, his body acted on instinct, and he rushed to hug the vase back.

His center of gravity was unstable, and he stumbled backwards a few steps, hitting his back directly on the corner of the cashier’s table.

—Peng!

Seeing that Xia Shu’an still dared to resist, those gangsters picked up the stick and smashed it at random. Several times, the thick stick reached his side. Xia Shu’an hugged the vase while protecting his head and was blocked in a corner.

“I advise you to be sensible—”

The man grinned ferociously. Just as he raised the stick, there was a “bang” at the door, and it was kicked open. Xia Shu’an thought the police had arrived, and his eyes lit up. Then he saw men in messy clothes rushing in, all of them tall and burly, but none of them were policemen.

“What are you doing?!”

After they came in, they rushed toward the crowd of gangsters. At first glance, they all had weapons in their hands, so they weren’t exactly good people.

The gangsters also panicked: “Who are you people?”

“And who the hell are you? What are you doing in broad daylight?”

“Let me tell you, in a society ruled by law, violence is disgraceful!”

Having said that, there was nothing pleasant about the way they rushed in.

Although the number of men in the second wave was small, their hands and feet were exceptionally agile, as if they had received professional training. Two men rushed out of the crowd to protect Xia Shu’an. In the panic, Xia Shu’an didn’t have time to ask who they were. The two gangs fought for two minutes, and there was another roar at the door: “Police, all stop!”

Recently, the police station has been heavily cracking down on local gangsters. Many policemen came fully equipped, wielding batons, and quickly controlled the scene.

“Take them all to the police station!”

“…”

In the police station, two groups of people stood separately. There were five or six people on each side, looking quite imposing. The policeman who made the record glanced at each side and said:

“Who called the police?”

“It’s me!”

Xia Shu’an took a step forward. His hair was disheveled, his body was scratched by pieces of porcelain, and there was a light bloodstain lining his white jade face. It was not serious, but it was very uncomfortable to look at.

The policewoman on the side had a mild attitude and said to Xia Shu’an, “Tell me about the matter.”

Xia Shu’an, the shop owner and the one who made the report, explained the situation to the police. When asked about gangsters, those gangsters were laughing and joking, saying, “We didn’t do anything. We just wanted to have a meal, but the boss refused to let us in. Don’t you think this is discriminatory? A few of our brothers only started fighting because it got to their heads.”

These old hooligans, who often enter and exit the police station, are beyond the police’s control. Even if they’re locked up, they still make mistakes when they come out.

The policeman looked to the other side again and said, “What about you?”

“Wrongfully accused!” A youth in the lead said it with exaggeration.

“We just wanted to have a meal. When we entered the store, we saw people smashing the store and a small boss being surrounded. This is how we help each other when we see injustice. We’re purely doing good deeds!”

“Doing good deeds with weapons?”

The youth asked, “Don’t they also carry sticks when they go out for a meal?”

Xia Shu’an couldn’t hold back and let out a chuckle, but he quickly bit his lip.

“…”

The policeman who took the record looked at this side and then at that side and knew that this matter was over again with 50 slaps each.

While recording, a man whose aura was incompatible with the atmosphere of the police station suddenly walked in from outside.

The man was dressed in a black suit. He has good facial features and shrewdness in his slightly downcast eyes that hide behind a pair of gold-rimmed glasses, very much in line with the image of an elite in the public’s opinion.

Accompanying him was a person who looked like an upper-level leader of the police station. The two walked up to the police and talked to them for a few minutes. The policeman looked up at Xia Shu’an, who was putting on the band-aid with the help of the policewoman, and nodded.

After a while, the policeman said to Xia Shu’an, “You can go now.”

Xia Shu’an nodded, and when he walked past those young people, he stopped and nodded his thanks to them before walking out of the police station. Just out of the gate, as expected, the man in the suit was waiting for him.

“Mr. Xia, our boss wants to see you.”

…

…

On a September day, he was already sweating after walking outside for five or six minutes.

The man led Xia Shu’an to a black car parked outside a coffee shop and turned back to respectfully say, “Mr. Xia, our boss is inside.”

Xia Shu’an nodded to him and walked towards the car.

As soon as he opened the car door, a hand stretched out and pinned him his entire body onto the back of the seat. The interior space of the four-seat Lexus is not small, but it still looks cramped when two adult men are stuffed inside. The atmosphere inside the car suddenly became stifled, and Shen Boyan’s thunderous anger rushed towards Xia Shu’an.

Xia Shu’an’s head hit the back of the seat, and his injured waist was pressed hard. His lower body immediately jerked, and he took a deep breath. Shen Boyan was unaware of it; his eyes locked on the young man tightly like a wild beast, “You think you’re so powerful that you dare to go head-to-head with those hooligans?”