While they were still playing and arguing, several motorcycles approached from the opposite direction. As they passed one another, the lead rider caught sight of Xiao Man, and his mocking voice drifted through the wind. “Hahaha! Isn’t that the whore from the poster?”
Liu Yi slammed on the brakes, and Xiao Man crashed into the young man’s solid back. The motorcycle tires let out a piercing screech.
“What did you say?” Liu Yi asked, his voice carrying an icy chill.
The rider stopped as well and turned his head provocatively. “I said, isn’t this Miss ‘Little Starfish,’ the girl whose picture we used to attract customers outside our brothel?”
Xiao Man immediately buried her face against Liu Yi’s back, her entire body beginning to tremble. Liu Yi removed his jacket and draped it over her, then swung around to dismount. Just then, there was a tremendous “boom!” The rider and his motorcycle were sent flying by Cui Dong Dong’s bike!
Cui Dong Dong also crashed to the ground, but rolled once and sprang immediately to her feet. She rushed forward, seized the rider by the collar, and smashed a rock against his helmet! Several of his companions surrounded her with loud shouts. Cui Dong Dong lifted one knee, pulled a dagger from beside her boot, and glared at them coldly.
Liu Yi drew both long blades and prepared to help. Xiao Man tugged at him and cried, “Don’t fight! Xiao Liu, stand here and don’t move!” Then she shouted at the rider sitting on the ground in his broken helmet, “You insulted me, and she broke your helmet. We’re even now! No one is allowed to fight anymore!”
The rider struggled for quite a while before finally tearing off his helmet. He said resentfully, “This is a racetrack. Why fight? If you’re racers, then settle it with a race!”
“Fine! I’ll race you!” Cui Dong Dong said furiously.
“I’m not racing a stinking woman like you!” The rider pointed at Liu Yi. “Aren’t you her little brother? You race me!”
What happened afterward was as swift as a gust of wind. During the race, a lost truck suddenly appeared around a bend. The rider could not avoid it and nearly crashed into it together with his motorcycle. Liu Yi leapt through the air and knocked him off the bike in time. The two rolled across the ground together, and Liu Yi released a cry of agony.
Liu Yi had saved the insolent brat, but broken his own leg in the process.
Staring at Liu Yi’s mangled, blood-covered leg, the rider sobbed as he apologized. “Thank you! I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to insult your sister. No—I did mean it. I was wrong, I was wrong. It was because your Xiao Qi Hall boss stole our goods from us, so I was angry and…”
Liu Yi’s face was contorted with pain, yet he still had the energy to curse him. “Nonsense! Who stole your goods?! My Eldest isn’t that kind of person!”
“Not Azure Dragon Boss. It was that ‘Eagle’—Boss Xu, Xu…”
Still terrified and grateful, the rider hurriedly helped the sobbing Xiao Man take Liu Yi to the hospital. Cui Dong Dong sped away to notify Azure Dragon. Something this serious was far beyond what a few little brats like them could handle.
“You’ve got some nerve!” Before leaving, Cui Dong Dong threatened the rider. “Those two are Azure Dragon’s younger brother and sister. If anything happens to either of them, you won’t have enough lives to repay it!” She then instructed several of her girls to protect Liu Yi and Xiao Man.
Azure Dragon soon arrived at the hospital with Cui Dong Dong. Seeing Azure Dragon and Xiao Man gathered around Liu Yi, while Xiao Qi Hall’s second-in-command, “Eagle” Xu Ying, had also arrived, Cui Dong Dong felt there was no use in her remaining and left with her girls.
Before leaving, she glanced at Xiao Man’s tear-streaked profile and heaved a long sigh inwardly. Such a terrible disaster had happened during their very first meeting. Xiao Man was bound to be left with nothing but bad memories of her. What an unbelievably unlucky beginning.
Then again, Sister Xiao Man certainly had an abundance of tears. She had been crying since earlier and had not stopped once. What a tenderhearted woman. Whoever could be cared for so gently by such an angelic sister was truly blessed across three lifetimes.
Completely intoxicated by her fantasy of this gentle paradise, Cui Dong Dong left with a heart full of bliss.
Yet the pursuit that followed did not, as she had hoped, turn from misfortune to victory. Instead, she ran into one obstacle after another and remained unlucky all the way to the end. Her expensive gifts were politely declined. Whenever she invited Xiao Man out, Liu Yi was invariably there as an enormous third wheel. She accepted Azure Dragon’s invitation to join Xiao Qi Hall and sincerely visited his villa to cook for Xiao Man. She tried every method imaginable, but no matter how many times she confessed, all she received were one tender rejection after another.
“Ahhh! Who wants to be a good person?!” Cui Dong Dong roared while shaking Liu Yi by the shoulders. “I want to be her good sweetheart! Her darling! Her baby! Her husband! Tell me! Have you been interfering behind my back? What bad things did you tell your sister about me?!”
“I never said anything bad about you! You’re simply not a good sweetheart!” Liu Yi shouted back. “You change girlfriends five times a month! Do you think she’s stupid? She isn’t the sort of person who casually plays around like all of you!”
“Fuck! None of those women were my girlfriends! They were fuck buddies, understand?! We were each getting what we needed, understand?! Your Sister Cui has excellent technique! Women who want to sleep with me form a line from here all the way outside the Walled City, understand?!” Cui Dong Dong miserably wiped away her “tears.” “I only want to invite her to become my first girlfriend. She must have misunderstood me.”
Liu Yi looked speechlessly toward the heavens. He did not believe there was any misunderstanding whatsoever. He knew too well what kind of life his sister wanted—stable, quiet, and peaceful. How could a gang leader who smoked, drank, raced motorcycles, and chased women every day possibly give her that? Besides, he did not think Xiao Man was interested in women the way Dong Dong was.
This thought left him greatly confused. Ever since childhood, Xiao Man had been just like him: uninterested in men and equally uninterested in women. She had never shown admiration or longing toward anyone. He seriously discussed the matter with Dong Dong, worrying that his sister might also be “asexual.”
“Give me a break. How could there be so many asexual people in the world? Don’t you secretly love your precious Eldest?” Dong Dong said. “Xiao Man must already have someone in her heart. Otherwise, how could she remain unmoved by a pursuer as beautiful, capable, and wealthy as me—the finest of the finest, perfection itself? Tch. Who exactly does she like? As far as I can see, she usually only treats you and Azure Dragon especially well…”
At that point, Dong Dong choked on her own saliva and turned a contorted expression toward Liu Yi.
“Why are you looking at me?”
“You said she’s ‘the same as you.’ Could it be that she also…”
Liu Yi froze as well. After a while, he flushed and said in a panic, “You’re talking nonsense!”
“I’m drawing a conclusion from the facts.”
“Nonsense!” The young man turned and fled in confusion and panic.
“Hey! Hey! Why are you running again?! Where did you learn this habit of fleeing like a lovestruck maiden whenever you’re embarrassed? Did you learn it from Xiao Man?” Cui Dong Dong chased after him, shouting curses.
“Ah!” Cui Dong Dong set down the cup of cold coffee in her hand and sighed at He Chu San across the table. “So from that point onward, Xiao Liu and I became fellow sufferers and began our shared history of heartbreak. Of course, his was a secret love, while mine was openly declared. But the result was the same. Xiao Liu’s personality changed over the next few years too. He became a boss, took in subordinates, and started putting on airs. Gradually, he stopped being cute at all. Whenever he encountered trouble, he liked bottling it up inside, and he became increasingly awkward about his feelings. Of course, his mind also grew sharper and he became more calculating in how he handled things—but I deserve the credit for teaching him those last two qualities. Hahahaha.”
He Chu San summoned a server and ordered her another coffee. Only after the server left did he ask, “What happened afterward?”
“Afterward…” Cui Dong Dong sighed. “Afterward, Azure Dragon and Xiao Man got married.”
On the night of the wedding, Cui Dong Dong and Liu Yi slipped away from the banquet and got thoroughly drunk in Cui Dong Dong’s little home, celebrating the complete and utter failure of their Lovelorn Alliance.
Only that night did Cui Dong Dong learn from Liu Yi’s drunken confession that Liu Yi himself had asked Azure Dragon to marry Xiao Man.
She put all her strength into beating Liu Yi, and the two fought until heaven and earth turned dark inside the room. They even resorted to pulling hair and digging fingers into each other’s nostrils. By the end, both had disheveled hair, swollen eyes, crooked noses, and torn clothing. They lay spread-eagled amid the wreckage, staring at the ceiling as tears streamed down their faces.
“I didn’t want this either,” Liu Yi cried, covering his face with one arm. “But Xiao Man loves Azure Dragon most. Ever since we were young, she gave me everything she liked. This is the only thing I can’t take from her. I can’t… This is what’s best for them. From now on, they can live happily together as a complete family…”
“Complete and happy, my ass!” Cui Dong Dong sobbed. “How do you know whether Azure Dragon will truly love her? I’m the one who truly loves her! She would be happier with me than with Azure Dragon!”
“She would be even less happy with you,” Liu Yi cried. “Isn’t your love only something you say? You claim to like her, but have you had any shortage of bed partners over the years?”
Cui Dong Dong wiped away her tears miserably. “That’s only because she always ignores me. I couldn’t help myself.”
Liu Yi raised a hand and lightly slapped her face. She slapped him back. The two grabbed each other’s clothes and blew their noses into them.
After blowing her nose, Cui Dong Dong sighed nasally. “Why don’t the two of us just get together? You look a little like Xiao Man, so I could make do with you.”
“Bullshit! If the two of us walked down the street together, people who didn’t know us would think we were two gay men,” Liu Yi replied through his blocked nose.
“You are gay.”
“I’m not! I’m not!”
“Ah.” Cui Dong Dong sighed deeply at this hopeless personality of his and collapsed onto the floor again. After sniffling for quite a while, she finally admitted helplessly, “Sometimes, I’ve wondered… I like Xiao Man, but perhaps I don’t love her that deeply. Even while thinking about her, I can still sleep with other people.”
She wiped her face and sighed. “Perhaps I only like the sense of safety and stability she gives me. Whenever I see her, I think that only a gentle, beautiful, pure, extraordinary, one-of-a-kind woman like her could completely settle my wandering heart. Only if I had a woman like that at home would I lose interest in going out to drink and fool around…”
“And yet you still go out drinking and fooling around every day,” Liu Yi pointed out cruelly.
Cui Dong Dong coughed awkwardly. “That’s why I’m hopeless. What the hell even is love? I probably won’t understand it in this lifetime. A wild and outstanding woman like me is a natural-born heartbreaker. It’s probably better if I never stay with anyone, so I don’t end up hurting them…”
She smacked Liu Yi across the face again with the back of her hand. “A twisted little gay bastard like you should remain single for life too. Look at you—baring your teeth and claws on the outside while shrinking back inside. Who would have to be blind and possess the courage of someone who ate a bear’s heart and a leopard’s gall to fall in love with you?”
Liu Yi snorted, turned his back, and curled into a miserable little ball. Dong Dong crawled around rummaging through the mess and eventually found a packet of cigarettes that had miraculously survived. She shook Liu Yi awake and gave him one. The two unlucky bastards smoked in bitter silence.
As they smoked, Cui Dong Dong suddenly tilted her head. “Hey, do you hear that?”
“What?”
“It sounds like someone is singing. Tch—it sounds just like Xiao Man!”
Cui Dong Dong rolled swiftly to her feet and ran outside, following the faint, intermittent singing. Liu Yi was still drunk and stumbled after her. “Wait for me!”
Futile Devices Scans 
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