In the open-air food stall, neon signs cast mottled reflections across the greasy glass windows.
Zhou Ruo An loosely held a beer glass in his hand while Bai Ban gnawed on a grilled chicken wing, completely oblivious to the grease smearing his sleeve.
It had been over a year since Zhou Ruo An last came to a place like this. He used to be a regular here, drinking the cheapest liquor and talking the wildest nonsense alongside people from every walk of life. But now, after getting used to holding elegant stemmed wine glasses, picking up a chipped glass tumbler again truly felt, in an exaggerated sense, like something from another lifetime.
Yet it also felt relaxing. Leaning back against his chair, he quickly recovered the carefree, unrestrained state he used to have. He and Lin Yi had often gathered here in the past. The man never talked much, but always knew exactly how to play along. Whatever food ended up on Zhou Ruo An’s plate was invariably something he liked. Sometimes Lin Yi would brush a hand across the corner of his eyebrow and claim there was something stuck there. Looking back now, it was all bullshit—he had simply wanted an excuse to take advantage of him.
With a sharp crack, a beer cap landed on the tabletop. Beside him, Bai Ban bit open another bottle with his teeth.
“Your alcohol tolerance has improved.” Zhou Ruo An accepted the bottle, filled Bai Ban’s glass, and teased him. “Last time, you crawled under the table after three bottles.”
Bai Ban dug at his ear and looked disgusted. “What’s wrong with your voice? Were you gaming with voice chat last night? Yelling all night long?”
Expressionless, Zhou Ruo An popped a throat lozenge into his mouth, lowered his eyes, and gave a cold “Mm.”
Bai Ban tilted his head back and downed half a glass, letting out a thunderous burp afterward.
“I shouted half the night last time too. When I woke up the next morning, I sounded about the same as you. Though my voice was still better.”
Not wanting to continue the topic, Zhou Ruo An bit down on the lozenge and clinked his glass against Bai Ban’s.
“Drink.”
But Bai Ban suddenly returned to the earlier topic.
“Wait, were you making fun of my alcohol tolerance just now? I’m telling you, last time was because I drank on an empty stomach.” He drained his glass in one gulp. When he slammed it back down, the force made the peanuts in the metal tray bounce twice. “These days I practically live in bars. My drinking capacity speaks for itself.”
His ears were red, his tongue was getting stiff, and he was already talking nonsense. Zhou Ruo An knew the timing was about right.
Slowly rubbing the skin off a peanut with his fingers, he casually began probing.
“Your Brother Lin has been acting awfully mysterious lately. Is he secretly up to something?”
“Huh?”
Bai Ban had barely uttered a syllable before a phone vibration interrupted him.
Zhou Ruo An picked up the phone lying on the table. The name Zhou Ran Ming was displayed prominently on the screen.
Yesterday, Lin Yi had dragged him away from the private club. Zhu Shan Shan had undoubtedly reported everything. Having prepared for this, Zhou Ruo An cleared his throat and deliberately sounded uneasy as he answered.
“Uncle Ran Ming?”
The hoarseness of his voice made the man on the other end pause.
“Zhou Ruo An?”
“Yes, Uncle. My voice is gone.”
Nobody cared why his voice was gone.
Zhou Ran Ming’s angry voice immediately came crashing through the receiver.
“What trouble have you gotten into this time? Zhu Shan Shan said someone abducted you?”
Poking at a cucumber slice with his chopsticks, Zhou Ruo An remained expressionless, though his voice carried nervousness.
“Wasn’t I trying to get revenge on Zhang Xu Yao? It cost more money than expected. I delayed the final payment a few days, and they came looking to collect.”
He shot Bai Ban a warning look to keep quiet. Bai Ban rolled his eyes and continued stuffing skewers into his mouth.
A heavy thud echoed from the other end, as though documents had been thrown onto a desk.
“I don’t care what you’ve been doing outside, but if it affects the company, you’ll be the first person I remove!”
Over the phone, Zhou Ruo An responded obediently. Off the phone, he calmly refilled Bai Ban’s glass.
“I’ve already settled the account. It won’t happen again. Please don’t worry, Uncle.”
When the call ended, Bai Ban slumped across the table and sneered drunkenly.
“Why’d you even go back? They order you around and you have to smile through it all. You’re better off sticking with my brother. At least that’s comfortable.”
The mention of Lin Yi immediately reminded Zhou Ruo An of last night. His expression darkened at once.
“Drink. You talk too much.”
After feeding the last half bottle of beer to Bai Ban and watching his increasingly unfocused eyes, Zhou Ruo An returned to the earlier topic.
“Bai Ban, what exactly has Lin Yi been doing lately?”
“Brother Lin… hic… my brother said…” Bai Ban suddenly bent forward and stared blankly. “Can’t say!”
He mimed zipping his lips shut and nearly poked himself in the eye.
Turning a lighter over in his hand, Zhou Ruo An considered for a moment before quietly guiding him.
“Is he helping Bai Jiu do… illegal things?”
Bai Ban reeked of alcohol as he glared at him with disdain.
“No way.”
The lighter sparked to life. Orange flames flickered briefly in Zhou Ruo An’s pupils.
“Then is he skimming money from Bai Jiu?”
“My brother isn’t that kind of person!”
Something suddenly occurred to Zhou Ruo An, making his heart jolt.
When he raised the cigarette to his mouth, he missed the opening. The filter struck his teeth and slid downward before he finally caught it between them.
He remained silent for nearly half a cigarette.
At last, through curling smoke, he raised his eyes and casually picked up his phone.
One tap.
The recording function started.
After glancing around to ensure only Bai Ban could hear him, he asked quietly:
“Could it be… your brother wants to bring Bai Jiu down?”
“Huh? How did you know?”
Bai Ban suddenly clapped a hand over his mouth. Beer foam seeped through his fingers.
“No… no such thing.”
“Could it be because he doesn’t want to take the fall for Bai Jiu anymore, so he’s planning to strike first?”
Zhou Ruo An noticed the hand holding Bai Ban’s glass tremble hard enough to create a ripple of foam.
The recording timer continued climbing.
Just as Zhou Ruo An was about to press for details, Bai Ban lurched forward and nearly threw up.
With no choice, Zhou Ruo An stopped the recording.
He called over a waiter, paid the bill, then half-dragged and half-carried the drunken wreck of a man out of the noisy food stall.
Neon lights flashed along the street.
While using his phone to call a car amid alternating red and green lights, Zhou Ruo An slipped a hand into his pocket—
And froze.
His phone was gone.
He searched himself from top to bottom and still couldn’t find it. The moment he remembered the paused recording still saved on the device, a chill crept across the back of his neck.
“Looking for this?”
Bai Ban unsteadily raised his head.
In his hand was Zhou Ruo An’s phone.
The drunken young man had sobered considerably in the cold night air.
“Don’t underestimate me. My skills are great. I took your phone and you didn’t notice a thing.”
Zhou Ruo An snatched it back and laughed guiltily.
“When have I ever underestimated you?”
“That time you had me steal Fu Chun Shen’s phone. When I returned it, your face was so long.”
He gestured dramatically across his chest.
“I wasn’t angry at you that time.”
Zhou Ruo An unlocked the phone and quietly saved the recording.
Pushing him away, Bai Ban staggered forward along the roadside.
“You make one unhappy face and my brother gets upset.”
Pointing at him, he added,
“Stop losing your temper with my brother.”
Zhou Ruo An casually agreed, then added a reminder.
“Don’t tell Lin Yi we met.”
Bai Ban mimed zipping his mouth shut.
“Don’t worry. My lips are sealed.”
⸻
Dark clouds filled the sky.
Lead-gray clouds hung heavily above the city, as though they might collapse at any moment.
The cemetery on the outskirts of town was silent except for the occasional birdcall and the crunch of footsteps on dead leaves.
The hem of Zhou Ruo An’s black wool coat brushed through tangled branches as he wandered along the cemetery path carrying a plastic bag. His gaze swept across row after row of graves before finally settling on a relatively new headstone.
The words “Zhang Jin’s Grave” stood out starkly.
Stopping before it, Zhou Ruo An brushed dust from the stone with a gloved hand, then plopped himself down beside it. His fingers tapped lightly against the edge of the headstone, as though greeting an old friend.
Looking around, he smiled.
“Zhang Jin, not gonna lie, you picked a pretty good place. Nice and quiet.”
He pulled two cans of beer from the plastic bag. One was opened and set before the grave. The other he opened for himself.
“I was busy last New Year and didn’t come visit. I burned a few bundles of spirit money for you in Old Wang’s roasted sweet potato stove. You got them, right?”
Beer and cold wind entered his stomach together, making him shiver.
“It’s your birthday today. I tossed two more beauties into the offering furnace just now. Foreign ones. Thought I’d give you a change of pace.”
Tilting his head toward Zhang Jin’s photograph, he stared at the black-and-white image in silence for a long time.
Finally, he lightly tapped his can against the one before the grave.
“Usually I don’t think about you much. Didn’t expect that seeing you now…” A soft laugh escaped him. “…would make me a little sentimental.”
The plastic bag rustled.
He took out a roast chicken and placed it beneath the photograph.
“The place on Third Street you always liked. When we were kids, all I could remember was wondering why they sold roast chicken so expensively. Then I went there today and found out it only costs twenty-something yuan.”
Beyond the cemetery stretched a cornfield. Winter had left only withered yellow stalks behind.
There was no wind.
Yet a rustling sound came from behind him.
Turning around, Zhou Ruo An saw only bleak wasteland and several stray dogs wandering in the distance, staring hungrily at the roast chicken.
“These beasts sure know how to find food.”
Shaking his head with a smile, he looked back at Zhang Jin’s photograph.
The weather was cold.
Wrapping his coat tighter around himself, he continued,
“Oh, right. Let me update you on my achievements. Those two idiot brothers of yours used to make things difficult for me at every turn. And now? They’re all beneath my feet. Even your father—the one who barely qualifies as human—has to watch my expression before making certain decisions.”
He took another swig of beer, looking rather pleased.
“Back then, you spent fifteen yuan and eighty-six cents to make a deal with me. I’d say that was money well spent.”
Slowly leaning back against the headstone, Zhou Ruo An stared at the pale sky.
“But your Zhou family is full of man-eating monsters. One wrong step from me and I’ll be damned forever.”
After only half a can of beer, the cold became unbearable.
He stood, dusted off his pants, and looked once more at Zhang Jin’s photograph.
Pulling a faint smile across his lips, he said,
“Happy birthday.”
Lowering his eyes and hiding the loneliness he could not conceal, he added with deliberate crudeness:
“When you’re out sampling something new tonight, remember to wear protection. Otherwise you’ll end up with a bunch of little ghost brats you can’t afford to raise.”
“Alright, enough nonsense. I’ll come see you another day.”
Carrying the now-empty plastic bag, Zhou Ruo An turned and headed toward the cemetery exit.
After a few steps, he glanced back one last time.
“Hurry up and eat. The wild dogs are coming.”
After Zhou Ruo An’s figure completely disappeared from the cemetery, a man dressed in dark clothing emerged from deep within the cornfield, pushing aside the dried stalks.
Taking out his phone, he made a call and reported in a low voice:
“Master Bai, didn’t you tell me to find some leverage on Zhou Ruo An? I found it. Zhou Ruo An isn’t part of the Zhou bloodline. He’s an impostor who took someone else’s place.”
Futile Devices Scans 
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