Chairman Jian’s large office on the top floor of the Baiyue Atrium Hotel also served as a tea room. The lighting was a comfortable dim amber, and the furnishings and decor were restrained yet carefully chosen, perfectly in keeping with Jian Mingxun’s outwardly modest, moderate style.
Jian Mingxun sat by the tea table, his face sallow and pale. He tried to lean forward in greeting. “Boss Yan, my legs aren’t convenient, so I won’t get up.”
The dignified Chairman Jian had even stripped off his suit today and wore only a white pullover undershirt, wildly out of character for his status. You could call it casual and domestic, or you could call it a man so distracted he no longer cared about appearances. A few strands of hair lay plastered to his scalp with damp sweat. His manners toward a guest remained intact, but his face looked gray and exhausted.
Yan Xiaodao offered a thin, distant token of concern. “Are you all right?”
“I’m all right. Still holding on.” Sweat dampened Jian Mingxun’s eyelids too. “There isn’t one person around me I can depend on. An old man like me can only hold everything up by himself.”
Yan Xiaodao thought, That’s true. Compared with that pimp, your second brother, at least you’re more reliable when it comes to business. But after learning the history behind Ling He’s watch, he had little goodwill left for Chairman Jian. That friendly relationship between men of different generations now felt like proof that Yan had once been blind and unable to judge character.
Jian Mingxun suddenly asked, “Your Master Qi hasn’t shown his face in a long time. Something hasn’t happened to him too, has it?”
Yan Xiaodao’s heart sank. What was this about?
There was another meaning beneath Jian Mingxun’s words. “I mean no harm. I’m worried he may have gotten mixed up in trouble and been plotted against.”
Yan Xiaodao turned the subject in a circle and threw it right back. “What kind of trouble could my godfather be in? Who do you think would want to plot against Master Qi?”
“Wouldn’t they?” Jian Mingxun gave a miserable laugh. “Has Liang Tong not gotten into trouble recently, with the police watching him? Hasn’t my second brother Mingjue gotten into trouble? Go downstairs and look carefully. Isn’t that black car outside the hotel hiding plainclothes officers?… Ling He is right beside you. Don’t play circles with me. You know perfectly well how all of this fits together, Yan Xiao!”
Yan Xiaodao: “…”
Yan Xiaodao returned the blow. “Hah. What evil has my godfather done that he should fear ghosts knocking at the door?”
Jian Mingxun immediately deflated and sighed with resignation. “The evil was all done by my family. My second brother is a bastard, a complete bastard! Those people taught him a lesson and humiliated him that way because he deserved it. He was beyond saving. He brought it on himself!”
This was the first time Chairman Jian had personally confirmed the rumor circulating through their circle: Jian Mingjue had been gang-raped.
Jian Mingxun looked at Yan Xiaodao and nodded bleakly. “I also know why Ling He appeared in Linwan, why he came looking for trouble with us old bastards, tormenting us, making things difficult, grinding us down psychologically until one after another we were stripped bare, disgraced, exposed for what we are, and unable to die a good death. Because we are scum. Human garbage. Bastards.”
Yan Xiaodao’s face was grave. He said nothing.
The golden skin of Jian Mingxun’s Buddha mask peeled away strip by strip and fell like ash around his feet as he confessed, “That’s right. I am one of the people Mr. Ling came looking for. We hurt him. We did things that annihilated all human decency. Every one of us has evil on his hands that can never be washed clean. Shameless, filthy, without conscience!”
……
Chairman Jian’s path toward this soul-baring confession could be traced back several months, to the secret message he received about Blue Sea Cloudtop. From that moment, he knew the angel of vengeance had returned.
Ling He suddenly arrived and began showing himself openly in Linwan. Mr. Mai died unexpectedly. The Jian family’s eldest daughter-in-law and second brother were both dragged into criminal matters. Chairman Jian already knew that retribution was closing in, the bell tolling directly above his head. Every day he counted his remaining days, living one at a time.
Guo Zhaobin was shot dead in the street. Liang Tong was investigated. Qi Baoshan disappeared.
Chairman Jian must have foreseen that sooner or later he too would meet the same end. He would kneel at the execution ground with his hands bound behind him, a placard at his back bearing his name and crimes. Once his golden face was stripped away, only ugly hypocrisy would remain, spat upon by thousands and stabbed through the spine by ten thousand accusing fingers.
The edge of the swamp had already burst. Bloody water and rotting flesh were spilling out, and the great ship carrying this nest of snakes and rats now rocked violently in the storm. Everyone aboard had begun to panic. Some jumped into the sea, some into lifeboats, some scrambled up the mast. No one could spare a thought for anyone else as they desperately searched for their own route to survival.
Chairman Jian’s route to survival was right here.
Jian Mingxun seized his cane and struggled to stand, his back already bent.
There were only the two of them in the tea room. Jian Mingxun’s hands slipped from the dragon-head handle of the cane, and his whole body seemed to collapse with a clatter. With a heavy thump, he dropped to his knees.
Yan Xiaodao moved quickly to help him, but could not lift him on the first try. The man stayed kneeling in front of him and refused to rise.
Jian Mingxun’s two numb knees seemed nailed to the floor. His diseased thighs and calves folded into ugly, awkward angles that were painful to look at.
That kneeling posture stripped away the dignity of a great wealthy household.
That kneeling posture stripped away generations of family pride.
Yan Xiaodao slowly crouched and looked directly into his eyes. “Boss Jian, you met Ling He before. Tell me.”
Jian Mingxun had come prepared tonight. He did not even need to confess his crimes aloud. He pointed toward an inlaid lacquer box sitting squarely on the tea table and told Yan Xiaodao to look for himself. Once he saw it, everything would be clear.
Yan Xiaodao had originally assumed it was a decorative tea box. There was no hidden mechanism, only a small lock. Boss Jian used it to store important things, and inside lay a thick stack of personal dossiers with photographs.
They were photocopies, but clear enough to read.
Jian Mingxun explained quietly, “Liang Tong and I secretly copied these ourselves, as an extra precaution, a possible way out for the future. I kept one copy of the first half. He kept one copy of the second half.”
Yan Xiaodao opened the first page and felt as though a sharp weapon had pierced straight into his eyes.
Lamplight spun around him. He could barely breathe. Time froze in his vision, while a pinpoint of blood slowly spread in the depths of his pupils, the red stain widening.
There was nothing inside that would make someone blush at first glance and turn away in disgust. There were no obscene or humiliating photographs or words. Quite the opposite. The photographs were beautifully taken, the album exquisitely designed, the prose elegant, the calligraphy in the background flowing like clouds and water, unmistakably the work of accomplished hands. Even this hurriedly made half-copy was enough to suggest how lavish the original must have been, and the cultivated, self-satisfied taste with which its makers had produced and shared it.
“This album was made extravagantly. It was a leather-bound volume decorated with gold leaf and gold thread, hand-built by a private craftsman at considerable cost. Children with merely average looks and bone structure were not even qualified to be included. These were the best-looking ones, the most beautiful children.” Jian Mingxun spoke as though recounting the most ordinary indulgence of their circle, his tone unhurried, the details coming easily from memory.
Every boy in the album was strikingly beautiful.
Yan Xiaodao remained on the first page after the cover for a very, very long time.
He stared at the person in the photograph. The impact crashed over his senses like a rising tide, one great wave smashing him bloody onto the shore. In the hallucination of emotion, he stubbornly pushed himself upright again, only to face a higher wave with hot blood filling his throat.
The corners of his eyes reddened abruptly. He could no longer tell whether it was the alcohol or shock and agitation. His vision blurred beneath the lamplight and then struggled back into focus. At last he turned to the next profile and found another painfully familiar face. Page after page, every face was one he recognized.
Yan Xiaodao’s voice no longer sounded like his own. “Did you make this book? What is this supposed to be? A roster?”
Jian Mingxun gave a self-loathing laugh. “I was only a diligent supplier and blood-pump. I was never important enough to choose the goods and inspect them.”
Yan Xiaodao asked through chilled teeth, “What exactly did you do? What blood did you pump? What did you supply?”
Jian Mingxun’s lips trembled. “Mai Yunliang was brought into the circle by his own father. Liang Tong made the connection. Lu Yilun was someone I found. You know he’s local. His parents were ordinary people. As long as you gave them enough money and invented a story convincing enough to move them… Turn another page. You know that famous football star too. That was after I got acquainted with You Jinglian, and the two of us…”
Before he could finish, a brutal kick slammed into Jian Mingxun’s left shoulder, striking the nonvital area between neck and shoulder bone.
The kick was vicious. Yan Xiaodao was still wearing leather shoes and nearly folded the man in half. Chairman Jian’s back smashed hard against the leg of the table.
Yan Xiaodao’s face was ice-cold, only his eyes burning red as he stared at Jian Mingxun. “What about Ling He? Why Ling He?”
The kick filled Boss Jian’s vision with stars. Pain and physical weakness drenched him in sweat as he coughed. “Young Mr. Ling was in Yandu then and someone noticed him. Cough. He was simply too beautiful. He shouldn’t have appeared there. How foolish. A face like that was a calamity…”
A calamity.
Yan Xiaodao’s thumb nearly crushed the bones of his own hand. His heart hurt so badly that an expressionless face was the only expression heartbreak left him.
He swung another kick at the man in front of him. This one knocked Boss Jian unconscious, leaving the rotten sack of potatoes slumped weakly across the tea-room floor.
That kick was for Ling He.
For the first time in his life, Yan Xiaodao genuinely wanted to kill someone. He wanted to flay this sanctimonious, despicable creature alive.
……
This was also the first time in Yan Xiaodao’s life that he had seen a photograph of Ling He as a boy.
His Xiao He was so beautiful that ordinary language could not describe him.
Ling He’s hair fell past his shoulders. His smile was clear and genuine, touched with a faint shyness and a sense of distance from the world around him. His mixed heritage had been obvious since childhood, his eyes like enticing flecks of green set against an ink-wash mountain landscape. He had been an innocent, lovely boy.
The shyness was exactly enough to draw the eye and hold it. One glance could feel like a lifetime.
The secret circle hidden in Yandu was a sink where every kind of evil gathered. Built on immense wealth and power, the chasm of human appetite could never be filled, because the appetite itself had been born from wealth and influence without restraint, from people accustomed to doing whatever they pleased. Wherever the tentacles of that monstrous octopus could reach, there were no limits and no scruples.
Jian Mingxun, You Jinglian, and Liang Tong had all once supplied “treasures” to this circle. Quietly joining forces, they organized a trafficking pipeline that became currency for satisfying the refined tastes of high society. They were suppliers lurking at the edge of the swamp, hiding predatory faces behind the appearance of legitimate businessmen. They poured in money to feed the monsters and selected the most beautiful young victims to offer up as playthings.
When Yan Xiaodao had first opened the cover, the first person he saw was Ling He.
Ling He occupied the very first place in the beautifully designed album. In Boss Jian’s words, the boy had simply been too beautiful, the undisputed number one beauty in the book.
Boss Jian lay crooked beside the table, blood running from his nose and the corner of his mouth.
Yan Xiaodao suppressed the urge to carve the man alive with a knife and slice him piece by piece. He took a mouthful of cold tea and spat it, saliva and all, straight into Jian Mingxun’s face. One mouthful was not enough, so he spat again and woke him.
Jian Mingxun seemed to have lost two teeth to Mr. Yan’s kicks. The great Maitreya with the powdered, gold-plated face had revealed his mottled original form. The gold was gone, the smile was gone, and his mouth was full of blood. He simply gave up on appearances and lay there. Whatever Yan Xiaodao asked, he answered, confessing everything.
The bright, harmonious scene at the children’s charity gala, hosts and guests celebrating together beneath glittering lights, was still fresh in memory. Looking back now, it was exquisite irony. More even than the Jian family’s second brother, Boss Jian himself had been the true master pimp.
The album contained not only photographs but dense, detailed personal information, carefully describing each person’s appearance and physique, temperament and behavior, interests and preferences, even private physical characteristics and imperfections unknown to outsiders. The collection classified and archived human beings with inexhaustible care and cultivated taste, like stamp collecting, or some perverse obsession with possessing rare, living beauty. Someone had deliberately bound all of it into volumes so they could take the books out from time to time, admire them, handle them, and comment on every detail.
Halfway through, Yan Xiaodao threw down the book as though it were burning charcoal, stood by the window, and smoked two cigarettes before he could turn back and continue.
The second page was Mai Yunliang. As a child, Mai Yunliang had shown no trace of cosmetic surgery. His eyes were bright and innocent. The file recorded that he liked Hong Kong-style egg waffles and fruit shaved ice.
The third page was Lu Yilun, the locally famous television host known in practically every household, the gold-standard host of the weekend prime-time variety slot. Lu Yilun had a small red-bean-shaped birthmark on his chest then. His elementary-school grades were excellent, and he had been named a municipal outstanding student, so he was “selected” and sent to board at a prestigious school in Yandu. Tuition and fees were fully waived, the benefits generous, and there was even a scholarship. His family had happily sent their child away.
Several of the people after him could also be recognized from their faces alone. Two had grown into wealthy stars in professional sports and football.
Yan Xiaodao recognized another one too. This was a male model who had shot to fame several years earlier, becoming famous at eighteen and walking major Paris runways at twenty. Tall, handsome, elegant, and striking, he had been hailed as extraordinary throughout the industry.
“Is this boy Yi Han?” Yan Xiaodao pointed him out to Boss Jian.
Jian Mingxun looked and nodded. “Yes. That model.”
Yan Xiaodao had no dealings with the modeling world, but he recognized the face. Besides, the young man had such a distinctive name that Yan remembered it from the news.
Yan Xiaodao asked, “Yi Han died three years ago, didn’t he? I remember it was an accident. Such a pity.”
Jian Mingxun nodded without emotion. “Yes. His body was found near South Island. It was classified as drowning.”
Yan Xiaodao’s throat spasmed. “You mean it wasn’t a drowning? It wasn’t an accident at all?”
With faint mockery, Jian Mingxun pointed Mr. Yan toward the answer. “That happened during the few days when Blue Sea Cloudtop was returning from its cruise. His body was recovered near the inbound harbor. Who would dare say it wasn’t an accident? Was there evidence? Heh…”
Yan Xiaodao closed his eyes. He understood everything.
Three years earlier, the famous model Yi Han had died near the route Blue Sea Cloudtop followed while returning to port, at the age of twenty-two. The tragedy was officially classified as accidental drowning after he entered the water for recreation. No one had suspected anything beneath the accident, and no one had investigated the truth behind it.
Once these boys were entered into the roster, disaster followed them. At the time they were still too young, green and immature, not yet to the predators’ taste. This was a long-term grooming scheme. They were registered, watched, and kept. There was no need to act immediately. The predators intended to wait until they were older.
Half the album contained records on only six people, yet two were already dead.
Yan Xiaodao could not imagine how Ling He had survived.
Ling He had actually survived being entered into this roster and lived until today. The others had years of detailed “management files” and “medical examination reports,” while Ling He’s record simply went blank after childhood. Clearly, he must have escaped, leaving the file with no further entries.
Yan Xiaodao demanded, “Where is the other half of the book?”
Boss Jian was straightforward. “This is everything I have. Liang Tong has the other half. Go ask him for it.”
Yan Xiaodao said, “How many people were there altogether?!”
Boss Jian gave a damp, miserable smile. “This set recorded twelve. They jokingly gave them a code name, calling the young victims the ‘Twelve Young Masters of Yandu.’ The gold-leaf leather volumes were kept in a specially made book case. It looked like one glittering golden brick, so people also called it the ‘Golden Brick Codex.’ Mention the ‘Twelve Young Masters’ or the ‘Golden Brick Codex’ inside the circle and everyone knows you mean this matter, these people.”
The Twelve Young Masters of Yandu.
Yan Xiaodao told Jian Mingxun, “You know the police are right downstairs from your hotel. Boss Jian, come downstairs with me and see Captain Xue.”
Jian Mingxun slowly pushed his plump body upright. “I’ve given the evidence to you, Boss Yan. I’ve confessed too. Please go see Captain Xue for me…”
Yan Xiaodao put the album back into the lacquer box. He never wanted to look at those things again.
“Boss Jian, you…” Yan Xiaodao turned to grab Jian Mingxun and drag this sack of rotten, sinful potatoes downstairs to surrender, only for the situation in the room to change abruptly.
A moment earlier Jian Mingxun had looked frail and drenched in cold sweat. Now he suddenly seized his cane and forced himself upright. The room was not large. Jian Mingxun staggered into something resembling a ten-meter sprint and nearly fell at the end of it, but somehow managed to haul himself onto the windowsill.
The tea room followed a modern architectural style, with the lower edge of the large window less than thirty centimeters above the floor. That allowed Jian Mingxun to clamber onto it, half his body leaning out into empty air.
The small amount of strength he used to climb the sill exhausted him completely. Once he got up there, he could barely breathe. His face went deathly pale and his head spun, as though six stories of height had given him altitude sickness.
Yan Xiaodao shouted low, “Boss Jian, don’t move!”
“Yan Xiao, don’t come closer.” Jian Mingxun’s head was slick with cold sweat. He was agitated and gray-faced, and had plainly planned today’s ending in advance. Yet now that the moment had arrived, both hands and legs began trembling. It turned out even Great Buddha Jian was afraid to die.
Yan Xiaodao said steadily, “Boss Jian, listen to me. Turn yourself in and fight for leniency. Break away from those evil people instead of sinking with them. You still have a way to live.”
Jian Mingxun looked like a funeral bell made flesh. “Too humiliating. Too filthy. I can’t bear that kind of disgrace. Judge me after I’m dead. Then whip my corpse if you like, chop me into meat paste, grind my bones to ash. Yan Xiao, I’m grateful to you for handling this for me.”
Yan Xiaodao’s expression grew suddenly heavy. “Boss Jian, if you knew it would come to this, why do it in the first place? A great family, great business, wealth and luxury all your life. What were you still missing?”
“A great family? Wealth and luxury? Hahahaha, I’m a cripple. I was born disabled. You think I’m like a fine, able-bodied man like you?” Jian Mingxun laughed coldly and sighed. “Someone like me gets used to contempt and cold looks. If I hadn’t developed some ability, if I didn’t have a background powerful enough to press others down, who would respect me? Who would take me seriously? How could I have built a great family and business? How could I have married a wife from a distinguished clan? In this world, power is always passed around like a drumflower among a handful of great families. People like us only crawl at their feet as household dogs, getting a few mouthfuls of leftovers and picking up scraps from between their teeth!”
While Yan Xiaodao traded words with Boss Jian to drag out time, the tea-room door burst inward. Key members of the city police were all there, fully armed, and had clearly been waiting for their opportunity for some time.
The operation was led by Xue Qian himself. Another group of officers under Deputy Captain Fang had spread a giant inflatable rescue cushion below, like an enormous bouncy castle waiting to catch Chairman Jian.
Xue Qian quietly exchanged a look with Yan Xiaodao and stepped forward twice. “Chairman Jian, we know everything. Come down. Let me talk to you.”
Once Jian Mingxun had climbed onto the windowsill, getting back down became difficult. He had quite literally mounted the tiger and could not dismount. He feared Xue Qian, yet hesitated and did not dare jump.
For once, Xue Qian coaxed this valuable suspect in an unusually gentle tone. “Take care of yourself, sir. You already have diabetes and high blood pressure. You’ll make yourself sick even if nothing’s wrong, and if you jump you might trigger a heart attack too. Chairman Jian, come down. Stop making trouble!”
Jian Mingxun pointed at Captain Xue and forbade him to approach. Captain Xue had no choice but to circle back.
Jumping from a building was not so easy. It was an act requiring courage and did not suit cowards.
Qi Baoshan had dared to jump. Jian Mingxun truly did not. The leg hanging outside trembled like a twisted rope and looked close to cramping.
The harbor lights joined into one glittering expanse beneath the night sky, drifting with the moving air and making everything seem unreal.
The standoff continued. Chairman Jian glanced down and, under the force of his agitation, thought his eyes were deceiving him.
Below the hotel, voices rose in confusion and shadowy figures moved across the brightly lit garden lawn. Among the shifting silhouettes, Chairman Jian spotted Mr. Ling with his long hair.
Ling He stood at the edge of a flowerbed beside the grass, tall and conspicuous against the night in a loose white linen shirt fluttering in the wind.
Ling He tilted his face upward and met Jian Mingxun’s gaze directly.
Why was Ling He here?
He had originally come to pick Yan Xiaodao up and take him home. Who had any interest in watching Chairman Jian jump from a building?
He arrived at Ziyunlou and could not find Yan. The Baiyue Atrium Hotel next door was surrounded by police cars. Something had obviously happened.
Meeting Chairman Jian’s eyes, Ling He stared straight back, gaze sharp enough to split clouds and cut the moon, his long hair flying in the wind.
Ling He’s sharp lips were pressed shut and his face held no expression. He did not need to shout anything at the man upstairs. The first time he had met Jian Mingxun had been somewhere in Yandu, so he knew perfectly well why Chairman Jian had been driven into a corner today and wanted to jump to atone for his crimes. They both understood.
Jump.
You deserve to die.
So mentally fragile and useless that one watch has driven you to the point of jumping today? Fine. I’ll watch you jump. I’ll watch you fall from up there and hit the ground flat as meat paste.
Boss Jian, I’ll wait down here today to collect your corpse.
A cold smile slid across Ling He’s lips. He even lifted one hand and crooked his fingers toward Boss Jian above. Come on. Jump.
Chairman Jian trembled beneath Ling He’s icy, merciless stare. That gaze carried a blade, slicing flesh and soul inch by inch. Sweat poured from him. His entire body spasmed. The gilded clay Buddha slowly softened and sagged, close to dissolving into a puddle of mud.
He had no face left with which to meet Young Master Ling.
Xue Qian and Yan Xiaodao lunged together, one grabbing his head and the other his legs. They dragged Jian Mingxun off the windowsill and brought him crashing to the floor.
Jian Mingxun, chairman of Jianyue Group, was arrested. He was first sent to the hospital for treatment, and this time Captain Xue requested city SWAT support for hospital security.
Yan Xiaodao took a recording pen from his jacket pocket and handed it to Captain Xue. “It’s all in here.”
The two had arranged this privately. A few days after the charity gala, Xue Qian had contacted Yan Xiaodao in secret and given him a recording pen to keep ready.
Captain Xue felt a little jealous. “I admit defeat, Mr. Yan. Why do our suspects keep coming specifically to you to confess? Every damn one of them hides instead of daring to face me. Why don’t you come help me interrogate this case?”
Mr. Yan truly possessed a certain charisma that made people willing to confess in front of him and dissect their complicated inner worlds. From Mai Yunliang to Jian Mingxun, even Miss Su had chosen to speak to Yan Xiaodao. Those people feared the inescapable net of the law and fled the severity of legal punishment. They were intimidated by the Night Yaksha Xue’s reputation, and even more terrified of Ling He appearing to take ruthless revenge. After thinking it over, all they could do was come running to Yan Xiaodao.
“Take your time interrogating him, Captain Xue. I’ll leave it to you.” Yan Xiaodao turned and left.
Everyone seemed determined to tear out their heart and lungs and find some way to confess to him, revealing one horrifying old evil after another in front of him, forcing him to hear those monstrous stories with his own ears and dig open scene after scene of faded blood with his own hands. He did not want to know any of it.
He only wanted Ling He safe and sound, held tightly in his arms.
Vehicles crowded below the Baiyue. Police lights and ambulance lights flashed.
Amid that continuous river of light, Yan Xiaodao immediately found Ling He. Ling He sat calmly in the car with the window open, a smile hidden beneath windblown long hair, unhurried and composed. The view was always this beautiful.
……