When you were working as an extra, nothing was worse than running into someone you knew.
“I…” Ji Tan steeled himself and dutifully stayed in character. “I’m… getting engaged.”
Xie Zhi pointed at the bride standing behind Ji Tan and asked exactly the same question. “Who is she?”
“Yingying,” Ji Tan replied promptly. He’d remembered the name from listening to everyone argue earlier.
After answering, he tilted his head and quietly asked the customer behind him, “Sorry, what’s your name?”
The bride whispered back, “Chen Yingying.”
They thought they were speaking so softly that their voices wouldn’t carry far in the quiet banquet hall. Unfortunately, several people standing nearby were Orderbearers, blessed with sharp senses and extraordinary Inspiration even with their eyes closed.
Sure enough, the very next second, the original groom, Zhou Chengyao, practically jumped off the floor. “He doesn’t even know your name!”
It was Ji Tan’s first time seeing the phrase jumping up and down in anger acted out quite so literally. Mr. Zhou, that domineering CEO, hopped about so furiously that he practically performed a complete little tap-dance number.
Xie Zhi was so furious that he laughed, baring his teeth like an angry pufferfish.
Lawyer Qiao sensed something was wrong. She looked from the man radiating danger to Ji Tan, whose forehead was beading with sweat, and leaned over to ask in a whisper, “Is he… that husband of yours?”
The puffed-up pufferfish froze for a moment, nearly deflating.
Ji Tan quickly shook his head. “My boss.”
The engagement banquet had descended into farce.
The two families were still arguing. There was little chance the engagement would go ahead, but everyone could judge for themselves which side had embarrassed itself more.
The groom and his White Moonlight had been dragged off by the bride’s family for a live-action round of Mortal Kombat: Friends and Relatives Edition. The only peaceful place left was the dressing room, where the bride, Lawyer Qiao, Ji Tan, and Xie Zhi remained.
Ji Tan apologetically explained the men in black to his customer. He hadn’t expected those bodyguards to burst in, much less the Sequence-Breaking Unit to storm in after them and turn an already chaotic engagement banquet into utter bedlam.
“Not at all! Our engagement ceremony was already over,” the bride said, laughing so hard she doubled over. She waved a hand. “Don’t worry about it. I loved that little interruption! Hahaha…”
That absurd intrusion had made the scumbag completely lose his composure. The result was even better than she’d expected.
Lawyer Qiao took out her phone and smiled mysteriously. “I recorded every ridiculous expression Zhou Chengyao made. I can squeeze a substantial sum out of him later.”
Ji Tan breathed a sigh of relief.
Once you accepted someone’s money, you had to see the job through. Ji Tan had taken Miss Chen’s payment. If he not only failed to help but made a bigger mess of things, that would be unforgivable. After all, he’d been the one who summoned both those four men and the Sequence-Breaking Unit.
A few hours earlier.
When Ji Tan heard that the bride wanted their engagement video shown on the enormous public-square screens, a plan to kill three birds with one stone immediately came to him. That was why he thought for a moment and agreed.
Before putting on his makeup, he’d called the silver-uniformed officer who’d agreed earlier to let him act as bait. “Those Huo-family men will probably come here to grab me. Set up an ambush near the hotel ahead of time, and arrest them when they show up.”
The officer readily agreed.
Ji Tan then took his time getting made up. Between learning the ceremony’s procedures, practicing the speech, filming, and having the bride review the edited footage, roughly an hour went by before the video was finally released.
Yet the TS Task Force hadn’t stopped those four conspicuous men outside the hotel. They’d even allowed them to come in and cause a scene, only to tie them up within seconds once the trouble began.
Ji Tan found it incomprehensible.
Back in the present, Ji Tan stared at Xie Zhi, who’d insisted on following him, for a moment. Then he excused himself to the two women, caught hold of Xie the Pufferfish, and dragged him into the deserted corridor outside the dressing room.
Ji Tan asked, “What’s going on?”
Xie Zhi had both hands in his pockets and looked perfectly justified. “Traffic jam.”
Ji Tan: “…Do you take me for an idiot?”
He’d deliberately allowed them a full hour’s head start, hoping the Sequence-Breaking Unit would deal with everything outside the hotel instead of disrupting the engagement banquet.
The Order Administration Bureau was also near the center of Western District, not far from Huangban Avenue. Even without taking one of the bureau’s helicopters, there’d been more than enough time to drive over.
Xie Zhi took half a step back and leaned against the wall, his hands still in his pockets. “That’s right. I did it on purpose.”
Ji Tan was infuriated by the way he looked, like a high-school student deliberately defying an adult. He couldn’t understand why Xie Zhi would do such a thing. Was it so the public would see the Order Administration Bureau actively handling a case and give him more votes?
The unlicensed-cab-driver murder case had kept Western District in a state of fear, and public opinion had turned against Xie Xi. Plenty of reporters had attended the engagement banquet. Once the story got out, the public mood would probably change.
Ji Tan could understand that sort of tactic, but he couldn’t agree with it. He sighed in disappointment. “How could you do something like that?”
Putting ordinary people in danger for votes, and ruining someone’s perfectly good engagement banquet! Well, the banquet hadn’t exactly been going well to begin with, but it had been thrown even further off course. If the bride hadn’t been so understanding, Ji Tan would have wanted to compensate her himself.
Xie Zhi watched the expressions flickering across Ji Tan’s face, and his anger kept climbing. “If you can deceive a bride when you’re already married, why can’t I let people know about it?”
Ji Tan: “…” The anger that had risen to his throat and was about to erupt vanished with a sudden whoosh.
He’d thought this was about winning votes, but it turned out to be an anti-fraud public-service announcement?
Ji Tan helplessly pressed a hand to his forehead. He’d spent all that time pretending to be the groom, and the bride’s family hadn’t believed it, the groom’s family had been half-convinced, and that scumbag had flatly refused to believe it out of sheer confidence. Only that melodramatic teenager Xie Xi had taken it seriously.
“It’s a Killed Yet? order.” Ji Tan removed the groom’s boutonniere from his chest and spread his hands innocently. The suit didn’t even fit him: the jacket was too long and the trousers too short.
Xie Zhi wasn’t having any of it. If anything, he grew angrier. He snatched the boutonniere and threw it to the floor. “Someone pays you and you marry them? Is there anything you won’t do for money?”
That was a nasty thing to say.
Ji Tan’s chest heaved violently. Xie Zhi was insulting him!
He clenched his fists, the veins standing out on his neck, and said through gritted teeth, “Yeah, you know all about it, don’t you? You paid me, and I worked for you day and night for three years!”
A faint rustle came from inside the dressing room. Lawyer Qiao and the bride were pressed against the door, listening with pursed lips. They exchanged a glance and couldn’t help making strange little “Eee, eee” noises.
“Someone pays me, so I marry them,” Ji Tan sneered. “What’s it to you?”
Xie Zhi was so furious that he paced in a circle. “Then I’ll pay you! Marry me!”
Ji Tan: “…”
The two women behind the door: “…”
The corridor fell silent for a long time.
The expression on Ji Tan’s face gradually crumbled, shattered, and finally settled into calm. He muttered softly, his face blank, “What nonsense are you talking about?”
Then, with his ears turning red, he pushed open the dressing-room door and went back inside, muttering to himself.
Xie Zhi followed in a huff. He pushed open the door as it swung back toward the frame and sent the two women, who’d pressed themselves against it again, staggering.
The bride said, “Ahaha, Little Ji, I’ll transfer your payment to you in a little while.”
Lawyer Qiao said, “Right! And don’t worry about marriage. I’ll introduce Yingying to someone better.”
The bride gave her best friend an elbow. What was she saying? Only then did the great Lawyer Qiao come back to her senses. She cleared her throat and briefly updated Ji Tan on his case.
As for the supermarket compensation, Lawyer Qiao had already connected with Tom’s legal team. Their preferred settlement figure was 1.2 million, but she didn’t think negotiating it up to 3.5 million would be a problem.
“That much?” Ji Tan’s eyes lit up, as though he could already see coins pouring into his pockets in a glittering stream.
“Mm-hmm. As for your divorce case, come by our law firm when you have time and we’ll discuss it properly.” Lawyer Qiao waggled her eyebrows. “As it happens, the better match I’m going to introduce to Yingying is a partner at my firm.”
Ji Tan suddenly found the prospect of visiting the law firm much more appealing and nodded vigorously.
The flashy motorcycle was parked downstairs. Ji Tan wanted to ask Xie Zhi about dropping Uncle Yan off at home first, but Xie Zhi had gone aside to take a call, so he could only ask Uncle Yan to wait.
Uncle Yan waved off the offer. He didn’t have to work that afternoon, and taking the subway home would be more convenient.
Ji Tan really was in a hurry to pick up his brother, so he didn’t insist. Uncle Yan, however, tried to split the money he’d earned from Killed Yet? with him. Ji Tan refused outright. “I came along to learn the trade. If anything, I ought to be paying you. If you insist on splitting the money, then I’ll have to split my fake-groom fee with you too.”
“Now that won’t do!” Uncle Yan had no choice but to give up. With a smile, he teased Ji Tan about the advantages of being good-looking.
Killed Yet? did indeed offer orders for things like “pretend to be someone’s partner” and “crash a wedding and steal the bride halfway through.” Usually, though, only high-ranking killers could take such jobs. Clients looking to humiliate a scumbag ex tended to hire someone at least one rank above their target.
For example, if the scumbag was E-rank, they’d find a D-rank killer to crush him.
Someone like Ji Tan, who landed the job purely on the strength of his face, was unusually lucky.
Ji Tan smacked his lips, not knowing what to say. City A seemed to have an alarmingly high concentration of scumbag men and women.
When Xie Zhi finished his phone call and came back, he caught Uncle Yan saying goodbye with, “You’ll probably be able to get more jobs like this on your looks alone.” Xie Zhi’s already sour expression darkened even further.
The two stood facing each other beside the dazzling multicolored motorcycle, neither speaking.
Having shouted at his former boss, Ji Tan was belatedly losing his nerve. He still couldn’t work out why this pampered young master was so upset about his “ordinary business transaction,” but he could tell Xie Zhi wasn’t acting out of malice. Perhaps he simply looked down on such an undignified way of making money.
Now Ji Tan could only hope Xie Zhi wouldn’t be petty enough to go and tell tales to Ji Sinan.
Following the principle that the boss should ride and the employee should drive, Ji Tan climbed onto the motorcycle first, adjusted the helmet around his ears, and snapped it into place. Then, imitating Xie Zhi’s earlier move, he tossed his head with a flourish. “Hop on.”
Unfortunately, his helmet was round and pink-and-blue. The dramatic head toss made him look like a lollipop directing traffic.
Xie Zhi pressed his lips together, quickly put on his own helmet, and lowered the visor. Then he reached out, grabbed the back of Ji Tan’s collar, and lifted him onto the pillion seat. Before Ji Tan could protest, Xie Zhi swung one long leg over the bike and took hold of the throttle.
Ji Tan straightened his crumpled collar, ready to say something, but the motorcycle shot forward with a roar. He instinctively wrapped his arms around Xie Zhi’s waist. That was the only reason Ji “Lollipop” Tan wasn’t flung off the back.
His brother had been right. Xie Xi really was a rotten fellow.
Ji Tan grumbled under his breath and stared at Xie Zhi’s back, looking for something to pick at. After replaying all the things Xie Zhi had said today, he finally thought of a good question. “How long have you been in City A? Have you ever dated anyone?”
Xie Zhi slowed the motorcycle, and his tone softened too. “What made you ask that?”
Naturally, Ji Tan wanted to coax out his romantic history. Ideally, there’d be some tale of him sobbing his heart out or getting drunk alone late at night that Ji Tan could gossip about with his brother. Once Ji Sinan recovered his memories, the two could laugh at Xie Zhi mercilessly.
People always seemed to think more clearly when they were up to no good.
Within half a second, Ji Tan had come up with an excuse. “People who buy motorcycles this flashy usually go for single-seat racing bikes, but your gaudy machine has two seats.”
Xie Zhi fell silent for a moment. His voice came slowly through the helmet, muffled. “I bought this motorcycle on the very day you transmigrated to City A.”
So it was brand new!
His attempt to find something to hold against Xie Zhi had failed, leaving Ji Tan indignant. “You don’t even have a partner! Why did you buy a two-seater?”
The motorcycle wobbled as they rounded a bend.
Xie Zhi leaned into the turn to regain his balance, then accelerated sharply once they were through. His irritated voice was whipped by the wind straight into Ji Tan’s ears as the latter scrambled to hold on.
“I’ve got long legs, so I need two seats! What’s it to you?”