Screams, cries, and the sounds of weapons smashing into flesh kept sounding across the road. It was an unfortunate fact that none of us were nearly as strong as we were in the game. Almost all of us were wounded in just less than two minutes, although thankfully no one had suffered worse than a few bricks to the body thus far. Worse comes to worst, we would be walking away with a bone fracture or two.

Gui Guzi was clutching his left arm because it was cut open by a watermelon knife. However, he also managed to snatch the weapon for himself and left similar wounds on his attackers’ arms. Xu Yang was swinging his brick left and right like a madman. He had to have hurt a lot of people.

I was the one who fared the worst out of all of us. Du Thirteen was so goddamn drunk that he could hardly stay on his feet, much less fight the bastards. I had to stand in front of him and Xue Lu and bear almost all the attacks coming their way. There were three bloody slash wounds on my arms, my purple shirt had turned gray in color due to the sheer amount of brick strikes I took, and even my forehead was blue and black at two separate spots.

……

“Huff… huff…”

I panted heavily but kept my eyes wide open. Life of Luxury’s hand was actually shaking a little as he said angrily, “What the fuck is wrong with you, Lu Chen? Who the hell is he to make you defend him like this?”

I replied indifferently, “Anyone who’d die for me is someone I’d die for!”

“Fuck you!”

Two hooligans rushed me at once. I threw a punch and successfully knocked the front teeth out of one of them, but I also took a brick to the back of my head. My consciousness started blurring.

“Lu Chen!”

I heard Du Thirteen shouting before I collapsed limply to the ground.

……

I closed my eyes, feeling as if I had had a nightmare. It was a nightmare I didn’t want to recall.

Drip… drip...

I opened my eyes when I felt a strange, warm liquid dripping on my nose. When I looked up, I was shocked to see Du Thirteen standing in front of me with the Swiss Army knife sticking out of his right shoulder. Blood was dripping profusely down his back and splashing against my face. My heart was ice cold with fear.

“Thirteen…”

Du Thirteen grabbed the hilt of the weapon and forced a painful smile to his face, “Life of Luxury, you are fucking nothing. What do you think women are, your toys?”

Behind Life of Luxury, a hooligan asked quietly, “Brother Luxury, isn’t this a little too much? Wha… what if he dies here?”

“What the hell are you afraid of? Nothing will happen even if he dies here today! I’ll make it all go away!”

Life of Luxury glared hatefully at Du Thirteen before kicking him right in the stomach. He immediately dropped to his knees.

Xue Lu cried and cried as she lay above Du Thirteen’s shoulder and stared at the knife wound. “Are you okay… don’t…”

Du Thirteen looked at Xue Lu and broke into a gentle smile. “Lulu, I… I’m fine…”

Not far away, Xu Yang was fighting four hooligans on his own. Gui Guzi was lying unconscious on the ground with blood on his forehead.

……

Rustle rustle rustle...

I grabbed onto the flowerbed and pulled myself up. I tried to make myself clear-headed, but I collapsed to the ground again before I could even take half a step forward. My face was cold, and my mouth was open, but I was so spent that I couldn’t even get a word out.

Du Thirteen was barely holding in the pain on his shoulder, but he stared at me and blurted, “Brother, you…”

Xue Lu was also watching me. “Lu Chen, you…”

I glared at her and yelled, “Xue Lu, look at what you’ve done!”

“I…” She burst into tears and sobbed again. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry…”

……

Clutching a wound on his arm, Life of Luxury pointed at Xue Lu and ordered, “Bring that woman to me!”

Two hooligans ran over and forcefully dragged Xue Lu away.

“Kneel!”

After forcing Xue Lu to the ground, Life of Luxury grabbed her chin angrily and hatefully. “You like him that much, huh? You quit the bar and cut connections with everyone because of him, huh? Very good! Tonight I’ll fuck you to the high heavens right in front of him!”

At this point, Life of Luxury had gone completely insane. Dropping his pants and grabbing Xue Lu’s head, he shouted, “What’s wrong, bitch? You don’t want it? Show me that slutty bitch who clung to me the first day we met!”

Tears still pouring down her cheeks like a waterfall, Xue Lu shook her head with all her might.

All around us, the hooligans were laughing without a care for the world. One of them was actually sitting right on top of Gui Guzi and lighting a smoke for himself. If Gui Guzi wasn’t unconscious, only god knows what would’ve happened to this stupid bastard.

One of the hooligans laughed obscenely. “Faster, Brother Luxury, the police are gonna show up anytime soon! We want a go at her too, ya know! She’s quite the cutie!”

Life of Luxury replied, “Don’t worry, I have friends inside the police station! It’s all fine!”

……

Du Thirteen rose unsteadily to his feet with bloodshot eyes. Gritting his teeth and pulling out the Swiss Army knife on his shoulder abruptly, he shouted angrily, “I’ll kill you, you motherfucker!”

But Du Thirteen was so badly wounded that his movement was as slow as a snail. Life of Luxury easily knocked the weapon out of his hand and sent him stumbling with a powerful kick.

Thud!

I grabbed Du Thirteen’s shoulder and pushed him slightly to the side. “Let me!”

My head had finally cleared up enough that I could move again. After pushing Du Thirteen to the side, I ran toward Life of Luxury with incredible speed. I was the only one in the group who could still move this fast because I hadn’t drunk any alcohol during the dinner.

I appeared in front of Life of Luxury before he could reach and pushed Xue Lu away with my left hand. Then, I grabbed his arm in an iron grip and kicked his exposed groin with everything I got!

Bang!

Life of Luxury screamed on top of his lungs, but I wasn’t done yet. I punished his carelessness and repeated the motion again and again. It was to the point where his friends actually forgot to help him, opting to close their eyes instead and shut the horrible sight out of their minds.

By now, Life of Luxury had fainted for sheer pain. A couple extra kicks later, I pushed him away and watched him collapse to the ground like a log.

The hooligans were completely stunned by this unexpected turn of events. Even the smoker sitting on Gui Guzi’s body had risen to his feet shakily. “Is… is he dead?”

Another hooligan replied, “Nonsense, he can’t be…”

……

It was at this moment we heard a siren sound. Finally, the police had arrived, and they were too fucking late, as usual.

A group of policemen rushed down their vehicles and surrounded us immediately. I raised my arms like I had done this a hundred times before pointing at Du Thirteen. “He’s badly injured, please help him immediately…”

One of the policemen frowned deeply before yelling, “Save this one first… and that one too!”

Du Thirteen wasn’t the only one who was being rescued. Gui Guzi was smiling as he was being carried up a police car, almost as if he was having a nice dream.

Xu Yang’s arms were covered in blood. When he saw me staring at him, he licked his lips and smiled. “This ain’t my blood.”

He stared at my forehead, and I nodded. “This totally is my blood…”

“Fuck…”

A couple of medical personnel were busy treating Du Thirteen’s wounds not far away from us. I had no idea what was happening at Life of Luxury’s side though.

Xue Lu was still crying, but she went into the police car after Du Thirteen.

……

A young policeman finally walked up to us with some iodine and bandages. He stared at me and asked, “Did a fight break out?”

I replied, “That should be obvious.”

He smiled. “Too bad you fought the wrong person. That guy with his pants down has a powerful friend in the public security bureau. I’m sorry, but I don’t think you’re walking away from this.”

I smiled back. “It’s fine.”

He nodded. “Whether or not this fight is classified as self-defense, my advice for you is to gather your money and pull as many connections as you have. With luck, you may be able to shave a few years off your jail time…”

I stared at my battered brother for a moment before replying, “Got it.”

……

That night, we all gave our statements after our wounds were treated and bandaged. Something funny happened during this time though. When a policeman had pinched Gui Guzi to wakefulness, he was treated to a slap to the face and some incoherent shouting until Gui Guzi finally realized where he was. The poor policeman was white with fright as a result.

“That idiot…” Xu Yang couldn’t help but smile. I smiled as well.

It was at this moment Du Thirteen was pushed into the room on a wheelchair. It looked like his treatment was finally over. He looked absolutely terrible, and red-eyed Xue Lu was behind him.

“Brother, I think it’s time we talk to you about a couple of things…” Du Thirteen started.

I nodded and sat down on a chair. “Talk to me!”

Du Thirteen swallowed once before pulling Xue Lu to the front. Then, he asked, “Lu Chen, do you really not remember her? Not one bit?”

I stared at Xue Lu’s face for a couple of seconds, but I still couldn’t remember her. I shook my head and replied, “Not at all.”

“She’s… she’s our old classmate, Qiu Xiaohan…”

I trembled. “Wait what? Qiu… Qiu Xiaohan?”

It was a name I had almost forgotten. Qiu Xiaohan was our high school classmate, and she was none other than Du Thirteen’s first love and girlfriend! But that was so many years ago, not to mention that the girl in front of me still looked nothing like Qiu Xiaohan at all. This can’t be right!

“No…” I shook my head. “This can’t be right. She looks nothing like Qiu Xiaohan…”

Du Thirteen fell silent for a moment. “That’s because she had gone through a lot of things after she dropped out from school. The guy who took her away was taken in by the police, and she had to join a model packaging company after she was left alone in Beijing with nowhere to stay. Her looks changed after she underwent plastic surgery, and some time later she finally returned to Jiangsu. She had suffered a lot during this time…”

Staring at me with reddened eyes, Xue Lu suddenly walked up to me and grabbed my hand. She said, “Do you still remember my friend, Li Fang? She liked you a lot at the time and wrote you a couple of love letters. But you folded them all into paper planes and threw it to the campus belle on the opposite block…”

I shivered. “Xue Lu… You’re really Qiu Xiaohan?”

“Of course!”

Things finally made sense now.

My eyes suddenly turned colder. “In that case, what’s your deal with that man at the parking lot earlier?”

Xue Lu didn’t say anything. It was Du Thirteen who answered my question. “That man was her sugar daddy. His name is Tang Chuan. But they haven’t been in that kind of relationship for a year already.”

“...”

……

Suddenly, we heard some noise from outside the police station. Then, a couple of beautiful girls burst through the entrance. Their high heels clicked against the floor as a beautiful girl with a handbag ran up to us. Her expression looked urgent, and her bangs looked a bit untidy. It was none other than He Yi herself.