Ji Xun’s heart sank.
Mr. Liu had figured it out!
Still attempting a final effort, he laughed and said, “Stop joking. I wouldn’t save the women down below, so why would I save a criminal who murdered his own companion forty years ago? Kill him if you want. My life might not be worth much, but it feels a bit more valuable than his… Mr. Liu, I advise you to stop these meaningless, backwards antics. Why not use these final moments to think about what you’ll do when the police arrive? Let me tell you a secret. Actually, after my mother was beaten and suffered a concussion, she didn’t die. But lying there, she was probably in a state worse than death, so… I pulled off her oxygen mask…”
“Ah, it truly was a difficult decision…
“I still remember the image of my mother holding me, gently rocking me and singing lullabies. But her senile, vacant face before she died bore no resemblance to the refined, loving face in my memory, so I didn’t feel any regret.
“Because just thinking about how the person who initially caused their deaths—and forced me to murder my own mother—will soon be repenting day after day in prison makes me feel immensely happy…”
Although they suspected the words coming from the Ghost’s mouth were likely pure fiction, the bodyguards still wavered slightly.
If what the Ghost said was actually true… If Mr. Liu had misjudged… then wasn’t Boss Wu, whom Mr. Liu was currently holding hostage, being sacrificed for nothing?
Boss Wu… was still Mr. Liu’s close partner of many years!
Mr. Liu was truly ruthless.
Right, and there was also Boss Wu’s bodyguard, Xiao Han.
The bodyguards involuntarily turned their gazes toward the lone outlier in their ranks.
Xiao Han’s face was deathly pale.
He didn’t know whether to raise or lower the gun in his hands.
It didn’t take long for Boss Wu to process the shock and come to a realization. He was old and no longer sharp. Pulled into Mr. Liu’s embrace with a gun barrel pressed against his chin, his lips trembled. The curses threatening to burst from his mouth were fiercely bitten back, causing his cheeks to quiver in bursts.
Had he really never thought about the anomaly of Mr. Liu suddenly keeping him close by?
No, no, he had thought about it.
It was just that now, old and terrified of dying, he felt safer by Mr. Liu’s side. He felt that following Mr. Liu was the only way forward, and having long since betrayed Feng Silong and his friends for Mr. Liu’s sake, he could only stick to this dark path with Mr. Liu until the very end.
For this reason, he had ignored all other dangers.
Now, he was truly going to die…
The gun barrel wasn’t coming from the opposite side; it was coming from Mr. Liu!
Regaining control of his tongue, he uttered no curses, but instead said, “If I had known, I shouldn’t have backed you to take the top spot back then, Brother Long…”
“What? People become good once they die?” Mr. Liu sneered. “Was Feng Silong any better than me? The first one to start the slaughter back then was Feng Silong. Didn’t you turn to me precisely out of fear?”
“Listen to this, listen to this. You’re both criminals—pot calling the kettle black. There’s no point in internal fighting among criminals; outsiders just find it laughable,” Ji Xun interjected.
Suddenly, without any warning, Mr. Liu fired!
His silver pistol was the only un-silenced gun on the ship. The deafening gunshot detonated across the deck like a firecracker!
The noise drowned out all other sounds.
Only when the echoing blast faded did the sound of the wind, the rain, and Boss Wu’s miserable screams reclaim the deck.
“Don’t kill me, don’t kill me! Liu Yan, don’t kill me! I’m so old, let me go, I beg you, please let me go—”
Then came Mr. Liu’s cold, ruthless voice:
“Don’t panic, that shot was just fired into the sky. Boss Wu, you’re begging the wrong person. Whether you die or not isn’t up to me—it’s up to that Mr. Ghost across from us.”
“Now,” Mr. Liu’s voice rose sharply, “I will count to three. Turn off the jammer! Otherwise, my next shot will blow his brains out! He is only the first!”
“One!”
Ji Xun pondered whether he could snipe Mr. Liu from a distance.
“Two!”
Impossible. The deck was open, and Mr. Liu was surrounded by bodyguards, making a line of sight from the deck’s perimeter impossible. His positioning was tricky, and he was sheltering himself under an umbrella; even if an ambush were set up on the third or fourth floor, an angle couldn’t be found.
“Three—”
“Let’s talk.”
Ji Xun spoke up. He no longer used that lighthearted, mocking tone; his voice was low and cold.
The Ghost compromised!
The bodyguards all looked toward Mr. Liu.
The miserable screams from Boss Wu’s mouth gradually died down as well.
Yet, Mr. Liu’s face showed no sign of surprise. Ever since he had seen through the trick beneath the ship, he knew the Ghost was bound to compromise—if not for this reason, then for another.
“I can turn off the jammer,” Ji Xun paused for a moment. “But how can you guarantee that after I turn it off, you’ll release Boss Wu?”
“Once I make contact with the outside world, why would I need to kill my partner?” Mr. Liu said.
“Perhaps out of worry that the partner you almost sacrificed to the heavens might get furious after escaping and turn around to target you—so you strike first to gain the upper hand,” Ji Xun mocked.
“…I won’t!” Boss Wu grunted weakly.
“See? He says he won’t. So I won’t either,” Mr. Liu laughed heartily. “Because fools can’t make waves anyway. This is no longer an era where you can succeed purely through violence and ferocity! A useless waste who relied on Feng Silong years ago and relies on me today—even if I spare him a hundred times, he won’t be able to turn the tides! As for you, you’d better stop stalling for time.”
“Fine, then let’s trust each other,” Ji Xun said quickly. “I have a proposal. Send Boss Wu out alone. Once he reaches the French windows in the central hall, I’ll let him inspect the jammer.”
“Impossible,” Mr. Liu said. “You bring the jammer out, and we will inspect it.”
“Do I look like an idiot?” Ji Xun replied. “Why would I just hand myself over for nothing? How about this: I can come out, but you must throw all your guns to a spot ten meters away. Otherwise, the moment I step out, you’ll riddle me with bullets—who would I complain to then?”
“You have a gun too,” Mr. Liu said. “Throw your gun out first.”
“Fine. One gun against nine—anyone knows where the advantage lies,” Ji Xun agreed. “Put your guns to the side first, and I’ll throw my gun outside.”
“Simultaneously,” Mr. Liu said. “One, two, three—”
He barely paused. Following a series of clattering sounds, the bodyguards actually threw their weapons—including Mr. Liu’s silver pistol—to a spot about ten meters away from them.
Ji Xun also kept his word; he threw out his own gun, which only had two bullets left, at the exact same time.
At that moment, the dark clouds drifted away, revealing a cold moon.
The pitter-patter of rain had already soaked the guns, and under the moonlight, an icy luster shimmered across every inch of their barrels.
“You should come out now,” Mr. Liu said.
Inside the central hall, Ji Xun held the megaphone and pondered for ten seconds. He turned around, grabbed a large, square cardboard box, placed the megaphone inside, and held it in his arms.
Then, Ji Xun peered out through the broken glass to gauge the situation.
That’s right—Ji Xun hadn’t gone far at all. He was standing right near the broken glass that Mr. Liu had ordered his bodyguards to smash earlier in the central hall.
Mr. Liu was standing on the deck outside this position, shouting downward.
Ji Xun was inside at this position, holding the megaphone, shouting downward.
Without modern technology to assist them, communication relied entirely on shouting… It was a makeshift measure out of necessity, but this position—though seemingly dangerous—was actually secure. He had a gun in his hand and cover in front of him. The cautious Mr. Liu wouldn’t waste his precious manpower on an irrelevant spot, which was why Ji Xun and Mr. Liu had been able to harmoniously shout downward at the same time just moments ago.
Now, that harmony was about to be shattered.
The only regret was that from start to finish, he had never found an opportunity to shoot Mr. Liu through the barrier of bodyguards.
This cunning and venomous old man was completely shielded by an impenetrable human wall of elite bodyguards.
A dark shadow appeared at the shattered glass of the central hall.
He was holding a box in his hands.
A silver mask was clasped onto his face, with moonlight flowing over it, illuminating a seductive silver glow.
“Let Boss Wu come up.”
“Put the item down first and step to the side.”
“Simultaneously,” Ji Xun said. He set the box down and backed away.
Under Mr. Liu’s watchful eyes, Boss Wu slowly walked up.
By the time Ji Xun had retreated to a safe distance inside the central hall, Boss Wu finally reached the breach in the glass, bending down to pick up the cardboard box. The lid of the box wasn’t sealed, just loosely shut.
Boss Wu opened the lid and glanced inside.
There was no jammer inside—only a megaphone.
On top of the megaphone lay a slip of paper.
Written on the note was:
“Throw the box backward, run into the central hall, don’t hesitate!”
Boss Wu acted on the note’s instructions without a moment’s hesitation. He hurled the box backward with all his strength and dashed forward!
The moment the cardboard box flew into the air, Ah Bang swiftly reached into his jacket, pulled out a concealed gun he had hidden in advance, and fired repeatedly at the box.
At the same time, Ji Xun drew his own hidden weapons—the Molotov cocktails crafted by Meng Fushan—lit them, and threw them at the bodyguards!
The scene instantly descended into chaos. Amidst the bedlam, Mr. Liu urgently barked instructions:
“Take your guns and charge over! Guard the glass breach in the central hall! Block the Ghost’s escape route!”
The bodyguards obeyed his orders without hesitation. Two ferocious, wolf-like bodyguards had already rushed forward with their guns. Xiao Han wanted to move as well—not to block the gap, but to seize the chance to escape while they were busy blocking it.
However, the moment he twitched, two pairs of eyes locked onto him from nearby.
Once Boss Wu had been taken hostage by Mr. Liu, nobody trusted this bodyguard belonging to Boss Wu anymore.
Xiao Han didn’t dare to move.
Ji Xun continued hurling the Molotov cocktails. They exploded upon impact, scattering sparks, but these makeshift firebombs lacked power. Combined with the rain-drenched environment, their effect was marginal at best—better than nothing, but barely.
Ji Xun rolled to the spot where he had thrown his gun earlier and retrieved the weapon containing only two bullets left.
He fired a shot behind him.
It was useless; the enemy’s firepower suppressed him with ruthless, insane force.
He could only barely duck behind a piece of cover—which was nothing more than a deck light!
Looking across the deck, it was completely open without any shelter whatsoever. Dammit, this was lethal.
Hiding there for two seconds, Ji Xun took a deep breath and dashed toward another entrance leading into the ship’s interior. This time, his luck ran out. He hadn’t run more than a few steps after poking his head out when he felt a heavy, hard blow to his arm, as if someone had punched him fiercely.
Yet, there was no one around him.
Which meant—
He had been shot.
In the first moments of getting shot, the human body often feels no pain, only numbness, followed by an increasingly excruciating agony until the body can no longer bear it and faints.
Ji Xun’s footsteps faltered, but he didn’t slow down. The Molotov cocktails were used up, and there was only one bullet left in his gun. Ji Xun didn’t hold back any longer; he turned around and aimed at a bodyguard who was raising his gun.
It was him.
That shot had come from him!
He raised his arm and pulled the trigger.
The bullet shot out of the barrel, hitting the opponent’s arm!
This was the final counterattack Ji Xun could muster. The very next second, he was captured alive by Mr. Liu’s bodyguards.
The bodyguard who charged up pinned his head face-down against the deck with a gun pressed against him.
At the same time, a bodyguard’s shout rang out:
“Got the box! Inside it is—fuck, it’s a megaphone!”
Mr. Liu walked over.
He glanced into the box without a flicker of emotion; it would have been stranger if the real jammer had actually been inside.
Then, he walked up to Ji Xun.
Ji Xun’s eyes caught sight of a pair of pitch-black leather shoes and dark gray trouser legs.
Next, he was roughly hauled up, forced to kneel on the ground, and the silver mask on his face was ripped away. Looking up from below, he saw Mr. Liu’s face covered in wrinkles. Mr. Liu also stared fixedly at his face with his single remaining eye, taking in his true appearance.
Perhaps Mr. Liu was pondering who his face resembled.
Regrettably, judging purely by looks, Mr. Liu would likely never guess his true identity.
“Very young,” Mr. Liu said. “What is your name?”
“Does it matter?” Ji Xun countered.
“Indeed, it doesn’t,” Mr. Liu nodded. “You shunned the road to heaven only to break into hell…”
“Mr. Liu, should we go look for Boss Wu?” Ah Bang asked from the side.
“No need,” surprisingly, it wasn’t Mr. Liu who spoke, but Ji Xun, who sounded entirely unbothered. “Now that you have me, do you still need a liability like Boss Wu? I know where the jammer is, and I can serve as a useful bargaining chip for you against the police—”
“Shut up.” Ah Bang struck Ji Xun directly with the butt of his gun.
Ji Xun’s face was knocked to the side. After a brief moment of numbness, a metallic, coppery taste quickly welled up in his mouth.
He spat a mouthful of bloody saliva to the side.
“I generally don’t enjoy torturing people; it feels unrefined to me,” Mr. Liu said.
“However, tonight, it seems I’ll have to make an exception.
“I’ll give you one last chance to reveal the location of the jammer. Otherwise, I’ll torture you until your companion hiding below crawls up here to spill it himself.”
“Don’t kid yourself,” Ji Xun smiled at Mr. Liu. “He won’t come up, because you won’t kill me. You still need to keep me to negotiate with the police, so you have to at least guarantee my life and ensure I don’t lose any arms or legs that would drag you down on your escape route. All in all, I’m actually quite safe. At most, I’ll suffer a bit of physical pain, but in this life, it’s hard to avoid…”
Mr. Liu made a gesture.
Two fierce bodyguards rushed into the ship’s interior. They didn’t stay long and quickly emerged once more.
They brought out a lot of items in their hands.
The most eye-catching among them were two sharp, gleaming hooks.
Glinting with a cold, sharp light, they looked like the kind used to hang dead pigs.
Ji Xun was dragged up from the ground, and the two hooks were indeed used on his body, piercing through his collarbones. He was suspended directly off the ground, the full weight of his body pressing down upon those sharp, flesh-piercing iron hooks!
