Chapter 433: Wouldn’t That Be Asking to Die?

Chapter 433: Wouldn’t That Be Asking to Die?

Before setting the phone down, Wu Chen tapped the screen a few more times with one hand and blocked Qi Jun’s number.

He rarely blocked anyone. Friend or foe, communication mattered. But he had no wish to keep talking to Qi Jun. There was nothing more to say to him. The man had outlived his usefulness.

More to the point, it kept Qi Jun from calling back.

Knowing Qi Jun as he did, Wu Chen was sure he would.

Blocking him kept things clean.

Of course, once Qi Jun found he’d been blocked, he could always call from another phone. But not everyone was as sick in the head as Ding Ruilong. Most people weren’t obsessive enough to bombard someone from number after number.

Blocking someone was a statement in itself.

Anyone halfway normal would realize that calling from a new number would only get that one blocked too.

So they’d stop calling.

Not calling, of course, was one thing. Tracing the number’s owner was another. Qi Jun would certainly do that.

The Bentley Continental Flying Spur left the overpass and headed straight for An Menglan’s company.

A little over half an hour later.

Beneath the broken span of Zhangjiang No. 3 Overpass, several luxury SUVs, Land Rovers, a Mercedes G-Class and others, pulled up near the burned-out Mercedes van. Once they reached the area, they had followed the column of smoke.

Qi Jun got out with more than a dozen bodyguards in black suits.

Several of the bodyguards took one look and their faces changed. Without waiting for orders, they went back to the cars for fire extinguishers.

One especially conscientious bodyguard even stepped slightly in front of Qi Jun. “Careful, Boss.”

The van looked mostly burned out, but there was no telling whether it might go up a second time.

Several bodyguards rushed in with dry-powder extinguishers and blasted the van, crumpled and still smoking, every window shattered.

Meanwhile Qi Jun, expressionless, tilted his head back to look up at the bridge, then down at the van.

It wasn’t hard to work out. The van had come off the top, crashed, and exploded.

The last few small flames inside were quickly smothered, and the smoke thinned considerably. Several bodyguards fetched crowbars and pried open part of the twisted wreck, little more than a frame now.

Only then did Qi Jun step closer.

“Boss, three of them. They’re all in there…” A bodyguard crouched to look inside, then turned back to him.

“Fuck!” Qi Jun swore through his teeth. His face turned vicious, his eyes shot through with blood.

He had sent exactly three men in one vehicle to watch and tail Wu Chen and Zhuang Xiaodie, with clear orders: grab them if the chance came, and if the targets spotted them and tried to run, stage a crash.

Qi Jun didn’t know who Wu Chen was, but he did know Zhuang Xiaodie was connected to Mao Rusong.

That was precisely why he hadn’t called Mao Rusong to demand an explanation.

He owed his elder brother, Qi Min, an accounting first.

If he went straight to Mao Rusong to negotiate without having done anything himself, and his brother found out, he’d be in for it.

Settle it first, then tell his brother. That was the only way to keep the blame on himself to a minimum. Killing Zhuang Xiaodie first wouldn’t even be a problem.

She was only someone connected to Mao Rusong, after all.

The one rushed to the hospital for emergency treatment was Qi Min’s own son.

Which weighed more? Mao Rusong was smooth and worldly, a man who knew how to play every side. With the deed already done, surely he wouldn’t dare fall out with Qi Min over it.

A fine plan.

What Qi Jun had never imagined was that all three of the trusted bodyguards he’d sent would die together in one car, burned to charcoal.

Ruthless.

And utterly final.

That was why Qi Jun didn’t believe Zhuang Xiaodie and that young man had done it. However glib two young people might be, they stood no chance against three professional bodyguards.

It had to be Mao Rusong.

Clearly, Zhuang Xiaodie had called him after the incident.

Fourth Master Mao, whose reach extended everywhere in Dongpu, could certainly be this vicious when he chose. It was just his style.

But what exactly was she to Mao Rusong?

An illegitimate daughter?

They didn’t look alike.

But if they weren’t family, what gave Mao Rusong the nerve to go this far? Disregarding Qi Jun was one thing. What made him dare disregard Qi Min?

Because he was close to the Gu family?

The Xiang family was no pushover either.

Over one little girl, where had he found the courage to start a war?

Qi Jun’s face was dark and sinister. There were things he couldn’t make sense of, but the more he thought, the angrier he got, and however he turned it over, he kept arriving at the same answer.

Mao Rusong had done it.

His nephew was still lying in a hospital bed with more than ten stitches in his forehead. The doctor had diagnosed a severe concussion. His life wasn’t in danger, but whether there would be lasting damage was anyone’s guess.

And now three men were dead here.

“Boss, should we call the police?” a bodyguard beside him asked quietly.

Qi Jun turned and fixed him with bloodshot eyes, then swung a hand and slapped him across the face.

“Call the fucking police? Have you got a brain in your head? You think we aren’t humiliated enough already?!”

The slap sent the bodyguard staggering back several steps. He kept his head down and didn’t make a sound.

Qi Jun was seething, with nowhere to vent it.

He turned back to the wrecked van.

With things this bad, he naturally had to think about how to handle it.

The humiliation he’d mentioned was actually secondary. Losing the first round of arm-wrestling to Mao Rusong wasn’t the real problem. It was only one round.

The real problem was that if this got out, the first one likely to land in trouble was Qi Jun himself.

The wrecked van wasn’t clean. Neither were the three men in it. All three had blood on their hands. Report three deaths at once, and it would be a major case.

And in a place like Modu, once something became a major case and was seriously investigated, things would surface.

Mao Rusong, on the other hand, would hardly suffer. At worst, he’d find someone to take the fall.

No investigation would ever reach the man himself.

Qi Jun stared for a long time and thought for just as long.

Turning it over again and again, he concluded he had to tell his brother. Three men dead, and still keeping quiet? No explanation later would spare him a beating.

And on his own strength alone, he couldn’t go head to head with Mao Rusong.

He would tell his brother. He would also check the traffic cameras. This overpass had none, but the van hadn’t appeared out of thin air. With the right connections, they could trace its route and find out what had happened before.

But first, Qi Jun felt there was one call he ought to make.

He took out his phone, tapped a few times, scrolled quickly through his contacts, and soon found the number.

He dialed.

Six or seven seconds later, someone picked up.

“Well, well! Boss Qi! What wind blew you my way? It’s been ages. What made you think of calling me? Hahahaha…” Mao Rusong’s hearty laugh came down the line.

He was only being polite, the usual small talk.

But to Qi Jun in his present state, it dripped with mockery and ridicule. The laughter grated on his ears.

“Mao Rusong! Fuck your mother!” His breathing went heavy, and he launched straight into it. “Three lives! You listen to me, you bastard! This isn’t over! If I don’t kill you, I’ll take your fucking surname!”

The line went silent.

Mao Rusong was, of course, completely lost.

What the hell? Swearing the moment the call connected? What three lives?

No one had cursed Mao Rusong like this in a very long time. Anger flared in him at once.

“Heh.” He gave a cold laugh. “Qi Jun, back when your brother called you a useless idiot, I thought he was selling you short. Today I finally know better. You really are a fucking idiot. Did a dog eat your brain?”

He was furious.

He could tell at once there was probably some misunderstanding. But if a misunderstanding like that had landed on him, he would never have opened by cursing. He’d have found out what was going on first.

Qi Jun, though, came in swearing and threatening to kill him.

An idiot through and through. Apart from a certain talent for chasing women, he had leaned on his elder brother his whole life. Without Qi Min, someone would have killed him a hundred times over.

Qi Jun misunderstood again.

Mao Rusong had been mocking him for cursing before asking. Qi Jun took it as a declaration of war: not only had Mao killed his men, now he was calling him a useless idiot to his face.

“I—fuck! I fucking—you fucking—!” Qi Jun was nearly insane with rage. “Fine! Fine, fine, fine! Mao Rusong, you fucking listen to me! Bring Zhuang Xiaodie here right now to kowtow to my nephew and beg forgiveness! Then call me Grandpa three times, or I’ll—”

Mao Rusong didn’t even catch the rest.

The threat was juvenile. Call me Grandpa? What kind of idiot talked like that?

But that wasn’t the point.

The point was that Qi Jun had said a name.

Zhuang Xiaodie.

“Fuck!” Mao Rusong swore too.

Because in that instant, he understood.

Qi Jun had… crossed Mr. Wu.

Wasn’t that just asking to die?

He hung up.

He had no interest in Qi Jun’s ranting. The moment the call ended, he dialed Wu Chen.