Chapter 23: Now This Is Trouble

After only a few words had been exchanged, Ye Gongmin’s phone rang.

He picked up the call, grabbed his coat, and stood up, shaking his head. “They’ve arrived. Let’s go—take me over there so we can get the girl who’s been illegally kidnapped out first.”

Charge!

With a fierce air, two handsome men and a beautiful woman took the elevator straight down to the underground parking lot. There, two large seven-seaters were parked, and a dozen or so burly-looking men were milling about.

Ye Gongmin’s assistant hurried over and whispered, “Mr. Ye, there are fourteen men here this time. You asked for quality, so they’re six hundred each. If it comes to using clubs or any kind of altercation, it’s another eight hundred per person afterwards.”

Ye Gongmin smacked him on the back of the head and cursed, “Damn it, I told you to bring more people, and all you can muster is a dozen? You haggle over costs for land deals, and now you want to pinch pennies for Honghong’s matter too? Are you brainless?”

“Yes, yes, please don’t be angry, Young Master Ye. I’ll have them bring two more carloads of people right away,” the assistant stammered.

“Forget it, there’s no time. Tell them to give it all they’ve got, but no one is to die. Starting rate is a thousand, if it turns physical, it’s an extra fifteen hundred each afterwards.” Ye Gongmin waved dismissively.

“Excellent,” the assistant replied, his cut now even sweeter. He gave Ye Gongmin a thumbs up, heaping on the praise.

With that, the assistant stepped aside. Ye Gongmin took the wheel of his BMW 750, with Ni Feihong and Xiao Ma in the front, the two seven-seaters following behind, and together they made for the so-called “old warehouse” with great momentum.

Before they even reached the warehouse, Ye Gongmin kept reassuring Ni Feihong, “Don’t worry, it’ll definitely be resolved.”

Ni Feihong, however, was preoccupied with another matter: this “old warehouse” was in fact a cluster of abandoned factory buildings, long since out of use. Land was precious in Haizhou, and she’d long ago petitioned the company to do something with it, but mysteriously, her request was never approved.

Once, leveraging her beauty and personal charm, she tried to probe the company’s finance chief, who let slip that “the old warehouse is still in operation, though it’s running at a heavy loss.”

Not long after, that chief resigned and vanished. Despite being a senior executive, Ni Feihong could never get inside the place herself, only able to observe from afar that, sure enough, it was “operating,” and she’d even seen a few familiar vehicles going in and out.

That was why, as soon as she saw Xiao Ma’s photo, she recognized it as a company car.

Piecing all this together, Ni Feihong began to sense that this situation was far from simple. She wasn’t thinking of backing out, but she was more than a little nervous.

As he drove, Ye Gongmin watched her and hurried to say, “Don’t worry, Honghong. I said I’d help you, and I will.”

Ni Feihong had no better plan. Though worried, she couldn’t just stand by while her two girls were in trouble. She had to get them out first. Based on Zhan Yunfei’s explanation, she vaguely understood that calling the police wasn’t an option.

She couldn’t quite reason out why, but she instinctively trusted Zhan Yunfei on this point.

As they drew near the old warehouse, Ni Feihong’s phone rang. It was Zhan Yunfei.

He said, “Honghong, this is complicated—listen to me and stay out of it.”

Ni Feihong retorted, “My two girls are missing, and I’ve got people inexplicably tailing me, with strange photos being used to sow discord between us. And now you tell me to stay out of it?”

Zhan Yunfei’s voice was urgent. “Just listen to me this once. If you stay out of it, there might still be a way to turn things around.”

“How?” Ni Feihong demanded. “Just tell me—can my girls come back or not?”

Zhan Yunfei hemmed and hawed. “Not for now. At first, it really was some people stirring up trouble over personal grudges, but now it’s escalated. It’s on another level. Not only am I powerless—those behind me are too. There may even be involvement from ‘higher-ups.’”

“What nonsense,” Ni Feihong said. “Then I’m calling the police.”

“Don’t! Whatever you do, don’t call the police!” Zhan Yunfei insisted. “Honghong, listen to me. If you don’t call, there may still be a chance. But if you do, regardless of whether the police actually intervene, just having a 110 report on record will trigger the opposition’s self-protection mechanisms. To avoid trouble, they’ll do something drastic—something uncontrollable.”

This left Ni Feihong feeling utterly in the dark. She pressed for more, but for various reasons, Zhan Yunfei couldn’t elaborate.

Frustrated, she hung up and switched off her phone.

By now, they’d stopped outside the old warehouse’s crumbling main gate. From the outside, there was only a bored “security guard” idly playing mobile games.

Ye Gongmin, eager to show off, didn’t want Ni Feihong getting cold feet after talking to Zhan Yunfei. He urged, “Honghong, just say the word. Do we go in and get them out? They’re people—two girls—probably waiting with tears in their eyes to be rescued.”

Xiao Ma chimed in, “Go for it, Sister Feihong. Since Ye here is so raring to play the hero, how can you not let him have his moment?”

Ye Gongmin turned, face dark, and jabbed his finger at Xiao Ma in the back seat. “Hey, I’m warning you—if you provoke me again, I’ll knock you out here before the real fight even starts. If your face gets smashed, I’d like to see you keep posturing. What do you have besides that face?”

“You know nothing about power,” Xiao Ma sneered. “Yes, my face is an asset, but it’s the weakest one I have.”

“Damn, I’ve had enough of this brat,” Ye Gongmin snarled, turning to Ni Feihong. “What about it, Honghong? If you and I are of one mind, before we take on the enemy, let’s beat this kid’s mouth crooked first.”

“What are you arguing about, like children? Is this how people who do great things behave? We’re here to uphold justice, aren’t we?” Ni Feihong interjected.

Ye Gongmin and Xiao Ma glanced at each other.

Meanwhile, with three cars gathered outside, several men from inside the warehouse—six or seven of them—were now heading over. They were muscle-bound, tough-looking types.

Xiao Ma pointed from inside the car. “It’s them, they took my money and kidnapped my roommate.”

Ye Gongmin looked at Ni Feihong.

Ni Feihong hesitated for a final second. Since Xiao Ma had identified the kidnappers, she waved her hand. “Go in! If anything happens, I’ll take responsibility. No matter what, get them out first!”

Ye Gongmin stopped talking, clamped a fat cigar in his mouth, gripped the steering wheel with both hands, and floored the accelerator. With a screech, the BMW kicked up a cloud of dust as it rammed straight through the rickety, fence-like gate.

“Go, go, go!”

The two cars behind instantly got fired up, following Ye Gongmin’s lead. Inside the vehicles, men were raring for action, egging each other on. “Even if the other side chickens out, stir things up! Beat them down, because if there’s no fighting, we don’t get the extra fifteen hundred per head. So let’s start a war!”

“Right, right!” came the eager replies.

“What are you doing? Are you crazy or what…” the musclemen, scuttling like crabs, scattered in panic across the yard when the BMW came barreling in, terrified of being run over.

Ye Gongmin didn’t want to waste time on them; his plan was to penetrate to the core, strike at the heart. Everyone agreed this was the right tactic.

But then, to his dismay, Ye Gongmin saw in the rearview mirror that instead of following the BMW deeper inside for a decisive confrontation, the musclemen had scattered completely, and the two seven-seaters had stopped short. Their doors flew open and out jumped a gang of men, lunchboxes in hand, wielding baseball bats and chasing after the now-harmless musclemen, pummeling them with gusto.

A mob of fools, Ye Gongmin and Ni Feihong cursed inwardly.

Still, with the main force bogged down here, there was no alternative—Ye Gongmin couldn’t storm in alone.

So he decisively parked the car in the yard, then stepped out with a fire extinguisher in hand, shouting, “Honghong, stay in the car. Let me deal with these bastards first. I promise, I’ll sort this out for you.”

“Thank you, Young Master Ye.”

The fight had begun, and though there were no flashing blades, clubs were swinging and chaos reigned. Ni Feihong huddled in her seat, shielding her head.

“Hey, why are you still in here?” she asked, noticing that Xiao Ma hadn’t gotten out either, but was crouched down, head covered, looking comically timid. It seemed odd—weren’t most men eager to show off in front of her? Yet Xiao Ma was skulking like this?

“You’re one to talk—why don’t you get out first? That’s why I’m staying put.”

It wasn’t that Xiao Ma was afraid of a one-sided brawl, but his body seemed hardwired to play it safe, keeping him glued to his seat…