"Who is he talking about?" the tiger asked incredulously.
"...Uh, it's Tiezhu, the senior student from the class next to theirs. You've said enough."
"...Your school must be harder to manage than a prison, right?"
"Uh, our school is a school that combines academics and martial arts."
Tiger was somewhat relieved and immediately asked, "By the way, what's your relationship with that Brother Dong from the other day?"
"He's my friend."
"When does he have time? I'd really like to learn a few tricks from him, maybe even formally become his apprentice."
"Well, he might not have much time lately."
The tiger immediately showed a disappointed expression.
To change the subject, I picked up my cup and said to Mr. Gu, "The tea is really good."
Grandpa Gu looked at me with a smile, seemingly aware that what I said wasn't entirely true, but he didn't point it out. He said, "Do you know why I didn't let you use my things to hit people earlier? Those are all antiques; if you broke them, could you afford to pay for them?"
Tiger said, "Master Gu is a hardcore collector!"
Grandpa Gu chuckled and said, "You young people can use the word 'ashes' to sound cool. I can't stand that word. In a few years, Grandpa Gu will be ashes." We all laughed awkwardly.
Suddenly, a strange sound came from somewhere: patter, patter, patter. We all looked around simultaneously, but found nothing. I saw Li Jingshui sitting there motionless, one hand under the table, so I asked him, "Did you do that?"
Li Jingshui placed his hand up, revealing two pieces of iron clutched in his hand, which he was tapping around like clappers. The sound was coming from them. I gave him a wink, and he quickly put them away. Old Master Gu, however, had already seen it and asked Li Jingshui, "What are those pieces of land for?" Li Jingshui made a climbing motion: "This is what we were doing when we came up here..."
I quickly replied, "I found it."
But Master Gu wasn't a tiger. He glared at me, then said to Li Jingshui in a gentle tone, "Can I take a look?"
That piece of iron was the tool Li Jingshui and his men used to climb the wall. Needless to say, it must have been from the Song Dynasty. I suspect it was even used by the Beiwei Army. If this old fogey saw it, he would definitely be exposed.
In a moment of inspiration, I said, "Master Gu!"
"Huh?" He was taken aback by the question.
Do you know what a "listening bottle" is?
Master Gu was indeed very interested: "How come you know about this too?"
"I have one that I'd like to sell. Are you interested?"
He then forgot about what had just happened and asked carefully, "Do you really have it? When will you bring it so I can see it?"
I wiped the sweat from my brow and said, "In the next few days, then—"
...
After leaving Tingfeng Tower, Tiger and I exchanged phone numbers. He's the same age as me, a few months older, but insisted on calling me "Brother Qiang," so I just called him "Brother Tiger." He was very curious about my school and said he definitely wanted to find time to visit.
Liu Xuan's matter has finally come to an end, but another matter has surfaced: who exactly is the one who went to investigate the camp?
Chapter Seventy: Unspoken Rules
I took Li Jingshui and Wei Tiezhu to the motorcycle. Seeing that the two of them looked sullen, I asked, "What's wrong with you two? You fought 12 people and didn't suffer any losses. You've already shown your strength."
Li Jingshui said dejectedly, "We have disobeyed military orders."
Wei Tiezhu said, "We failed to protect you."
“Yes,” Li Jingshui said, looking at the bruises on my face, “and I almost killed someone.”
I looked at the two of them; their injuries were far more severe than mine. Li Jingshui's eyes were swollen, and Wei Tiezhu was coughing incessantly. Out of military dignity, they declined Tiger's help. One was 18, and the other was only 17—almost children by modern standards—yet they were blaming themselves for not protecting me. I couldn't help but feel moved and said to them, "Sit down, I'll take you for a drink."
The two of them exclaimed "Ah!" in unison, "We can't drink!"
"Sit still. What did your Captain Xu say before he left? He said you had to obey my orders during this time. You don't want to break another military order, do you?"
The two fell silent. Li Jingshui knew she was no match for me in a battle of wits; Wei Tiezhu kept pondering the paradox of not being allowed to drink alcohol in the army and obeying my orders during this period.
On the way, I told them not to mention seeing Liu Xuan for the time being. I took them to a bar, where Zhang Qing was standing at the entrance. As soon as he saw the three of us, he laughed and said, "Oh, you went to get into a fight?" I nodded and led the two of them inside, finding some medicine for them to apply. Zhu Gui and Yang Zhi didn't even ask any questions. Murder and arson were commonplace to them, and they couldn't be bothered to mention this minor injury.
Zhang Shun and the Ruan brothers were also there; yesterday, Ni Siyu's father had arranged for them to stay in a boys' dormitory. That's when I noticed Ni Siyu was there too. She was sitting in a corner, holding a bottle of orange juice, sticking out her little tongue at me, and grinning, saying, "I'm here to play!"
I opened a few beers and gave them to Li Jingshui and Wei Tiezhu. I took a bottle for myself, sat down in front of the pretty girl, and asked her with a smile, "Did you learn anything?"
Ni Siyu said, "Teacher Zhang and the others told me to forget everything I had learned before, and to pretend that I couldn't swim. They also told me to recall what you looked like in the water, saying that only by forgetting all the garbage I had learned before could I truly learn a skill."
I said angrily, "Damn it, this is so unfair! Xiaoyu, none of your masters are good people, you should stay away from them."
Looking at the bruises on my face, Ni Siyu smiled and said, "I think you're not a good person at all—you guys went to watch a football match, didn't you?" Ni Siyu lived near the stadium and often saw fans fighting. Today happened to be a match between a Shanghai club and the city's football team.
Zhu Gui chimed in, "What's so interesting about that? Gao Qiu may not be a good person, but he does play better than those other guys."
Just then, Zhang Qing came in carrying a large plastic bucket, excitedly saying, "Brothers, this is good stuff!" I looked and saw that it was the "Three Bowls and You Can't Cross the Hill" that I had filled.
As Zhang Qing spoke, he unscrewed the lid of the bucket and fanned it a few times with his hand, filling the large bar with a faint aroma of alcohol. The lazy thugs immediately stood up and spontaneously gathered around, all shouting, "It's alcohol!" This was infuriating; did they think this huge bar only sold urine?
Zhu Gui ran over with a large stack of tempered glass cups, eagerly pouring wine from the bucket and drinking it. After drinking half a cup, he smacked his lips and said, "The taste is a little off, but it's still passable." He then downed the rest in one gulp and propped the cup up again. Yang Zhi shoved him aside, pouring himself a drink while saying, "Your injury hasn't healed yet, drink less."
Zhang Qing said, "Don't fight over it, sit down, sit down, this bucket is enough for us." He then called out, "You two young men, come on over too." Li Jingshui and Wei Tiezhu weren't used to beer, so they exchanged glances, then looked at me. I said, "Go ahead, you can drink as much as you want today." Firstly, young people love to join in the fun, and secondly, the beer really smelled good; these two had probably been craving it since noon. They ran over excitedly. I thought to myself: Now that's what you call soldiers and bandits in cahoots.
A large group of people sat down, waiting for Zhang Qing to pour the drinks. Zhang Shun suddenly turned around and said, "Xiaoyu, what are you doing? Come and have a drink."