Qin Shi Huang suddenly said, "That's right, let me ask you, what happened to my Great Qin in the end?"
Liu Bang immediately became nervous, and I was speechless. Baozi tapped the plate of peanuts with his chopsticks: "Eat, eat, we'll talk about your games later."
After dinner, we proceeded as planned. Xiang Yu and I got out, and as he opened the car door, he said, "Shall we go straight to Futai Road?"
"Let's... go there first." I originally wanted to take him directly to "Zhongda International," but going to Futai Road wasn't to save money. It was just that I suddenly realized that to dress Xiang Yu up as a young man in his early twenties, I'd need a lot of props, and these odds and ends could only be found on Futai Road. You can't expect clothes bought from a place where socks cost over 300 yuan to make you look young.
We parked the car at the intersection of Futai Road. I led him into a sportswear store first, and as soon as we entered, I grabbed a turban and threw it into Xiang Yu's arms: "Put this on."
Seeing that I was a big customer without even asking the price, the shop owner hurriedly ran out from behind the counter, bowing and smiling obsequiously, and asked me, "Just let me know what you need. If the outside stock isn't complete, I'll go inside to find it."
I pointed at Xiang Yu with a cigarette in my mouth and said to him, "If you just make my friend look ten years younger, the price is negotiable. My idea is to make him look like a rapper."
The boss rested his chin on his hand, sized up Xiang Yu, and slapped his forehead, saying, "He's absolutely perfect for rap."
I exhaled a puff of smoke: "Then you figure it out yourself. Do you even have one that big?"
The shopkeeper squeezed behind the counter and said, "You're lucky. I just got a batch of American goods here, for black guys. They're definitely big enough."
I laughed: "Stop talking nonsense, this isn't a sex shop."
The shopkeeper chuckled and offered an extra-large T-shirt with an 18th-century European general printed on it: "Napoleon, is that alright?"
Xiang Yu asked, "Who is Napoleon?"
"It's the French version of you," I told the shop owner. "Change it, it's bad luck."
The shopkeeper then presented another item to me, which made me angry, and I said, "I told you to get something auspicious, look for yourself!"
The shopkeeper took one look and saw it was Saddam Hussein, so he sheepishly put it away. This time, he looked around first and picked out one with an image of Osama bin Laden, saying, "How about this one?"
"Do you have any politically insensitive people? Do you have any like Fan Wei?"
"This... you can have it custom-made."
I rummaged through his clothes and finally picked out a milky-white garment with a bat painted on the back, then tossed it to Xiang Yu: "Put this on."
"What kind of pants would suit you?" I asked the shopkeeper.
The shopkeeper brought out a curtain and said, "This is a treasured item that I've kept for a long time. My wife made it herself, stitch by stitch. I was even planning to give it to Yao Ming. Since you need it, I'll give it to you first."
"Why did you give me the curtains when I asked you to get my pants?"
The shopkeeper shook open the curtain, and I realized it was actually a pair of lantern pants. He held the waistband up to his head, and the pant legs were dangling to the ground.
I excitedly snatched it and compared it to Xiang Yu's waist; it fit perfectly. I said, "Just put it on like this, no need to change."
Xiang Yu changed his pants, and I continued searching around. Because his feet were too big and shoes were hard to find, he only had one pair of sneakers to wear outside; he usually wore flip-flops at home. The shopkeeper quickly understood what I meant and said, "Shoes are indeed hard to find." I immediately spotted a pair of sailboat-shaped shoes in his cabinet—it was an advertising concept for a certain sneaker brand, with a flying carpet underneath to represent "the feeling of flying." I said, "Give me those."
The shopkeeper said with a bitter face, "I can give it to you, but you have to buy the flying carpet as well."
When Xiang Yu was dressed up, he wore a headscarf, a white batwing shirt, and smooth, white-painted curtain-style trousers, with medieval Arabian sailing shoes on his feet. But something just didn't look right. Why didn't he look like a rapper at all? The effect I wanted was that youthful energy like Wang Jing and her group, but why did Xiang Yu look more like a railway guerrilla fighter?
My boss and I stood side by side, sizing each other up. I asked him, "Do you feel awkward?"
The boss actually had the audacity to say, "It's awkward!"
I said, "It seems like something's missing."
The shop owner clapped his hands: "A chain! We're missing a chain. How can a rapper not wear a chain?"
I immediately realized: "That's right, do you have any here?"
"Over there, there are all sorts of messy little things."
I paid and led Xiang Yu to the other side. There were quite a few people there, mostly young hipsters, picking and choosing necklaces and rings from the cardboard boxes. I said to the female shop owner, "Do you have any chains? The kind you wear around your neck."
The shop owner pointed to a wall, and I saw it was full of them. She randomly picked up a few chains and tried them on Xiang Yu's neck, but the thin chains didn't look right on his massive frame. I looked around and saw a thick gold chain piled up in the corner of the counter. I picked it up and put it on Xiang Yu; it looked much better. I asked the shop owner, "How much is this?"
The female boss looked troubled and hesitated for a long time before finally speaking.
I said, "Don't worry, money is not a problem."
The female boss then said, "Money isn't the issue, but what am I going to use to leash my dog if you buy it?" Oh, it's a dog leash. Upon hearing this, Xiang Yu immediately tried to pull it off, but I quickly grabbed him and said, "Brother Yu, for your wife's sake, please bear with it." He then stopped.
I looked at Xiang Yu again. With this dog leash, he definitely had a bit of a rapper vibe, but he still looked a bit plain. I brought over two plates and put everything wearable on Xiang Yu: ten stone rings, a few bracelets, and then I pulled out a huge ring and put it on Xiang Yu's ear. The female shopkeeper said irritably, "Are you deliberately making things inconvenient for me? That's my cabinet door handle."
Finally, I picked out the biggest earring and used it as a nose ring for Xiang Yu. Taking a step back to look, Xiang Yu was wearing baggy trousers, a copper-plated chain, and a doorknob hanging from his ear—he looked exactly like the illegitimate son of some Arab oil tycoon.
I said, "Let's leave it at that for now. After all, my sister-in-law is studying dance, so maybe this is right up her alley—boss, check please."
As we walked back after finishing our errands, just as we reached the intersection of Futai Road, a drunkard came towards us carrying a bottle. He stumbled, the bottle slipped from his hand and shattered, then he looked up and saw Xiang Yu. He immediately knelt down, tears streaming down his face, and cried, "Are you Aladdin's lamp? How did you get sealed inside this bottle?"
I was greatly provoked, and I grabbed Xiang Yu and left, while the drunkard shouted from behind, "Hey, you haven't fulfilled my three requests yet—"
Back in the car, I sighed and said, "Brother Yu, it seems being a rapper isn't for you. Just throw away all that trash."
Xiang Yu brushed the bits of trash off his head and asked, "Where are we going?"
"I'll drive. Let's find a hair salon to get you fixed up first."
I've only just realized that dressing Xiang Yu as a 20-year-old is no less difficult than modifying a Geely into a BMW. The appearance isn't the challenge; the real difficulty lies in getting the Geely to reach 300 mph. Xiang Yu's profound and dignified aura simply cannot be concealed, nor does he intend to.
I drove aimlessly, and as we passed a dark street, the women from the hair salons on both sides of the street were posing seductively behind their dimly lit glass doors. Some even suddenly lifted their miniskirts to their navels, revealing various pubic areas. Xiang Yu, who did recognize the word "hairdressing," asked me, "Why don't we get it done here?"
"Nongnong?" I looked at him with a smile. Xiang Yu glanced at the young ladies and immediately understood what kind of place this was. He said, "Let's go."
I said, "Brother Yu, there's a saying, 'A hero's true colors.' Heroes are supposed to be lecherous, so there's nothing wrong with 'doing it'."