Chapter 23 Part 1

"Stop!"

"Don't run!"

"Hey fugitive up front, you're surrounded by us!" The person who said this was waving a kitchen knife in his hand.

"..."

Ten minutes passed, but this tug-of-war was not over.

The fugitive, Suspect Wang, didn't look impressive, but he was surprisingly good at running, managing to endure these ten life-or-death minutes.

Before returning to the residential area, Suspect Wang had bought some barbecue from a roadside stall. Now, he could only throw it away as he ran.

As Lu Yan and Xiao Heng were running, a skewer of grilled pork belly flew towards them.

Lu Yan tilted his head to dodge the incoming grilled pork belly: "He even has hidden weapons?"

Xiao Heng vaulted over the seat of a small electric scooter parked on the roadside, too lazy to go around it: "...Fuck."

Xiao Heng was very annoyed: "How can he run so fast."

Lu Yan said: "People can always perform at an extraordinary level under unexpected circumstances."

Zhang Xiaohui, panting heavily, couldn't speak properly: "Ha, slow... slow down, you two brothers, I... I can't go on."

In the pitch-black night, the streetlights shone down on a large group of enthusiastic citizens running wildly through the streets of the Lower District for a hundred thousand yuan.

The large group of over fifty people gradually dispersed. Some who really couldn't keep up collapsed from exhaustion, bending over and clutching their stomachs on the roadside.

The street layout in the Lower District was strange, with lots of winding and twisting paths.

Suspect Wang had been around for years and was no pushover. Just as Brother Wei was about to grab his collar—Suspect Wang threw the remaining few skewers of barbecue at his head. While Brother Wei was caught off guard, he turned and ducked into a nearby family's courtyard, stepping on a vegetable jar to vault over the wall. Lu Yan chased after him, only managing to catch a glimpse of Suspect Wang's clothes.

Lu Yan said in surprise: "He got away?"

Brother Wei: "Damn it!"

After speaking, Brother Wei lifted the hem of his shirt and took it off, revealing his firm pectoral muscles and toned body. His eyes were incredibly determined, as if a fire was burning within them: "I know this area so well I could fucking walk it with my eyes closed. Let's see where you can run. Squad 63, let's go!"

"Climb over?" Xiao Heng asked, looking at the wall.

To ward off thieves, the family had embedded countless glass shards into the top of the wall when it was built. They jutted out like jagged teeth, thin and sharp as needles. This was a common practice for these old rural buildings.

"..." Lu Yan was covered in sweat from running. He sighed and said, "Let's climb."

Xiao Heng vaulted over in a few swift movements.

He was tall, so that wall was nothing to him. As he jumped down, the hem of his shirt was lifted by the wind. Lu Yan watched Xiao Heng's back as he climbed the wall, thinking, 'This guy is so fucking pretentious even when climbing a wall.'

'Is he climbing a wall or trying to look cool?'

'Wait, cool?'

'What am I thinking.'

Lu Yan placed one foot on the vegetable jar, his hand right next to the sharp glass shards.

...

Five seconds passed.

Ten seconds passed.

Lu Yan was still squatting on top of that wall.

Xiao Heng looked at him and said: "Aren't your legs pretty long."

"Scared to jump?"

But actually, looking at Lu Yan's expression, Xiao Heng felt it wasn't that he was scared to jump, but more like he had remembered something and frozen on the spot.

Lu Yan pulled his hand back slightly. He hadn't actually touched the broken glass; when Suspect Wang and Brother Wei jumped down, their steel-like bodies had already cleared a path. Besides, his entire hand was hidden in his sleeve, the fabric covering his palm.

Lu Yan snapped back to his senses, just about to say: You're the one who's fucking scared!

However, Xiao Heng let out a low chuckle, different from his usual sneer. There was no disdain or mockery. He said: "Go on and jump. It's fine, this wall isn't high."

Lu Yan took a deep breath and leaped down from the wall.

For a desperate fugitive, ten seconds was enough time to run several dozen meters and turn a corner. By the time Lu Yan jumped down from the wall, Brother Wei and Suspect Wang were nowhere in sight. Just then, Lu Yan's phone vibrated twice.

"Brother Wei?"

The sound of wind accompanied Brother Wei's voice as he spoke on the phone while running: "You two, stop following! Hurry and run towards the Seventh District! You know that dead end next to our residential area, right? Go squat there. Zhang Xiaohui and I are herding him towards that dead end... We'll coordinate from inside and out, pull off an ambush tactic, and take the fugitive down in one fell swoop!"

This night was destined to be anything but peaceful.

Lu Yan squatted on the lid of a large trash can in the dead-end alley. In front of him was the Seventh District. From this angle, he could just see their dilapidated building. Stone brick walls surrounded him, and the young master stood beside the trash can.

The scene was quite bizarre.

Not only had Lu Yan never imagined that one day he would be up late at night in this godforsaken place setting an ambush, but everything that had happened tonight had also completely upended Xiao Heng's understanding of the world.

"You guys," Xiao Heng said, "do you do this often?"

Lu Yan: "Not really. Usually, at most, we'd go participate in some sort of big-stomach eating contest, the kind where you can eat your fill for free. It's held every two years, and it hasn't started this year. If you're interested—"

Xiao Heng: "I'm not interested."

After observing the surroundings, Lu Yan spoke again: "Will this ambush of ours work?"

"It will," Xiao Heng was very calm, "As long as you don't run later."

"Fuck."

Lu Yan said: "We're never going to get past this, are we."

Xiao Heng: "Getting past it might be a bit difficult. The way you ran that day—"

Talking about this was just asking for trouble. Lu Yan promptly cut the topic short: "Alright, shut up."

"Whoever runs is a dog."

"I can definitely win this time!"

"If I run, I'll kneel and call you Dad."

Lu Yan made a few vicious oaths under the moonlight, finally concluding: "Later, I'll let you witness what real strength is."

By now, more than twenty minutes had passed since the fugitive Suspect Wang was first chased by over fifty people.

He had shaken off most of them, but there were two tails behind him that he just couldn't lose.

Brother Wei clung on relentlessly: "Give up resisting! Evil can never triumph over good. Surrender is your only way out!"

It was a miracle that Zhang Xiaohui could hold on this long with Brother Wei. His throat felt like it was smoking, and out of the smoke came a line from a movie: "You had no choice before, but now you can choose to be a good person!"

Fugitive: "..."

The voices carried into the dead-end alley.

Lu Yan and Xiao Heng looked at each other, once again seeing a certain message in each other's eyes: "I'll count to three."

"Three."

"Two."

"One!"

This time, Lu Yan did what he said he would. The moment the fugitive was herded into the dead end by Brother Wei, Lu Yan jumped down from the trash can lid—his position was perfectly in the fugitive's blind spot, using a protruding part of the wall to hide himself in the pitch-black alley.

His timing for the jump was incredibly precise. He pounced directly onto the fugitive, hooking an arm around his neck in a clean and decisive chokehold!

Fast! Ruthless! Accurate!

A direct hit to a vital point.

This series of actions left Xiao Heng, who was standing at the side, stunned.

'He really did it.'

Brother Wei, who was right behind the fugitive, couldn't help but shout when he saw this scene: "Brother Yan is awesome!"

Lu Yan's entire person exuded a murderous aura.

To be a qualified ambusher, he had specially put on the hood of his hoodie. The hood perfectly covered half of his face, revealing only a few stray strands of hair, a cool and high-bridged nose, and ruthless thin lips.

...

Very fierce.

However, in the blink of an eye, the situation reversed.

The fugitive suddenly exerted his strength. The two scuffled for a moment, not even lasting three rounds, and the next second—Lu Yan was sent flying.