Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
Ye Xuan’s words and the genuine pain on his face shocked the old man.
“What vegetative state? What are you talking about? Child, I’m old, and my ears are no good. I might also have Parkinson’s, so I don’t understand what you’re saying.” The old man quickly composed himself, no longer wanting to talk to Ye Xuan anymore.
He held his dog’s leash and put his fingers in his mouth to whistle.
A middle-aged man ran over from the other side of the road and smiled very humbly at him. “Is something wrong, Mr. Vanderbilt? Do you want to go home?”
He glanced at Ye Xuan and got a strong impression from his mixed-race features and tall figure.
The old man looked at Ye Xuan and originally wanted to make him go away. When he saw the dejection, disbelief, and a bit of hesitation on his face, he changed the words that were almost about to leave his mouth. “Take the dog back home. I’m going to walk some more.”
“Ok, Mr. Vanderbilt.” The middle-aged man was the Vanderbilt family’s housekeeper. He bowed at Ye Xuan before taking the dog home.
Ye Xuan coldly assessed the man’s tailored Armani suit.
He thought to himself with great disdain, Could this lawyer be able to earn all that money with his resume and be able to afford that kind of clothing for even his housekeeper in this tiny and unknown town?
This horrible old lawyer even dared to say that he had no relations with Uncle Gu!
Ye Xuan’s heart was filled with rage. His eyes were about to spurt flames.
Before he came there, he had already used his hacking skills to check this lawyer’s resume. To his surprise, the more he investigated, the more he believed this lawyer was the kind of lawyer Uncle Gu would choose.
He was discreet and cautious. Although he wasn’t famous, he had never made any mistakes.
This was the kind of person that Uncle Gu could trust.
Although he had received enormous benefits from Uncle Gu, he was pretending that he didn’t know him at all.
The old man suddenly smiled when he saw Ye Xuan’s expression. Patting his shoulder, he said, “Young man, don’t be so angry. Anger makes you age and become ill easily. How about you take a walk with this old man, OK?”
Ye Xuan suppressed the dissatisfaction at the bottom of his heart and tersely agreed. He followed the old man and turned onto a tree-lined path in the neighborhood for a stroll
The two men walked to the end of the street but neither spoke.
When they were walking back, the old man finally asked, “Did you say Kevin Ku is in a vegetative state? Who is he? Why did he go into a vegetative state?”
“Since you don’t know him, why should I tell you?” Ye Xuan sneered before looking away. A dozen ideas flashed through his head. He considered how to threaten the old man into talking.
“Haha, it’s fine if you won’t tell me.” The old man walked several steps ahead and said, “My home is here. Where do you live?”
Ye Xuan didn’t tell him. He looked up at the most towering building in the entire town. It was basically a huge castle built on the edge of the town. Not far from the castle was a hill. There was also a blue lake behind the castle.
It bordered a mountain and faced a lake, so this was a place with fairly good Feng Shui.
Ye Xuan sneered again and said, “I’ll come visit you again tomorrow. I hope that you will remember by then.”
He finished speaking and turned to leave without looking back.
The old man quietly looked at Ye Xuan’s back and shook his head. He staggered back home.
…
Ye Xuan returned to the hotel where he was staying in a foul mood. He was too lazy to eat, so he grabbed a pack of beer from the fridge and took it out to the balcony to drink.
Soon after, the entire pack of beer was half-finished. He reeked of alcohol as he sat drunkenly on the balcony and inhaled deeply.
The middle-aged person staying next to him was a field agent from the Huaxia Special Operations Forces.
He had been ordered to follow Ye Xuan for a few days but didn’t notice anything amiss.
No one was following Ye Xuan, and no one was anyone attempting to harm, kidnap, or murder him.
Could they have anticipated it incorrectly?
The person quietly returned to his room and connected to the Huaxia Imperial Nandou Satellite Tracking and Navigation System to send a series of codes back.
The following evening, Ye Xian returned to Mr. Vanderbilt’s residence and ran into him walking his dog.
The old man wasn’t surprised to see Ye Xuan. He smiled and said, “You’ve come back.”
Ye Xuan nodded. His expression was haggard as he walked beside the old man. Practically begging, he said, “Mr. Vanderbilt, I know that Uncle Gu must’ve made an agreement with you. Uncle Gu is in a terrible state right now, and his daughter desperately needs your help. Please don’t tell me you don’t know Kevin Ku again. That makes me feel terrible.”
“I want to ask you, who is Mr. Kevin Ku to you?” The old man stopped in his tracks. Folding his hands behind his back, he looked at Ye Xuan with a solemn expression.
Ye Xuan pressed his lips together and said, “My name is Ye Xuan. I am an orphan Uncle Gu sponsored. I owe him a lot, and I swore to protect the Gus for the rest of my life.”
The old man stared at him pointedly for some time. There was a flash of light in his cloudy eyes before he turned to look at the gradually darkening sky and calmly replied, “I don’t know a Kevin Ku in a vegetative state. The only Kevin I know died seven years ago, so I didn’t lie to you.” As he spoke, he started to walk away.
“What did you say?” Ye Xuan was shocked and enraged. He grabbed the old man’s shoulder to nearly drag him back. “Say that again! You old scammer! If you say such sick-minded things again, be careful or you won’t live to see the sun rise tomorrow!”
He almost lost his mind and attempted to use all his energy to grab the old man’s shoulders.
The old man’s housekeeper saw things were bad. He immediately rushed over from behind them and pushed Ye Xuan away as he warned him, “Come any closer, and I’ll shoot!”
The United States was a country that allowed civilians to carry guns legally.
Ye Xuan retreated, not stubbornly going against this family.
Tamping down the stormy emotions at the bottom of his heart, he said to the old man, “Thank you, I’ll come back tomorrow.” As he spoke, he turned to leave.
He drove his car back with unease and got on the road back to the hotel.
This time, his rental Jeep died not long after he started driving.
Taking out his phone, he wanted to call the car rental company to exchange it for a new one. He discovered that there was no cell signal.
He was stuck, unable to move forward or backward. Walking back in the direction he came would take an hour or two.
Ye Xuan parked on the side of the road. He didn’t see any other cars pass by. He sat and thought for a while. Since he didn’t have anything to do anyway, all he would do was drink beer when he got back. He decided to try to see if he could fix the car himself.
He got out of the car and opened the hood to take a look. He thought there was probably a short circuit.
Finding a spare toolbox in the trunk, he began to examine the circuitry.
The night sky began to grow dark, and the clouds became dense, blocking out the moon and stars.
After spending great effort, Ye Xuan finally fixed the car four hours later.
When he opened up the car, he noticed that the circuits weren’t the only problem. There were also battery issues. The tires also seemed to be punctured.
The road was remote, and there were no traces of people at all. In four hours, he hadn’t seen a single car pass by.
By the time the Jeep was fixed and ready for the road, it was already 1 a.m.
Ye Xuan’s face was smeared with black grease. It was on his body as well. When he returned to the hotel, the doorman almost didn’t let him in.
Ye Xuan had to take out his identification and key card to be let inside.
The Special Ops field agent watching Ye Xuan had returned to the hotel a long time ago.
Ye Xuan’s schedule had been regular the past few days. He always left the hotel and went around the area where the lawyer lived in.
In the first few days, he was planning his route, so he hadn’t spoken with Mr. Vanderbilt.
They began chatting in the past two days, but there didn’t seem to be much progress.
When the agent tracked Ye Xuan the entire way, he didn’t want to be noticed since Ye Xuan was taking a remote road. The agent took another route and returned a few hours before Ye Xuan.
This incident wasn’t the main goal of the Special Ops, so the agent planned to return to his post the next day once he finished writing the investigation report.
Not long after Ye Xuan returned to the hotel room, harsh sirens wailed sounded outside the hotel.
Police cars, ambulances, and fire trucks raced down the road by the hotel and sped towards one direction.
This was a quiet little town. The biggest news was typically someone drunk driving.
The current situation seemed to be extraordinary.
However, most of the people in the hotel were already deeply asleep.
The hotel windows had excellent soundproofing, so people didn’t hear the sirens outside.
It was until daybreak that these people got up from their beds and turned on the TVs to watch the morning news that they finally knew what happened.
“It was learned at 1 a.m. this morning that the residence of the most famous lawyer in our town, Mr. Vanderbilt, suddenly caught fire. The entire mansion was seriously damaged. According to police sources, Mr. Vanderbilt’s entire family, including his two sons, three daughters-in-law, one daughter, one son-in-law, as well as four grandchildren, all perished in the fire. The house was nearly burnt to the ground. The housekeeper and cook were the only ones to survive because they lived in the servant’s quarters 600 feet away from the main residence. The cause of the accident is still under investigation.”
The female news anchor had a solemn face and wore a black suit on set. It was like she was announcing an obituary.
Mr. Vanderbilt had an esteemed reputation in the town of Little Rock, so everyone greatly respected him.
After the news was broadcast, everyone thought the incident was over and treated it like a mere tragic accident and lamented briefly.
Suddenly, the TV station change camera angles once again returned to the nearly burnt-down address of Mr. Vanderbilt’s home. The local sheriff was holding a press conference.
He appeared grim as he spoke into the microphone passed to him. “We just confirmed that the fire at Mr. Vanderbilt’s home was not an accident or natural disaster. It was caused by deliberate human action. There are traces of a high-concentration, volatile gasoline spilled at the scene. There was also a report of someone pestering and issuing threats to Mr. Vanderbilt lately. If you have seen this suspect, please call 911 now, and we will immediately send officers to make the arrest.”
The photo of the TV was none other than a photo of Ye Xuan’s somber face as he unhappily left Mr. Vanderbilt.
The photo looked like it was taken candidly, and the camera angle was from a certain house on the street.
Mr. Vanderbilt’s housekeeper also confirmed that he saw this young man dispute with Mr. Vanderbilt and even said that Mr. Vanderbilt mentioned to him before that this young man had been following him for several days now. He wasn’t sure what he was trying to do.
This time, the American policy was unusually efficient.
Ye Xuan was still asleep and hadn’t got out of bed yet when a group of fully armed police officers kicked open the hotel door and shouted, “Freeze!”
