Chapter Four: The King of Hell Seeks a Son-in-Law

After agreeing to go back with Liu Hao to meet his boss and help explain things, I quickly realized my decision had been far too impulsive. I felt myself sinking deeper and deeper into this murky business. Xiao Lianshan accompanied me, and ever since we left the hospital, it seemed he trusted me implicitly. At some point, he started calling me “Brother.” In truth, he was older than I was, but as he put it, I was the capable one. Perhaps it had simply been too long since he’d felt a sense of family; when he called me “Brother,” it struck a chord, filling me with an inexpressible warmth and familiarity.

Only on the way did I learn that Liu Hao’s boss was based in the city of Rong in the heart of the land known as Tianfu, and bore the formidable name of Yue Leiting.

When Liu Hao spoke of Yue Leiting, I could see a deep reverence in his eyes. He told me Yue Leiting was a towering figure throughout the southwest. He’d lived on the knife’s edge since the age of fifteen, rising from begging on the streets to a status where both the underworld and the authorities greeted him with respect as “Brother Ting.” He’d earned his reputation the hard way, each of his more than twenty scars a testament to real battles fought.

In the southwest, Yue Leiting’s words often carried more weight than official edicts. Rong City was his stronghold, a domain he had ruled for over thirty years. No one could say for sure how many prisoners were held in the city’s detention centers, but their number was said to wax and wane with Yue Leiting’s mood.

I had never seen Yue Leiting in action, so I couldn’t say just how formidable he truly was. All I knew was that right now, he must want nothing more than to kill me.

Because at this moment, I was standing atop the brand-new Santana sedan he had just bought for his birthday.

In the mid-1980s, a Santana cost around 170,000 yuan—a fortune in an era when being a “ten-thousand-yuan household” was a mark of pride. Anyone who owned a Santana was counted among the city’s wealthiest.

But this sleek black Santana had, ten minutes earlier, been reduced to a wreck by my own hands before a crowd of onlookers. The windshield and side mirrors were smashed to pieces, and the black lacquer on the hood was now a chaotic web of lines etched by the red brick in my hand.

As I caught my breath and finished the last stroke, I looked up to see Xiao Lianshan standing beside me, fists clenched, every muscle tense with vigilance. I guessed he was estimating the car’s worth, but it hardly mattered—neither of us had a penny, and the only way we were leaving today was if someone carried us out.

I caught a glimpse of sweat streaming down Liu Hao’s brow; his hands trembled uncontrollably. He’d traveled all the way from Yuzhou just to surprise his boss on his fiftieth birthday—but the pleasant surprise had yet to materialize, while the shock was right before his eyes.

My gaze finally came to rest on Yue Leiting himself, who had just witnessed my wild destruction of his birthday gift in under ten minutes, standing there in stunned silence.

I imagined Yue Leiting must never have expected that someone would dare smash his car so brazenly on his fiftieth birthday. If there weren’t someone pulling strings behind us, not even ten of me and Xiao Lianshan would have dared such a thing.

If Yue Leiting thought so, then his men surely did as well. And since he didn’t give the order, none of them dared to act, so I was able to finish the job in front of everyone without a single person trying to stop me.

I had no time to explain myself to Yue Leiting. Seeing the clock ticking, I jumped down from the car and strode up to him, red brick still in hand.

“Give me your blood!”

The moment the words left my lips, I saw Yue Leiting’s eye twitch. Beside him, Liu Hao’s Adam’s apple bobbed as his face turned deathly pale.

“Tie them up,” Yue Leiting bellowed, veins bulging in his neck. “Alive—I want to question them!”

A dozen men in black suits drew machetes from behind their backs and rushed us. Xiao Lianshan leapt in front of me. The first attacker had barely raised his arm before Xiao Lianshan seized his wrist, twisting sharply—there was a sickening snap and a blood-curdling scream. His movements were swift, every blow precise and forceful.

As he dodged attacks from all sides, Xiao Lianshan shouted anxiously for me to run. But there were too many; just as he felled the first few, the cold gleam of blades pressed against both our throats.

I watched Yue Leiting approach through the crowd, a knife now in his hand. Given his current status, he no longer needed to dirty his own hands, and his life of luxury had left him portly—his belly so broad he could no longer see his own feet. Yet the hand that gripped the blade was steady as a rock.

Standing before us, Yue Leiting asked coldly, “You want my blood?!”

“Someone wants your life,” I replied, meeting his gaze.

Yue Leiting gave a chilling laugh, the twitch in his eye growing more pronounced. “How many of you are there?”

I didn’t understand his meaning and looked at Xiao Lianshan.

“Just the two of us,” I replied.

“Impressive! Just the two of you, and you dare come straight for my life.” He slapped my face with the flat of his axe, glanced at Xiao Lianshan, and said with icy malice, “Looks like you can fight. Chop off his hand—if you came for my life, I’ll cripple you first.”

The black-suited man beside Xiao Lianshan didn’t hesitate, raising his blade to strike.

Suddenly, I realized Yue Leiting had completely misunderstood—I wanted his blood to save his life, not spill it. I shouted quickly, “Jiaxu, Bingyin, Yihai, Renwu!”

“Stop!” Yue Leiting roared. The falling blade halted just above Xiao Lianshan’s arm. One second later, and his arm would have been on the ground. Even so, Xiao Lianshan didn’t blink; Yue Leiting shot him a glance, a hint of admiration in his eyes.

“Your birthday isn’t today,” I said confidently, “it was yesterday. Your element is fire, specifically mountain fire. This year is your zodiac year, and also a year of great misfortune.”

The secrets of the Four Pillars of Destiny are mysterious indeed. Master Qin once told me never to reveal a person’s birth data lightly, lest someone use it against them. A man like Yue Leiting, who’d lived on the edge, would surely be cautious about such things. I knew that if I spoke his fate aloud, he would understand the gravity.

Yue Leiting appraised me from head to toe. Perhaps he thought, there are people who can divine the Four Pillars by appearance alone, but seeing how young Xiao Lianshan and I were, he doubted I could do it.

Sensing his hesitation, I pressed on, “Someone’s plotting against you. You were born on the fifth day of the third month. One day after is the Waking of Insects. Your fate is Eagle Coiling Snake: a life of daring, snatching food from a tiger’s jaws. Noon was your hour of birth—a time of blazing yang. You have the life of an eagle above and a snake below, yin and yang intertwined. For the first sixty years, you were the eagle biting the snake—dangerous but not deadly, prosperous, with wealth flowing from all sides.”

Yue Leiting’s mouth fell slightly open in surprise.

“Go on,” he said.

“You were destined for sixty good years—a full cycle. But when the cycle ends, yin and yang reverse. Then the snake coils the eagle—a fate of disaster. The eagle, flying high, is bitten by the venomous snake. If I’m right, calamity will befall you!”

I saw Yue Leiting’s hand tremble slightly. Clearly, he’d had his fortune read before, and unless the reader was a charlatan, the verdict would have matched mine. He was startled by how much I knew.

“If I have sixty good years and it’s only been fifty, why do you say today is bad luck?”

“It’s your birth hour,” I replied. “Noon made you; noon will break you.”

“Nonsense! You just said noon is yang and suits me.”

“Yes, but noon is the peak of yang. When yang is at its height, it begins to wane and yin is born. You were born at twelve-thirty—precisely the moment yin and yang switch.”

“So what?”

“Today is the Waking of Insects. Spring thunder rumbles, and spirits stir. Look at your car—painted black, with red and green flowers tied to the mirrors. The car faces west, down a road with no end in sight. But you, born at noon, at the crossroads of yin and yang—the gates of hell open for you. This is your zodiac year, too. Red flowers, black sedan—ghosts laugh, the King of Hell opens his doors to welcome a son-in-law. This is the fatal ‘King of Hell’s Bridegroom’ arrangement. If you ride in this car at noon, you won’t live to see the evening. Someone wants you dead today!”

As I finished, I saw a flicker of panic in Yue Leiting’s eyes, quickly replaced by a disdainful sneer.

“Kid, you’re just a baby, playing at spirits and ghosts. The almanac said today was a good day—that’s why I picked it for my birthday feast. Plenty of weddings, too—black wedding cars everywhere, all decorated with flowers for luck. You call it the King of Hell’s carriage, but nobody’s died riding in one yet.”

I pointed to the car. “What kind of flowers are used on those cars, and what’s tied to yours?”

“It’s our boss’s birthday; we bought a new car and thought roses and pine leaves would be auspicious—roses for celebration, pine for longevity,” a black-suited man said stoutly.

I picked up the smashed bouquet, smiled faintly, and handed it to Yue Leiting. “Take a closer look. Is this really a rose?”

Yue Leiting examined it uncertainly. “If it’s not a rose, what is it?”

I turned the blood-red flower in my hand calmly. “This is a razor flower, also known as the ‘Death Flower.’”

Yue Leiting’s brows creased as he stammered, “Bi… bi an…”

I nodded. “Yes, it’s the legendary flower that grows on the Yellow Springs—the ghostly flower of the underworld. Someone put these on your car’s mirrors, and your car faces west—to send you to your grave. Whoever did this must hate you deeply; even this wasn’t enough, so they added death flowers to lure your soul away.”

I tossed the flower aside and shook the remaining “pine leaves.” “These aren’t pine at all, but locust leaves. Under locust trees, ghosts gather. Whoever wants you dead has gone to great lengths.”

The black-suited man who’d spoken earlier nearly collapsed in terror. Clearly, he had bought the flowers, but had no idea what they really were.

“Boss, I really did buy roses and pine leaves. I don’t know how these got there, I swear!”

I believed him. Arranging a ‘King of Hell’s Bridegroom’ setup, and calculating Yue Leiting’s fate, would require an adept in geomancy and destiny—not a simple thug.

“You said whoever rides this car at noon today will die?” Yue Leiting asked with a cold smile.

I shook my head. “The feng shui has been broken, but your blood is still needed. If you drip blood atop the car, the calamity will be fully dispelled. But now that the time has passed, sitting in the car at noon won’t kill you, but blood will surely be shed.”

Yue Leiting nodded, then turned to the man who bought the flowers. He smiled coldly. “You’re driving my car to the hotel today.”

“Boss, it really wasn’t me!” The man’s legs trembled.

“Whether it was you or not doesn’t matter. If it wasn’t, then you have nothing to fear. If it was, you won’t leave alive.” Yue Leiting patted his shoulder with a chilling smile.

The man, with no choice, drove away in the battered Santana. As he left, I heard Yue Leiting instruct his men, “Follow him. If he dares get out before noon, end him on the spot.”

“My brother saved your life. Everything’s been explained—someone wants you dead. Let us go,” Xiao Lianshan protested, staring Yue Leiting down.

At that moment, I understood why Liu Hao feared Yue Leiting so much. He was a man who’d rather kill three thousand innocents than let a single enemy escape. There was no way he’d let Xiao Lianshan and me go on the strength of a few words. I turned to Xiao Lianshan and said quietly, “Save your strength. He won’t let us go now. If nothing happens to the driver after noon, we’ll be released. If not, we’ll be the ones who pay the price.”