Golden Scale [EN]: Chapter 126

The Agreement Under the City

“Aren’t you getting ahead of yourself?” Zhang Fujishi knew that Hou Longtao must have come prepared, but he still felt that he lacked the leverage to be so assertive.

“Want to see my trump card? Fine, I’ll lay my cards on the table.” Hou Longtao lit a cigarette. “The catalytic converter will be included as standard equipment in Acura, CR-V, and Gold Wing. Other Honda models will also list it as an optional component. Lexus’s main competitors are Acura and Nissan’s Infiniti. To maintain Lexus’s competitiveness, I believe that in the near future, you will at least list the converter as an optional component.”

“We’ll talk about that in the near future. Besides, even if that day really comes, the emphasis is on ‘optional.’ Toyota will never include the converter in the basic configuration.”

“It’s not necessarily impossible, but I don’t want to wait. I want to know what the future holds right now.” Hou Longtao tapped his chest. “Actually, I have principles. If someone does business with me fairly, I won’t resort to dirty tricks. But if someone tries to cheat me, I’ll make them regret it even more. If you can’t accept my demands willingly, I’ll force you to accept them.”

“Still, aren’t you getting ahead of yourself?”

“Yuzi, did you see that? Do you know why she didn’t kill me? Because I’m their master, haha.” Hou Longtao originally wanted to remain serious, but when he recalled how he had defused the assassination carefully planned by the old Japanese man in front of him, he couldn’t help but laugh triumphantly. “Can you escape the pursuit of the ‘Sakura Allure Ninjas’?”

“You wouldn’t dare!?”

“See? See? Your tone shows that you don’t have any countermeasures.” Hou Longtao curled his lip contemptuously. “However, although killing you would vent my anger, and you deserve it, I’d rather make money from the Japanese. So, if you don’t cooperate, I’ll have a few ‘Allure Ninjas’ testify that you hired someone to kill me. There are records of everything they’ve done for you in the past twenty years. I don’t think you want to spend the rest of your life in prison, do you?”

“Hmph, you’re making it too simple,” Zhang Fujishi gritted his teeth and lit a large cigar. He wasn’t considering how to stop IIC [International Investment Corporation] from lending to Honda; that was clearly irreversible. He was thinking about how to get rid of this annoying Chinese brat. “Regardless of the outcome of the trial, even if I’m found guilty, those women won’t escape. They’ll go to jail too.”

“Are you Japanese? Don’t you know? Ninjas are synonymous with slaves. If I want them to die, they won’t even blink, let alone go to jail. Besides, I have other methods.”

“Let’s hear them.”

“We’re already sure that there’s someone from you inside Honda’s upper management, and we have our suspicions. If I subject him to severe torture, do you think he’ll agree to be a witness? Corporate espionage—not only will you bear criminal responsibility, but Toyota’s reputation will also be greatly affected, right?”

Zhang Fujishi puffed heavily on his cigar, weighing the pros and cons. He had no room to bargain, but if he agreed so easily, who could guarantee that the other party wouldn’t make further demands? Once this kind of thing started, it wouldn’t be easy to stop. “At worst, we’ll go down together. Accepting bribes from Honda, having an improper relationship with your superior Xu Ruyun, and using your position for personal gain to seek exorbitant profits for ‘East Star’—if I’m finished, I’ll drag you down with me.”

The atmosphere upstairs wasn’t relaxed, and downstairs it was even more tense.

The Star and Moon sisters had driven all the servants out of the hall, one guarding the staircase and the other guarding the entrance to the side room, forbidding anyone from entering.

“Twenty years, Mrs. Sakura, you’re glowing. What can I do for you?” Li Hong thought the other party had a secret to discuss and didn’t realize anything was wrong.

“You traitor!” Yuzi suddenly jumped up, lunged across the coffee table separating the two, grabbed the stunned woman, and slapped her five or six times, cursing her with incredibly vicious words as she hit her.

In a matter of seconds, Li Hong’s face was swollen like a pig’s head, and blood was flowing from her mouth and nose. Only then did she think of resisting, but she was a pampered noblewoman in her fifties, while Yuzi was a trained fighter in her prime. Although she blocked a couple of blows, she was still being slapped continuously.

“You slut! Son of a bitch!” Yuzi’s silver teeth were almost grinding to pieces, her eyes were red, and she was swinging her arms like crazy.

“Okay, okay!” Zhiji and Huiji grabbed Yuzi’s arms from the left and right, dragging her back. “If you keep hitting her, you’ll kill her.”

“Let go of me! Let go of me!” Yuzi struggled desperately, kicking Li Hong in the stomach.

“Calm down! Brother Tao told you not to go too far!”

“Hoo… hoo…” Yuzi tried to take deep breaths, adjusting her emotions. “Okay, okay, I won’t hit her then.”

Li Hong knelt on the ground, clutching her abdomen, and raised her tear-streaked face. “What… what… what are you doing?” She wanted to shout, but she couldn’t muster the strength.

“What am I doing? Hehe,” Yuzi laughed in anger, her body still trembling slightly. “Where’s my daughter?”

“Your daughter?”

“Wipe yourself first.” Zhiji threw a few tissues at Li Hong’s face.

“Situ Qingying!” Yuzi took another step forward, clenching her fists.

“How… how do you want me to compensate you?” Li Hong heard the name that hadn’t been mentioned in twenty years and immediately understood that the other party knew she hadn’t fulfilled the agreement. As for how they knew, it didn’t matter.

“Compensate? Hmph, how can you compensate? I just want to know why.”

“I couldn’t find the person you were looking for, but I didn’t want to give up the opportunity to use you. It’s that simple.”

“That simple, that simple…” Yuzi repeated those four words. She saw that Li Hong didn’t even have a hint of remorse on her face, and her lungs were about to explode with anger. But for the sake of her master’s important affairs, today wasn’t the time for her to take revenge. Once everything was settled, she would let her taste the pain of losing a son.

Hou Longtao stood up, paced to the window, and put his hands behind his back. He understood the principle of combining kindness and severity. After slapping someone, you had to help them rub it. “If you agree to my request, Yuzi will give you all the previous records. I can also help you deal with that rat [informant/mole]. Without evidence of your crimes, you don’t have to worry about me bothering you.”

“Such a large business deal can’t be decided by me alone. I can’t do anything if the board of directors doesn’t approve it.”

“That depends on whether you’re sincere about cooperating with me.” Hou Longtao turned around, glaring sternly at Zhang Fujishi. “I’m just asking you to bring forward an inevitable business deal. I don’t know if Honda will bear the cost of the converters themselves, pass it all on to the buyers, or share it proportionally. I don’t care, but you should care. If Toyota only designates the converters as optional, then it will inevitably have to price them separately. You know better than I do what that means. As I see it, whether you can convince the board of directors isn’t a problem at all.”

In the modern market environment, a company’s decisions are often constrained by the decisions of several competitors. How could Zhang Fujishi not know this? “Then why did you have to come and confront me? We would eventually make a decision that benefits you.”

“I’m giving you a lump-sum price.”

“When can you give me the information?”

“When the ‘East Star’ representative signs the contract with you.” Hou Longtao smiled again. Zhang Fujishi had clearly agreed to the deal. “Let’s talk about that rat.”

“Don’t you already know who it is?”

“Let’s not play games anymore. I want to go back to sleep.” Hou Longtao sat back in his chair and spread his arms. “Fang Jie, also known as Quan Zhilang, is the spy planted in Honda. What I want to know now is what exactly he has done for Toyota. I don’t need specific details. Just list the things one by one.”

Zhang Fujishi lowered his head and thought for a while. If he said nothing, the other party wouldn’t let it go. If he said too much, he would get himself involved. He could only find some insignificant things to fob him off. “Fang Jie found out about Honda Hirotoshi and Hirokawa Norio’s tax evasion, which directly led to their arrest.”

“What do those two do?” Hou Longtao was just trying to trick the other party. Apart from a feeling, he had no evidence that Fang Jie was Honda’s mole. He didn’t expect it to be true.

“Honda Hirotoshi is the eldest son of Honda Soichiro [founder of Honda Motor Co.]. The ‘Mugen’ [Japanese motorsport company] he founded is a manufacturer of automotive parts famous worldwide for its design and development of F1 engines.”

“Why? What benefit does this have for Toyota?”

“Weakening the enemy is equivalent to strengthening yourself. Honda’s team’s engines are provided by ‘Mugen’.”

“Their contract amount with Honda is already close to the total revenue in their annual report?”

Zhang Fujishi began to re-examine this opponent whom he had been calculating for a long time but was meeting for the first time. It seemed that he wasn’t just a nobody. “Correct.”

“Okay, what else?” Hou Longtao suddenly noticed that the contempt that had always made him very uncomfortable in the other party’s eyes was gone. Even when he had threatened him just now, he didn’t seem to value himself as much as he did now.

“Honda’s US branch’s financial scandal was revealed to the media by Fang Jie.”

“Hahaha, good, good. I really didn’t expect that my trip to Japan this time was thanks to Fang Jie.” Hou Longtao clapped his hands and stood up. He had already seen that Feng Yun on the side was a little impatient. Anyway, he didn’t need to get to the bottom of Honda’s affairs. “I’ve achieved my purpose here. Let’s say goodbye.”

“Okay,” Zhang Fujishi also stood up. “I hope we can cooperate happily in the future.”

“Hehehe, actually, you didn’t suffer any losses today.” Hou Longtao had already pulled Feng Yun to the door. He turned back again. “Fang Jie was able to keep climbing up in Honda because you deliberately let him have a few deals, but how did you choose him in the first place?”

“Are you constantly adding conditions, aren’t you going back on our agreement?” Zhang Fujishi didn’t want to spread the embarrassing story of how he had initially taken a fancy to the laundry’s deliveryman.

“Whatever, but don’t notify Fang Jie.” Hou Longtao shrugged. He wasn’t particularly interested in this…

Two days later, in the afternoon after work, Fang Jie and several colleagues took the elevator to the parking lot on the second basement level of the Honda Building.

As the group exited the elevator, a woman in a light blue business suit walked out of the stairwell. She had long hair, an outstanding appearance, and walked with measured steps. Her round, upturned buttocks, tightly wrapped in a narrow skirt, swayed as she walked.

“Which department is she from?”

“How would I know? This is such a big company. I don’t know everyone.”

“Go ask.” Several Japanese men were staring.

Fang Jie didn’t have a particularly big reaction. Compared to Ruyun, this woman was a little inferior, and he wasn’t really the kind of man who was particularly lustful. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have left Ruyun.

The woman probably heard the men’s discussion, turned her head, flicked her long hair behind her ear with her hand, and gave them a flirtatious look.

“Hey!” The Japanese men all turned their heads and looked at Fang Jie with envious eyes. “She’s interested in you.”

“Hmph, no way.”

“Hurry up and go chat with her.” The men began to push Fang Jie.

“No, stop it.” Fang Jie pushed away the men’s hands.

“You’re not going for it? Are you even a man? You don’t like men, do you?”

“Don’t talk nonsense.” This sentence immediately hit Fang Jie’s sore spot. Although he knew his colleagues were just joking, he still felt particularly awkward and felt that it was particularly necessary to prove that he liked women.

“That woman’s leaving. If you don’t go, I will.”

“Who says I’m not going?” Fang Jie quickly walked to the woman who had just opened the car door. “Hey, I’m Quan Zhilang, the head of the Honda Credit Department. Which department are you from? I’ve never seen you before.”

“I’m not from your company. I’m just here to do something. You’re the head? Get in the car.” The woman got into the car, looking at Fang Jie very seductively.

“Um…” Fang Jie didn’t expect the other party to be so straightforward. It seemed that she really had taken a fancy to him. “You… you haven’t even told me your name yet.”

“Why do you need to know my name? I’m not going to fall in love with you. After one night, we might never see each other again. What’s the use of knowing my name?” The woman pulled her short skirt up a little, revealing a dazzling section of thigh.

“This…” Fang Jie swallowed. “There has to be a way to address you, right?”

“Hmph, can’t you just call me ‘beauty’?” The woman showed a little impatient expression. “Are you getting in the car or not? Stop being so wishy-washy. If you’re gay, just say so.”

“Who’s gay?” Fang Jie quickly walked to the other side of the car and got in amid a chorus of whistles from his colleagues.

The woman drove the car to a love hotel [hotel designed for sexual encounters] in downtown Tokyo, entering a room with pink wallpaper. In the middle of the room was a heart-shaped bed covered with bright red sheets.

“What are you waiting for?” The woman threw her handbag on the bed and unbuttoned her top, revealing a milky white silk camisole underneath.

“Don’t… shouldn’t we take a shower first?” Fang Jie seemed a little nervous. Of course, it wasn’t his first time renting a room in a hotel with a woman, but he had never met someone as aggressive as this one.

“Are you dirty?” The woman took off her coat, grabbed Fang Jie’s collar, dragged him to the bed, and pushed him down.

“Of course not.” Fang Jie kicked off his shoes and scooted to the center of the bed. “Are you a prostitute?”

“I just like sleeping with strangers.” The woman straddled Fang Jie. “If you’re willing to pay, I don’t mind.”

“How much do you want?” As Fang Jie spoke, he reached out and grabbed the woman’s breasts through her camisole. She was indeed very attractive, especially the seductive expression on her face. It made him want to sleep with her.

“Whatever you want.” The woman grabbed Fang Jie’s wrist and pressed his arms to either side of his head. “Let’s play something exciting. I want to tie your hands to the bed.”

“Okay.” Fang Jie’s breathing began to quicken. It wasn’t that he hadn’t thought of the scene from “Basic Instinct” [erotic thriller film]. The words he spoke were a little insincere, but he didn’t physically resist, allowing the woman to use the strips of cloth she took out of her handbag to tie his hands to the bedposts.

The woman suddenly got off the bed, knelt on the ground, and rested her hands on her knees, bowing her head very respectfully.

“What… what are you doing?” Fang Jie was completely confused. His dick was so hard it was about to explode, but the other party suddenly slammed on the brakes. He couldn’t take it.

The sound of a toilet flushing came from the bathroom.

“How… how is there someone in there?” Fang Jie was shocked.

The bathroom door opened, and Hou Longtao walked out with an unlit cigarette in his mouth, pulling up his zipper as he walked. He looked up and saw the two people in the room, immediately showing a surprised expression. “Mr. Fang? What are you doing here?”

“Hou Longtao?” Fang Jie wasn’t stupid. This was clearly prearranged. He struggled with his wrists, but the woman had tied him very tightly. “What does this mean?”

Hou Longtao sat down on the sofa and scratched his head. “Lust is a knife above the head. That’s an ancestral teaching. You’ve become Japanese, have you forgotten that? But you can die under a peony flower [idiom for a pleasurable death], and be a romantic ghost, right?”

“You… you… what do you mean?”

“Dying without knowing why is perhaps more difficult to accept than death itself, right? But knowing that you died with your eyes open will make me very happy.” Hou Longtao stood up, took out a lighter, and the expression on his face in the firelight was extremely cold.

“How did I offend you? What do you want to do?” Fang Jie didn’t feel particularly afraid because he hadn’t really felt the threat of death.

“Hmph.” Hou Longtao gave Fang Jie a deathly smile, opened the door, and walked out.

The woman got up and began to untie Fang Jie’s pants…

“Brother Tao, Brother Tao.”

“What… what is it?” Hou Longtao sat up, propping himself up with one hand, and rubbed his eyes with the other. “What time is it?”

“It’s not even six.” Zhiji handed the man the glasses that were on the bedside table.

“So early!? Why did you call me?”

“Yuzi is here. She has something important.”

“Just let her wait.” Hou Longtao put his arm around the girl, pulled her into his arms, and lay back down. “Sleep with me a little longer.”

“Brother Tao, it’s about ‘Hua Lang’.”

“What?” Hou Longtao sat up again, put on a robe, and pulled Zhiji out.

As soon as Yuzi, who was waiting in the hall, saw Hou Longtao coming down from upstairs, she immediately knelt down to pay her respects. “Master.”

“What news do you have about ‘Hua Lang’?”

“He was captured by the people of the Sanlian Gang [Taiwanese organized crime group].”

Hou Longtao lowered his head and rubbed his forehead. “How do you know?”

“Although we are a secret organization, in order to avoid unnecessary trouble, we also have people who specialize in collecting information from the underworld, reporting to me every Saturday morning. Today, they reported that the Sanlian Gang had released news, inviting the heads of various major underworld groups to attend the collective funeral of seven members of the Sanlian Gang, where they would disembowel ‘Hua Lang’ during the ceremony and use his head as a sacrifice. I was there with you and Sister Feng Yun when you mentioned ‘Hua Lang’ that day, and I knew he was your friend, so I came to inform you immediately.”

Hou Longtao paced back and forth in the room. “Hua Lang” was supposed to be leaving Japan soon. How did he get caught again? If the news was true, he had been caught for several days, and he might have been tortured half to death. “When is the funeral?”

“Three o’clock next Monday afternoon, at Aoyama Cemetery [famous cemetery in Tokyo].”

“Hoo…” Hou Longtao slumped down on the sofa. “Hua Lang” was in this situation today, ninety percent because of himself. Repaying kindness has always been his principle, but this time it was very different from repaying Auntie Qi. Last time, it was solved by giving some money, but this time the opponent had become the brutal Japanese underworld. If he wanted to repay the favor, he would have to risk his own life. If he called the police, “Hua Lang’s” identity was what it was.

“Whatever you want to do is fine.” Feng Yun walked behind the sofa, massaging the man’s shoulders with both hands.

“Hmph,” Hou Longtao patted his beloved wife’s hand. “Are you coming with me?”

“Is that even a question?”

“I don’t want you to take risks.”

“What’s a risk? I think it’s like playing a game. I won’t get rusty if we do this every now and then.” Feng Yun slowly turned her head, making her neck bones crack. “I don’t want to have to beat you up every once in a while.”

“Hahaha,” Hou Longtao knew that the woman was just helping him make up his mind. “That’s against the law. If we get caught by the Japanese police, we probably won’t be able to return to Beijing.”

“Catch us for what? I believe we acted in self-defense.”

After the two had talked for so long, Yuzi had long understood what they meant. “There’s no need to wait until Monday. We can go directly to the Sanlian Gang’s headquarters. No one outside will know if we kill people there, and the Sanlian Gang won’t seek revenge because they can’t admit that their headquarters was taken over. They can’t afford to lose face.”

Hou Longtao lowered his head and thought for a while. This matter still needed to be planned carefully. “Yuzi, send someone to scout the place first.”

“Yes.”

“How many people are we taking?”

“I’ll bring the Star and Moon sisters, and three or four more people will be enough.” Feng Yun smiled like a flower.

Hou Longtao knew that his beloved wife was highly skilled, but as a husband, he was never at ease. “Just kidding, if you go, I have to go.”

“If you’re going, for your safety, all the ‘Allure Ninjas’ have to go with you.” Yuzi said this ninety percent to protect her master, and ten percent because she still had to rely on this “son-in-law” to contact her long-lost daughter.

“Then there’s no need to discuss this issue anymore. Everyone goes. I’m going to walk in through the front door in a dignified manner and let the Japanese underworld see this Beijing hooligan.” Hou Longtao clenched his fist with high spirits.

In fact, Hou Longtao had two feasible plans for attacking the Sanlian Gang’s headquarters. The first was to send the “Allure Ninjas” in first, as he had done when he was kidnapped last time, to find out where “Hua Lang” was being held, then release their unique incense and easily take the person away. But since they were going to play, they would play it to the fullest and not let the opponent suffer in silence…