Golden Scale [EN]: Chapter 152

“Maybe he’s changed,” Er Dezi said, spreading his hands. “We used to be street thugs, squatting by the roadside, smoking, and looking for fights. Look at us now, we’re all upper-class people with status and position. [9+Z+Book+City mobile reading m.9zsc.coom]”

“We don’t call that changing,” Wu Da said, patting Lao Liu’s shoulder. “We call it superficial evolution. Deep down, we’re still those street thugs.”

“Second Brother hit the nail on the head,” Hou Longtao said, pursing his lips and nodding. “It’s easier to change rivers than character, so I highly suspect he’s putting on an act for us. But why? I need something from him, we need something from him, but he really doesn’t need to be nice to us.”

“These are just your subjective assumptions; there’s nothing concrete.” Yu Qian’s position on this matter wasn’t as clear as the others; she wasn’t as quick to assume Tian Donghua was against them.

“Don’t be impatient,” Hou Longtao smiled at the girl, then turned to everyone. “You all know that I later argued with Yu Qian, and she used the police to mess with me, trying to force me to give up Ru Yun and the others.”

Yu Qian pouted, her face looking unhappy, feeling wronged, her long eyelashes fluttering, her eyes turning red.

Hou Longtao got up, walked behind the girl, bent down, and hugged her along with the chair, rubbing his cheek against hers. “I’m not blaming you; I deserved whatever you did to me.”

“Hmph.” Yu Qian ignored the man, but a smile had returned to her face.

“Originally, Yu Qian wanted to directly cut off my lifeline, shut down my purifier business, but Tian Donghua convinced her to just comprehensively crack down on my tertiary industries. Yu Qian told me the reasons Tian Donghua gave her at the time,” Hou Longtao clapped his hands. “Absolutely brilliant! From the stability of the national leadership to my personal psychological activities, everything was analyzed, absolutely brilliant.”

“Actually, you admire him, don’t you?”

Hou Longtao shrugged, not giving a clear answer.

“He helped Yu Qian mess with you so much; isn’t he afraid you’d find out? If he’s acting in front of us, according to you, wouldn’t doing that remove all his disguise? Or was that his ultimate move?”

Hou Longtao slowly paced back and forth. “He superficially helped Yu Qian and secretly helped me. He didn’t offend either side, and both should be grateful to him.”

“How so?”

“Most of Tian Donghua’s analysis was correct. Revoking the administrative order to install the purifier would affect too many interest groups, and the consequences would be far more than just messing with me. For most people, that reason alone would be enough, but Yu Qian is different; she fears neither heaven nor earth; she doesn’t care about harming some intangible interest groups.”

“I fear neither heaven nor earth; I only fear you.”

“Heh heh heh,” Hou Longtao stroked the girl’s cheek. “So, Tian Donghua brought up my background to make a point. He analyzed from a psychological perspective why I would care more about my tertiary industries than the purifier. His analysis was absolutely correct. If the purifier had no room for improvement at the time… But the fact was that the purifier was just getting started; although it was making a lot of money, it hadn’t even developed one-thousandth of its full potential. I could never think it was not as important as the tertiary industries. On the other hand, I didn’t necessarily have to control the underworld in my own name; any of you could take over the entertainment projects. Yu Qian still has a clear sense of what she likes and hates. Her relationship with you is good, and she doesn’t really want to fall out with you, which wouldn’t positively affect my relationship with her. I know this, and Tian Donghua knows it too, so the idea he came up with was actually painless. It did make me uncomfortable, but it didn’t really hurt me.”

“You know, he knows, and only I don’t know?” Yu Qian glanced at her lover. “You’re all smart, and only I’m stupid? You’re just playing with me back and forth?”

“That’s not what I meant. You were in a fit of anger at the time, blinded by rage. And deep down, you definitely didn’t want to really hurt me.”

“Ugh, that’s so disgusting—’blinded by rage,’ ‘deep down’… Why don’t you just die?”

“I’m going to throw up!”

“Wow, you guys are so sappy.”

The whole room started arguing and yelling.

“You guys are so annoying!” Yu Qian’s face turned red, and she turned to look at her lover. “Hmph, I’ll give you credit for that.”

“Stop howling like ghosts and wolves.” Hou Longtao slapped the table, stopping the group of “beasts in human clothing.”

“According to you, Tian Donghua was helping me while fooling me? I don’t believe it,” Yu Qian really had a good relationship with Tian Donghua; after all, they had been friends for eight or nine years. “If his method hadn’t worked, wouldn’t Long have come running to me, and you would have been in terrible pain?”

“I was in pain; I was in pain because you weren’t with me. And no matter what, it was a career that our brothers built up together, so of course I would feel bad.”

“If you ask me, Tian Donghua wasn’t helping Monkey; he was helping Dongxing,” Wu Da answered the first half of the girl’s question.

“Is there a difference between the two?” Yu Qian looked Wu Da up and down. “Brother Tao always says you’re smarter than him.”

“Hey, hey, hey, are you insulting me?” Wu Da pouted at the girl. “He can control Dongxing, but he can never control Stinky Monkey, do you understand?”

“What?”

“Tsk, Stinky Monkey is smarter than you. If Tian Donghua eventually became the owner of Dongxing, would you be surprised that he’s protecting Dongxing now? Of course, he would protect his own property.”

Hou Longtao walked behind Wu Da, pinching his shoulders. “My Second Brother is a smart man. That’s also why Tian Donghua refused the kickbacks in the first place. In his mind, taking those kickbacks would have been a loss.”

“In the end, there’s still no evidence. Give a dog a bad name and hang him [falsely accuse someone to justify punishing them].”

“Too many coincidences stop being coincidences and become inevitable.”

“What coincidences? I didn’t see any coincidences.”

“Okay, okay, keep listening to me. Anyway, my suspicion of Tian Donghua grew stronger and stronger. Although Long was getting closer to him, it wasn’t enough to win his complete trust, because in his eyes, the conflict between me and Long hadn’t reached the point of no return. At that time, I didn’t have a good solution. Later, Yunyun got together with me, and my troubles on the official side disappeared all of a sudden, but the misunderstanding between me and Yu Qian deepened.”

“Is that called a misunderstanding?” Yu Qian glared her beautiful eyes.

“It was beyond my control.”

“Hmph, I won’t hold it against you.”

“She doesn’t hold it against me now, but it was different back then. You also know her relationship with Yunyun; she really hated me. I attacked the person closest to her, creating a rift between them, so she also wanted to attack the person closest to me. Long had the most contact with her, so he naturally became the most suitable candidate.”

“Wasn’t that exactly what you wanted?” Yu Qian stared angrily at the man.

“It did give me an opportunity to make Tian Donghua completely trust Long, but I definitely didn’t want you to be used by Tian Donghua.”

“I wasn’t used by him; it was my idea.”

“How do you break through a seemingly indestructible fortress from the outside? Undermine it from within. He’s been looking for the weak link in our group who might be able to walk the same path as him,” Hou Longtao pointed at Horse Face. “The first person he looked for was you.”

“We’re not done yet.” Yu Qian felt that the man wasn’t answering her question.

“Don’t be impatient.”

“What do you mean the first person he looked for was me? Why me?” Horse Face couldn’t help but ask, hearing himself mentioned again.

“Tian Donghua has a certain understanding of us. Of course, he would first eliminate the impossible candidates. Eldest Brother is straightforward. If he has an opinion of me, he would bring it up to my face regardless of the consequences, and he can’t keep a secret, so Eldest Brother is unusable; Second Brother is cunning and can’t be easily manipulated, so Second Brother is unusable; Third Brother has a complicated family background and has an expert advising him, so he can’t be easily discarded after the matter is done, so Third Brother is unusable; Fifth Brother is muddleheaded all day long, acting like he doesn’t care about the world, and there can’t be any conflict between me and him, so Fifth Brother is unusable; Seventh Brother’s advantage is obvious; he’s been with me the longest and is closest to me. Under normal circumstances, on the surface, his loyalty is unlikely to waver, so Seventh Brother is also unusable.”

“So, that leaves me?”

“Your weakness is obvious; you’re a bit greedy, which can easily be misinterpreted as you being susceptible to bribery.”

“He never looked for me.”

“That’s because he later discovered that your weakness couldn’t really affect our relationship, and he also discovered that Long’s loyalty wasn’t flawless, because we both acted very convincingly in front of him.” Hou Longtao looked at Yu Qian. “Now to answer your question, while Long was trying to gain Tian Donghua’s complete trust, Tian Donghua was also trying his best to win you over. What can make real brothers turn against each other? Face, money, and women. The first two already existed, plus the brotherhood between me and Long was the most unreliable, and I wasn’t very loyal.”

“Are you saying I delivered myself to his door?”

“It was just a coincidence,” Hou Longtao said helplessly. “Of course, Tian Donghua wouldn’t let go of this coincidence, but I believe he must have felt bad when he saw you seducing Long.”

“Tian Donghua had bad intentions towards Fourth Sister-in-law?” Long didn’t know about this before.

“Of course, he did.”

“Hey, hey, hey,” Bao Ding slapped the table. “I’m not interested in your dirty and chaotic relationships; keep going.”

“Okay, okay, okay,” Hou Longtao rolled his eyes at Bao Ding. “It’s fake that Long likes Yu Qian, and it’s also fake that Yu Qian likes Long. Long knows the inside story, but Yu Qian doesn’t. Although I let Long take advantage of this, I’m actually very dissatisfied with her doing this. It’s very dangerous for him to do that; it’s reckless.”

“What could you do if you weren’t satisfied?” Yu Qian’s eyes widened again.

“Of course, I couldn’t do anything. I had to go to Yunyun and Aunt Feng for help. They saved me, helping me persuade my baby to change her mind.”

“How did they persuade her? Just like that?”

“Aren’t you tired of listening to love stories?”

“Okay, okay, she was persuaded, then what?”

“Yu Qian didn’t think Tian Donghua was brewing any conspiracy and wanted to tell him that we had made up. I meant to keep it quiet for the time being and play along. She didn’t agree, so I told her that I also wanted to see if Long could resist temptation. I didn’t tell her that Long was my man, so she would act more realistically. At the same time, I made a bet with her. If Tian Donghua really had no problems, as she said, I would never mention going home again. If Tian Donghua really had problems, she would obediently come home with me, so she wouldn’t be honest with Tian Donghua.”

“What’s this about going home or not?” Everyone was a little confused.

“Sleeping together.”

“Oh, oh, oh.”

“Okay, everything is ready. Yu Qian rushed into Tian Donghua’s office, crying that I had raped her. That was the final blow. The conflict between Long and me rose to an irreconcilable level, and Tian Donghua began to fully reveal his intention to help him get rid of me.”

“Why would Long believe him? If he’s as smart as you say, he wouldn’t consider this.”

“He seized on Long’s loyalty, and he was being loyal to him, and he explained his situation to Long, that he had offended me, helped to bring Long and Yu Qian together, etc. Plus, Long should have been blinded by strong hatred, so it wasn’t a problem for him to gain Long’s trust.”

“Why?” Wu Da scratched his head hard. “There’s something I just can’t figure out. Why? You racked your brains to scheme against him; his goals are good—money, power, women—but you already have all these things. Why are you doing this? You could have eliminated him long ago. Feng Yun and Yu Qian are on your side, and there’s also Uncle Gu’s line. Even if Yu Qian doesn’t want you to really do anything to Tian Donghua, you can just kick him aside. Jia Qi wouldn’t dare to do anything to you, but you’re still messing around with him here. Why?”

“Fighting with the heavens is endless joy; fighting with the earth is endless joy; fighting with people is endless joy.” Long, who hadn’t spoken for a long time, finally opened his mouth. “On the train to Shanghai for the first time, after we finished chatting, I felt like I had heard a sentence that could perfectly describe you. I looked for it for a long time and finally found it in Chairman Mao’s famous quote.”

“Damn, that’s so apt,” Wu Da clapped his hands. “It’s like it was custom-made for him.”

“Why can’t you guys speak Mandarin?” Bao Ding still had one big eye and one small eye, looking confused.

“Our Fourth Brother likes to play mind games with people, treating it as entertainment, understand?”

Hou Longtao stood up again and started strolling around. “Tian Donghua is a rare talent. He received a formal education from a prestigious school and has good economic literacy; he grew up in a family of officials and has a strong sense of how to handle the various complex relationships in China today. He’s smart, he has a brain, he’s a good chess player. Although my body is stronger than his, you should defeat a chess player on the chessboard, not in the boxing ring.”

“Most good chess players, even if they can’t be friends, will respect each other. Why do you have to fight a good chess player to the point of exhaustion?” Yu Qian looked at her lover dissatisfied. “You also said that he’s so capable; can’t you cooperate with him?”

Hou Longtao looked at the girl strangely. “You still think so?”

“You’re the one who gradually lured and forced him to this point.”

Hou Longtao shook his head with a smile. “His way of appearing on the scene destined him to come to this point. No matter how suitable the temperature is, a stone can’t hatch a chicken [some things are fundamentally impossible]. Guess what? He can’t accept your relationship with me; he has never given up trying to take you away from me, and I can’t tolerate him even more.”

“Then what exactly do you want to achieve? You can’t fight him endlessly.”

“Yeah,” Hou Longtao breathed a sigh of relief. “What I want to see most is the expression on Tian Donghua’s face when he thinks he has me under control but suddenly realizes that he has always been played by me. You and Long are both my undercover agents by his side, and I have absolute confidence that I’m always one step ahead of him. But plans can never keep up with changes. When I started playing with Tian Donghua, I didn’t realize that my life was already very rich and colorful, and I didn’t need Tian Donghua to embellish it anymore. My family, brothers, friends, and career—I don’t have time to play with him, especially since I have to pretend to be fierce and cold when I meet you if I don’t solve him, but in my heart, I just want to hold you in my arms.”

Yu Qian stood up; she could see that the man was full of guilt towards her, walked over and hugged his neck, and kissed him.

“Damn, you guys…”

“Stop being so mushy.”

A group of people clamored.

Hou Longtao kissed the girl deeply and held her in front of him. “I’ve been playing with Tian Donghua for so long, and everything that should be in place is in place. As long as he takes action, I can end everything. But he’s been slow to act, and I don’t know what he’s waiting for, or if he just doesn’t have a good solution. I couldn’t wait any longer, so I asked Long to urge him several times.”

“Ouch!” Long slapped his thigh hard.

“What are you doing?” Horse Face, who was sitting next to Long, was startled.

“Last time, Tian Donghua told me that he would take action after your business with the Russian was over. Did I tell you?”

“You did.”

“Oh.” Long breathed a sigh of relief.

“It’s because you told me that I knew you were probably exposed.” Hou Longtao released the girl in his arms, sat back in his chair, and lit a cigarette.

“I’m exposed?” Long’s eyes widened. “How could that be?”

“That day, when I was talking about ‘Infernal Affairs’ [a popular Hong Kong crime film] with Bao Ding, I suddenly understood Tian Donghua’s abnormal behavior. He knew you were an undercover agent, but he wasn’t as stupid as Tony Leung [a character in ‘Infernal Affairs’], or as stupid as the screenwriter of ‘Infernal Affairs.’ He turned around and used you again, telling you a fake plan, and then really executing that fake plan. First, it could paralyze me, making me think he wasn’t a threat. Second, it could prove to me that he trusted you very much, and that everything he told you was the truth. In the future, when he wants you to convey lies to me, I will also think they are the truth.”

The people in the room stretched their necks, leaned their heads, squinted their eyes, and stared at Hou Longtao with a slightly confused look. He said all that very quickly, and it wasn’t easy to digest all at once.

“Why couldn’t he just kill us both in Hong Kong without telling me?”

“First, he knows that if I don’t know it’s a trap, I won’t go to Hong Kong. If I really wanted to enter Hong Kong, I would never appear in the form of attending the opening ceremony of some restaurant. Second,” Hou Longtao held up two fingers, “he couldn’t have forgotten about Yunyun. How could a few third-rate so-called killers be her match? Third, Tian Donghua couldn’t possibly reuse someone like Sha Bi. Fourth, if he just eliminated the two of us from the physical world, he would face a lot of trouble next.”

“I still don’t understand; how did he know Long was your man?”

“I don’t know either,” Hou Longtao shook his head dejectedly. “He won this round. I’ve been thinking about this question all weekend, and I don’t have an answer. I don’t know where my flaw is.”

“Then how can you be sure he saw through Long?” Wu Da rubbed his forehead. “To be honest, the incident in Hong Kong was too accidental. If you consider it in isolation, it doesn’t really explain the problem.”

“Tian Donghua told Long that the time for him to deal with me would be ripe after my transaction with the Russian was completed. At that time, we hadn’t even gone south yet, and he didn’t know about Sha Bi’s existence yet. That Liu Chun also appeared after we went south, so the ripe time that Tian Donghua mentioned was definitely not referring to Hong Kong. The plan in Hong Kong could be implemented at any time, and it had nothing to do with my business with the Russian.”

“That’s true.”

“Do you remember the look in Tian Donghua’s eyes when he looked at Long at the airport before he went to the United States?” Hou Longtao laughed.

“I remember.”

“He was telling me that he looked down on me, just like Yu Qian said.”

“What do you mean?”

“I learned a little about Tian Donghua from the side. He didn’t grow up in a honeypot [sheltered environment].”

“He’s not Jia Qi’s…”

“Yes, that’s right. Even today, a relationship between a man and a woman can end a person’s political life, let alone twenty-five or six years ago. At that time, Jia Qi participated in a cadre’s work-study program and trained in a particularly backward village in Shandong for a year.”

“Going up to the mountains and down to the countryside [a political movement during the Cultural Revolution]?”

“Something like that,” Hou Longtao was amused by Er Dezi. “He got together with a village girl there. Later, when he returned to Beijing, that woman followed him. Guess what?”

“She got pregnant before marriage?”

“Smart. In that era, getting pregnant before marriage was a big crime. Ordinary people might still have a choice; they could get married because of the pregnancy, but Jia Qi couldn’t. His only way out was to send the woman away. Again, in that era, single mothers were very conspicuous, and judging from the later situation, Jia Qi wasn’t a sentimental person. He sent the woman back to her hometown in Shandong and then ignored her. That woman was very honest; she was from the village, so she didn’t cause Old Jia any more trouble.”

“Damn, if it were now, she would have bled him dry.”

“Hmph, that’s true.” Hou Longtao put out his cigarette. “When Tian Donghua was eight years old, it is estimated that his mother’s maternal instinct finally overcame the village girl’s simple honesty…”

“Don’t talk so rudely,” Yu Qian kicked the man under the table. “I met his mother once; she’s a nice person.”

“Okay, okay, Tian Donghua’s mother brought him back to Beijing. After all, he was her own son, and she had a handle on Old Jia, so Old Jia arranged for Tian Donghua to study in Beijing.” Hou Longtao was about to start using his psychological knowledge again… (A golden carp is not a thing in a pond) [someone is out of their element]