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Volume 1: Case 502 — The Intoxicated Frozen Corpse
Chapter 22
Yan Xie felt that in the eyes of the drug traffickers, he was probably a horny dog
Edited by Beth
The ten thousand thoughts in Yan Xie’s heart coalesced into two words— you motherfucker.
However, he was destined to not be given the opportunity to express these words. As the reason was, right at this moment, the door to the room was once again opened, and the two lackeys respectfully welcomed a thin, middle-aged man inside.
Yan Xie caught a movement out of the corner of his eye. It was the fatty subtly nodding at him.
“This is our boss, Zong-ge.” The red-headed man pointed. “Zong-ge, this is—”
Yan Xie spoke up gracefully, “There’s no need for introductions, I’ll leave once I have the goods. If not for the Hu fellow having gone to jail, I wouldn’t need to make this trip myself. Coming here from the northern zone is so troublesome.”
“Oh, you’re Old Hu’s friend?” Zong-ge’s face, at first looking reticent and reserved, relaxed. “Aiyah, you should have just said so earlier, many apologies for the neglect— look at how the two of you handle things! You even dare offend an old time customer!”
He then gave the red-haired man a slap.
This slap looked very impressive, but actually amounted to nothing. The red-haired man only smiled sheepishly, and Yan Xie hurriedly put on a show and stopped any further hits.
“To be honest, Old Hu has been getting his stock from me for quite some time already. He’s a good man, just that he’s a little unlucky,” Zong-ge sighed. “Ai, in these times, it isn’t easy to run any business. Regulations are tight, and we’re kept on our toes the entire time. If not for Fatty Bro and Old Hu, I also wouldn’t dare to easily accept a new customer like you!”
“Hai, exactly!” Yan Xie gestured, and he spoke in a casual tone, “I also don’t understand. With a salary of 10000RMB, it’s hard for the police to even support their family. Yet they still keep giving us so much trouble, do they just have too much free time? The amount of money I spend buying a bottle of liquor can cover their salary for half a year already!”
Zong-ge laughed loudly. Just like what he saw in the CCTV just now, this rich kid was truly simple-minded.
The two exchanged more small talk. Casually, Yan Xie revealed everything about the locations of where he collected the goods from Hu Weisheng, to the price he paid, as well as the quality. Zong-ge listened, clicking his tongue in amazement, and was even more satisfied by how brainless this rich kid was. As such, he took the initiative to offer, “Since you’ve already done so many deals with Old Hu, then on my own accord, I’ll give up some profits, and provide you a 5% discount. Don’t worry about the purity of the goods, I’m Old Hu’s supplier, and mine will never be worse than his.”
Exactly at the right time, Jiang Ting yawned, starting to look around impatiently.
Jiang Ting had interrogated many drug addicts, and he was able to imitate their behaviour of craving for a fix perfectly. Even an ‘insider’ wouldn’t see anything wrong with his acting. Zong-ge had wanted to say something, only to laugh aloud when he saw this. “Fine fine fine, I’ll let you two try the goods first.”
Yan Xie became a little more wary.
He watched Zong-ge hold his hand out. The red-headed man immediately understood. From the inner pocket of his jacket, he took out an opaque waterproof ziplock bag. Inside the bag was unexpectedly a blister pack.
— they seemed like capsules?
Were these the fake smart drugs Hu Weisheng had sold to the deceased Feng Yuguang?
Yan Xie’s breath was momentarily caught. However, when the red-headed man released the pills from the blister pack, they were white capsules — not the red adderall!
Chuckling, Zong-ge had a piece of tinfoil in his hand. “It’s not that I’m bragging, but when I do business, I only deal with the real stuff. Unlike those ‘retailers’ out there, we don’t add any glucose or pulverised lime whatnot as fillers. Come on bro, try it here, I guarantee that you’ll agree with me as well.”
Yan Xie watched Zong-ge prepare the drugs, his brain working quickly. He suddenly called out, “Wait!”
Zong-ge’s movements paused.
The room was dead silent. The walls had blocked out most of the rock music playing outside, while the strong rhythmic beats pulsed through the air. A few pairs of eyes were directed at Yan Xie simultaneously; Fatty’s anxiety, the red-headed man’s confusion, and Zong-ge’s extremely concealed bewilderment and suspicions were all playing out in their gazes. The few seconds suddenly seemed to drag on for years.
“…” Yan Xie slowly leant back into his seat. With an atypical expression of focus, he smiled. “Zong-ge, Long-ge might have not explained it clearly to you just now. I still have a lot of heroin at home, and it doesn’t matter if I get it today or not. I came here, because Old Hu said that you have something new.”
Such face-to-face interactions were much more challenging to one’s acting ability as compared to the Brokeback Mountain romance that happened downstairs a while ago.
Without having to look, Yan Xie could already feel that the uncomfortably thin Zong-ge was shooting a very sharp gaze from under his drooping eyelids.
Those eyes were sharpened by suspicions and confusion, peeling the skin off this idiot rich kid layer by layer. It seemed as though he was trying to reach his brain and dig out something from it.
“Something new,” Zong-ge repeated, as if deep in thought. He then smiled, and asked in reply, “What do you mean by something new?”
Yan Xie only had one thought — the blue powder!
That slightly sparkling, crystalline blue powder was like a spirit that came from the ocean, silently encroaching into Jianning, steadily infiltrating the underground of this huge city, until Hu Weisheng revealed an inkling of its existence on the rooftop.
No one knew its structural formula, and no one knew where it came from. The anti-drug enforcement, shouldering a heavy burden, could do nothing about it.
The one person who possibly had any understanding of it was currently in this room.
Yan Xie’s heart jerked. He lowered his gaze and met Jiang Ting’s eyes in a flash.
Extremely subtly, Jiang Ting shook his head at him.
“…” Yan Xie looked up, smiling. “Hai, seeing that we’re getting along so well, I won’t beat around the bush anymore.”
The drug trafficker watched him closely.
“It’s that red one, the one they say you’ll do well in your exams after taking it. Old Hu had recommended it to me a few times.” Yan Xie scratched his nose, laughing. “Of course, I’m not the one taking it. It’s just that Old Hu says this drug is good as gifts for female students.”
The moment he finished, Zong-ge snorted.
The snort quickly changed into an uncontrollable laughter.
“I knew it, this Old Hu, really, hahahaha—”
The two lackeys in the room also laughed along with him in accompaniment. Fatty, whose forehead was covered with sweat, did not understand what was going on. With a stiff face, he chuckled foolishly as well. Instantly, the entire room was filled with a happy atmosphere of relief. Zong-ge slapped his thigh, laughing, “Yes, yes, of course I have it hahahaha— Old Hu is really something, how ingenious! …”
Yan Xie laughed along as well, as he heard a thud inside him.
That was his heart crashing back down.
“Bro, I never expected that you’ll be the sort to have so many dalliances, and both genders at the same time as well!” Zong-ge squinted at Yan Xie, his tone filthy and indecent. “Good, you have ambition, no wonder Old Hu tells you everything — hahahahahaha!”
Yan Xie knew that in the eyes of the drug trafficker, he already was an unscrupulous horny dog who went for both genders. Quirking his lips, he laughed drily, “Yes, yes. In life, we must always seize the day.”
Reaching over the table, Zong-ge rubbed Yan Xie’s shoulder and raised his thumb.
“Price is not an issue.” Yan Xie patted the stack of cash in front of him. “I might not have brought enough with me, but my car is parked downstairs, and I still have more in the trunk…”
Unexpectedly, it was Zong-ge who interrupted him. “No hurry, no hurry, we haven’t finished testing out this one yet.”
Yan Xie froze slightly.
“You said you’ve purchased heroin from Old Hu before, but Old Hu’s quality is much poorer than mine. Also, don’t be in such a rush to get the new goods, you have to try out how good my heroin is, and only then can we continue discussing any business — If not, everyone can just come here looking. Even if I have channels, as well as new, fresh goods, they wouldn’t be enough for me to sell, right?”
Zong-ge’s words were very affable, but his actions gave people no leeway at all. He took the capsules from the red-headed man and placed them on the tinfoil, handing them over to Yan Xie with a smile.
For anti-drug officers to work undercover, other than having extraordinary courage, be extremely meticulous, and remarkable cautiousness, they also needed to face a very special challenge — taking drugs.
Or rather, pretending to take drugs.
Yan Xie looked at the two capsules lying quietly on the tinfoil, with many thoughts flashing randomly through his head. Such as the undercover officers who were completely destroyed due to becoming addicted to drugs, the regular posts on the intranet announcing the double-agent civil servants that had been corrupted by drug traffickers, the visits to the drug rehabilitation centres which were arranged by the police academy when he was a student, an unshaven old man that seemed neither dead nor alive, looking out from solitary confinement. He was hugging his knees, and no matter what, refused to turn his head around. The instructor quietly told them that he was once an Anti-Drug Officer, who had received many commendations…
However, to others, Yan Xie’s expression looked just like normal, his panic not even revealed by an extraneous blink or two.
“Zong-ge’s goods are very pure, do I even need to test them?” Yan Xie paused, then accepted the tinfoil, smiling, “Well, if you insist.”
Very quickly, a cold hand reached out and grabbed him.
Jiang Ting poked his head out from Yan Xie’s embrace. He seemed very groggy, the epitome of weariness and listlessness.
His eyes were wandering and unfocused, glistening under the warm lighting. The tips of his brows were tilted down slightly, exuding an indescribable charm, looking like a debauched yet peculiar bloom. His actions were very gentle as well, but they could not be refused. Jiang Ting took the tinfoil from Yan Xie, his long, slender fingers pulling the capsules apart and tipping the powder out. Completely ignoring the eyes of the people around him, he rolled up the tinfoil and placed it in front of his nostril. Pressing down on the other nostril with a finger, he took an intoxicated and jaded sniff.
All this happened right in front of Yan Xie, and his pupils immediately shrunk to the sizes of pin pricks.
“…”
Jiang Ting casually tossed the empty tinfoil at Zong-ge, then bonelessly fell back into Yan Xie’s arms.
He took it?!
What was going on?!
Then what should they do now?!
This was the most anxious ten seconds of Yan Xie’s life. There was even a moment when he could not control the muscles of his face, and exposed an expression that could be called fright.
Yes, fright.
Having been a police officer for so many years, the more drug traffickers he caught, and the more he understood about drugs, the more he could not control his fear and loathing towards heroin. It was also because of his awareness of his own cowardice, he knew that as a real undercover anti-drug officer, Jiang Ting’s understanding definitely surpassed his understanding, and so he would only be more unyielding towards drugs.
The best cop who truly fought against drugs would know that the fear the heroin-demon brought was unconquerable. Scorning this enemy, this sort of behaviour completely did not exist.
However, it was this fear, this terror, that would protect them from falling into the bottomless abyss on their missions.
“…” Yan Xie’s lips moved slightly.
Zong-ge seemed to be smiling and saying something, perhaps making a joke, as well as bragging endlessly. Fatty put in great effort in going along with him, trying to divert the drug trafficker’s attention.
However, these clamorous background noises suddenly become very indistinct to Yan Xie.
“Hmm—” Jiang Ting abruptly closed his mouth, sitting up as he mumbled, “It’s hot.”
Zong-ge laughed, “Good stuff is like this. It’s different from the one Old Hu sells, right? Just wait here for a while, you should wait for the effects to dissipate. Come, Bro, you should have a cigarette. Help him prepare…”
Yan Xie bent over and lifted Jiang Ting in his arms. He accepted the hand-rolled cigarette Zong-ge held out to him, tucking it behind his ear as he gave a roguish smile. “Sure. Let me make a trip to the washroom.”
He then shot a look at Fatty. Ignoring whatever reaction the drug trafficker had, he went straight into the attached washroom under the laughters and jeers of the two lackeys, and closed the door.
Bang!
Yan Xie did not pause at all. He turned out the tap, then flushed the toilet. Under the cover provided by these two sounds, he held Jiang Ting up against the wall, exclaiming quietly, “Are you crazy?!”
However, Jiang Ting was strangely calm. He held his palm out. “Calm down.”
Yan Xie looked down.
— Only to see that the left hand Jiang Ting had used to press down on his nose, the section of his palm closest to the tinfoil, was actually covered with a white powder, the drug!
Yan Xie released his tight grip on Jiang Ting, and collapsed without a sound. He crouched on the ground, hugging his head and exhaled slowly.
Jiang Ting: “…”
Jiang Ting was not sure what he was doing, and only bent down a little after a moment of hesitation. Pushing at Yan Xie, he asked, “Are you alright?”
“… No.” Yan Xie looked up. His expression was impersonal, and he even looked as though he was about to start philosophising. He sniffed, “I was nearly scared into softening by you.”
Jiang Ting frowned. “I’m… sorry?”
“It’s not that softening, it’s the softening of the entire body, not the sort that I wouldn’t be able to get hard again… Fuck, what the fuck am I saying?” Yan Xie forced himself out of this status where he kept babbling nonsense. Mumbling a vulgarity, he finally calmed down. “There’s not much time left, hurry up and leave this place. At the end of Sanchun Lane, outside the back door of the club, there’s a Grand Cherokee, the car plate number triple 1. Call the police there, or you can just look for a phone booth and call the police as well. I’ll hold them off, we definitely must make them take out the ‘blue stuff’. Inform the group on standby to burst in immediately after five minutes! Force the doors open! Remember, you must get the timing perfect, hurry!”
The toilet was in the corner of the building, and had a small ventilation window. The width only allowed for people of Jiang Ting’s size to barely crawl through, and then from the second floor, he could land on the trash cans behind the back door of the club.
Yan Xie spat a couple of times on his palm. About to stand up and remove the window, he was suddenly grabbed by Jiang Ting.
“What’s wrong?”
“…”
Jiang Ting seemed to be considering something. Yan Xie shot him a look to tell him to hurry up, and not waste time.
“Vice-Captain Yan,” Jiang Ting spoke slowly, as though every word had to be pondered over before he said it. “There’s something that I need to tell you.”
Yan Xie: “?”
“With regards to the objective of your mission, that light blue crystalline form of the new psychotropic drugs, there’s…”
Before Jiang Ting could finish, someone knocked loudly on the door.
The door to the room slammed open, bouncing closed swiftly, only to be kicked by someone. Countless footsteps entered the room. Before Zong-ge could make a sound, someone else took control of the situation first. Hiding in the washroom, Yan Xie and Jiang Ting heard a stern voice shouting, “Don’t move, we’re the police!”
Yan Xie and Jiang Ting looked at each other.
“… Old Qin?” Yan Xie was doubtful. “No, it’s not Old Qin.”
Jiang Ting did not say a word. He immediately stepped forward to remove the ventilation window.
However, from outside came words that crashed upon their heads like thunder.
“— This is Yihe Road Police Station. Someone has reported their suspicions of homosexual indecent assault and prostitution. All of you, stand up, clasp your hands behind you and squat down! Take out your ID and residence permit!”
Bang bang bang! Bang bang bang!
“Is there anyone inside? Come out now!” The police officer slammed on the door of the washroom, shouting as Yan Xie and Jiang Ting stared at each other. “Hurry up! If you don’t come out, we’ll kick the door open!”
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- ISMM Chapter 45 - May 11, 2023
- BTTC Chapter 55 - April 25, 2023
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What was Jiang Ting going to say?! And my brain also needed Yan Xie to explain the ‘softening’ lol
Thanks for the chapter 💕
Just a question, is it Jiang Ting or Jiang Qing? They say Jiang Qing in the radio drama.
The audio drama says Jiang Ting, at least for the previous few seasons. 停 is never read as qing as well.
Your translation is so very much appreciated.
This novel is such a gem and I’m so happy that we are able to read it.
Loving our mains and the plot unfold.
LMAOO they were reported for homosexual incident and not for illegal drugs HAHAH