Huo Zongzhuo said a few words, and Jiang Luo fell silent at once.
Huo Zongzhuo said, “He paid money. He bought shares. Does that mean everyone has to acknowledge him?”
“The factory doesn’t have to.”
“He won’t accept that—so what can he do?”
“Let him sue.”
Jiang Luo’s chest tightened as he heard this. In an instant, scenes from a few days earlier flooded his mind—the time Huo Zongzhuo had taken him to Haimen, moving between several restaurants, eating and exchanging pleasantries with different people—
Private rooms, banquet tables, four men and one woman, briefcases. Some speaking sternly with Huo Zongzhuo, some laughing over drinks. Raised glasses, different expressions, naked displays of calculation.
And now, Chen Xianlong throwing a tantrum at the factory gates.
All at once, it clicked. Jiang Luo understood—completely.
Those five people, four men and a woman, were either factory leadership, officials in charge of converting state-owned factories to private ownership, or even department heads with real clout in the county.
Huo Zongzhuo had met them one by one, throwing money at them—likely promising even more—just to have the state-owned garment factory repudiate Chen Xianlong’s already-invested shares. The most direct, brutal method possible: kick Chen Xianlong straight out of the factory.
“You…”
Jiang Luo stared at Huo Zongzhuo, eyes wide in disbelief.
It wasn’t just that he’d never imagined such a crude, savage tactic existed—it was that it actually worked.
Repudiate?
Just… deny it outright?
Everyone refusing to acknowledge it?
A signed investment contract, black ink on white paper, rendered useless just like that?
Even if it was legal?
Jiang Luo was shaken by the realization that something like this could happen in the world.
This was basically—
Before he could finish processing it, the car pulled away from the factory gates.
Not long after, it stopped on a dirt road with barely any signs of human activity around, and the engine cut off.
Lao Si got out, walked a short distance away, and relieved himself by the roadside.
Jiang Luo looked around. “Where are we now?”
What were they here for?
Huo Zongzhuo sat calmly, glanced at his watch. “Wait. You’ll see.”
“We agreed. I do, you watch.”
So Jiang Luo didn’t ask more. He looked at Huo Zongzhuo and said, “No wonder you brought me here a few days ago—to meet those people and give them money.”
Then he asked, “So just not acknowledging him is enough to repudiate it?”
“Black-and-white contracts, official stamps—this isn’t child’s play…”
Huo Zongzhuo looked at him calmly. “Anywhere people can walk, even if there was no road to begin with, once enough people walk it, it becomes a road.”
Jiang Luo said, “Then doesn’t that mean if someone offered more money than you, they could use the same method to kick you out?”
Huo Zongzhuo replied, “This is northern Jiangsu. A small, rundown county under Tongcheng.”
“Other than that Singaporean, Chen Xianlong—who knows why he came here to dump money into a factory—and other than me, us—who else would come?”
“More money? Who’s going to offer it?”
He was utterly confident.
Jiang Luo was genuinely rattled. “This actually works?”
Huo Zongzhuo said steadily, “Things are dead. People are alive. Solutions are made by people.”
“What looks like a dead end to you—tear down the wall, and it becomes a path.”
Lao Si finished relieving himself and didn’t get back into the car, just stood outside swinging his legs, looking around.
Soon he returned to the car, bent down to the open driver’s-side window, and said, “Mr. Huo, they’re here.”
Huo Zongzhuo said to Jiang Luo, “Watch.”
Jiang Luo didn’t know what he was supposed to watch. Just as he turned to look outside—
Boom.
A deafening crash shook the air.
Jiang Luo jolted, nearly jumping out of his skin.
Through the windshield, he saw a massive dump truck stopped at a nearby intersection, long tire marks trailing behind it. Not far from the truck’s front, a black sedan lay overturned, wheels in the air, roof pressed to the ground.
The sight was terrifyingly familiar.
Jiang Luo’s eyes widened silently. His heart, already racing from the shock, began pounding even faster as a realization surged up—
Was that…?
The one who’d been hit—was it Chen Xianlong?
He looked again. Lao Si had already run over, yanked open the car door, crouched down, and dragged someone out by force.
It was Chen Xianlong.
Lao Si grabbed him by the hair, leaned down to say something, then raised his hand and slapped him across the face—twice.
Jiang Luo turned to Huo Zongzhuo. His heart was pounding so hard it felt like it might stop altogether. He’d lived two lifetimes, met plenty of people, seen plenty of things—but he’d never witnessed anything like this, or methods like these used on someone.
Huo Zongzhuo was also watching the scene outside.
“Scared?” he asked, then turned to look at Jiang Luo.
Jiang Luo suppressed his racing heart and shock, holding his breath as he spoke carefully, word by word. “You told me to watch. I just didn’t expect this.”
Huo Zongzhuo looked away again, eyes back on the scene, his face utterly calm. “Anything he dares to do, I dare to do too.”
“He wanted your life. Whether he makes it back to Singapore in one piece depends on my mood.”
“Jiang Luo.”
Huo Zongzhuo turned again, looking at the young man. His voice was flat, but there was concern in his eyes.
He said, “In business, don’t make enemies lightly. But once you have an enemy—once they threaten your life—never show mercy.”
“Your kindness, your softness, your retreat, your hesitation—those are knives you hand to your enemy.”
“And sooner or later, that knife will be used on you. It will kill you.”
…………………………………………….
Jiang Luo turned fully toward Huo Zongzhuo, then glanced outside again. Instinctively, he reached out and grabbed Huo Zongzhuo’s arm, his voice tense. “Huo Zongzhuo, you’re not planning to kill him, are you?”
“It’s broad daylight. This isn’t the middle of nowhere. Someone could pass by at any moment.”
What he meant was—they couldn’t do that to Chen Xianlong.
They couldn’t just let him die here.
Jiang Luo said seriously, “Have Lao Si take him to the hospital. Don’t let him die here. If the local police get involved, it’ll be a huge mess.”
“Relax,” Huo Zongzhuo said, meeting his gaze calmly. “As long as you’re fine, I won’t take his life.”
Sure enough, outside the car, Lao Si released Chen Xianlong, put his hands on his hips, and pulled out his brick-sized mobile phone to make a call.
Soon another sedan arrived and stopped beside the overturned car. Two people got out. Jiang Luo recognized one of them immediately—it was Wang Junqing, who had also been injured in the crash some time ago.
Before seeing Wang Junqing, Jiang Luo had only been shaken by Huo Zongzhuo’s methods.
But the moment he saw him, something clicked—and his heart leapt painfully into his throat.
Jiang Luo stared at Huo Zongzhuo, hard, unblinking. His heart pounded faster and tighter with every second, as if a hand were clenched around it.
He held his breath and said quietly, “Huo Zongzhuo, tell me the truth. Guo Ronghai—the one who knocked me out and tied me up in the countryside, the former manager of Pacific Department Store…”
He paused, staring even harder into Huo Zongzhuo’s eyes, not letting the slightest change of expression escape him. “Guo Ronghai… is he—”
“Dead?”
He said the word “dead” very softly.
As if saying it any louder might let someone overhear.
Huo Zongzhuo looked straight back at him.
Jiang Luo clutched his arm, desperate for an answer. “Is that right?”
“I stabbed him. I broke his leg. I left him alone in that field for so long—he was already dead, wasn’t he?”
“Just like today—Wang Junqing and Lao Si came to clean it up?”
Huo Zongzhuo met his gaze, steady and controlled. His voice was even. “No. It’s not what you think.”
“When Junqing and Lao Si found him, he was still breathing.”
Still breathing.
What did “still breathing” even mean?
It meant death was just around the corner.
Didn’t that mean Jiang Luo had basically killed him?
Jiang Luo’s grip tightened, his hand trembling slightly. He swallowed and said, “I never meant to kill him.”
“You didn’t,” Huo Zongzhuo said immediately.
He raised his hand, covering Jiang Luo’s, then gently patted it in reassurance. “Everything after that—I had people handle it.”
Jiang Luo thought of something else. “Li Fengrui, he…”