Chapter 2 - The Naming (1/2)
Chapter 2: The Naming
Translated by Shiya of Exiled Rebels Translation
It was a Friday, so Li Yan had to go home for a family dinner. He brought the incident with Lu Shang up at the dinner table and as expected his dad did not reprimand him for his actions. Instead, his father praised him.
“When you do business with him, you have to be extra careful.” Li JinYao, Li Yan’s father reminded him.
“Yeah, yeah, I know. Always think before I act. Right, you’ve said that so many times already.” Li Yan irritatedly grumbled.
“You damn kid. How dare you think I’m annoying?” Li JinYao said furiously, “Lu Shang’s father’s death had a lot to do with us. With how useless you are, I won’t be surprised if you were sold by Lu Shang one day.”
Li Yan hated feeling inferior, but seeing that his father was in a bad mood, he just replied, “Yes, I understand.”
Li JinYao had his son at an old age, so naturally he pampered him a lot. Li Yan was still very young and he was protected by everyone in the family. He never encountered any hardships in his career, neither had he ever lost to anyone. He was very proud and had no respect for others at all.
“Also, for that Sun Mao guy, watch him carefully, okay? Don’t let him get in our way.”
Li Yan said yes to his father’s warning but then he suddenly thought of something and asked, “Hey, wasn’t Sun Mao pretty great back in the day? How did he become like this?”
Li JinYao flipped the newspaper open and gave a weird scoff, “There are two things in this world that people should never do. One is drugs and the other one is gambling. Once you get into those things, even if you have a mountain of gold and silver, you’d eventually lose all of them. Sun Mao used to be really rich, but last year someone took him to Macau. After that, he barely spent a day back home. Who knows how much money he actually lost.”
“Who took him there?”
“Meng XinYou.”
If the wise and beautiful noblewomen on television were to become a real-life person, then it would be someone like Meng XinYou. Even if her intelligence was ignored, her family background was stunning enough. Her family had high military achievements for three generations straight; so high achieving that they could be listed in history books. Others were all high officials, such as her grandfather who was the chief of a major company. This woman knew a lot of people; she had all kinds of friends. It was quite natural that she was able to get Sun Mao to Macau, but there was one thing that not many people knew…… she was Lu Shang’s god sister.
Li Yan didn’t need a lot of brain cells to understand what role Lu Shang played in this whole incident. He couldn’t help but frustratingly curse in a low volume, “Fuck.”
It was nine in the morning when the returned loans arrived on time in the books. Lu Shang listened to Uncle Yuen’s report and nodded, “Send a letter to Mr. Sun, also pick up a present for Meng XinYou for me.”
Uncle Yuen replied yes and suddenly remembered something as he was about to leave. He turned back and said, “The kid you brought back yesterday, the doctors found drugs that would drive a person insane in his system. They cleaned all of them up and there are none left in the boy now. It seems like the Li family is really doing deals with prohibited drugs in the dark. Also, as you ordered, the doctor did a full body check-up on the boy. Here’s the report.”
Uncle Yuen handed the report to Lu Shang, “The doctors think that he must have been abused for a long period of time. There were a lot of wounds and scars on the boy; some new, some old. He is also malnourished; he most likely needs to stay in the hospital for a while.”
“Let him stay in the hospital.” Lu Shang took the report and put it aside, not looking at it. “Get a copy of the drug sample, then go find Dr. Ng in the west district to make an official record of his wounds. Remember to take pictures of all his wounds. Get the surveillance tapes in the car repair factory, exchange it for something different, and save a copy of the fight.”
Uncle Yuen said, “Do you want to…”
Lu Shang gave uncle Yuen a look, hinting at him not to say anything. Lu Shang really wasn’t a kind-hearted person. If he could get a hold of Li Yan’s weakness, he didn’t mind getting himself involved in this little affair. If he hyped up the facts a bit, it would definitely work wonders in bringing him down. Li Yan was still too inexperienced, if it was Li JinYao who was handling this, he would definitely clean the kid up first and bring the boy to his door with as much publicity as possible. That would give himself face and, at the same time, not leave any traces of his wrong doings behind.
Lu Shang rubbed the bandages on his arm and changed the subject, “When will ZiRui be back?”
“Eleven tonight, I’ve already arranged people to get him from the airport.”
Uncle Yuen was always a meticulous person, Lu Shang was never worried about his working ability, but after Uncle Yuen replied, the two of them fell into silence, staring each other in the eyes. It was only after a long while had past did Lu Shang ask, “Do you want to ask why I brought the boy back?”
“Your father asked me to take care of you before he died. You know he was quite wary of these kind of things.”
Lu Shang imagined his father’s grave and showed a depressed expression. Then, he said to Uncle Yuen, smiling slightly, “You don’t have to worry about me.”
Uncle Yuen didn’t push the subject further and asked, “When Dr. Leung is back, do you want him to go to your home first?”
“No. Put him in the hospital. I will go find him there when I have the time.”
Uncle Yuen’s face contorted at what Lu Shang said.
Seeing his expression Lu Shang said helplessly, “I’ve waited for a long time already. It’s fine, I don’t really care anymore.”
While Uncle Yuen had been the Lu family’s personal driver for almost thirty years, he was also Lu Shang’s assistant. He understood Lu Shang’s temper and habits pretty well. He knew that it was useless for him to say anything, so he forced himself to nod.
Nine years ago, Lu Shang’s father died from acute heart failure. Lu Shang, who was still in his teens, had to rush back to the country to handle the funeral preparations and other matters. He had to take care of the company handed down to him from his father. That was when Uncle Yuen first met the Lu family’s only hermit heir. Lu Shang was very young at the time, but he did things in an orderly fashion. He was able to get used to everything very quickly. With the help of Lu Shang’s father’s friend, Lu Shang got full control of the situation promptly. At the beginning, Uncle Yuen couldn’t grasp why Lu Shang’s father kept him away in another country instead of letting him help in the family business… That was until he read Lu Shang’s health records.
A human’s life was nothing more than a trade. One exchange for another. If one wanted something, then they’d need something of equal value to trade for it. Lu Shang’s father couldn’t escape that, neither could Lu Shang.
Uncle Yuen was an efficient person and the photos of the boy’s wounds arrived on Lu Shang’s work desk at home that night. Lu Shang never really cared much for these things, so he just flipped it open and skimmed through it. Then something in the pictures caught his attention.
Leung ZiRui rushed straight to Lu Shang’s home after getting off the plane. He flung the door open and, as expected, the person he had been worrying about for his whole life, also the owner of this house, was overworking himself as per usual.
“Sick people should rest. Why is it that you never listen to what your doctor says?” Leung ZiRui threw his luggage away and ran towards the fridge, “I’m in a hurry. Is there anything to eat? I’m going to starve to death.”
Lu Shang stared at the sand and mud on Leung ZiRui’s shoes and said, “Can’t you take your shoes off first?”
“Forgot.” Leung ZiRui kicked his shoes away, then opened the fridge. A message was left in the kitchen saying that a bowl of pasta was prepared already.
Seeing that there was pasta, Leung ZiRui immediately stopped ruffling through the fridge. With a huge grin on his face, he said, “You knew I’d come here tonight, didn’t you?” Leung ZiRui saw the bandages on Lu Shang’s arm, “Oh, why is your arm hurt?” He pulled Lu Shang’s hand over, then muttered, shocked, “This is…someone bit you?”
Lu Shang was busy with the files he was working on and ignored Leung ZiRui.
“Don’t move your hand. Let me examine it.”
Leung ZiRui was Lu Shang’s childhood friend. He studied for his Medical Doctorate in America, while his family opened a Chinese medicine clinic in Chinatown. He had contact with medicine at a very young age, interchanging between Chinese medicine and Western medicine with ease. This person was crazy about medicine and its related knowledge. He especially liked to challenge hard medical cases. He was self-proclaimed to be a rare flower in the medical sector, while in truth, he was a weird mutated alien flower. Seeing people with odd diseases brought him more joy than seeing a beauty in a bikini. Others might feign a body check-up to grope a lady, while he truly just wanted to go do a full-body check-up on the person.
While Leung ZiRui was examining Lu Shang, pasta, roasted squid, and roasted Chinese toon (chun/toona) were served, making the whole house contain the aroma of food.
“You’ve been overexerting yourself again these past six months. Tomorrow, come to my place, I’ll give you a more in-depth body check-up. Don’t have breakfast tomorrow.” Leung ZiRui let Lu Shang’s hand go, his complexion looking quite bad.
“I…”
“You can refuse to come, but the next time you have surgery, I’ll reduce the amount of anesthesia I administer.” Leung ZiRui continued to eat his food calmly as he said that.
The wood in the fireplace cracked, giving a short sharp sound. Lu Shang avoided the subject completely and pulled out a picture from a folder, pushing it towards Leung ZiRui. “What do you think this scar was caused by?”
Leung ZiRui gulped down some water and gave the picture a peek. Immediately, he concluded, “A gunshot wound.”
“Could you determine the caliber of the bullet?”
“That’d be hard. This must have been a wound from at least a decade ago. Moreover, the person was still a child when he got hurt. This person must have grown a reasonable amount already.” After saying that he got curious and picked up the report to give it a more detailed look. “China banned guns long ago. There aren’t many people with gunshot wounds left. Whose report is this?”
Lu Shang made an indescribable expression, “ZiRui… Do you believe in destiny?”
Leung ZiRui raised his head from the report in shock, “Did you eat the wrong medicine or something?”
Lu Shang shook his head, “I didn’t believe that before either.”
Leung ZiRui’s hand stopped. He tried to link the clues together and when he finally understood what Lu Shang was suggesting, he stood straight up from the chair and asked, “Are you saying that this is the kid from ten years ago? He’s not dead yet?”