193 Friends (2/2)
Night time was the peak period for brothels in Pleasure Alley. Upon hearing someone knocking on the door, Gu Shenwei immediately hid beside the door, saber in hand. Xu Xiaoyi opened the door slightly and repeatedly apologised to the customer outside. The customer was extremely unhappy at being turned away. ”Is she looking down on me? What sort of illness does she have that she can't even meet me? I want to see for myself. I think it's more likely that she's serving some other rich customer.”
”No, no, you should know, Sir, it's the usual sickness. I don't wish for you to waste your silver as well, Sir.”
It took much effort to convince the customer to leave. Xu Xiaoyi let out a large sigh of relief.
”So, the regular your sister mentioned just now is Guan Houlin?” Gu Shenwei asked as he returned to the table.
Xu Xiaoyi rubbed his ear, trying to re-collect his memories. His sister received a regular once every few days, and they came and went quickly. He could never remember all of them.
”That's him indeed.” Xu Yanwei had re-appeared above the stairs and seemed to have made up her mind not to walk down to her brother and Gu Shenwei. She was chewing on melon seeds and had placed their husks carefully on the railing in a row. ”All slaves covet the women their masters have slept with before. Especially the slaves with a little money.”
”When he comes back again—”
”We've offended him. Now he may or may not be coming back to me again.”
”He will. When he comes back, ask him who... the Ninth Young Master favors now.”
”Ha, ha, so is the 'person he favors' a new term for a male prostitute? Fine, I'll ask him for you.”
”Don't let him know why you're asking.”
”Tsk, do you believe that I have the ability to make him tell me all his secrets and not remember afterwards?”
Gu Shenwei did not answer. He only wanted results from her, and was not concerned what sort of method she used to get the information he wanted.
As it got later, Xu Yanwei picked up the seed husks and wrapped them in her handkerchief. She muttered to herself as she returned to her room, ”How can I fall asleep so early? I have two men with me, but one is useless while I can't use the other. Sigh, what a night...”
Xu Xiaoyi kept himself pre-occupied by tidying up, never stopping once to rest. Gu Shenwei knew that he was afraid and said to him, ”Soon, it'll be over. He said that he would kill you within three days, and the latest this would drag on would be till tomorrow.”
”Can I try to convince him to stop learning such an unhealthy technique? Who knows whether he would change his mind. He listened to me all this while.”
”He could, or maybe he could kill you too. If you should try to reason with him, there's no way I can guarantee your safety.”
Xu Xiaoyi sighed as he thought, ”There's indeed something wrong with everyone in Hope Alley. The first time I went there, I was worried that anyone there would take a fancy to me. Who knows, someone really did. However, he only wants to kill me, and it's really weird that he has to make friends with me before killing me.”
The streets were starting to become less crowded as it reached midnight. Xu Xiaoyi dozed off a number of times as he sat on the stool. Gu Shenwei remained still as he hid in a dark spot at the corner of the walls.
Suddenly, they heard Xu Yanwei screaming.
As Xu Xiaoyi lifted his head, he noticed that Yang Huan was gone from his spot. He forgot about his fear and shouted at the top of his voice, ”Run, Litte Chu! There's a killer!”
Gu Shenwei had leapt up to the second storey and dashed into Xu Yanwei's room immediately after he heard her scream.
He saw a black figure standing beside her bed, saber in hand.
Before her scream had stopped, and immediately after Xu Xiaoyi started shouting, Gu Shenwei's sword had already pierced the neck of the assailant.
When the body of the assailant fell to the side of the bed, Xu Yanwei finally controlled herself from screaming. She trembled as she asked, ”Didn't he come for Xiaoyi? Why was his target me instead?”
”It's not Chu Nanping.”
The assailant was obviously an adult, and not a boy about to enter his teens.
As Gu Shenwei lit the oil lamp for a better look, he noticed Xu Yanwei was nude. ”Why are you not dressed?”
She pulled up her sheets to cover herself up, replying, ”Of course I'm not dressed, I'm sleeping.”
Gu Shenwei brought the lamp closer to the corpse. It was nobody he knew, and seemed to be an ordinary macheteman for hire.
He dragged the body out of her room and tossed it near the entrance of the brothel. He then used his saber to hack at the wound, to disguise the fact that it was made by a sword. He then extinguished the flame of the lamp and returned to wait at the corner of the wall.
”It's not him?” asked a pale Xu Xiaoyi.
”No.”
”Hey, hey, i just... I couldn't control myself.”
”It's alright. I could've killed him even with your warning.”
Gu Shenwei was even more confident in Death Scripture after his adventure in Joy Pavilion. To him, Chu Nanping was just a child and could not even be considered as a kung fu master.
After taking a while to dress, Xu Yanwei also came down the stairs. ”What's going on now, who's this man, and why does he want to kill me?”
No one answered her. Gu Shenwei could roughly understand what had just happened but could not come up with a concrete explanation.
Someone was knocking on the door again. It could not be a customer or another assassin. Xu Xiaoyi grew pale again as he remembered that Chu Nanping frequently came looking for him at this hour.
Gu Shenwei rushed to open the door, and it turned out to be Maid Lotus. Xu Xiaoyi could calm down again upon seeing that it was not Chu Nanping. He did not know how much more fright he could take in one night.
”Someone came to kill you,” Maid Lotus observed. She had glanced upstairs upon entering the brothel. She was a killer with sharp instincts, and could sense a dead body when she was near one. ”It's rumored that you've stolen Immortal Peng's treasure, and now everybody is coming for their share.”