Chapter 31 - A Side CP Drama
Yu Liang accompanied his bosses in the villa area for a while before he suddenly needed to go to the bathroom. So he told Sun Zinan he had to rest for a bit, asked the person in charge to point him in the location of the bathroom, and hurriedly ran over to solve his personal problems.
Jin Yuan Villa was still under construction; the bathroom in the new house was not yet open to use and he could only make do with a simple bathroom built far away to the side.
He knocked weakly on the door twice. There shouldn’t be anyone there, since the people on the construction site were gone. Yu Liang inexplicably felt a little guilty, so went in lightly. He quickly went and was about to pull the curtain open when he suddenly heard heavy footsteps outside.
He had been born with little courage and he was as sensitive as the grass moved by the wind blowing by. He originally could have walked out casually and comfortably, but for some reason he thought he had done something wrong. At the sound of the footsteps, he turned around and hid in the corner behind a tool cabinet.
Two middle-aged men came in along with the strong smell of smoke. Their speech was slightly accented; they were probably workers from the construction site. The material the villa was built with gave a faint echo to the sound of their conversation. The talking was accompanied by a few rustles. They seemed to be talking about Yu Liang’s group. “The one coming today is some big boss, I saw Liu Qiang take them to see the house.”
“Someone really bought it?” The other said, “Isn’t that just rushing in generously to be deceived?”
Yu Liang was shocked and quietly paid more attention.
“But speaking of that, the way they’re cutting corners is crazy. In the buildings to the west, the iron railings on the balcony have only been installed but they’re already rusting off.”
The first person said, “After we heard a few days ago that someone was coming to take a look, a few of us personally had to re-brush the paint.”
“In this world, money won’t buy you a good house,” the other exclaimed. “It’s just this family, their hearts are as dark as ink. Didn’t a stone kill two people the moment construction started? One of the victims had no family other than his mother who had sat at the door yesterday crying, looking very miserable. She had been driven out by Liu Qiang’s grandson. Her son was gone in his early twenties, but he heard she had only received a hundred thousand dollars in compensation.”
“Alas, the lives of the poor are worthless...”
“Life is so difficult, it’s better to die than keep living...”
The sound of conversation and footsteps gradually went away. The door outside shut with a heavy bam. Yu Liang didn’t even dare breathe too loudly. Only when he was sure that the two people were completely out of sight did he merge from the cabinet, his head covered in dust.
His heart was beating very fast, about to fly out of his chest. He clenched his fists, his palms covered in cold sweat.
He had to tell Sun Zinan as soon as possible—
He took a step forward, but perhaps due to the psychological effect or perhaps he had squatted for too long, his legs gave out beneath him.
Yu Liang’s courage wasn’t even bigger than a sesame seed. He was the type of person who was easily scared, but always ran into the most eventful coincidences. On one hand, he knew he should immediately go to Sun Zinan and expose the problem of Jinyuan villa to him face-to-face; but on the other hand, he was afraid of all the potential risks. Starting from childhood, everyone had taught him to mind his own business. In case he messed up the business and brought on the wrath of Jin Ke Real Estate, what should he do?
He wanted to be a good person and also wanted to be brave. He wanted to be a fearless hero.
But he was just a helpless, ordinary person.
Yu Liang struggled with this the entire way as he returned to the team. Sun Zinan glanced at him and said jokingly, “You went for so long, did you fall into the toilet?”
Yu Liang was currently filled with guilt. Sun Zinan’s words directly hit his conscience and he was so scared he almost jumped three meters away.
“What’s with you?” Sun Zinan was also startled and said huffily, “You’re so jumpy. Did you flush your courage down the toilet too?”
Yu Liang muttered, “I&#k2026;sorry.”
Sun zinan waved his hand, not caring too much, but Wang Geng turned to look at him and asked, “Did something happen?”
“Nothing,” Yu Liang said hurriedly. “Nothing happened.”
Wang Geng remained doubtful.
Liu Qiang, the person in charge, was leading them around the gate on the east side. Seeing that the time was not early, Sun Zinan’s group of people stopped picking at the issues. He pretended to hesitate, thought for a bit, then said to the man, “Let’s stop here today. After all, this is a big transaction. We’ll go back and have a meeting to discuss...”
Yu Liang did not expect him to go so soon and immediately panicked, but did not have the courage to open his mouth although he was anxious to the point of crying out loud.
Last time, he had overheard Liu Cheng’s phone call and he didn’t dare tell his boss. Fortunately, it didn’t end up being anything big. But this was not the same; if he didn’t speak up and Sun Zinan really bought Jin Yuan Villa, sooner or later the problem would be exposed. He might not be implicated in anything, but the company would suffer significant losses.
“Let’s go—”
“Wait!” As soon as Sun Zinan’s words left his mouth, he was interrupted by Yu Liang.
It was taboo to interrupt a boss in public. Wang Geng came forward to diffuse the situation and asked, “Little Yu, what’s wrong?”
“I...” Yu Liang stammered, his face turning red, only to say, “I, that...I just remembered we haven’t visited the buildings in the west.”
Liu Qiang said hurriedly, “The buildings are the same, symmetrical to the buildings in the east.”
For the first time, Yu Liang stood at the center of so many people’s gazes. He was so embarrassed he was about to drill himself into a hole, but he still insisted, “That, we should still take a look.”
Sun Zinan’s eyes delicately questioned Wang Geng, who nodded back.
“He just entered the company and doesn’t understand how things work. Please don’t be offended.” Wang Geng pushed Yu Liang behind him and said politely to Liu Qiang, “Since we’ve already mentioned it, let’s be a little more cautious and take a stroll around?”
Liu Qiang suddenly felt his heart cool down. He strongly suppressed his emotions and gave a guilty smile. “Is Vice president Wang saying he doesn’t trust our sincerity?”
Of course not, Wang Geng thought to himself.
However, he couldn’t show it on the surface and merely seemingly smiled apologetically. “This matter is important. We want to do this for the better cooperation between our two sides.”
After saying this, he turned to Sun Zinan and asked, “Director Sun, how do you feel?”
Boss Sun went with the flow and waved his hand of authority. “Let’s walk around.”
The appearance of the villa in the west looked no different from the row of buildings in the east at first glance, but the color seemed to be a little fresher. The person in charge led them to stop outside the courtyard and said, “I really have nothing to introduce. Director Sun, you see, are both sides not the exact same?”
“Well,” Sun Zinan asked carelessly, “Little Yu, what do you think?”
Yu Liang gritted his teeth and said, “We can’t really tell by standing outside...why don’t we go inside and take a look?”
The tour guide even thought about killing him at this moment.
Sun Zinan actually also expressed his support, so he could not help doubting that this boy was actually Sun Zinan’s relative. Just a small assistant couldn’t sway their plans like this!
The group of people walked into the villa. The inside had not been renovated yet. It was empty and quiet. They went up the stairs to the second floor. The corridor didn’t have many issues. Yu Liang remembered what the two workers had said, and deliberately led them to the terrace. He wasn’t very good at architecture. In fact, he didn’t even think about how to debunk the scam. He could only act on instinct and thought to himself that if everything else failed he could just try to break the railing with his hands.
The villa had an open terrace on the second floor. It was surrounded by a white wrought iron fence, suitable for a set of tea tables and chairs, or for growing flowers and grasses.
Yu Liang’s entire mind was focused on exposing schemes. He walked even quicker than Sun Zinan and rushed to the front of the group. He was a foolish child who didn’t think too much and got carried away at first glance. He didn’t pay attention to his steps while walking and accidentally stepped on a PVC pipe on the ground. The soles of his feet slipped, and his body suddenly fell forward uncontrollably—
If it had been on a normal balcony he would have been caught by the railings; but now he knew better than anyone that in front of him was a shoddy, rusty iron fence!
“Be careful!”
With a clunk, the weight of an adult easily broke the rusty fence.
The space in front of Yu Liang was empty. He fell down, clawing in panic. In the brief moment of weightlessness, he heard the wind whistling by his ears.
‘Am I going to die?’ He thought in despair.
In his more than twenty years of life, he had not experienced any earth-shattering setbacks or tribulations. He had grown up peacefully and found a decent job. Although he didn’t have much courage, fortunately, there was rarely anything that required him to be brave. Forget about even having to worry about his life.
Yu Liang never thought that the plots he saw in films and TV dramas would suddenly happen to him. He was like an unprepared soldier who had just been pushed onto the battlefield. It was too late to think of every move that had led step by step to his fall.
From childhood, school had taught him to be brave, honest, and kind; his parents had taught him to protect himself and to mind his own business. When he went out into society, the words ‘good people obtain good rewards’ went in his left ear and came out of his right ear as ‘good people do not live long.’ No one could give him an exact answer. He had waited so long to muster enough courage before he ran into a wall and ate appeared coldly, rewarding him harshly.
It was hard to be a good person, ah.
He never wanted to become a good person again...
“Yu Liang!” In the face of this close call, Wang Geng rushed out from behind Sun Zinan, his reaction surprisingly quick. He hurried over to grab Yu Liang’s collar. At the same time, he was also pulled forward by gravity and instantly hit the railing. The two of them fell down the terrace.
Sun Zinan’s expression changed dramatically, but everything had happened too fast. There was no time for him to go forward and save them. Wang Geng was dragged down by Yu Liang but he actively sought to save themselves. His left hand swept around and happened to grasp a part of the iron railing that had not yet broken.
The iron fence was embedded in the wall and relatively secure. It managed to hold the weight of the two of them. Yu Liang felt himself stabilize and dazedly looked back. He saw Wang Geng with his entire body leaning off the terrace, grabbing his collar with one hand and holding the iron railing with the other. A sharp iron fragment was buried in his palm and blood flowed down his wrist into the sleeves of his shirt. His white shirt cuffs had been completely dyed blood red.
”Vice president Wang,” he cried, shivering as he continued, “Quickly go up, ah...”
The man frowned, his mouth tight, but his tone was as calm as ever as if he didn’t feel any pain. “Yu Liang, the second floor is not that high, you should be safe now. Look for a place to put your feet down. If you can’t find one, you can directly jump down.”
Yu Liang did not know why, but tears suddenly rushed out.
“Don’t cry, calm down, you won’t die if you fall.” Wang Geng said softly, “Look around for a place to land, your clothes won’t hold up.”
Yu Liang hung above the first floor window, surrounded by a smooth wall. There was no place for him to land. He choked out, “I, I better jump...”
“Okay.” Wang Geng said, “Don’t be afraid. Take a deep breath and listen to me. On the count of three.”
Yu Liang forced his cries back into his throat.
“Three, two, one, jump!”
Wang Geng let go. Yu Liang exhausted all his efforts in adjusting his posture. His entire body squatted and jumped down. His heels tingled from the impact of landing. His body was not stable and his left knee knocked heavily against the ground.
It was indeed painful. Although it was far from unbearable, he sobbed like a child with a broken knee.
On the other side of the terrace, a group of hands and feet scrambled to pull up the brave vice president Wang. Wang Geng acted like nothing had happened. He pinched at his wrist to stop the bleeding and even had the leisure to appease the crowd. “It’s just a small injury, it’s nothing...someone go check on Yu Liang, he’s probably scared out of his wits.”
“Bullshit. Do you not want your hand?”
Sun Zinan looked at his copiously bleeding left hand. His expression could not have been uglier. He turned to Director Zheng who was standing next to him and said, “Drive the car, hurry and send the two of them to the hospital, hurry up!”
Director Zheng made a sound of agreement and jogged over to the car. Hongsen’s people busily looked after the two wounded people. Everything was a mess.
The head of Jin Ke Real Estate was completely panicked and shrunk aside, trying to minimize his existence, but Sun Zinan locked onto him with a single glance.
Liu Qiang had never witnessed this Director Sun’s anger. With such a glance, he suddenly had a sense of suffocating panic, as if his neck was being choked.
“This is not over,” Sun Zinan said coldly. “Go back and tell your boss to wait for a letter from a lawyer and a court subpoena.”