Chapter 22: Chapter 22: Robbery
Around 4:00 p.m. that afternoon, beneath a plain, old-fashioned bus stop sign, a frowning Zhang Wenda stood waiting for something with a pack on his back.
On the road nearby, buses topped with large gasbags swayed past one after another, but Zhang Wenda didn’t board any of them. Instead, he kept sneaking glances at a nearby rooftop.
The second time he saw the Black Cat, Zhang Wenda knew that psycho had latched onto him for good.
There’s a saying: a thief can choose any day to steal, but a homeowner can’t stand guard for a thousand days straight. He couldn’t let her keep hounding him; he was going to end this nuisance once and for all.
After a while, a few figures emerged from a nearby alley. The one in the lead was Fatty Pan Dongzi, followed by the other kids from the Youth Palace.
Perhaps because they had shared a life-or-death experience, Zhang Wenda no longer felt so distant from them. He truly saw them as his classmates now.
And since they were his classmates, Zhang Wenda had no qualms about asking them to back him up now that he was in trouble.
"Is everyone here?" Zhang Wenda did a head count and saw seven or eight kids.
"Yeah, Xiao Tiao’s sick, but everyone else is here," Yang Shu said, pushing his glasses up his nose. "Haozi, what did you call us for?"
"Are we friends?" Zhang Wenda asked, looking at them.
"Of course! You saved us at the Youth Palace!"
"Then follow me. I need your help settling something. Someone’s giving me trouble." Zhang Wenda handed out the candy he was holding—one piece of bubble gum for each of them.
’Since he was going to confront Song Jianguo, he obviously wasn’t stupid enough to go alone. Of course he was going to bring backup.’
The monk can run, but the temple can’t. He was going to bring his posse to her treehouse today and corner her, solving this problem for good.
"So, Haozi, what’s the deal?" Fatty asked, chomping loudly on his gum.
"The bus is coming. Let’s get on first. I’ll tell you when we get there," Zhang Wenda said, spotting the Route 3 bus in the distance.
When the swaying bus pulled up to the stop, the large gasbag on its roof looked a bit deflated, sagging limply over the front of the vehicle.
The ticket seller climbed on top, tossed a few white stones into the gasbag, and it slowly wobbled and swelled up again.
Zhang Wenda stared, stunned. He never imagined that the white stones he’d collected were used like this.
’So, does that mean the Youth Palace uses those white stones to generate gas and float to the surface?’ Zhang Wenda couldn’t help but wonder.
"Are you getting on or not? If you are, hurry up!" the ticket seller, a dispenser hanging from her neck, snapped impatiently.
"We’re coming! Of course we are!" Zhang Wenda and his group of classmates squeezed onto the crowded bus.
"Tickets! Three cents a ticket!"
Nine people at three cents each came to twenty-seven cents. Zhang Wenda sighed as he watched his savings dwindle, but he knew some costs were unavoidable.
’After all, you can’t bring your crew to go pick a fight and make them walk while you take the bus, can you?’
The bus was large, but it was also packed. Zhang Wenda felt like he was lost in a dense forest of human legs. All he could see when he looked up were torsos; not a single face was visible.
This was nothing new to Zhang Wenda. He sat down on someone’s leather shoe as if it were a stool and looked over at his friends. "Did you guys bring your gear?"
Even though the rule’s punishment flared up again, Zhang Wenda didn’t stop his questioning. ’Some questions are necessary, no matter how much they hurt.’
"Yeah, we brought it." Yang Shu pulled a length of iron wire from inside his jacket. Fatty took a small utility blade from his pocket. The others had brought similar things.
"Ah, forget it." Zhang Wenda scratched a scar on his arm. "Fatty told me you guys all have Superpowers?" He was hoping to find at least one person in the group who could actually help him against Song Jianguo.
"We do! Yeah, we all have them."
"So, what can you do?"
"I can boil an egg with my mind!" "I can channel my energy into water!" "I can eat with my nose!" "I can drink with my eyes!" Listening to this list of ridiculous Superpowers, Zhang Wenda felt his energy drain away.
He was starting to regret asking this bunch of clowns for help. He had no idea if these guys would be useful at all.
"Don’t worry, Haozi! With crouching dragons and fledgling phoenixes like us on your side, no one will dare to mess with you!" Fatty boasted, showing off a new idiom he’d learned.
"Stop showing off. We’ll see what you can do when the time comes." Zhang Wenda glanced down, touching the red scar on his arm, which was now one-fifth healed. ’They all have one? Does that mean this is a type of Superpower, too?’ he wondered.
The bus swayed to a stop. Ten minutes had passed by the time Zhang Wenda and his crew got off.
Seeing the treehouse in the distance, Zhang Wenda snapped out of his thoughts. He squeezed the flashlight in his hand and led his group forward, marching menacingly to find Song Jianguo.
Once they were under the treehouse, Zhang Wenda activated his red-light ability and kicked the utility pole, making it shudder. "Song Jianguo! Get down here! If you don’t, I’ll tear your house down, see if I don’t!"
"You just try it." The voice came from behind him. Zhang Wenda spun around to see Song Jianguo standing on the roof tiles, flanked by her huge clowder of black cats.
Zhang Wenda took two steps forward, glaring at her. "I don’t like to argue, especially with a kid. But if you’re going to act like a brat, don’t think I’ll go easy on you."
"Hmph." Song Jianguo was clearly annoyed by Zhang Wenda’s condescending tone.
"How old are you to be talking so big?" With that, she leaped from the roof like a cheetah and slowly advanced on Zhang Wenda.
"Old enough to be your daddy," Zhang Wenda shot back. Not wanting to lose ground, he led his own crew forward to meet her.
He talked tough, but Zhang Wenda hadn’t actually brought his friends here for an all-out brawl with Song Jianguo. He just wanted to make her stop stalking him.
"Let me tell you something. There’s a right way and a wrong way to do things. You tried to rob me for no reason, and then you sent your cats to stalk me. You’re in the wrong here, and you know it."
Song Jianguo looked down her nose at the smaller boy. "The ’right way’? Who’s going to reason with you? So what if I robbed you? What are you going to do about it?"
With that, she raised her left arm, which was covered by a sleeve protector. With a slight crook of her finger, the cats behind her let out a collective MEOW and leaped at Zhang Wenda and his friends, sending Fatty and the others screaming in terror.
Claws raked bloody lines across the back of Zhang Wenda’s hand. A surge of anger flared through him; he hadn’t expected her to attack so brazenly.
He grabbed the cat clawing at his face and flung it away. Just as his vision cleared, a glint of cold steel flashed before him. To his horror, a spear was thrusting straight for his eye.
Zhang Wenda’s right hand shot out instinctively, catching the sharp point of the spear in his palm.
SQUELCH! Blood blossomed from Zhang Wenda’s palm.
But this had been Song Jianguo’s goal all along. She angled the spear up, driving the tip—and Zhang Wenda’s hand with it—down into the concrete, pinning him in place and severely restricting his movement.
Song Jianguo immediately planted a foot on Zhang Wenda’s chest to keep him down, then her right hand darted toward his pocket.
With a sudden burst of strength, Zhang Wenda threw her off him and scrambled to his feet, a dusty footprint now on his chest.
He yanked the spear from his hand and swept it in a wide arc, forcing the surrounding black cats back. He leveled the point at her and said viciously, "Little girl! This weapon is mine now!"
But Song Jianguo wasn’t angry at all. Instead, she laughed and dangled a green bill from her fingers.
"Then this is mine."
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