Death Progress Bar Chapter 14-15
‘Dreamy Night' did justice to its name because it really looked dreamy—the drink had a brilliant ice-blue color and was served in a triangular c.o.c.ktail gla.s.s with a maraschino cherry floating in it. Pale blue contrasting with bright cherry red made a truly beautiful picture.
Unfortunately, this c.o.c.ktail could only be admired and not drunk, and so it was used merely as a prop to increase Shi Jin's appeal.
“Remember to discreetly spill a little from time to time while pretending to sip it, but don't let anyone notice what you're doing,” reminded him Gua Two.
Shi Jin raised the gla.s.s in a playful toast, using this move to slightly turn his body and make an unnoticeable ‘OK' sign.
They kept flirting and drinking at the bar counter, calmly waiting for the big fish to bite. After three rounds of drinks, one of the targets arrived—tonight's birthday boy appeared in the entrance with a group of friends.
Gua Two gave Shi Jin a meaningful glance, mouthing “go act s.e.xy”.
Shi Jin suppressed the urge to show him a middle finger, put his gla.s.s down and went to the dance floor as they've planned earlier.
As an ordinary police officer whose only hobby was mahjong, he naturally didn't know how to dance, but so what? Xiao Si gave him a buff that not only made him a good dancer, but it also made his dance especially dazzling and provocative!
{Little JinJin, I really haven't expected you could dance so well,} Gua Two's voice came from the diamond stud in his ear. Shi Jin rolled his eyes hard and ignored him.
Gua Two wasn't planning to let him off and began to give him a detailed real-time narration of what was happening, in an irritating voice: {The birthday boy lead his friends to a booth next to the dance floor, they appear to be waiting for somebody… They saw you… Birthday boy took your picture with his phone, it seems he's sending it to someone… Oh, why didn't I think of it, Little JinJin's dance is so good I must let Jun-shao have a look.} After that, the camera shutter sound could be heard.
Shi Jin finally couldn't stop himself. He turned his back to the target and his friends, and forced out through clenched teeth: “Gua, Two!”
{What gua two gua three, I'm Chen Er now. You have to call me Brother Er, don't forget it again.} Gua Two tone was still as annoying as earlier, but the sound of the shutter stopped. After enduring his real-time narration for a while longer, Shi Jin finally heard the thing he was waiting for. {Xu Huai is here, dance for another five minutes, then come back to me.}
Shi Jin breathed a sigh of relief and confirmed he understood. He continued to dance while avoiding countless people who wanted to dance with him, then revealed a tired look, jumped off the dance floor and returned to Gua Two's side.
Gua Two greeted him with a sleazy ‘baby, how can you be so attractive, I can't stand it' smile, put an arm around Shi Jin's back and hugged him, rubbing his face in his curls.
“Does my sweaty hair smell good?” Shi Jin put on a fake smile.
“Not bad, it smells like hair dye,” answered Gua Two, still with the sleazy smile. He handed Shi Jin his gla.s.s and lowered his voice, “Xu Huai is looking this way, do something seductive.”
Shi Jin took the gla.s.s, bowed his head, bit the cherry stalk that stretched out of the c.o.c.ktail and took the cherry into his mouth, swirled it inside for a moment, then spat it out again. Looking up at Gua Two, he also lowered his voice and asked maliciously, “Is this seductive enough for you? Here, have a cherry.”
Gua Two, being a man as straight as a steel arrow, had not been moved by Shi Jin's suggestive actions. He glanced at the suspicious-looking saliva on the cherry and in the end, could not manage to put it into his mouth. For a second his expression distorted. “You are too vicious.”
“Takes one to know one.” Satisfied, Shi Jin pouted theatrically and put his head on Gua Two shoulder, flirted with him again, and ate the cherry by himself. After he finished eating and got ready to draw back, his eyes accidentally met the eyes of a man sitting in the corner.
The man looked familiar, as if Shi Jin has seen him somewhere before.
Xiao Si cried out in alarm,
Hearing these words, Xiao Si hurried up and got the result very quickly:
Shi Jin felt himself breaking into a cold sweat and hastily retreated behind Gua Two, using him to shield himself from sight.
However, it was already too late, as the man actually got up and walked over. He politely stopped at the distance of two steps and said genially: “h.e.l.lo, my name is Long Shi and I'm in charge of the artists' department in the Zhongjia Movie Company. As it happens, I just saw this little gentleman's dance and I think he is very suitable for the entertainment industry. Young man, are you interested in becoming a star? Don't worry, I'm not a liar. Here's my business card.” Then he really took out a business card and handed it to Shi Jin with both hands.
Gua Two kept listening stupefied. When he understood what Long Shi meant he almost laughed out loud but managed to mask it with a cough. Seeing Shi Jin was just looking at the business card without moving, he thought he also was stunned, so reached out and took it from Long Shi's hand. “I'm sorry, my friend and I need to think about it, you—”
“We don't need to think about it!” Shi Jin came back to himself and grabbed the business card from Gua Two, stuffing it back into Long Shi's hands. He forced out an insipid smile and straightforwardly refused: “I'm not interested in becoming a star at all. Thank you for your praise, goodbye!” After that, he grabbed Gua Two and tried to leave.
It was Long Shi's turn to be stunned. He had seen Shi Jin's eye-catching dance which made him a focus of all people present and had thought he was the kind of young man who liked to be in the limelight, so he hadn't expected to be refused so directly.
He hesitated for a few seconds, but couldn't bear to let such a good seedling slip away. He caught up with Shi Jin and said, “Young man, I'm really not a liar. If you don't believe me, I can ask my artist Rong Zhouzhong to give you a call and confirm my ident.i.ty. You should be able to recognize him—”
“I don't know him!” Shi Jin was ready to start tearing his hair out. He realized Long Shi was not going to let him get away so easily and might really make Rong Zhouzhong come over, so he turned back to him and said earnestly, “Mr. Long, please don't follow me, I really don't want to be a star, because it's extremely exhausting and I'd lose my privacy. For me, that kind of life would be really bitter. Rather than being a star, I prefer to be a toy boy, I just have to lie down and I would get money. Do you see my owner? He's super-rich, I'm very happy to be with him.” Saying this, he tugged at Gua Two standing by his side.
It took Gua Two but a second to understand Shi Jin's meaning, and he played along by hugging his shoulder and saying, “Of course, baby, you're my favorite and I'll give you whatever you want. Being my lover is much more comfortable than being a star.”
“Yes, what's so good about being a star? Rong Zhouzhong, you say? What's so great about him? He's nothing more than a handsome face, his mother just slept with the right people,” a slightly hoa.r.s.e voice interjected in their conversation, making the atmosphere volatile in an instant.
Long Shi's expression sank, and he turned to look at the speaker.
Gua Two and Shi Jin also glanced at him and found out that unexpectedly, the man who spoke was none other than their ultimate target tonight, Xu Huai.
“Be careful of what you say.” Long Shi's tone was chilly.
Xu Huai gave Shi Jin a ‘big brother will help you to solve this small problem' look. Taking advantage of his well-built body, he walked up to Long Shi and loomed over him in a threatening manner, saying scornfully, “You dare to be so arrogant on my turf? Get lost or you will have to be carried out.”
Long Shi has been working in the entertainment industry for many years already and he thought it made him rather even-tempered, but in this situation, he couldn't help getting angry. He looked at Xu Huai deeply and asked, “What is your name?”
“Tch, why are you asking, are you going to find me later? Then you have to remember this granddad's name clearly—Xu Huai, this master is called Xu Huai. I'll wait for you to come and settle accounts with me.” Xu Huai slapped Long Shi on the chest hard, making him take a step back.
Long Shi's expression turned even more unsightly. He patted his chest and said, “Xu Huai, I will remember you.” After giving Shi Jin a regretful and disappointed glance he walked away with an angry look on his face.
Shi Jin watched him leave and silently lit a candle for Xu Huai in his heart. Offending Long Shi was the same as offending Rong Zhouzhong, and Rong Zhouzhong was not called ‘the demon king of the s...o...b..z world' for nothing. With his style of ‘seeking revenge for the smallest grievance', the transgressor will feel as if he had fallen into h.e.l.l. Xu Huai will most likely come to deeply regret this moment.
Xiao Si was on the verge of tears:
You can make a thousand plans and be prepared for every contingency, but a stupid teammate would ruin everything! Xu Huai, better watch yourself!
Although the things did not go according to the plan at all, Gua Two's mission tonight has finally been accomplished. Thanks to the ‘hero saves the beauty' scene, they successfully attracted Xu Huai's attention and were invited to follow him to the private room his friends reserved.
Shi Jin was full of self-pity and his feeling that peacefully staying by Lian Jun's side was great was getting stronger. After Xu Huai kept intentionally or unintentionally filling his gla.s.s with alcohol, he finally lost his patience, asked Xiao Si to give him a ‘still sober after a thousand gla.s.ses' buff and let loose.
Xu Huai has never met anyone like Shi Jin, who had a handsome but delicate appearance, yet could dance in such a provocative way and had a bold and straightforward personality, not even trying to hide his worship of money. However, these contradictions did not make him obnoxious but intriguing, causing people to not want to take their eyes off him.
The longer Xu Huai chatted with Shi Jin, the more he liked him, practically forgetting about his ‘owner', Gua Two. Xu Huai's seat was moved from opposite Gua Two to opposite Shi Jin, and from opposite Shi Jin to next to Shi Jin, and he kept devouring him with his eyes.
Gua Two hadn't expected Shi Jin to be so out of control after entering the private room, but it was just as well. He simply let the things develop as they were and reduced his sense of existence—today's task was just to meet with Xu Huai in order to establish deeper contact in the future. Now that the mission has been completed, Shi Jin wasn't required to follow the script any longer. It was fine even if Shi Jin kept drinking as if he wanted to make the bar go out of business, he was going to watch over him.
Translator's Notes: “A stupid teammate” – 猪队友, perhaps more known as a “pig teammate”, is someone who can be used to ill.u.s.trate the saying ‘With friends like that, who needs enemies?' They usually have good intentions though. I just love Shi Jin, he has so much s.p.u.n.k! No shrinking violet, that one. ٩(♡ε♡)۶
Unsurprisingly, Shi Jin drunk Xu Huai under the table, but before he could pa.s.s out, Shi Jin asked Xiao Si to give him a ‘bewitching voice' buff, moved close to the man and whispering into his ear, persuaded him to go out of the private room.
Birthday boy and his friends all had ambiguous smiles when they saw them leaving together. Gua Two secretly made a face, then closed his eyes and pretended he was dead drunk and didn't know anything.
“Sugar, I know a good place, let's, let's go there and have fun.” Xu Huai didn't fall on his a.s.s only because he was being supported by Shi Jin, but he still didn't forget to try to take advantage of him.
Shi Jin gave him a mouth-only smile and said, “OK, let's go have fun.” I will make sure you will not forget this fun for the rest of your life.
They stumbled into an empty private booth located out of the way and locked the door.
About half an hour later, the door opened and Shi Jin came out alone. He intentionally put on a dissatisfied, angry face, returned to the room and ignoring the catcalls of Xu Huai's cronies, he made them go pick Xu Huai up. Then he woke up the ‘drunk' Gua Two and left with him without looking back.
When they returned to the car, Gua Two immediately revived and asked, “What were you doing with Xu Huai?”
“Fawning over him trying to make him talk. With too many ears nearby, I wouldn't have been able to get anything out of him,” explained Shi Jin. The real reason, though, was that there were too many people in the room and it would be inconvenient to use some of Xiao Si's less innocuous buffs there.
Gua Two didn't tangle with him over that, asking instead, “So did you get anything?”
“Important news,” replied Shi Jin. He elaborated on his findings, “I suspect Xu Huai is the one who is going to make the trade. When he poured wine for me in the beginning, he let it slip he expected to make so much money in the near future he will become richer than you and then would leave the country, and asked if I will go with him. I took him to the different room to coax the details out of him. He mentioned that he was going to play with his friends on a cruise ship before going abroad, but before he could tell me the exact date he pa.s.sed out drunk.”
Gua Two was incredulous, staring at Shi Jin as if he was seeing a monster, apparently not being able to believe he actually got the information they needed.
Seeing his expression, Shi Jin lost his temper. “You could hear everything, so what does your current look mean?”
Gua Two pulled out a hidden earphone from his pocket and said with some difficulty: “After the two of you left and I started to hear Xu Huai's voice in the earphone… it was too, uh, intense and I took it out. Cough, I hadn't thought you would really sacrifice yourself for this mission and let Xu Huai…”
Shi Jin raised his hand, clenching his fist so hard his knuckles turned white.
“Stop, stop, don't do it, I was just joking! I know you wouldn't go that far.” Gua Two promptly ducked and started to flatter Shi Jin: “Little JinJin, you're too amazing, thanks to you we've pretty much completed our task, and it only took you a few hours. Now we just need to verify the information you got and we can take a vacation!”
Shi Jin was surprised. “What do you mean? We aren't going to follow things up?”
“Nope, the government's side will take care of that. We're but a small and humble company, this kind of official business is far too big for us to handle,” Gua Two said lightheartedly, motioning the driver to return to Nightlight, then turned to size Shi Jin up. “But this is truly a surprise. Little JinJin, I hadn't expected you can hold your liquor so well.”
Plomp.
As if the magic spell had been lifted, Shi Jin, who was energetic and clear-headed a second ago, slumped in his chair and turned red-faced. He put his hand over his mouth, looked at Gua Two with blurry eyes, and uttered weakly, “Mom, I'm gonna hurl…”
Gua Two: “Eh?”
Buffs have a set time of duration. If the human body does things that exceed its limits while under the buff, it will bear all the consequences after the buff ended.
Shi Jin was a silly drunk. After vomiting, he was forced by Gua Two to drink a bottle of water and became slightly more conscious, but as soon as he did, he clung to Gua Two and started clamoring to go see if Darling ate a proper meal.
Gua Two wanted to knock him out immediately, but Shi Jin looked so sick and pitiful he changed his mind. Deciding to give him more water he turned to him, only to find him drunkenly fumbling around for his phone and dialing a number.
When he saw the name “Jun-shao” on the screen, Gua Two almost choked to death on his own saliva. He lurched, desperately trying to s.n.a.t.c.h it from Shi Jin's hand, and said in an urgent tone, “This is who you call ‘darling', you're really aiming for Jun-shao! Anyway, hang up and don't even think about this right now, or you will really get yourself killed!”
Shi Jin twisted and turned, trying to hide the phone with all his strength and then happened the last thing Gua Two wanted to see—the call connected.
Lian Jun's voice was somewhat raspy, the phone obviously had woken him up. He asked, {Shi Jin?}
Gua Two tried to save the situation, replying loudly, “Jun-shao, I'm sorry, Shi Jin is drunk and called you by mistake while playing with his phone, please go back to sleep—”
“Darling!” Shi Jin let out an ear-splitting roar, pushed Gua Two away and started to nag into the speaker like an old lady: “Why don't you like soup? The soup is so delicious, why won't you drink it? Your stomach is not good, you need to warm it up and you know it! Do you want to be healthy or not? You're this old, how can you be still so picky? You really are too much!”
Gua Two gasped in shock. He hurriedly covered Shi Jin's mouth and said into the phone: “Jun-shao, he is really drunk. I will straighten him up later, so please go to sleep and don't be offended, he truly doesn't know what he's saying.”
“Mmm, mmph… Darling!” Shi Jin struggled, wanting to continue speaking.
Gua Two wished he could just beat him to death. He tightened his hold on Shi Jin to completely stop him from moving and reached a hand to secure the phone.
Just as Gua Two thought Lian Jun should've hung up, his voice could be heard again: {Bring him back and come to see me immediately.} Only then the call disconnected.
Gua Two finally managed to grab the phone, but it seemed to be of little use now. He bowed his head and looked at Shi Jin, who was struggling to get free even as his eyes kept closing from sleepiness. Feeling both exasperated and helpless, he let him go. “You just had to make trouble. Even if you cry later, this brother won't be able to help you.”
When they returned to the clubhouse, Shi Jin was completely unconscious and Gua Two had no choice but to carry him to see Lian Jun.
Lian Jun was wearing a nightgown and waiting in his study. Seeing Shi Jin being carried in, his brow wrinkled. He eyed Shi Jin's toy boy getup and asked: “How's the mission?”
“We've already come into contact with our target, Xu Huai, Shi Jin also managed to pry some information from him. It was tentatively confirmed Xu Huai is the person sent to make the trade and the trading place should be on a cruise ship,” replied Hua Two. Seeing Lian Jun looking at Shi Jin again, he added, “It was thanks to Shi Jin the mission was accomplished so smoothly. He was drinking in order to get close to the target, not because he wanted to.”
Shi Jin, who had been thrown on the sofa, turned over suddenly and mumbled, “Darling… Drink soup…”
Alarm bells started to ring in Gua Two's mind. He hastily increased the volume of his voice and continued to report the incident with Long Shi, trying to drown out Shi Jin's muttered ‘Darlings'.
However, Lian Jun's hearing was completely fine. He moved his wheelchair towards the sofa and studied Shi Jin's ugly and silly-looking sleeping face, then, unexpectedly, slowly reached out and pinched Shi Jin's slightly open mouth closed.
Shi Jin felt uncomfortable and twisted his face in a grimace, looking even more silly.
Gua Two: “…”
“Investigate this Long Shi.” Lian Jun let go of Shi Jin's lips, removed the diamond stud from his ear and threw it to Gua Two, then continued, “Check the information Shi Jin obtained, and after verifying if it's true hand it over to the authorities.” After that, he waved his hand toward Shi Jin, signaling Gua Two to take him back to his room, turned his wheelchair away and left.
Gua Two stared openmouthed, not daring to believe this was the end of the matter. Looking at Shi Jin, who kept sleeping without a care in the world, a strange thought flashed in his mind—when it came to Shi Jin, didn't it seem as if Jun-shao was exceptionally… um, forgiving?
Shi Jin woke up suffering an agonizing headache from the hangover, not knowing what time it was and what happened. The first thing he did was to head to the bathroom and take a bath, the gray color of his hair washing away, then ran to Gua Two's door and knocked.
When Gua Two opened the door and saw him, his gaze turned sympathetic. “If you have woken up, go to the dining room, Jun-shao is waiting for you.”
Shi Jin was slow to respond, only nodding after a few seconds have pa.s.sed. He asked a bit nervously, “I vaguely remember calling Jun-shao last night, but, uh… I didn't say anything weird, did I?”
Gua Two sighed and patted him heavily on the shoulder.
“I, I did?” Shi Jin gulped.
Gua Two couldn't quite look at him. “You did. You called Jun-shao ‘darling' and scolded him for being a picky eater… You, well, I will pray for your well-being.”
Shi Jin had the urge to burst into a river of tears. He stiffly turned away, whining in his mind, “Xiao Si, you actually lied to me…”
Xiao Si felt extremely wronged:
One person and one system faced each other in silence for a long time. Finally, Xiao Si softened and tried to comfort Shi Jin, albeit without much confidence:
After opening the door, what appeared in front of Shi Jin was a table filled with cuc.u.mber dishes. Lian Jun was sitting behind the table with a bowl of soup in front of him, reading something on a tablet pc.
“Jun-shao,” Shi Jin called out weakly.
“Sit down and eat.” Lian Jun didn't lift his head.
Shi Jin sat down and looked at the pickled cuc.u.mbers, cuc.u.mber salad, cuc.u.mber stir-fry, stuffed cuc.u.mbers, egg cuc.u.mber soup, and many more cuc.u.mber dishes… Remembering the original ‘Shi Jin's' hatred of cuc.u.mbers, he could deeply feel Lian Jun's malicious intent. He tried to speak. “Jun-shao, yesterday…”
“You shouldn't be picky.” Lian Jun put down his tablet pc, picked up the soup in front of him and took a sip. “You shouldn't eat greasy food after a hangover, so the chef prepared this especially for you. Eat, don't waste his kindness.”
This kind of ‘kindness' is too hard for me to bear.
Shi Jin glanced at the soup in front of Lian Jun and picked up his chopsticks—it seemed Lian Jun was really angry, angry enough to force himself to drink soup… Fortunately, even though the original ‘Shi Jin' couldn't stand cuc.u.mbers, current Shi Jin didn't really mind their taste.
First, he scooped up some of the egg cuc.u.mber soup, then picked up an egg and stuffed it into his mouth.
“Rong Zhouzhong posted something on his microblog this morning. He wrote, ‘Looking for a young man dancing in the bar last night', and added they wanted to recruit him into their company. Below is a video of this young man on the dancing floor,” Lian Jun said suddenly.
Pff—the egg Shi Jin just ate was sprayed out all over the table.
Chapter 16 >>
This is why you shouldn't drunk dial. Or maybe I should make that, don't get drunk~