Volume One, Chapter Twenty-Nine: Old Blade Bo

Dao Laobo was a kindly father. He needed a large sum of money—a sum that would allow him to take his daughter away from this land that broke his heart, this land that had made him the chief accomplice of a notorious drug lord.

A mysterious figure promised him this vast fortune, enough to let him spend his remaining years in comfort in Thailand. He had already received a deposit, a sum that far exceeded what he’d earned building houses years ago.

Half a year ago, in Hua Hin—the Thai royal family’s summer retreat—he had his eye on an old villa that a wealthy businessman was selling. He immediately transferred the deposit to the businessman’s account. Not only would the house be his, but there would also be enough left to buy all the land encircling the villa.

He was about to personally serve as both designer and supervisor, expanding the property into a high-end resort hotel. These ill-gotten funds would be laundered, generating legitimate income and considerable profit.

Of course, he needed to do something worth such a high price: betray Yannu.

This required no wisdom, only the abandonment of his conscience. Faust had sold his soul to the devil for knowledge and youth. Dao Laobo, on the other hand, betrayed the devil in exchange for immense wealth—a transaction he felt no shame in making.

Thieves cooperate and fall out with each other solely on the basis of self-interest; those who cling to honor are unfit to be thieves.

This was not something one man could achieve alone. If he failed, the consequence would inevitably be the extermination of his entire family. Dao Laobo was well aware of this danger; he had witnessed Yannu’s vengeful methods too many times before.

Fortunately, the operative assigned to the task, the Flying Squirrel, possessed a calm mind, flawless planning, and the courage to venture into the lion’s den alone.

Dao Laobo provided every crucial detail to the Flying Squirrel; they were partners who had hit it off from the start. Yet, even as clever as the Flying Squirrel was, he could never have imagined that Dao Laobo was hiding something—a plot of staggering magnitude.

After bidding farewell to Yannu, Dao Laobo left the grand estate.

He could not have foreseen that Yannu would survive, badly wounded but not killed by the Flying Squirrel. But that was irrelevant; his part was done. As for the Flying Squirrel, Dao Laobo never doubted the professionalism of these people, especially their relentless tenacity.

Outside the pavilion, rain began to pour.

Dense drops battered the lake, lashed the sprawling forests, and filled the valley with the roar of rain and thunder.

Beneath the pavilion, a shadow slowly surfaced from the reservoir, swiftly scaling the sheer stone wall a dozen meters below, moving nimbly upwards.

The rain’s drumming on the lake masked the sounds of the ascent.

As the figure vaulted onto the pavilion, lightning split the night sky. He strode toward Dao Laobo. In the instant Dao Laobo saw him—like beholding a specter—his expression shifted from shock to terror.

“You—” he began, but before the word was finished, a blade pierced his heart.

The last thing the informant Dao Laobo saw before death was the flash of lightning illuminating the arterial spray from his neck.

The instructor had always stressed: never feel pity for any informant’s death. The moment they chose to become this role, their fate was sealed—they would not die well. The only question was whether they got what they wanted before the end.

The Flying Squirrel could tell at a glance, without even checking, that Dao Laobo was dead. The two stab wounds were both fatal.

It was a long-bladed Thai knife, wielded with deadly precision and ruthlessness.

The blade was withdrawn from the body before the victim even hit the ground—fast and efficient. He mimed the motion in the air: first, a backhand strike with the left forearm toward the target’s face. Any quarry would instinctively raise their hands to protect their face—a feint. The real attack came as the long blade thrust upward from the right abdomen, bypassing the ribs and piercing the heart from below.

It was clear: that first, lethal stab had already killed Dao Laobo.

The wound on the neck had been inflicted from the right, passing through and emerging on the left, so that blood gushed from both sides. The blade severed his right carotid artery; blood still spurted, suggesting he’d been killed less than three minutes ago.

The lightning revealed Dao Laobo’s contorted face and half-open eyes.

He had seen the “Lone Wolf” use this knife technique before; only the Lone Wolf in their unit could leave such rapid traces. But the Lone Wolf was dead.

Could another tactical team have been dispatched from above? The thought sent a chill down his spine.

Dao Laobo had trusted only the Lone Wolf and him, after a year of working together.

Every meeting, the Flying Squirrel remained silent and indifferent, while Dao Laobo whispered secretly with the Lone Wolf, always casting sidelong glances at him.

The brief contact before heading into town that afternoon had been a huge help; Dao Laobo had drawn a terrain map as precise as any architect’s, enabling him to find a breakthrough.

Three gorillas burst out of the jungle, chasing each other with remarkable agility, then began to wrestle and brawl right beside the Flying Squirrel, shrieking in anger—most likely fighting over a mate.

He crouched over Dao Laobo’s corpse, indifferent to the gorillas at his side; the situation was growing ever more chaotic.

Until now, only he and the Lone Wolf knew about this place. That afternoon, he had called Beijing and mentioned this rendezvous point. Obviously, those in Beijing could not possibly be here.

The Lone Wolf was dead.

Thinking of the Lone Wolf brought a secret to mind: the Lone Wolf had a child in Yadu.

Three months ago, the Lone Wolf brought a woman from Yadu to the little cabin, asking Amei to look after her. He left soon after. The woman stayed just two hours, had lunch, and then the Lone Wolf took her away.

The woman told Amei she lived in Yadu City, working as a hotel maid.

She had an infant son with her. The child had to be the Lone Wolf’s; otherwise, why bring her to the cabin—the safe house known only to the two of them?

That was a serious lapse on the Lone Wolf’s part, thought the Flying Squirrel. He should never have let Amei in on the secret.

He hadn’t told Amei what he’d immediately noticed: the woman was an addict, and deeply so.

Given the Lone Wolf’s line of work, procuring enough free heroin for her would have been effortless, but in the Flying Squirrel’s eyes, that was only sending her faster down the road to ruin.

Subsequent incidents proved just how naive the Flying Squirrel’s thinking had been. He had believed: as long as it didn’t interfere with the mission, who cared about a teammate’s private affairs?

“No matter how perfect the battle plan, once the fighting starts, half of it becomes useless,” said the famous General Chen Geng, “The other half is made up on the fly.”

The situation was dire: trapped in the enemy’s stronghold, mission incomplete, the informant dead—clearly, the Flying Squirrel was no longer in the shadows.

The best option was to change the battlefield.

But he couldn’t obtain transportation. The entire town was on high alert; the locals, united with the Yannu clan, would never let him out of the woods.

The Lone Wolf’s child was in Yadu. The Flying Squirrel decided to take the boy with him. The Lone Wolf had once saved his life; he owed him this much.

Dejected, the Flying Squirrel returned to the safe house, agitated and lost in thought as he slumped into a bamboo chair.

He said nothing, so Amei dared not ask.

As she pulled the wooden stopper from the jug of rice wine, it made a popping sound, and the Flying Squirrel’s hand instinctively went to his waist. Amei saw the gesture, and both gave apologetic smiles.

Amei poured him a cup of wine. As he took the cup, his hand trembled uncontrollably.

Amei sat on the floor, gently holding his hand. “Brother Mouse, you’re burning up; you’ve got a fever.”

“Oh, really? I feel cold,” the Flying Squirrel replied, recalling how Amei had once lent him money for medicine.

Amei knew that even this fearless Brother Mouse was now afraid.

She rose silently, gathered some dry firewood from behind the door, crouched by the hearth, and lit a fire. She placed an old clay pot on the flames to boil water, intent on making him drink more.

But it wasn’t fear. The Flying Squirrel knew his trembling was a symptom of his anxiety disorder.

Years in this line of work had left him with severe, if intermittent, bouts of anxiety and depression. Dao Laobo’s mysterious death meant there was now an unknown beast lurking in the shadows, watching his every move, ready to strike at any moment.

He forced himself to calm down. He wanted to sit by the fire all night, sifting through the clues in his mind.

His conclusion: nothing that happened tonight had any trace of logic.