Chapter 72: Southwall
Translator: Transn Editor: Transn
Jade City was divided naturally into two parts by a river. On the north bank of the river stood a high city wall, which was built to prevent South City's residents from sneaking into North City.
Since Tie Hanfeng had a killer waist token issued by Golden Roc Fort, he had free access to North City. After he had managed to smuggle Slave Huan in and out of North City, he warned him, "Follow me closely, otherwise, you'll have to rot in South City. Without me, you can never return to the fort."
"North City is the safest place in the Western Region, and South City is..."
After a long time, Gu Shenwei finally thought of a proper word. "South City is the most profligate place."
After crossing a pontoon bridge, which was the only access connecting North City to South City, they saw a shabby building that was a brothel. A hooker was drearily standing at the gate. In the light of the setting sun, Gu Shenwei could clearly see the wrinkles around her eyes under her heavy makeup. He guessed that she would look good only after night had fallen.
But Tie Hanfeng was so excited to see her. He cheerfully went over to her and held her by the waist. When they were about to walk into the house, Tie Hanfeng thought of his apprentice. "Do you want to try?" he asked coldly.
Gu Shenwei shook his head.
"Wait for me outside. Don't go far."
Gu Shenwei did not want to be mistaken for a pimp or a doorkeeper, so he turned away and walked down the street. He walked past three brothels and four taverns and then he finally found a place to stop.
It was getting dark. All the buildings along the street were brilliantly illuminated and had their doors open for business. The muddy street reflected the light and looked as if it were glowing. At this moment, this hell-like city became a place of dazzling colors.
Gu Shenwei now understood why his father had declined to stay any longer in Jade City. He had been avoiding this dissolute place for the benefit of his three sons.
Gu Shenwei stood on a street corner, observing the pedestrians. He believed that many of them came from North City because they were nicely dressed and were followed by a group of servants. They were strutting in the streets like they owned the place.
He also spotted quite a few killers from the Stone Castle. They looked different from all the other pedestrians. They always kept a straight face and often looked down as they walked. Once someone approached such a killer, he would intuitively cast a murderous eye on that person.
All killers remained low-key as Golden Roc Fort required, but their cool attitude and some occupational habits still made them easily recognizable.
Gu Shenwei thought of Tie Hanfeng, who did not look like a professional killer at all and, thus, fit in naturally with the crowd here. He believed that no one would discover that his mentor was a killer.
Gu Shenwei felt awkward standing here. He did not like that place at all. In fact, he would rather stay inside the Stone Castle. Things here were so strange and so inconsistent with his traditional Chinese upbringing.
Most people in the street avoided him, for everyone could tell at a glance that this cool and vigilant boy was a killer.
But there was always an exception. A young man wearing a cloak walked past him and suddenly turned around. He leaned over and whispered beside Gu Shenwei's ear, "Do you need a knife? It's the sharpest in the world. It'll never get blunt, even after killing hundreds of people."
Like all the other killers, Gu Shenwei did not like to be approached by strangers. He held his head back and stretched out his right hand to grab his saber shaft but failed. After a few seconds, he remembered that he had already given his saber to the guards at the northern gate of Jade City.
"No."
Such a stiff refusal did not discourage that young man at all. He continued to ask, "What about poisons? Antiaris and gelsemine, they leave no trace on dead bodies."
"I don't have any money."
Gu Shenwei hoped to send him away by saying that, but the young man just paused for a moment and said with a smile, "Hey, bro. You've never bought anything in South City, have you? You must come from the Stone Castle. No matter what you want, you can tell me. All you need to do is..."
Then the young man made a throat-cutting gesture. Gu Shenwei now realized that what the man wanted was not his money, but his services.
When the young man was looking hopefully at Gu Shenwei, waiting for a reply, another man suddenly rushed over and pushed him several steps away and said with a threatening tone, "Piss off."
Seeing the young man hurriedly run away, Tie Hanfeng smiled. To Gu Shenwei's great surprise, his mentor was sober and at the same time in a very agreeable mood. He even patted his shoulder and spoke to him kindly. "Don't give a damn about those guys. They can't even be sure if they themselves can live through the night or not. If you want to make a lot of money, you just need to listen to me. Even if you can't become a killer in the future, you'll live much better than most of the people here."
"No, I want to be a killer."
Gu Shenwei replied with finality, but Tie Hanfeng did not take it seriously. He tugged on his apprentice's arm and dragged him forward, saying, "Come with me. I'll take you to a nice place. Let's see if you still want to become a killer when you get there."
Gu Shenwei worried that his mentor had already abandoned the assassination plan. He wanted to urge him to carry out the plan, but had continually not gotten a chance to do so. Tie Hanfeng had told him that someone wanted to kill him. He did not quite believe it, but he really wanted to see what a real assassination looked like.
A section of the city wall situated in the southwest of Jade City had collapsed years ago and had not been rebuilt in time. Since then, many businessmen had begun to open up shops outside the broken wall. This area had developed into a prosperous place now, and the nice place that Tie Hanfeng had mentioned was located there. The back of it was up against a section of the dilapidated city wall, and its name was Southwall.
"There's an old saying, 'You'll never turn back until you hit the southern wall', which means that it often takes a very rude awakening for a person to change. But do you know what the next line is? 'You'll never turn back after you enter Southwall.' Hahaha."
Tie Hanfeng was cheerful like a child. He seemed to have already forgotten about his assassination plan before he had even drunk anything. Gu Shenwei now reckoned that he might just have used the plan as an excuse to go down the hill to have some fun.
Different from the shops in the street, Southwall tavern's entrance was very dimly lit. Most people, except for familiar customers, would easily miss its entrance in the darkness.
There were two fat guys standing at the entrance: one was tall and the other was short. They would search every person before they entered the tavern. No one could bring a weapon inside of it. After taking away someone's weapon, they would coldly say, "You can get it back when you leave."
Evidently, Tie Hanfeng must have visited here pretty often. He just opened his arms, showing the guys that he did not have any weapons, and directly walked into the tavern. The fat guys bowed to him with a smile and then stopped Gu Shenwei and carefully searched him before pushing him inside.
Just like South City, Southwall did not give Gu Shenwei a good first impression. He hated this place and was instantly on alert here. He never expected that in the future he would consider this place his second home. He had lost his entire family, so this place actually was going to become his only home.
To his great surprise, he found out that Tie Hanfeng seemed to be a big shot here.
He had seen how humbly this cripple behaved in Golden Roc Fort. With that image stuck in his mind, he thought that the waiters and customers must have mistaken him for somebody else because they all warmly greeted Tie Hanfeng when he entered the tavern. Some of them even bought him drinks.
The tavern was quite spacious and well-lit inside. There were many tables of different sizes. About a dozen waiters were swiftly moving around, serving the customers. Unlike Gu Shenwei, all of them were running so light on their feet, meeting Tie Hanfeng's requirements about stepping.
Southwall was famous for good drinks. It offered all kinds of famous wine and liquor. In this place, a customer who came from the Central Plain could drink famous liquor from his hometown, such as Fen liquor or Diao liquor. He could also try some new drinks, such as wine or ale. A beginner here would order lots of different drinks and try as many new drinks as he could. A real lush would just order his favorite drink and keep drinking it until he got drunk.
It took Gu Shenwei quite a long time to locate Tie Hanfeng, who was sitting in a corner and waving to him.
Many different drinks had been placed on his table. He had a craving for alcohol but he was not yet a lush. Like the beginners in Southwall, he preferred to try various kinds of drinks.
He gave his apprentice a cup of wine and screeched, "Drink it!"
Gu Shenwei shook his head and refused to take the wine, but Tie Hanfeng still thrust it into his hand while saying, "Every killer drinks. That's a skill you have to master."
Gu Shenwei did not believe what Tie Hanfeng said, but he could not resist any longer. The wine was red and looked like blood, which made him feel nauseous. He had killed three people in the monthly tests, but still failed to overcome this discomfort. In order to conceal such a restless mood, he followed the example of his mentor and chugged the wine down.
He found that it tasted surprisingly good. It was sweet, tart and zesty, dispelling his nausea and exhaustion.
He started to drink one cup after another just like his mentor. During this period of time, many people came to their table to drink and talk with Tie Hanfeng, who could manage to drink while talking. He even drank much more than his silent apprentice.
After a while, Gu Shenwei began to realize that his mentor came here not for fun, but for information.
"A fat guy from Shu-lik was killed in Haitang Lane," a gangly man told Tie Hanfeng, and then he left their table but remained nearby. After that, a one-eyed man came and whispered to Tie Hanfeng, "I want to hire someone to send some goods to the Central Plain safely." After hearing what they said, Tie Hanfeng summoned a poorly dressed middle-aged man and told him that there was a good case that they could accept now. He asked the man to charge a high price for it since it was not a regular case. The man bowed to Tie Hanfeng and then went back into the crowd, searching for the one-eyed man. Seeing that, Tie Hanfeng beckoned the gangly man back over and gave him a small packet of silver.
While doing all of those things, Tie Hanfeng still continued to drink.
It was getting late, but the tavern somehow became even more crowded. People just kept coming in, and it seemed that no one wanted to leave. Tie Hanfeng's business was doing quite well. He spent quite a lot of money here, but at the same time earned more. When no one came to him to talk about business, he started to drink and chat with his friends.
He had quite a lot of friends here. Gu Shenwei could tell that none of them were Golden Roc Fort killers.
The one that he remembered most clearly was an old friend of his mentor. He secretly nicknamed him the horse-faced man, since this man had a really long face and a peculiarly small mouth. Among all these people, he and Tie Hanfeng had talked for the longest time. They had talked about their youth, their dead friends, and the beautiful women that they had seen. They had even talked about their enemies in the past while shedding tears.
After midnight, the customers started to leave. After hugging Tie Hanfeng, the horse-faced man also staggered out of the tavern.
Tie Hanfeng had a really good time. He touched his belly with satisfaction and then he turned to look at his apprentice and said, "Let's go kill that guy."