Chapter 51: Won’t Let That Old Bastard Go Just Like This
“Then may I venture to ask, what task is Alliance Head planning to give?” Elder Yu couldn’t figure out what exactly Tang Doudou wanted to do and could only play along. Finding out what she was planning before coming up with a countermeasure would be ideal. In any case, although this matter was said to be urgent, it wasn’t really that urgent. The time limit given by the Demonic Sect was seven days and Cloud Sun City wasn’t that far from here. No matter what, they’d be able to make it in time.
Tang Doudou looked at Elder Yu’s eager eyes and opened her mouth hesitantly, before shaking her head and closing her mouth again, as if she wanted to speak but didn’t dare to. Elder Yu got extremely anxious seeing this.
“Is it some personal matter that can’t be made known publicly?”
Tang Doudou nodded.
“Then it doesn’t matter, there are no outsiders present. Alliance Head, you should just say it!”
Tang Doudou shook her head adamantly.
Elder Yu was irritated to the point that his beard was about to be huffed flying. Yet, he just couldn’t flare up towards her. In his sullen mood, he actually managed to laugh and say, “Then what exactly does Alliance Head want to do? Alliance Head should at least give everyone an explanation, right!?”
Tsk tsk, now he’s starting to pull a tiger skin* again.
What I translated pretty literally to ‘pull a tiger skin’ is 扯虎大皮. A tiger is a fierce animal, so there’s this saying 拉大旗作虎皮, waving a flag like it’s a tiger skin, which refers to revolutionaries using their flags to intimidate people as if their flag is a tiger skin/aka representation of their strength. So, Elder Yu is pretending to speak for ‘everyone’ and trying to pressure Tang Doudou into giving an answer. I think… correct me if I’m wrong~
Tang Doudou disdainfully curled her lips and scorned at this outdated trick as she hesitantly asked, “Do you really want to know?”
Elder Yu nodded solemnly, “Alliance Head’s matter is everyone’s matter. As long as Alliance Head tells us, we will help Alliance Head with all our strength!”
The people behind him also echoed one after another, “Elder Yu is right!”
“Alliance Head, you should just say it!”
“Precisely ah. We still have to save Bai gongzi once we’re done with this!”
“Actually, it’s not my matter, it’s Elder Yu’s.” After hesitating again and again while pacing back and forth several times, Tang Doudou saw that she had reached her intended effect and finally spoke while looking towards Elder Yu with a helpless expression.
Wha? Elder Yu’s head was filled with question marks. What exactly did she mean? How did he get pulled into the topic?
And she even said it was more important than saving Bai Feiyun, this… For some unknown reason, Elder Yu started feeling a strong sense of unease. He seemed to have realized what Tang Doudou wanted to do.
However, he still couldn’t figure out her exact plans. It was seriously difficult to bear ah!
“Elder Yu’s matter?”
“What matter could Elder Yu possibly have!?”
“It couldn’t be…”
“Could it be…”
Tang Doudou took a long inhale and took over the discussion, “It’s precisely the matter of Madam Yu!”
Elder Yu choked on a mouthful of old blood as he turned fiercely to look towards Li Hong. Other than him, there was no one else that had such big nerves as to tell Li Xueyi about this matter. No wonder she asked him about the injury on his face the moment she had walked through the door. She actually was digging this huge hole so that he would have to jump around over here*!
In general, the word 坑, which translates to hole, pit, to defraud, is used in an expression 坑人 (pretty much literally ‘cheat person’), with the expressed meaning of ‘I can’t accept this, this is like fraud!’. This is cause there are two meanings. The first meaning is meeting with an unlucky/crappy situation, like when you fall into a hole. The other meaning is being deceived, implying that someone dug that hole for you to fall into.
“Alliance Head, I’ll venture to be so bold as to ask, why is Madam Yu and Elder Yu’s matter even more important than saving Bai gongzi?” Someone asked quite pertinently.
Tang Doudou rubbed her chin, feeling that it was about time to shift the topic. She had to suspend Elder Yu’s appetite so that his thinking won’t be as clear. Only through this way would she have the advantage in the following development. And so, Tang Doudou started to give a long explanation, “Bai gongzi and this Alliance Head has an iron-clad relationship. Even if he didn’t help me deal with many affairs in the Alliance Head Residence, I would still feel that it is my duty to save him. However, even if we must go save him, we can’t move hastily without making any preparations. Even though the Demonic Sect isn’t worth mentioning, for better or for worse, they’re still experts with skill levels as high as the clouds. I still have not recovered completely from my injury. To head off alone, it would be difficult to escape from harm. At that time, being injured would be a small matter, but if it so happens that this Alliance Head isn’t successful in rescuing Bai gongzi, wouldn’t that cause everyone to be disappointed?”
“As for the Alliance Head Command Tablet, I definitely won’t hand it over to the Demonic Sect.”
This statement once again stirred up a thousand waves in the crowd. Everyone started voicing opinions but there was no one that stepped out to interrogate her as to why. Only the person that asked the question earlier spoke again, “Alliance Head’s words aren’t related to the topic ah?”
She took a brief glance at the Elder Yu, whose expression turned pretty bad the moment he heard her say that she wasn’t handing the Alliance Head Command Tablet over, then gestured towards the crowd, indicating for them to listen.
Only then did they gradually quiet down.
They then heard her clear and straight-forward voice sounding again, “Everyone, calm down first. Listen until I finish speaking before asking questions, alright?”
The surroundings were completely silent as they all looked towards her, waiting to see what she was going to say.
My lord, it’s finally quiet! They were so loud her ears were practically ringing(symptoms of tinnitus)!
Sweeping an eye over everyone, Tang Doudou cleared her throat and started to spit out all the drafts she had in her stomach section by section, “Ladies and gentlemen, think about it. What does the Alliance Head Command Tablet represent?”T/N
“It’s face!”
“It’s everyone’s face ah!”
Everyone had lost and vacant expressions. What did that have to do with the situation ah? What exactly is the Alliance Head trying to convey?
Tang Doudou didn’t care whether they understood or not and quickly continued: “The Alliance Head Command Tablet not only represents my status as Alliance Head, it also represents everyone’s face. Why? Because of its symbolic nature! Symbolic nature! Symbolic nature! The important point was said three times! You guys must remember at all costs!”
“And what is the Demonic Sect?”
“An evil, dark, criminal organization!”
“And what we represent is justice, light!”
“When facing the coercion of an evil criminal organization, we should resist and reject them, not accept a compromise and allow them to continue their arrogant behavior!”
The Alliance Head seem to be making a lot of sense!
Tang Doudou’s voice was impassioned. As she spoke, she even stepped onto a large rock at the side and looked forty-five degrees up towards the sky as she cried out in a voice ladened with grief. “But your reactions have made me very disappointed and hurt! You all want me to use everyone’s face to exchange for Xiao Bai! You want me to take your face and hand it over to the Demonic Sect to trample! This is like fiercely giving my heart a stab, it hurts ah!”
As she was speaking, she even lifted her hand and fiercely jabbed towards her heart. While displaying a pained expression, she slowly lowered her head and used her tear-filled emotional eyes to stare at the already stunned blank crowd.
Abruptly stretching out her hand and slowly moving her five fingers in the air above the crowd, she then tightly clenched her fist and thumped it on her chest as she sung passionately, “Ah! Jinkela, my Jinkela…”*
I never expected Jinkela to show up again so I didn’t add it into the glossary before and had to go back through the chapters to look for it. It is now in the glossary. Jinkela is a chemical fertilizer additive brand with a strong local flavor. They invited foreign actors to shoot some ridiculous patriotic video to advertise so it ended up being mocked a lot on the internet.
What is Jinkela? Based on how mournful Alliance Head looks, could it be what she described as the so-called face?
This conjecture appeared at the same time in everyone’s hearts. Then, they immediately saw Tang Doudou continue to say with intense passion while holding back her tears: “Comrades ah! We can’t compromise just like this! We must resist! There would be no killing without trade!(slogan protesting killing for ivory) Rise up, let’s all stand up! Friends that aren’t willing to be Jinkela! Let’s resist! Friends that aren’t willing to be Jinkela!”
“Let us take this courageous first step!”
“Defeat evil, overthrow the Demonic Sect! Don’t give up hope, don’t lose faith, don’t compromise! We must let the Demonic Sect, that bunch of trash know that we, the Alliance Head Residence, aren’t that easy to bully!”
With a clean nimble sweep, she wiped off a tear. Tang Doudou stood with her back to the light, on top of the rock. The sunlight shone from behind her back and caused her to be wrapped in a seemingly incomparably pure and holy halo-like radiance. Adding on to her righteousness-filled eyes, it was bright to the point that everyone was almost blinded. It caused a feeling of admiration to arise involuntarily within their hearts.
She slowly closed her eyes again. When everyone became a little puzzled, she abruptly opened her eyes again and pointed towards the people below her and asked loudly: “There’s an opportunity right now to defeat the Demonic Sect. Are you guys willing to go do it? Are you willing!?”
Usually, there would definitely be someone that would ask: Did he go crazy?
Was defeating the Demonic Sect something that you can just talk about then do?
But right now, everyone’s passion was already aroused by her and there was a raging flame ignited in their hearts. When they heard her say this, some unknown person in the crowd couldn’t hold back and replied loudly, “Willing!”
Following that, people started reacting one after another and also shouted, “Alliance Head, we’re willing!”
“We’re willing!”
The momentum built. Each subsequent wave was stronger than the previous wave, vibrating through the entire Alliance Head Residence to the point that the residence was close to collapsing.
Jun Xin’s head poked out to look over that elevated high white wall between the Alliance Head Residence and Plum Garden. Feeling this unusually energetic clamor, his gaze was exceptionally pleased as he looked towards Tang Doudou.
This yatou isn’t bad. By tugging towards the east and pulling towards the west a little, she was able to cause Elder Yu, that old bastard, to be completely confused and to no longer know where is the north, south, east, west.
He had even worried that she wouldn’t be able to handle it and ran over here to wait and see if he could help.
But from the looks of it, that was unnecessary.
As he thought so, he decided to just leap up onto the wall, and then laid down sideways, propping his head up with one hand. He watched as Tang Doudou waved her hand downwards again and again. Within her dignified voice, he could clearly hear the hints of a soft and cute intonation.
“Alright, everyone, calm down!” Tang Doudou spoke as such.
However, everyone was currently uncontrollably stirred up, how could they calm down?
It must be known that the situation of the Demonic Sect oppressing the small forces within the martial arts circles wasn’t something that had lasted for just one or two days. Yet simply because they were all apprehensive of Mu Ye’s unpredictable martial arts and that bunch of strange subordinates, the Alliance Head Residence and the several large powers of the Jianghu didn’t dare to act blindly without thinking. On top of that, because of the falling out between the Alliance Head and Cloud City, everyone turned to minding their own safety first. This allowed the Demonic Sect to gradually grow, to such an extent as to be as unbridledly aggressive as they were today.
When their thoughts got to this point, there were people that turned to look towards Elder Yu with blameful expressions.
Elder Yu was completely dumbstruck. He completely wrecked his brain to think through it, but still couldn’t figure out Tang Doudou’s true intentions. At this moment, his thoughts were still stuck on the fact that Tang Doudou mentioned Madam Yu and didn’t hear much of what Tang Doudou said after that. When he finally returned to his senses and saw that there were some not very friendly gazes directed towards him, he became even more confused.
But right now if he didn’t say anything, everyone would be lead off by the nose by Tang Doudou.
When he glanced backwards, those in the same alliance as him currently had stars in their eyes as they looked towards Tang Doudou with incomparable adoration. Upon seeing this, Elder Yu felt a burst of anger. This bunch of useless trash!
But even after thinking, he still didn’t know what to say because he didn’t pay attention to what Tang Doudou said earlier. All he heard was that last sentence, are you willing? And faintly something about some opportunity.
After a little bit of deliberation, Elder Yu saw that everyone had almost quieted down under Tang Doudou’s beckoning and hurriedly took advantage of the opportunity to ask: “Alliance Head, lao fu(basically ‘this old man’, used by men over 70 that are respected) still doesn’t quite understand. What kind of opportunity is it exactly ah? Why don’t we know anything about it?”
Tang Doudou didn’t look at him. She had been keeping an eye on the old bastard the entire time earlier, and knew that he didn’t hear what that bunch of words she said earlier was about at all. She sneered in her heart. Old bastard, wait and see how this great auntie will sort you out!
Before she came, she was just thinking of finding some people to go rescue Bai Feiyun. But after hearing about how Elder Yu was henpecked from Li Hong, she got a faint feeling that perhaps this was an opportunity, a good opportunity to defeat Elder Yu.
Of course, if Elder Yu behaved and stayed honest rather than provoked her, she definitely wouldn’t go to this pain-in-the-ass length to defeat him. But Elder Yu simply had to provoke her. Not only did he want to get her Alliance Head Command Tablet, he even collaborated with the Demonic Sect and kidnapped Bai Feiyun!
Uncle could endure but Auntie can’t endure!T/N
Damned freak, I spit! She, Tang Doudou, definitely won’t let that old bastard go just like this!
Moreover, this was a seized opportunity. If she didn’t use it properly, wouldn’t that make her look stupid?
Slightly narrowing her eyes and exposing the craftiness of a little fox, Tang Doudou lifted her middle finger towards Elder Yu as she praised ruthlessly: “Elder Yu’s question is good, is well, is hella dang swell!”T/N3
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