Chapter 17: Not Afraid to Die
“Ah… monitoring a law-abiding citizen like me isn’t really against regulations, is it?”
“Facial recognition caught your appearance.”
“Isn’t that a tracking method only used for S-class targets?” Gu Qing’s voice sounded somewhat deflated.
“I have special permissions.” Ji Yueling answered coolly.
“Fine, fine.” Gu Qing raised both hands in surrender. “Just catching up with an old friend. I knew him before—we even worked together as middlemen for a while. I was casually asking about that mermaid demon incident.”
“Taotie is a law-abiding citizen. He’s a good demon recognized by your Alliance. Me having a chat with him can’t be illegal, right?” Gu Qing’s momentum was lacking, sounding somewhat like bluster.
Li Si was Taotie, and Taotie was Li Si. In the human world, Li Si was called Li Si. In the world of demons and Extraordinaries, Li Si was called Taotie. He lived in A City as an officially Alliance-certified good demon. He usually lived as a human, never used demonic powers, reported his status to the Alliance monthly, and sometimes even quietly tipped off the Alliance when demon factions made big moves.
In the demon world, he was undoubtedly a traitorous dog, so he could never return to S City or K City. He could only survive by living in A City for the rest of his life.
“Tell me honestly how you know him.” Ji Yueling said coolly, while Gu Qing seemed to be thinking, apparently considering excuses to deflect. But the next moment, his shoe under the table was stepped on by the tip of Ji Yueling’s high-heeled Mary Jane. Her eyes grew colder as she said, “Think a little longer and I’ll step on you with my heel.”
“Don’t, don’t, don’t!”
Being stepped on by a woman brought back unpleasant memories for Gu Qing, so he obediently answered, “When I was wandering in A City before, I heard about this amazing organization called the Fight Club from other vagrants. Anyone could go there to fight and vent their dissatisfaction with their shitty lives. I was severely agitated back then and always itching for a fight, so I mixed into that organization too.”
“That organization is almost entirely demons.” Ji Yueling said coolly.
“I know, but they’re all good demons. Sometimes I even chat with them in their tribal demon language to help them reminisce, so I had good relationships there.”
Obviously Ji Yueling didn’t know exactly what Gu Qing and Li Si had discussed, but hearing Gu Qing say he had good relationships with them all made her eyes flash.
“You have a good relationship with Taotie too?”
“Yeah, we often drink together. I always pay.”
“What’s the point of these demons… playing house?” Ji Yueling finally couldn’t help asking this question that was destined to have no answer.
“How would I know? I’m not a demon.” Gu Qing spread his hands helplessly.
Half the good demons in Fight Club played various strange roles in the human world. They never used their abilities to make money or satisfy desires, but worked with their hands like ordinary people. Gu Qing had heard many friends from the club complain about their shitty bosses making them work overtime and docking their pay, and women complaining about their husbands’ domestic violence and cheating. Yet she seemed to enjoy playing the role of a wronged, resentful wife. Li Si was an unprofessional middleman who sold flowers on holidays, scalped tickets when he had nothing to do, and sold a bit of everything—as professional and reliable as the corner store owner.
“I want to buy information from Taotie.”
This was Ji Yueling’s real reason for suddenly seeking out Gu Qing today.
She was a member of A City’s Alliance, bound by A City Alliance regulations. So even though she was itching with hatred, she couldn’t just take her sword and wipe out all those so-called “good demons” in one go. Besides, she couldn’t beat them.
She’d known about Taotie for a long time. Taotie’s intelligence network covered all of A City. She’d approached Taotie before, but no matter what price she offered, Taotie would just put on a bitter face and say he was already half a traitorous dog—if he sold demon intelligence on top of that, he’d be hunted by demons then, so he couldn’t say anything.
Ji Yueling couldn’t beat Taotie and had no way to threaten him by force. She’d also tried using connections, but her father had personally told her that a terrifying big shot was protecting Fight Club from behind the scenes—even he couldn’t afford to offend them.
Gu Qing remained silent at first, then began deflecting.
“Why don’t you just go buy it from him directly? You can probably contact him anyway, right?”
“I already approached him. He wasn’t willing to sell me that information.”
“Well there you go. If he won’t sell it to you personally, me asking him won’t help either.” Gu Qing could only spread his hands helplessly, while Ji Yueling across from him poured another glass of wine into his cup.
This was already their third glass. Gu Qing could see what this woman was doing—she planned to get him drunk to extract information. This was probably her real excuse for asking him to drink. Fortunately, Gu Qing didn’t dislike this.
Because he was originally a heavy drinker, and due to his special constitution, he needed to drink a lot to feel even slightly drunk. So he envied those with poor alcohol tolerance who could feel the wonderful slight intoxication from just a little bit.
He picked up his glass and drained it, while Ji Yueling’s eyes fell on his face, saying coldly, “Find a way.”
“There’s no way.” Gu Qing shook his head.
“I heard… Fight Club’s principle is mutual help?” Ji Yueling spoke slowly, apparently already quite familiar with that organization called Fight Club.
“That’s what they say, but mostly it’s mutual help in the human world. Like if someone’s getting married and needs wedding cars, or if someone got a DUI and wants to pull some strings, or if someone urgently needs money to buy a school district house for their kid and everyone pools donations together… that kind of mutual help. But anything involving Extraordinaries and the demon world is tacitly never mentioned. That’s also why I could join Fight Club.”
“Then how do I join Fight Club?” Ji Yueling’s eyes were still cold.
“You generally need a member to refer you. Like Taotie referred me. There’s also a rule that first-time joiners must choose someone to fight.”
“You. Refer me. Join.” Ji Yueling again used that commanding tone.
Gu Qing first looked at his empty glass, then took the bottle himself, filled his glass, took a big drink, and answered, “No.”
Ji Yueling was stunned.
She suddenly realized that perhaps her tone was too condescending, which triggered Gu Qing’s rebellious psychology. So she gradually softened her tone, becoming slightly gentler: “After you refer me to join, I’ll owe you a favor. In the future, I’ll help you with one thing within my power and authority.”
But Gu Qing still shook his head. “No.”
“Why?”
“I don’t need anything…” Gu Qing answered frankly.
Ji Yueling looked seriously into his eyes and suddenly understood what he meant. He’d wandered outside for years, exposed to the elements. If he’d really wanted a decent life, he only needed to join the Alliance and translate demon language for them, helping the Alliance understand demons better. But he’d refused without hesitation.
Ji Yueling’s intuition told her that his earlier claim about being afraid of death was just an excuse. Perhaps he simply held no expectations for that so-called decent life.
“Besides, your motives for joining are impure and don’t meet Fight Club’s membership criteria. You’re coming with an agenda, so of course you won’t get along with everyone.”
“What are Fight Club’s membership criteria?”
Gu Qing thought about it. “Mentally ill people? People disappointed in the world? Lonely people? People who want to touch something real? I can’t say exactly, but based on my current understanding of you, you don’t have the qualifications to join Fight Club.”
“What’s the most basic, minimum requirement?” Ji Yueling asked coldly.
“Not afraid to die?”
This phrase seemed to touch Ji Yueling slightly. She picked up her wine glass and took a big drink, slowly answering, “I’m not afraid to die, but I have reasons I must stay alive.”
Gu Qing looked into her eyes. Her gaze was indeed excessively resolute, burning with surging flames of vengeful fire. It made sense—back then, all her friends had died because of her, so revenge seemed to have become her obsession for living.
Perhaps that guilt had made her want to die countless nights, but she had to stay alive… to avenge her friends, to avenge herself. When the flames of hatred finally died out, she would be completely burned up too, becoming confused and dazed from then on—a corpse gradually rotting from the inside out.
“I’ll ask the club members when I have time. If everyone has no objections, I’ll refer you.”
Gu Qing’s sudden change of heart made Ji Yueling pause. She instinctively began to suspect this was another delaying tactic, but there didn’t seem to be a better outcome available, so she instinctively replied softly, “Thank you.”
Her voice wasn’t sincere or serious—it was more like going through the motions, a condescending arrogance. Her facial expression was the same, like a stone in a latrine—smelly and hard.
But Gu Qing truly didn’t care at all.
For someone so overwhelmed like her, maintaining basic politeness and courtesy had already become an exhausting thing. Perhaps this was why she always looked cold and wore that sour expression.
Her thanks were perfunctory and arrogant, but Gu Qing would take his own share of payment.
“As payment, take me to see the stars on the mountaintop?” he said.
“How do you know I drove here?” Ji Yueling was startled.
“That silver sports car of yours is really cool. It’s parked downstairs—hard not to notice.”
“But I’ve been drinking a lot.” Ji Yueling answered.
“Would anyone really check if you’re drunk driving?” Gu Qing blinked innocently at her.
“I mean… aren’t you afraid of getting killed in a crash with me?”
“Aren’t you a healing-type ability user?” Gu Qing looked at the hesitation on her face and showed a trace of contemptuous mockery. “Besides, why do you think I’m qualified to join Fight Club?”