My Strange Tale Love Strategy Simulator

At noon, the wind chimes on the door frame of Xixiang Cafe rang out crisply once again.

The boss looked up as a man pushed open the door and entered. The man was dressed in a well-tailored bespoke suit, his leather shoes were gleaming, and his watch gleamed with a cold metallic sheen under the warm yellow light.

This outfit, which must have cost at least six figures, looked completely out of place on this old street slated for demolition.

"Sir, what would you like to drink?" The boss straightened up instinctively.

"A glass of ice water." The man seemed not to even look at the boss; his gaze went past the bar and landed squarely in the corner.

A man wearing sunglasses and a mask sat in that corner. He was wrapped up so tightly that his face was not visible, and there was a half-finished Americano in front of him.

Their eyes met.

It felt as if something in the air had been ignited.

Li Danyang walked over and sat down in front of the other person. He didn't exchange any pleasantries, didn't introduce himself, and didn't even lean back in his chair; his back was as straight as a long sword.

"How do you know about that place?" His voice was low, yet carried an undeniable, demanding tone. "What do you want?"

His eyes narrowed slightly behind his sunglasses.

"No rush."

The voice was hoarse, like that of an old smoker.

Zhang Ying picked up his coffee cup but didn't drink it; instead, he rubbed the rim with his thumb. His gaze slowly moved down from Li Danyang's face and landed on his wrist.

"The jade bracelet Mr. Li is wearing is of good quality," he suddenly said. "Where did you get it?"

Li Danyang was visibly taken aback.

In this situation, the other person asked him about the bracelet. He frowned, but patiently replied, "I got it from a master. It's for good health and success in my career."

Having said that, he leaned forward, preparing to regain control of the conversation: "Now can you answer my question? What exactly are you—"

"How is Mr. Li treating his wife?"

The hoarse voice interrupted him again.

Li Danyang's expression froze.

"Is your family happy?" Zhang Ying's voice was devoid of emotion, as if he were chatting casually. "Have you... ever had a mistress?"

Snapped.

Li Danyang slammed her hand on the table. The sound wasn't loud, but the suppressed force made the coffee on the table shake.

"What the hell do you want?" Li Danyang gritted his teeth. "You're just rambling on and on; what's your real purpose?!"

"You broke the rules first."

Zhang Ying's voice suddenly turned cold.

He didn't look at Li Danyang, but instead shifted his gaze to the window, to the old, demolished building across the street, its dark windows resembling the empty eye sockets of a dead person.

Li Danyang followed his gaze, and her pupils suddenly contracted.

"You think I didn't notice?" Zhang Ying withdrew his gaze, his voice still hoarse but tinged with sarcasm. "That sniper has been watching me since I walked into the store."

For the first time, a look different from anger and tension appeared on Li Danyang's face, and her straight back slumped slightly.

He really hadn't expected it. The sniper had a sniper scope that shielded his eyes and was hiding behind a load-bearing column on the fourth floor of the demolished building; even professionals would have had a hard time spotting him.

The person in front of me hadn't even taken off his sunglasses since he entered, yet he had already seen through everything.

silence.

The only sound was the hum of an old-fashioned air conditioner in the corner.

"With just a wave of my hand," Li Danyang's voice turned sinister, as if squeezed out from between clenched teeth, "you will die."

He's right. At that distance and angle, a bullet from a simple sniper rifle is enough to tear a person's skull open in a fraction of a second.

Zhang Ying laughed.

"You won't."

He took off his sunglasses and placed them on the table. His eyes, which were exposed, showed no fear or panic, only a calm and unsettling certainty.

A ring of black mist enveloped his eyes, making his pupils even darker and deeper, unconsciously giving people a chilling feeling.

If he hadn't activated his Ghost Eye early on, allowing Xiao Hei to patrol the surroundings the whole time, he might have been sniped and killed here without even knowing why.

"You think I'm here to die?" Zhang Ying brought his coffee to his lips and took a sip. The Americano was bitter and astringent. "My accomplice has a whole set of materials on you, including all the negative evidence you collected about the company to blackmail others and get you out of jail."

"If I don't leave this room today, these things will be on the front page tomorrow, and on the police station's desk the day after."

He put down the cup, the bottom of which tapped softly on the table.

"I'm not afraid to die, Mr. Li." He stared into Li Danyang's eyes, enunciating each word clearly, "But if I die, you'll have to come down with me and take my place."

A deathly silence.

Li Danyang's hand froze in mid-air, half still in the posture of wanting to give orders, the other half hesitant. His eyes shifted several times in a few seconds, from fierce to calculating, from calculating to suppressed, and finally he gave up.

His back bent even more over.

He took out his personal cell phone, dialed a number, and said two words briefly into the phone: "Withdraw."

After hanging up the phone, he looked up at the man opposite him whose face he couldn't see.

"I don't know who you are." Li Danyang's voice had returned to its apparent calm, with only a slight tremor at the end revealing her earlier loss of control. "But I will treat this negotiation with utmost sincerity."

Zhang Ying didn't say anything, but simply took a piece of chewing gum out of his pocket and stuffed it into his mask.

He knew that from this moment on, the initiative had shifted to him.

Outside the window, sunlight streamed in, and the demolition site across the street fell silent once more, as if nothing had ever happened.

Even at midday in April, the temperature in Okura City still carries a lingering chill.

But Li Danyang felt unbearably hot.

He unbuttoned his suit jacket, his Adam's apple bobbing as he swallowed. The masked, sunglasses-wearing man opposite him had taken every step unexpectedly from the moment he entered. He hated this feeling, hated the sensation of things spiraling out of control.

"Just tell me straight," Li Danyang said in a low voice, her eyes fixed on Zhang Ying. "Do you want money, or something else?"

In his view, as long as a matter can be resolved with money, it's not a problem. Trouble that can be settled with money is never a real problem.

Zhang Ying didn't answer immediately. A slight smile seemed to appear on his lips behind his mask, and then he said, "Don't worry. What I want to ask isn't about your career."

"It's about your daughter."

daughter?

Li Danyang was momentarily stunned.

He had considered countless possibilities. This person could be sent by a competitor, a victim of an old case, or an insider with trade secrets.

He went to great lengths to gather evidence against himself, gradually pushing himself to the brink of despair.

The last question is simply about that daughter who is already dead?

A surge of emotion, a mixture of absurdity and anger, welled up within him. He struggled to suppress it, his knuckles cracking from the effort, his voice filled with rage.

"Stop joking."

"I'm not joking."

Zhang Ying's tone was calm, revealing no flaws. He reached up and touched the back of his head, continuing, "As long as you answer my questions properly, I won't bother you anymore from now on."

Li Danyang stared at him, but he couldn't read any trace of wavering on that face, which was mostly covered by a mask.

Things took him by surprise once again.

What's the point of asking about a dead daughter?

But when he thought about his future, those seats on the board of directors, those projects that hadn't even been launched yet, and his public image that couldn't afford any mistakes, he finally gritted his teeth.

"OK."

He agreed.

Zhang Ying leaned forward slightly, his hoarse voice slamming down on him, word by word.

"How did your daughter, Li Ziqing, behave during the time she was seriously injured and hospitalized?"

"What did you and your wife do to her while she was hospitalized?"

What happened to her after she was discharged from the hospital?

These three questions are like three nails, driven precisely into the same spot.

Li Danyang was silent for a few seconds. Then he sighed.

The expression on his face was not sadness or guilt, but rather an impatience caused by being annoyed by dredging up old grievances, like a businessman being asked to review a bad debt that had already been written off.

He spoke, his tone as if he were discussing a discontinued or phased-out product.

"That useless thing..."

He said angrily.