Forge a path to success

"I'm not eating," Vilbert declared in advance. Chu Hengkong had already picked up the phone.

"I'll have 30 lamb skewers, 5 chicken wings, 10 each of heart tubes, bone marrow, and kidneys, plus two baked flatbreads." He flipped the menu to the first page, "and a sandwich set meal with black tea."

Violet couldn't help but sigh; she would be working amidst the smell of cumin tonight. Chu Hengkong pulled out his NDS and started engrossed in those childish games again.

“I’ve always told you that sighing too often will make you an old woman, but you’ve only gotten more and more beautiful, which is really strange,” he said. “Maybe it’s just natural beauty; even with all that work, your skin is still great.”

She pressed the power button and observed herself through the dark screen, the rigid girl sitting in front of the laptop. She wore a black women's suit, had long, straight hair that hadn't been dyed, and her overly pale skin made her face appear cold. She was taller than her peers, but her figure hadn't changed much.

What appeal does such a person have? Even by Eastern standards, she seems unusual. The only connection she has with beauty is probably social jargon like "beautiful lady."

“Please don’t make fun of me,” Vilbert said coldly.

“Look at you, you’re like that. If someone sincerely compliments you, you think they’re joking. We usually call people like that ‘sensitive’ or ‘harsh.’” Chu Hengkong twirled her hair with his fingers. “In my experience, sensitive and harsh women usually don’t have good figures. If you don’t find a way to correct your personality, you’ll probably be flat-chested for life, Miss Vilbert.”

“It doesn’t matter, I don’t care,” Vilbert said. “I don’t need a figure.”

"Okay, here you go again."

She continued reviewing the reports: "I don't plan to date. I don't plan to get married. I don't need a husband. I don't need a lover. So you can say whatever you want, I don't care."

"Please, someone save me! I really can't talk to teenage girls anymore." Chu Hengkong sighed. "If I praise you, you think I'm supporting you. If I support you, you reply with ten. Please, stop being rebellious for the sake of being rebellious. Other people's high-achieving girls are thorny roses, but you're turning into a field of thorns."

"I will continue to stab you mercilessly."

She knew she hadn't controlled herself well today, because Chu Hengkong was a little annoyed. He closed the game console, put his hands on her shoulders, and his voice deepened.

“Vilbert, I’ve told you many times that the consequences of making such flirtatious jokes with men are very serious.”

She looked up, and Chu Hengkong's face was reversed in her eyes.

"If you want to use me to vent your desires, go ahead."

Chu Hengkong pinched her cheek hard, making her wince: "If I hear anything like that again, we're done."

“I’m sorry.” Violet conceded at the opportune moment, then added insult to injury, “But you were the one who just said I was pretty.”

Chu Hengkong stared at her for a long time until she smiled smugly. He let go and lay back on the bed, complaining, "I really have nothing to say to you."

Just then, the doorbell rang. Chu Hengkong brought in a plate of grilled skewers, making sure to place hers next to the computer. The sandwich contained salami, tomato, lettuce, and mozzarella cheese—an Italian-style panini. He wouldn't order her a high-calorie, greasy American-style sandwich.

As she immersed herself in the forms again, she heard Chu Hengkong ask, "Seriously, are you really planning to keep doing this?"

"what happened?"

“Look, you’ve made a lot of money. You have a lot of henchmen, a lot of cars, a lot of guns, and a lot of houses.” Chu Heng spat out a chicken bone. “But you haven’t had a few days of peace either. In the past three years, I’ve accompanied you to almost every corner of the world. You spend a third of the year negotiating business deals and a quarter of the year on airplanes. The little bit of free time you have left is spent holding family meetings, directing shootouts, and occasionally dodging assassins.”

“It was very fulfilling,” Vilbert said.

“You’re overdoing it,” Chu Hengkong said. “You’re only 14, boss. You’re capable, you’re exceptionally talented, but do you really intend to live like this for the rest of your life? On a path that you can already see the end?”

“You know very well that I can’t leave now.” Vilbert shook her head. “I could walk away with a check and sail across the ocean, but I will always be Vilbert Velus. My enemies, my subordinates, even my blood oath will be looking for me. There is no such thing as a clean break here.”

“It’s all an excuse.” Chu Heng laughed. “You can easily hide yourself in a corner of the world, like hiding a drop of water in the ocean.”

"You have too much confidence in me."

"You've already gone through countless versions of your retirement plan by the time you said that," Chu Hengkong pointed out.

He's absolutely right. She had been considering retirement for six months, at which point she would become a quiet, reserved Chinese girl attending a foreign language school in Shanghai. Her parents worked away from home year-round, leaving her to rely on her idle older brother.

The only flaw in this plan is that even if Chu Hengkong is willing to undergo plastic surgery, he will never be able to live a peaceful, ordinary life. Before the Blood Alliance finds Verus, the local police will come after him first.

“Those plans are impossible to implement. And I cannot detach myself from my current life until I achieve my goal.”

"You did have an ulterior motive."

"I want to find out the cause of my father's death."

Chu Hengkong frowned: "I thought it was Lucas."

“Lucas was too incompetent. Even as a mole, the only information he could leak was pre-arranged false information,” Wilbert said. “Yet such an incompetent man knew about my father’s death before me and started taking action before me. This was all planned. Lucas was supposed to take over the Velus family and lead them to ruin, but he failed by accident.”

“The cultists can’t get information about your father… So what about the people inside the Blood Alliance?” Chu Heng thought for a moment. “You haven’t found his trail yet, so you need to increase Verus’s influence as much as possible until that person can’t stand it anymore and takes the initiative to contact you.”

"Correct."

"When will this cycle of revenge end!" Chu Hengkong sighed. "Keep it up, boss. Remember to call me before you make your move."

He didn't deliberately show sympathy or feign sympathy, which pleased Wilbert.

By the time she quietly finished the spreadsheet, Chu Hengkong had already dealt with those strange strings of files and was playing games while plugged in. She shut down the computer and asked, "Hengkong, what about you?"

"how?"

"What are you planning to do?" she asked. "Why are you still living this kind of life?"

Since the negotiations with the Russians ended, she has been asking Chu Hengkong for work more and more frequently. Because besides him, she can't find another person she can completely trust, and the crises she faces are only getting more dangerous with each passing day.

This peculiar employer-employee relationship lasted for three years, so long that Chu Hengkong got used to calling her "boss," and she unconsciously started calling him "A-Kong." But their relationship never truly changed. Chu Hengkong accompanied her on her travels, killing all sorts of people, and after it was all over, he went back to delivering pizzas, unchanged.

"I don't have any plans," Chu Hengkong said, still playing his game. "Life's fine as it is now, I'll just take it one step at a time."

“If you’re content with your current life, you’re already a killer. If you’re just going with the flow, you should be staying in your rented room delivering food,” Vilbert said. “But you’re neither, Acon. You have many paths you could take, but you don’t choose. You just stand there stubbornly, reaching out to touch everything you see, but you neither move forward nor backward. I can only assume you don’t really care about any of this. You don’t care about anything around you.”

Chu Hengkong laughed: "You make me sound so heartless."

“You’re not heartless. You’re arrogant.” Vilbert stood up. “You’re too strong, Akong. You’re like a different species from everyone else. This difference makes you look down on everyone equally, and you never once put society in your eyes.”

"Have you always thought I was an alien?" Chu Hengkong laughed incessantly. "I thought you were just rebellious, but I didn't expect you to be such a deep-seated chuunibyou (a person with delusions of grandeur)..."

He still didn't understand. Violet thought desperately. He still didn't get what she really meant.

"Do you care about the police, Akong?"

"I respect their work."

"What about the law?"

“Follow the correct parts.”

"government?"

Chu Hengkong chuckled again: "Don't be like that."

Did you feel any psychological burden when you killed him?

"I only kill those who deserve to die."

"That's why I said you don't care."

Chu Hengkong realized she was serious. He put down the game console and stood up as well.

“Yeah,” he said. “I don’t care.”

“You know what, Kong. Any psychologist would classify you as a classic antisocial personality. And the difference between you and those potentially dangerous individuals is that you don’t need a gun to be more powerful than them,” Wilbert said. “You’re out of place in this world. You’re still standing there looking for something you crave, but I don’t know what you really want.”

Chu Hengkong stared at her for a long time, then suddenly reached out and ruffled her hair.

“You, on the other hand, are unusually childish for once,” he said with a smile, just as he had when he lectured her long ago. “Not everything needs a reason… and not everyone knows as clearly as you what they need. Most people just drift along aimlessly, day after day, day after day.”

"Then why are you still here?" she pressed. "Why did you save me that day?"

“I can. I am willing. I should,” he said. “So I acted.”

He rested his chin on Violet's head and gently patted the girl. "Alright, go to sleep early."

Before going to bed, Chu Hengkong packed up the trash and put it in the hallway. He used to be too lazy to clean it up, but since he was out with his boss, he didn't want her to be unhappy if it was too messy. He lay in bed, preparing for another sleepless night, when he heard faint thunder outside the window.

"Boss, look," Chu Hengkong said with a headache, "you're almost fifteen..."

Violet lay on the bed without saying a word, only showing her profile as she stared at him. Chu Hengkong once again flinched in the face of that gaze, and curled up slightly as thunder rumbled.

He turned off the light and lay down next to Violet. The girl gave him half of the blanket.

"Go to sleep early," Chu Hengkong sighed.

Chapter 310 Desires and Needs (2)

When Chu Hengkong woke up, it was just getting light, and the rain had already stopped.

Traveling with Violet had many advantages, one of which was the constant stream of fights. Over the past three years, his martial arts skills had improved, and he could even sense movement in his sleep. He knew the corridor was empty, the next room was empty as arranged, and he also knew Violet was still asleep, clinging tightly to his arm.

Chu Hengkong has always lived an upright and honest life, and there are few things he regrets, but this is one of them. After his business trip to Ohio, Wilbert developed a bad habit: she needed him to be with her to fall asleep during thunderstorms, or she would simply stay up all night until the rain stopped.

At first, he didn't think much of it; it was just taking care of a timid girl. But as they grew older, things became more complicated.

Violet was almost 15, and he was already 16—an age when he would have been married and settled long ago in ancient times. He could joke about a girl's figure verbally, but the sensations he felt on her body told him that things had changed. She was no longer a girl.

At this age, it's natural for things to go awry, and one day he might really lose control. That's why he's recently started reading Buddhist scriptures.

Occasionally, he would let his mind wander. Did Violet not know? Could such a clever girl really be indifferent to these things? She'd never cared about making jokes about these things before…

But those thoughts quickly faded away, because he knew the real reason. Violet trusted him completely; she never had any reservations about him. She depended on him and longed for him; she sought security in him.

In the girl's heart, Chu Hengkong was probably the man who could become her father.

He really should have a serious talk with Vilbert.

About an hour later, Violet woke up. She looked at him sleepily for a moment, then let go of his arms, which had gone numb from being held so tightly, and shrank to the other side of the bed.

"Sorry. Good morning."

"If you keep going like this, you might as well just book a double room when you go on business trips in the future."

"No."

"Can't you say 'no' even on rainy days?" Chu Hengkong said helplessly. "Vilbert, I'm serious. You'll be 15 in two months. Even though you said so many hurtful things last night, you'll eventually fall in love, get married, and have children... You'll have your own family and your own lover. It's not appropriate for you to keep hanging out with me like this."

Vilbert's eyes were like those of a woodpecker staring at an ironwood tree.

Chu Hengkong felt uneasy under her gaze: "So you'd better keep your distance from me... What are you doing?"

Violet looked up and bumped into him hard. She hurt herself from the impact, then hugged his arm tightly.

"You're up too early. I want to sleep a little longer."

"Children are getting harder and harder to raise," Chu Hengkong thought dejectedly.

·

Back in New York, Chu Hengkong, as usual, drove her back to the family building. He put on the courier vest he had left at the front desk and rode his motorcycle to the pizza shop. This was the "reward" he received after his trip to Egypt, when Wilbert noticed his strong interest in the local modified motorcycles.

“Excuse me, boss,” Secretary Alita knocked on the office door. “Nothing in particular, but lately the new employees have been talking about ‘why the deputy always uses his free time to deliver takeout.’”

Alita's seniority far exceeded her age; she was one of the few female gangsters to live past 40 with a happy family and well-behaved children. Violet turned her chair, gazing out the window at the bustling streets.

"Perhaps the head of the family is not capable of keeping him by his side."

“Boss, allow me to say something,” Alita’s face softened. “In my opinion, you and he share a common trait. You both want to keep your work and personal lives separate, but in your worlds, they are one.”

“I know,” Wilber nodded. “Report now.”

Alita closed the door. She hadn't brought any documents with her because her boss didn't allow important information to be left behind.

"During my exchanges with the Baiyue Chu Clan, the information I obtained was largely consistent with your account. The deputy was adopted by the former head of the Chu Clan, Chu Tongchen, when he was 7 years old. At the age of 11, he dueled with Chu Tongchen and won. He then came to the United States with him and witnessed the duel between Chu Tongchen and the former head of the Ivanlenko Clan, Leonid. Afterward, he refused to return to the Chu Clan and began living alone in New York."

"What was the result of that duel?" Velbert asked.

“Both patriarchs perished together,” Alita said. “I didn’t ask for details, but judging from their mannerisms… it must have been close combat, a fight to the death with melee weapons.”

"What was his reaction at the time?"

Alita pursed her lips, recalling the terrified looks in the Chu family's eyes, as if she were remembering a blood-soaked demon.

"They had only heard that... that the second-in-command applauded and cheered for his adoptive father until the fight to the death ended."

“Not surprising.” Vilbert seemed to have expected this. “Further ahead, before we encountered the Chu family.”

“Before being adopted, the deputy lived in a local social welfare institution. He had a clean background, worked in a standard public institution, and there was no trace of a blood alliance. There hadn’t been any unusual incidents in the city for nearly thirty years, so we can basically rule out the influence of special factors,” Alita said. “I talked to the long-time staff of the welfare institution, and they had a deep impression of the deputy… The deputy did not interact with the other children.”

"No communication?" Vilbert frowned.

“Yes, it’s not that they don’t get along, it’s that they don’t communicate.” Alita nodded. “He spends most of his time reading and playing with toys, and when he does speak, he only talks to the orphanage staff. But he’s not ostracized because most of the children are afraid of him.”

That's normal. Young children also have the instinct to seek advantage and avoid harm; they know what danger is... In this light, Chu Hengkong understood his difference from ordinary people at a very young age. He probably didn't consider the children around him to be "the same" as himself; in his mind, only the adult employees were qualified to communicate with him.

“Tell me about books and toys.”

“My second-in-command liked Lego bricks and small transforming toys. He also liked mini 4WD cars, but the orphanage only had one at the time,” Alita replied. “Later, he stopped playing with toys much and started playing GBA games. Nobody knows where he got them from.”

Vilbert recalled the customs of foreign lands: "That game console will probably be confiscated."

“Yes, but…” Alita shrugged, “the deputy took it back the next day. The staff didn’t try a second time because they thought it would anger the deputy… to be honest, I think they were afraid of the deputy too.”

Violet could easily piece together Chu Hengkong's childhood: a naturally powerful, fearless child who absorbed information from his surroundings with exceptional intelligence and learning ability, like breathing. He would have continued to grow unchecked until he met Chu Tongchen. From then on, he received an education, learned martial arts, and also learned self-control… He became a chivalrous child…