lily’s note: the beginning of this chapter mentions (attempted) s*xual assault and does not reflect the view of the translator
***
See injustice on the road and draw your sword to help.1 One wave has not yet fallen when another one arises.
The road was not long, but the alleyway was full of twists and turns. What’s more, it was Hua Zhao’s first time here. It took much effort and her kung fu to chase the three people.
The dim and low streetlamps cast a dirty light onto the road. And underneath that light — those two men pushed the girl to the ground and reached for her shorts with their greasy hands!!
“—Halt!!” Hua Zhao’s hair stood on end in anger. It was truly unbelievable! There were people who could be so shameless and take advantage of a girl in danger to sully her innocence! At the same time, she was also glad; if she hadn’t arrived in time…
The two men froze. They hadn’t imagined that someone would crash their “kind actions” and expose them.
These two people were full of evil intentions, a complete pair of wily friends. Today, they had come to hang out in the night market and had the unexpected good fortune of bumping into a drunk girl, so they took her away to “xx”2 her.
At least, a girl who ran over here to drink should be a natural sl*t. With her clothes like that, wasn’t she just trying to seduce men? They’d have to be crazy, and they’d lose out, if they didn’t take advantage of a girl like this, so who would blame them?
How could they know that they’d be interrupted before they could even take off their pants!
The two men guiltily jumped in fright and scrambled up from the girl’s body.
How could they know that when they looked back — the “knight” who’d run over turned out to be a stunningly beautiful girl!
While she was wearing a baseball cap that prevented them from seeing her face clearly, just looking at her body was enough to make the two perverted beasts break free.
The two men exchanged glances with each other and saw the same exact lust in the other person’s eyes.
One prey wasn’t enough, then, two prey…
With this in mind, the two men, one on the left and one on the right, began to surround Hua Zhao.
They thought their sudden attack would make the girl turn pale from fear, but not only did the girl not show an ounce of fear, she even rolled up her sleeves in eager anticipation.
“It seems you have chosen to continue?” Hua Zhao raised her eyebrows and quirked up her mouth. Her eyes were filled with an extreme disdain. “Very well, bengong hasn’t moved her body for a long time, but come.”
The two bastards didn’t heed her warning.
They even thought that she was bluffing them!
“Girl, come here, look up and let these brothers see what you look like…” One of them approached with a malicious smile and reached out to take her chin.
But before his filthy hands could touch the prey in front of him, the girl turned her head to avoid that hand, then raised her foot. She kicked the bastard’s stomach—
—A huge bang sounded and the touchy bastard was kicked straight back by two meters!
……
The alleyway after the fight was a mess.
The two bastards had never imagined that a girl who had jumped out from who-knew-where could be so frightening!
They were two grown men who couldn’t even compare to a seemingly-weak girl.
No, she wasn’t a girl to begin with — she was clearly a monstress!
Simply using her two bare hands, without wielding any weapons, she beat them up. Able to kick off and fly up the wall, she jumped down again to smash them while screaming.
With a punch and a kick, Hua Zhao could escape from being completely surrounded by the guards at the History Museum. So confronting the two trash who were dead-drunk — there’s no need to say any more!
“You’re dead, b*tch, I’ll fight you!” The short and fat bastard spat out a mouthful of blood, and in the blood there was a tooth. Behind him, the tall and thin man was already beaten into an unmoving pulp on the ground.
He knew that he couldn’t afford to be gentle today — if he couldn’t break through right here, he was afraid he’d be finished!
So he was in for a penny and in for a pound. Suddenly, he pulled out a knife from his pocket and rushed toward Hua Zhao, waving it.
But Hua Zhao had seen thousands of soldiers and tens of thousands of horses, so how could she be scared by a tiny knife?
She didn’t avoid it but instead welcomed it.
Short-and-Fat was already nearing the end of his line, thus he indiscriminately waved his knife. A wild cry arose from his lips. Like a cat playing with a mouse, Hua Zhao cruised easily in front of the blade with contempt in her eyes.
The moment she underestimated the enemy, the knife perilously swung toward her. She hurriedly took a step back, but although she had escaped it, the knife cut the brim of her hat. It was lifted, just like that!
The hat fell on the ground, and she was left uncovered.
Hua Zhao’s face emerged clearly beneath the street light. The bastard with the knife froze, obviously recognizing her.
“You’re Cheng Xing—”
“—I’m your ancestor!”
While he was dazed, Hua Zhao took the chance to immediately lunge forward and snatch his knife away!
The next second, the knife spun quickly on Hua Zhao’s palm, turning the blade around. She raised her arm and went to stab the bastard head-on!
The tip of the knife was only a few millimeters away from the little bastard’s eyes. He had no time to evade it; he didn’t even have time to blink! Hua Zhao tsked disdainfully. With a flick of her hand, the tip of the knife slashed across the bastard’s cheek, slid by his ear, and flew to—
—Several strands of hair drifted down from his cheek. The bastard choked a cry for mercy back within his throat. Both of his legs softened and he dropped down to a kneel on the ground. At the same time, a fishy smell spread out from between his legs.
Hua Zhao took two steps back in disgust, brushed the nonexistent dust off on her hands, and blew on her fingertips.
“Get up, what are you kneeling for? This lady does not have any dear grandsons like you.”
The two bastards were paralyzed on the ground. One because he’d been kicked and the stomach and he was holding it while retching, the other because he’d nearly been blinded and simply peed himself in fright… The two of them who’d been beaten up without being able to fight back looked up at the girl’s exquisite appearance; their heads seemed to be scalded by a pot of boiling water. They had completely lost the ability to function.
And the girl who had beaten them up wasn’t even breathing hard. That appearance, like it’d been as easy as breathing, as if she had simply plucked a tender and beautiful flower from a branch.
The girl lowered her eyelids, her pale pink lips pursed together. No one knew that in all truth, her heart was drumming overtime.
What to do, what to do, she’d seen injustice on the road and drew her sword to help, but in the end she accidentally revealed her face! Cheng Xingfei seemed to be an extremely famous performer, and those bastards had just now mistaken her for Cheng Xingfei, so would this add onto Cheng Xingfei’s troubles?
It was just that while Hua Zhao was hesitating, a glaring flashlight suddenly shone through the alleyway entrance behind her.
Along with that light, there were also chaotic footsteps and the sound of noisy voices.
The voice of the person who spoke was extremely familiar. Hua Zhao immediately realized his identity — he was the stall worker from the food stall!
And she heard the stall worker say, “Comrade policeman, there was a female customer at our stall just now who drank a lot and there were two unfamiliar men who said they knew her and took her into this alleyway. But later on, I kept on thinking something wasn’t right, so I hurried to call the police.”
The police replied, “You did the right thing. Let’s find her quickly so that she won’t suffer anything!”
As it turned out, after they had gone into the alleyway, the stallworker felt like something was wrong, so he quickly called the police to search for the drunk female customer.
Hua Zhao knew what ‘police’ was.
In the same way, she also knew that if she remained, her face would bring Cheng Xingfei a lot of trouble!
As she thought about it, Hua Zhao immediately turned and ran to the other end of the alley.
But she was slow by a step — the flashlight had already shone into the alleyway. Within the alley, two bastards were unconscious and paralyzed on the ground. The drunk female customer was off to the side. Only Hua Zhao was left standing, which was honestly really eye-catching.
The policeman immediately ran into the alley, the light of his flashlight bouncing around. He raised his voice to ask Hua Zhao, standing there: “Miss, please take out your ID card.”
Not daring to reply, Hua Zhao immediately booked it.
She ran, seeming extremely suspicious. The policeman couldn’t identify her clearly — it didn’t matter if she was an accomplice or a justice-seeking passerby — anyway, you have to chase the person down first and then ask!
The more Hua Zhao ran, the more the policeman chased. The more he chased, the more she ran.
She’d never seen this alley’s twists and turns, leading in all directions, but the policeman knew every little path here. Hua Zhao did her best to run away but was unable to shake off the policeman.
She just finished a beating and used up a lot of her strength, so she quickly lost energy as the policeman kept on chasing her.
Looking at the ever-shortening distance in between her and the policeman, Hua Zhao was supremely anxious. And at this moment, a hand suddenly reached out from somewhere in the shadows, grabbed Hua Zhao’s wrist, and dragged her over to the side of the road!
Hua Zhao jumped in fright. A cry of shock nearly rose out of her throat.
The next moment, the owner of the hand covered Hua Zhao’s mouth, pressing down the cry that was about to escape her mouth.
“Calm down,” a man said lowly into her ear.
It was a tall and large man. He was standing on the side of an alley in an unassuming pile of debris, discarded furniture stacked together and casting a large shadow. And now, he and Hua Zhao were hiding in those shadows.
Hua Zhao’s back was touching his chest. One of his hands was on her shoulder, the other covering her mouth so that she couldn’t make a sound.
After they had been hiding for a few moments, the policeman who was chasing Hua Zhao ran over in a hurry near the pile of debris. Yet he didn’t even notice that the person he was chasing was hiding in the shadows a few meters away.
Hua Zhao held her breath. Only until the policeman’s footsteps faded far away did she finally release the turbid gas that she’d been holding within her chest.
Fortunately… fortunately, the police didn’t discover them!
If it weren’t for the man behind her helping her hide from the police, she would’ve caused a lot of trouble tonight!
She settled herself down, covered her thumping heart, and turned around to look at the man who’d helped her. “Thank…”
The second word hadn’t yet left her mouth when her voice disappeared!
Her eyes widened in shock as she looked at the man — a ferocious scar extended from the man’s forehead, across the edge of his brow bone, through his temple, and finally disappeared into his black hair.
She knew him!
He was the History Museum’s security captain! Back when she’d rushed to the History Museum in the middle of the night, it was by luck that she escaped from his subordinates…
Hua Zhao subconsciously tried to lower the brim of her hat in guilt, but as soon as she raised her hand, she felt nothing. At this point, she realized that her hat had already fallen off while she was fighting.
Her face was exposed to Zhuo Yi’s gaze without any sort of cover.
Naturally, Zhuo Yi also remembered her.
“Cheng Xingfei? …No, that’s not right.” Zhuo Yi’s eyebrows drew together and then quickly relaxed. He found a new answer: “You’re not Cheng Xingfei, you’re the one who broke into the History Museum that night.”
“—!!!”
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1 A saying from a famous Song Dynasty poem.
2 捡尸 is slang that describes sexually assaulting someone who’s drunk, literally meaning “picking up corpses” (as in people who are so drunk they’re passed out)
lilypad translations 