Chapter 58 - 1#
“Ah!”
Meng Zhide let out a short, pained cry and collapsed to the side.
But Jing Shun wasn’t faring much better. He fell backward with the tilting wheelchair, his the back of his head slamming hard against the cold floor.
“Mm.”
Jing Shun gritted his teeth, swallowing the pain as he struggled to roll off the now-toppled wheelchair.
But the dizziness in the back of his head grew heavier, his vision blurring and swaying. Just as he was about to lose consciousness, an anxious voice pierced through his eardrums.
“Jing Shun!”
“Shun-shun? Are you alright?!”
“…”
Chi, Chi Gui?
Only then did Jing Shun remember the wristwatch that had been on a voice call. He choked down a breath of pain. “I-I’m fine. Don’t—”
Don’t worry.
Before those three words could even leave his mouth, Jing Shun’s ankle was grabbed again, tightly.
He propped himself up, his eyes slowly refocusing—
There was a wound on Meng Zhide’s head, seemingly from the impact, and thick, sticky blood was already streaming down his cheek. “You think just because you got lucky and hit me, I can’t touch you anymore?”
“Let me tell you, Jing Shun, you, you’ve cut off your own escape route!”
“Without the wheelchair, and with your legs useless, where do you think you can run?”
Meng Zhide’s hand flipped up Jing Shun’s pant leg again. As soon as he touched the fair skin, a strange light seemed to reignite in his eyes.
The infatuation and madness at the bottom of his gaze only surged, not diminished, under the stimulation of pain. The burning, greasy sensation in his palm welled up again.
Jing Shun wished he could chop off Meng Zhide’s hand right then and there. “Get lost!”
Convinced that Jing Shun couldn’t escape his control, Meng Zhide temporarily let him go. “Just be good. Be good and let me have my fun! Just tonight, just one night!”
“…”
“I won’t touch you from behind. Just your legs, just use your legs!”
Meng Zhide muttered incoherent, filthy words as he frantically started to undo his own pants.
Seizing the opportunity, Jing Shun used all his strength to lift his foot and kick him squarely in the groin. “Get lost!”
“—Ah!”
The sudden, explosive pain struck.
Meng Zhide’s face turned ashen, and he collapsed straight to the ground.
He instinctively covered his agonizing nether region, never imagining that Jing Shun’s supposedly disabled, useless legs could still pack such a punch!
“…”
Taking advantage of the other’s incapacitation, Jing Shun hurriedly crawled toward the wall. Enduring the discomfort wracking his body, he gritted his teeth, used the wall for support, and stood up, hobbling step by step toward the closed door.
Meng Zhide broke out in a cold sweat mixed with blood, watching in disbelief—
How was this possible?!
How could Jing Shun still walk? Wasn’t he already crippled? Hadn’t he lost all hope of ever standing again?
Click.
The locked door opened.
Hearing that sound, Meng Zhide felt as if struck by lightning. He realized belatedly—
No!
He couldn’t let Jing Shun get out!
If he couldn’t subdue the other tonight and get some leverage on him, the situation would definitely turn against him!
At that thought, Meng Zhide limped back up from the floor. His already fat face now looked sinister and terrifying, like an avenging demon from hell, as he lunged at Jing Shun.
Jing Shun sidestepped to dodge, but his legs, never fully healed, gave way, and he lost his balance, crashing to the ground again.
Meng Zhide missed, but had no intention of letting things go. “I told you! You’re not getting away!”
Jing Shun pulled himself up against the wall again, moving as slowly as he had to, but still refusing to fall into Meng Zhide’s clutches. “Is… is anyone there?!”
Just as Meng Zhide reached out and grabbed Jing Shun’s wrist, two voices rang out simultaneously—
“Xiao Jing!”
“Xiao Jing!”
Yu Xiuzhu and Fu Changting had suddenly appeared at the corner of the fifth floor, both sprinting over as fast as they could. The former shielded Jing Shun first, pulling his artist out of Meng Zhide’s grasp.
“…”
Seeing the sudden arrivals, alarm bells rang in Meng Zhide’s head. He took two steps back but tripped and fell to the ground.
Fu Changting noticed that Meng Zhide’s pants were already half-unfastened and instantly realized what had been happening.
His tense expression darkened immediately. Ignoring whether the corridor’s surveillance cameras might capture it, he grabbed Meng Zhide by the collar and yanked him up from the floor.
Fu Changting clamped his hand on the back of Meng Zhide’s head and, without a word, slammed him hard against the wall.
Bang!
“—Ah!”
Meng Zhide’s forehead was already injured. Now, sustaining a second impact, the excruciating pain caused him to go limp like a cooked shrimp, sliding down the wall to the floor, unconscious.
“…”
Yu Xiuzhu had no time to worry about whether that pervert Meng Zhide lived or died. He stared anxiously at Jing Shun’s condition. “Xiao Jing, it’s me. How do you feel?”
“Brother Yu, how… how are you all here?”
“After I got your call last night, I couldn’t stop worrying. I finished up at the company and rushed over.”
Yu Xiuzhu had originally thought coming all this way might be an overreaction. But as soon as his car pulled up near the hotel, he received a call from Chi Gui’s assistant.
Jing Shun was in trouble! He had been forcibly detained by Meng Zhide in the so-called “pre-recording room”!
Yu Xiuzhu rushed to the hotel lobby, quickly contacted Fu Changting, and together they searched until they found him.
“…”
Jing Shun could no longer make out what Yu Xiuzhu was saying. The nerves he’d had taut for so long suddenly snapped, and his barely held-together consciousness began to blur.
Fu Changting immediately pulled out his phone. “Xiao Jing’s condition isn’t good. Call an ambulance, get him to the hospital now!”
Yu Xiuzhu’s heart tightened as he nodded quickly, then cast a dismissive glance at Meng Zhide. “What do we do about this bastard?”
It wasn’t that he worried Meng Zhide might die from so much blood loss. Rather, he feared that given the man’s slick, shameless nature, he’d wake up and turn the tables by making false accusations!
“I’ll handle it.”
Fu Changting kicked Meng Zhide viciously one more time, then made a swift decision. “Take Xiao Jing to the hospital first. I’ll have my assistant come and help you.”
“Alright!”
…
Macau, private airport.
Chi Gui had finished his originally scheduled six-day workload ahead of time and booked a private flight back to Haishi for that evening.
The highway to the airport was smooth and open. The black car sped along, the blurry scenes outside the window flashing by, bearing an uncanny resemblance to a late night buried deep in memory.
A shadow of gloom accumulated deep in his heart surged for an instant—
Chi Gui suddenly felt an unexplainable sense of unease. The usually restrained man, after confirming that the crew had wrapped up for the day, deliberately called Jing Shun, who was far away in Hengcheng.
The call went through smoothly.
Jing Shun’s voice was like a soothing balm, easily calming Chi Gui’s baseless panic.
He didn’t explain why he had suddenly dialed this number. Instead, he chatted casually with Jing Shun. But their conversation hadn’t lasted long before the unexpected happened—
Jing Shun on the other end suddenly fell silent. Replacing his voice was another unfamiliar one.
Nauseating innuendo, laced with morbid, obsessive demands, punctuated by the sound of heavy objects hitting the floor, and then that familiar, uniquely Jing Shun-like, suppressed groan of pain.
“…”
Chi Gui realized what was happening to Jing Shun. He couldn’t help shouting a few times.
The other party’s response came, then abruptly stopped, only to be replaced by more disgusting coercion from the second man.
Chi Gui suppressed the murderous urge raging inside him, forcing himself to stay calm. He had Chen Yiming contact Yu Xiuzhu as quickly as possible, and had Wei Di immediately call the police, sending them the real-time location from Jing Shun’s wristwatch.
Click.
The call that had been connected suddenly dropped at some point.
Chi Gui’s nerves snapped along with it. The specter of death once again seized him by the throat, dragging him unrelentingly toward the abyss. It wasn’t until just before takeoff that he finally received a message from Yu Xiuzhu.
Jing Shun had been found and taken to the hospital in time. He was temporarily out of danger.
“…”
The plane quickly ascended to tens of thousands of feet, and Chi Gui’s heart rose along with it, suspended, never landing.
After requesting a diversion to the nearest airport in Hangzhou, he rushed to Hengcheng as fast as possible.
At three in the morning, the hospital’s inpatient corridor felt emptier than he’d imagined. Chi Gui easily found the room number where Jing Shun was staying.
Click!
The closed hospital door opened.
Only a small bedside lamp was on in the room. Chi Gui, by the dim light, saw Jing Shun lying asleep in the bed. It was only at that moment that his numbed heart finally felt the sensation of beating again.
Yu Xiuzhu had stayed up all night guarding the bedside, never leaving.
Seeing Chi Gui appear at the door, he was secretly surprised by how fast the other had arrived. Carefully pulling his chair back and standing up, he greeted him softly. “You’re here?”
His voice was kept very low, probably afraid of waking the person in the bed.
Chi Gui slowed his pace as he walked in, his gaze fixed on Jing Shun without straying. “How is he?”
“Full physical exam done. The back of his head took a hit, there’s a bump. Preliminary diagnosis is moderate concussion. The condition of his waist and legs is relatively okay.”
Yu Xiuzhu only gave the key details. “But Xiao Jing is still in rehabilitation. We’ll need to have Professor Song and the others do a follow-up examination.”
Chi Gui nodded. “I’ve already asked Chen Yiming to arrange that.”
Yu Xiuzhu continued, “That scumbag Meng Zhide went too deep into hiding. Xiao Jing must have been severely frightened tonight. He woke up once in a daze, but he was just muttering in his sleep.”
“The doctor added a small dose of sedative to his IV, so he’s sleeping soundly now.”
“Oh, and he has a slight fever, but nothing serious.”
“…”
Chi Gui held his breath and said nothing.
Yu Xiuzhu could probably guess his emotions at that moment, so he voluntarily explained the other situation—
Meng Zhide was injured more severely than Jing Shun, with stitches on his head, and he was still unconscious. However, the police had arrived and were keeping a close eye on him. Fu Changting’s team was helping monitor the follow-up.
“Nothing is more important than Xiao Jing right now. Let’s talk after he wakes up.”
“Mm.”
Chi Gui responded. His gaze finally shifted slightly to Yu Xiuzhu’s face. “You’ve worked hard. Let me stay with him. You go back and rest first.”
Knowing that the relationship between Jing Shun and Chi Gui had already changed, Yu Xiuzhu agreed. “Alright. Let me know if anything comes up with Xiao Jing. I’ll come back during the day.”
With this unexpected incident, fans were bound to be lurking around the hotel. If anyone got photographed or if word leaked out, it could cause a storm of public opinion online.
Yu Xiuzhu had to take preventive measures.
The hospital door clicked shut again. Only then did Chi Gui sit down in the seat Yu Xiuzhu had vacated.
He stared at Jing Shun sleeping in the bed, carefully took the other’s right hand—the one without the IV—and gently cradled it in his own palm.
The warm, soft touch came through, nothing like the coldness of memory, nor the stiffness of nightmares.
Chi Gui’s eyes inexplicably grew hot, and he held back the delayed emotional collapse threatening to surface.