NOVEL WEB
Chapter 140
An inconspicuous van drove towards the outskirts of the city. Inside the swaying van, Yu Shu and Yu Fanxing had their eyes tightly closed, their hands bound behind their backs and thrown onto the rear seat.
Zhang Yi sat in the front, holding Yu Shu's phone which she unlocked using Yu Shu's fingerprint. Zhang Yi flipped through Yu Shu and Shen Youlin's chat history with great interest, her lips curled into a permanent smirk.
She leaned towards the rear, her finger sliding along Yu Shu's smooth cheek: "No wonder he likes you, even I can't help but like you."
With that, she laughed, snapping a photo of Yu Shu and sending it to Shen Youlin.
Shen Youlin was embroidering a dress for Yu Shu. Yu Shu's newly bought white dress was too plain, so Shen Youlin had embroidered an iris on the chest, making the entire dress exquisite.
Carefully tying off the threads, Shen Youlin hummed a terribly off-key tune as he ironed the dress flat and hung it prominently in the closet, admiring it with satisfaction. Eager to show off his handiwork to Yu Shu, he picked up his phone, but the smile vanished from his face, replaced by a chilling coldness.
Shen Youlin made a call, but the other party rejected it and instead sent him a location with the message: "Come alone."
Yu Shu's mind was foggy, and before she could regain clarity, an oddly pitched male voice reached her ears.
"Is it done?" The impatient man asked.
Zhang Yi: "Yeah, you guys can leave."
"You're fucking crazy, you know? If it wasn't for you, we'd have all gone back to Myanmar with the boss." The man complained, but didn't say anything more, beckoning to the other men to leave.
Yu Shu opened her lead-heavy eyelids and saw the retreating backs of four tall men as they boarded the van at the entrance and drove off.
In her mind, Yu Shu cursed them, wishing they would crash on the highway and break both their legs.
This was an abandoned old factory workshop. The large door was wide open, leading to an open, desolate area overgrown with dense weeds. The small workshop was filled with rusted, discarded industrial products.
Yu Shu's hands were bound behind her back to a chair, and her legs were tightly bound to the chair legs. She looked down and saw explosives placed beneath the chair, the pungent smell of gunpowder filling her nostrils. Yu Fanxing's hands were spread apart, cuffed to a horizontal steel pipe, her head drooping as if she hadn't regained consciousness yet.
Zhang Yi stood in front of Yu Fanxing, her back to Yu Shu, holding a handgun and sliding it over Yu Fanxing's face, as if contemplating where to put a hole in it.
Oh god, oh god, oh god...
Ahhhhh, this situation, it's going to kill her!
Had she used up all her luck, so now she was facing the consequences?
"Hey..." Yu Shu mustered up the courage to speak.
At least let this crazy woman take the gun away from Yu Fanxing's face first.
Zhang Yi turned her head upon hearing Yu Shu's voice, and when she saw that Yu Shu was awake, she even smiled a tender smile, as if looking at a beloved junior: "You're awake."
Yu Shu felt a chill run down her spine, but tried to make conversation: "Don't play with guns, you might blow it up."
Zhang Yi laughed, the wrinkles around her eyes creasing as she skipped lightly towards Yu Shu, brandishing the gun: "Want to learn how to shoot? I taught Youlin how to shoot."
Heh... heh heh...
Bang!
A deafening explosion ripped through the workshop, and Zhang Yi let out a blood-curdling scream, clutching her bloodied right hand as she cursed the man who had given her the gun, calling it defective junk.
Yu Shu shrank her neck and bit her lip, not daring to say anything for fear of incurring Zhang Yi's wrath. But Zhang Yi only shot her a vicious glare before finding a first aid kit to treat her wound.
The explosion had woken up Yu Fanxing, who, upon realizing the situation, made a face even uglier than crying when she looked at Yu Shu.
I want to cry too, Yu Shu thought to herself. She could guess that Shen Youlin would be coming soon, but she couldn't guess what that crazy woman was planning to do.
"What does she want to do?" Yu Shu silently asked Yu Fanxing.
Yu Fanxing's expression became even more hideous as she stuck out her tongue, squeezed her eyes shut, and tilted her head to the side—she wants me dead.
A horn blared as an SUV appeared in view. Roadblocks were set up outside the factory entrance, forcing Shen Youlin to park a few hundred meters away and walk the rest of the way against the light.
Zhang Yi immediately stood up upon hearing the sound, gazing at the approaching Shen Youlin with affection and excitement, like a loving mother welcoming her long-journeyed child home.
Yu Shu suddenly began to understand what this psycho was trying to do. Zhang Yi's love for Shen Chaowen was pathological, and she loathed Yu Fanxing, hoping to take her place. As for Shen Youlin, her feelings were a twisted mix of love and hatred, grafting her love for Shen Chaowen onto her hatred for Yu Fanxing.
Shen Youlin glanced at Yu Shu, then spoke to Zhang Yi in a mocking tone: "You've really lost it in your old age, resorting to such clichéd tricks."
Zhang Yi laughed, her madness pathetic: "You don't even call me auntie anymore?"
"You don't deserve it."
Zhang Yi's expression was proud and deranged as she stared unblinkingly at Shen Youlin: "It doesn't matter, auntie won't hold it against you. Did you see the explosives under that chair?"
Zhang Yi broke into gleeful laughter: "With a 'bang,' that girl will be blown to smithereens, her flesh and blood splattering everywhere. It'll be so beautiful... even more beautiful than when Yun Duo fell to her death..."
Zhang Yi spread her arms, displaying the remote control hanging from her chest: "Do you want her to live? Do you want..."
"Shut up!" Shen Youlin coldly interrupted her dramatic speech. "You just want me to kill Yu Fanxing, don't you? No need for all this trouble."
Shen Youlin laughed and started walking towards Yu Fanxing.
With every step he took, Zhang Yi took a step towards Yu Shu.
Is this psycho putting on a farcical double-act?!
"Shen Youlin, don't listen to her!" Yu Shu's voice trembled as she spoke. "Don't..."
The muzzle pressed against her temple, and Yu Shu's throat tightened, unable to utter another word.
Zhang Yi held the gun with her left hand: "Shhh—good girl, don't talk, and watch with auntie."
Yu Shu broke out in a cold sweat, not even daring to hope for the gun to malfunction now, because if it exploded in her face, she'd either die or be disfigured.
Shen Youlin took one step after another until he stood before Yu Fanxing: "Any last words? Mother."
Yu Fanxing swallowed hard: "Find... find me a skilled mortician to do my makeup nicely."
Shen Youlin laughed as his hands wrapped around her throat: "I'll tell Shen Chaowen."
Upon hearing Shen Chaowen's name, a flicker passed through Zhang Yi's eyes, and her bandaged right hand instinctively caressed her heavily wrinkled face.
"I'm sorry..." Yu Fanxing said softly. "I gave birth to you, but I never loved you."
Shen Youlin didn't respond, only letting out a grim laugh as his hands gradually tightened.
Yu Shu could only see half of Yu Fanxing's face, which was turning red, her eyes spasming uncontrollably from the excruciating pain and terror.
Yu Shu felt like she couldn't hear her own voice: "Don't..."
Time seemed to stretch infinitely, and Yu Shu didn't know how long had passed before Yu Fanxing's head lolled limply...