"Knock, what are you staring at?"
"Do you have any idea what time it is?"
"Do you really think I'd let Old Li smash all your skulls in?"
In a foul mood, Yan Liang cursed as he yanked the door open.
"Ha, truly living up to the nickname Living Yama, got a hot temper bright and early, huh?
What was that about smashing skulls just now?"
The door swung wide to reveal Wong Chi-shing standing outside, digging into his ear and expertly blocking the threshold with his foot to keep Yan Liang from slamming the door shut.
He then pulled out his police badge, flashing it right in front of Yan Liang as he declared,
"I'm Wong Chi-shing, Senior Inspector from the Mong Kok Police Station."
"I have strong reasons to suspect you're connected to a murder case, so please cooperate with our investigation!"
Wong Chi-shing's playful grin vanished, replaced by an icy, serious expression. Behind him, several anti-triad officers instinctively placed their hands on their holsters.
The posture made it abundantly clear they already viewed Yan Liang as a criminal.
Yan Liang looked over Wong Chi-shing, who bore a striking resemblance to Hung Hing's Da Fei, and frowned involuntarily.
It wasn't that he was worried about any murder case; he just hadn't expected to run into this disgusting piece of work.
To put it bluntly, the guy was total scum.
Glancing down briefly at the foot blocking his door, Yan Liang couldn't be bothered to entertain him. Leaving the door wide open, he turned and walked back into the room with a massive yawn.
Wong Chi-shing and his men were left completely dumbfounded.
Since when were low-level punks this arrogant?
"Hey!
Hold it right there! Didn't you hear our Chief talking to you?"
"Get back here and come with us to the station for questioning right now!"
"Questioning?"
Yan Liang, having only taken a few steps, spun around and cast a contemptuous look at the men by the doorway.
"Look here, gentlemen, don't you guys have something straight?
Even if I am connected to whatever case you're talking about, shouldn't you lead with evidence?
Besides, I don't even know what you're babbling about!"
"..."
Hearing this, the faces of every single officer, including Wong Chi-shing, turned as dark as charcoal.
In the past, whenever they worked a case—even when dealing with arrogant triad thugs—the suspects would meekly follow them the moment they saw a bunch of cops.
Since when did street thugs start asking them for evidence?
"We're with the Anti-Triad Bureau. Please cooperate with our investigation, or we'll be forced to use stronger measures—"
"Tell me, officer, just what kind of strong measures do you have in mind?"
"Kid, let me guess—did you skip out on paying a hooker last night and get the cops cornering your door at the crack of dawn?"
Right on cue, a raspy, highly intrusive voice rang out from behind Wong Chi-shing and his crew.
Everyone turned around to see Liang Kun, decked out in a floral-print shirt, swaggering up the stairs with a few men in tow.
Right behind him stepped a bespectacled man in a sharp business suit.
"Gentlemen, I am Albert, legal counsel for Qiankun International Film and Television. If you have any inquiries, please submit a formal request to our company.
Of course, if you wish to invite our employees down to the police station, that's not entirely out of the question—provided you bring sufficient evidence.
Otherwise, I won't hesitate to report the Police Force for abuse of power..."
"What the hell...
Liang Kun, what are you playing at?
A street punk hiring a lawyer? Who the hell do you think you are?"
Wong Chi-shing stared at Albert's polite smile, his expression turning deeply bizarre.
While he knew full well that under capitalism, the law was the ultimate weapon...
Since when did these societal scum start playing by the book?
He had originally assumed that whether Babi's death had anything to do with Yan Liang or not, he could still shake some information out of him.
But now, with Albert's appearance, dragging Yan Liang away by force was completely out of the question.
"I'm a businessman with a mountain of affairs to manage. Is it illegal to hire a lawyer?"
"..."
That statement was practically airtight.
"Officers, if you don't have evidence, kindly get out of the way!"
Liang Kun paid zero heed to Wong Chi-shing's foul complexion, shoving past him and walking straight into Yan Liang's apartment.
"Damn your mother!
I give you money all the time, so why the hell haven't you moved out of this dog kennel?"
Gazing around the nostalgic, cramped apartment, Liang Kun couldn't help but remember the days when the two of them had first stepped out into the world.
Though they had suffered betrayal in the past, that very falling-out had ultimately shown him the true mettle of his sworn brother.
If there was anyone in this world Liang Kun truly cared about,
aside from his own mother, it was probably standing right in front of him.
Liang Kun's brazen display left Wong Chi-shing and his subordinates looking utterly wretched.
Yet Hong Kong was a place that demanded evidence.
Where on earth were they supposed to get evidence right now?
In fact, if they had even a shred of it, he wouldn't have been so polite.
"Fall back!"
After a long, tense silence, Wong Chi-shing finally uttered the words he loathed the most, and the group retreated in utter disgrace under the watchful eyes of Yan Liang and Liang Kun.
"Bloody hell!
A pack of trash thugs. One of these days, I'm sending every last one of them to Stanley!"
As soon as they stepped out of the apartment building, an anti-triad officer muttered furiously.
Another chimed in,
"I'm telling you, Babi's death has got to be tied to that piece of trash. Why else would Liang Kun show up with such uncanny timing?"
Hearing this, the others thought it actually made some sense.
Even so, at the end of the day, everything still came down to evidence. With a bitter scowl, Wong Chi-shing snapped,
"Cut the chatter and get back to the precinct to dig up some evidence!"
With that, Wong Chi-shing stormed off first.
A whole squad of cops had arrived in full force, only to scurry away like whipped dogs—it was unspeakably humiliating.
Wong Chi-shing was a notoriously petty man. Having his face rubbed in the dirt by Liang Kun and Yan Liang in front of all his subordinates left a festering rage in his chest, compounded by the snapping of the crucial Babi lead...
The moment he thought of how everything stemmed from Yan Liang, a vicious resolve hardened in his mind.
"Take him down!
I'm going to take him down!"
...
"I'm telling you, can you stop being so cheap? Anyone passing by would think I'm a terrible friend to my brothers!"
Inside Yan Liang's room, Liang Kun picked up a pair of trousers from the sofa with a look of utter disgust and tossed them aside.
"Look at you. I've never let you go short on cash, so why on earth do you insist on living in a dump like this?"
"Whatever!
I can't be bothered with you.
Once I head back, I'll have Sha Qiang find you a decent place."
While Hong Kong's housing prices hadn't reached their later sky-high levels yet, properties generally still started in the tens of thousands.
Meanwhile, across various industries in Hong Kong at the time, even white-collar salaries barely scraped past two thousand.
Under those conditions, buying a home costing hundreds of thousands was completely unrealistic.
However, the money Liang Kun made from trafficking heroin was entirely black market cash.
For the past few years, he had been laundering it through movie production, making him quite well-off.
Seeing that his good brother was still stuck in his old run-down apartment, he wanted to pay out of his own pocket to buy Yan Liang a proper property.
"I really think we should—"
"Knock, knock, knock—"
Before Yan Liang could finish waving him off, the conversation was interrupted by a round of knocking at the door.
Assuming that annoying nuisance Wong Chi-shing had come back, Liang Kun immediately stood up, cursing as he strode over to pull the door open.
"Damn your mother!
Wong Chi-shing, are you ever going to—"
Liang Kun's words cut off mid-sentence, the rest of his tirade shoved right back down his throat by the person standing outside.
He stared with wide, unblinking eyes, completely unable to believe the pink-haired woman standing at his threshold.
Stunning!
She was simply breathtaking!
Gazing at the smiling pink-haired woman at the door, even Liang Kun—a man who had watched countless films and slept with countless women—felt his blood pressure spike uncontrollably.
His face flushed beet red, and he felt a vague, dangerous urge for his blood vessels to burst.
"Oh crap!"
At the same time, Yan Liang caught sight of the woman at the door and his own eyes widened in horror.
Noticing Liang Kun's perilous reaction, a wave of panic washed over him, and he yelled out urgently,
"Xia He, don't mess with him!"