Chapter 5: Unmannered?
Lin Xian looked at Lin Zhang before him with a smile. It had been at least a year since he last saw this little old man.
"What are you saying?!"
Liu Ruyan stared at Lin Xian in disbelief. This was no longer just a matter of lacking manners; it was simply going way too far! He was actually calling someone a little old man straight to his face!
The viewers in the livestream burst into an uproar as well.
"Damn, I thought he was just ill-mannered, but now it turns out he's truly a piece of garbage! The guy literally saved him, and he just calls him a little old man like that?"
"Seriously! Is this how college students are nowadays? Forget about knowing how to show gratitude, how can he talk to an elder like that?"
"Tsk tsk tsk, this totally reminds me of those eighteen donkeys from Fudan!"
"It's a miracle he didn't turn around and bite the hand that fed him!"
"Where's his basic decency? What kind of school is this kid from?"
Several viewers immediately screen-recorded the broadcast and posted it online.
"Look at the character of today's college students! Not an ounce of respect for the elderly, and zero concept of gratitude!"
As soon as the video was posted, it instantly racked up a massive number of likes.
Some parents even forwarded the clip directly to their family group chats.
*Imperial Relatives*
"Family members, take a look. This is how children are being educated nowadays—completely lacking in respect for their elders."
*Love and Affection Family*
"New Year is coming up, everyone please teach your kids properly so they don't turn out like this, completely unable to respect older people! No matter how many books someone reads, if they act like this, they're an utter failure!"
Liu Ruyan glared at Lin Xian in fury. "What is wrong with you? The man saved you, so why on earth did you make him kowtow?!"
Lin Xian looked back at her with a peculiar expression. "Isn't that only natural? We're from the same village!"
Liu Ruyan froze, staring at him in bewilderment. The same village? What a coincidence!
No wonder that buyer had changed his mind the moment he saw Lin Xian and suddenly started shouting that they were human traffickers.
"From the same village? What an incredible coincidence!"
"Holy crap, no wonder this guy started yelling about human traffickers right away—they're from the same village!"
"Unbelievable, what kind of coincidence is this? But even if they're from the same village, does he still have to be so rude?"
Liu Liang, the gang leader, stood completely dumbfounded. *What the hell, they're from the same village?!*
No wonder this bastard had changed his tune at the last second.
"Damn it, I got screwed over so unfairly this time!"
Liu Liang gritted his teeth. Never in his wildest dreams could he have imagined such a coincidence.
He abducts a college student, and the buyer turns out to be from the same village. What the hell—after all that exhausting trouble, he had basically just given the brat a free ride home!
The human trafficker had accidentally turned into a Good Samaritan doing a good deed.
He had actually ended up becoming nothing more than an unlicensed taxi driver for this kid.
"Being from the same village doesn't make it okay! How can you address an elderly person like that?" Liu Ruyan snapped back to her senses, glaring at Lin Xian with a hostile expression.
"Hehe, young lady, it's fine, it's fine, say no more. I'll kneel," Lin Zhang said in a hurry, noticing that the Great-Grandmother seemed on the verge of scolding the Great-Grandfather. Without a second thought, he dropped straight to his knees on the ground.
"Grandfather!" Lin Zhang cried out with a trembling voice.
Liu Ruyan was met with sheer disbelief as she watched the scene unfold. The man had actually knelt down!
A man in his seventies, kneeling before a kid of eighteen or nineteen!
This completely shattered Liu Ruyan's worldview. What on earth was going on here...?
She stared at Lin Xian. Could this guy perhaps be a local tyrant? A gangster?
The viewers in the livestream were equally shocked.
"What the fuck? He actually knelt?! What is going on here? Is this guy seriously that badass? What's his background?"
"No idea. Could he be part of some criminal syndicate?"
"Feels like it. Isn't he a local village bully?"
"Has to be a village tyrant, or he wouldn't be this arrogant!"
"Holy shit, how has the nationwide crackdown on crime missed a guy this arrogant?"
A flurry of discussions erupted in the chat. Lin Xian's behavior and the villagers' reaction practically confirmed his status as an untouchable local boss in the eyes of the public.
"What are you all waiting for? Down on your knees with him," Lin Xian said, waving a hand.
Since it was the New Year, once these people kowtowed, it would make it much easier for him to hand out red envelopes later!
"Aren't you guys going to beat him up?!" Liu Ruyan blurted out, looking at the assembled villagers. There were so many of them, and most looked well over fifty years old—could they really just stand by and watch an eighteen-year-old act this arrogant?
To her utter astonishment, the very next second, every single villager dropped in unison to their knees.
"Grandfather! We kowtow to you!" the villagers shouted in a synchronized chorus.
The sight of so many people kneeling on the ground was breathtakingly spectacular.
Liu Ruyan watched in shock. She suddenly realized something far more urgent than catching human traffickers: organizing a crackdown on local criminal syndicates!
This was entirely too corrupt! A single college student could make this many people drop to their knees without the slightest hesitation. Just how long must he have lorded over the village to achieve such absolute power?
The internet audience was equally stunned by the spectacle.
"So he really *is* a local tyrant! Not a single person among all those people dared to resist!"
"Incredible. What century is this that people still pull this kind of feudal lord routine?"
"Nothing in a remote mountain village should surprise you at this point."
"Honestly, compared to the human traffickers, this place needs rescuing a lot more. Traffickers usually only ruin one or two lives, but judging by this, the entire village is probably being terrorized by this one family."
The viewers flooded the chat with comments.
"Alright, everyone get up," Lin Xian said cheerfully, looking out at the villagers of Linjiacun Village. There really was no place like home!
He then turned his gaze to Liu Ruyan, looking her up and down. This woman possessed an indescribable air about her, and he had no clue what she did for a living. "Ma'am, what are your plans? Should I have someone send you home?" Lin Xian asked.
Catching the gaze that she perceived as 'lecherous', Liu Ruyan bit her lip in frustration and impulsively blurted out, "Um, would it be alright if I stayed in your village for a while?"
Lin Xian wore a peculiar expression. Stay in their village for a while?
"What do you do for a living?" Lin Xian asked.
He already had a pretty good guess in mind. After glancing at his system stats earlier, he noticed that aside from the initial tens of thousands of reputation points he had accumulated, a massive new chunk had been added, bringing his total up to thirty thousand!
When he put two and two together, the only suspicious person around was this woman!
There was a very high chance she was secretly filming!
Liu Ruyan's heart tightened. *You couldn't even tell he was a human trafficker back then, but now you're interrogating me about my job?!*
She grew irritated. Wasn't Lin Xian supposed to be a total idiot? Why was he suddenly so sharp when it came to her?
Steeling herself, Liu Ruyan declared, "Actually, I'm a host for a variety show!" She stared right at him.
"A variety show host?" Lin Xian looked at her with mild surprise.
"That's right," Liu Ruyan nodded. "Our production team is planning to shoot a rural-themed show that combines traditional culture with a fresh, modern twist!"
"Is your show famous?" Lin Xian asked. Ideas were already spinning in his head. As the Great-Grandfather of the village, he naturally needed to find ways to boost the village's economy and fame. Secondly, this tied in perfectly with his reputation system! Best of all, he didn't even have to lift a finger to brainstorm—this woman had practically delivered a free vehicle for his reputation right to his doorstep!
"Of course." Liu Ruyan nodded proudly. It was the national television network, after all—how could it not be famous?
A smile bloomed across Lin Xian's face. If it was famous, that made things much easier to talk about!
"Very well." Lin Xian nodded.
Liu Ruyan paused, caught off guard. She hadn't expected him to agree so readily.
Wasn't he afraid of having his tyrannical behavior exposed?
"We can put your matters aside for a moment. There are other things to take care of first," Lin Xian said, turning his attention toward Lin Dahu and the three human traffickers.
As for Lin Dahu—how dare he get involved in human trafficking!
And as for these traffickers—of all people, they had chosen to target him!
***
Daxian.
Laicai Noodle Restaurant.
The battered minivan pulled into the narrow alley behind the noodle shop.
Wang Ming, whose arm bore a faded tattoo of a crippled dragon, still wore a look of lingering terror. "Damn it, we really took a massive fall today! Never thought we'd end up getting dragged straight to the kid's home village! Damn that cursed place."
It was a blessing that the two of them had managed to escape. If he had stayed behind like the boss, those villagers probably would have beaten him to death.
"Brother, what do we do now? The boss is gone, and our money is gone too. We lost at least half a million on this single job," Wang Xue said, looking at Wang Ming with a bitter smile.
"What do we do? What do you think I brought you here for? We're going to see the higher-ups," Wang Ming said, his eyes wide.
The four of them were merely a small cell; there were people of much higher rank pulling the strings above them.
The only reason they had been able to traffic so many people without getting caught was entirely thanks to those higher-ups.
"What happened to you two? Where are the others?" Just as they were speaking, a fat man dressed in a Zhongshan suit, looking entirely respectable on the surface, walked over.
"Boss Li..." Wang Ming offered a bitter, wretched smile before recounting everything that had happened to Boss Li.
"Such a thing actually happened? Linjiacun Village?" A ruthless glint flashed across Boss Li's face. The lower-level operatives were supposed to kick up at least three hundred thousand yuan to him from this deal, and now that cursed bunch of villagers had completely ruined it.
"Hmph, you two keep running your routes; I'll handle this matter myself," Boss Li said, glaring at Wang Ming and Wang Xue. There was no way he was going to let this slide.
Damn it.
He remembered that the county had some kind of policy in the works to develop a major scenic area, and that Linjiacun Village place seemed to have decent scenery.
"Hmph! If I don't bulldoze your entire village to the ground, my name isn't Li!"