Chapter 61: A Huge Fortune

Wang Cheng vaulted over the wall and ran for his life.

Inside the room, Liu Neng, the father of Liu Yuting, and the hooker got up from the quilt, leaning against the window for a long time without seeing anything.

"Must have been a stray cat, starving to death and rummaging through things."

"Well, alright, I'm not going to lie back down. I need to hurry back and discuss this with my daughter. If this works out, you'll be the biggest hero."

"Brother Liu Neng, we had a deal. If you really get the money, you have to take me out for a trip. I'll make sure to serve you hand and foot. Take this eighty cents back; you weren't even at it for long, so I won't take your money."

Liu Neng felt quite unhappy. Damn it, this hooker really didn't know how to speak like a human being. What did she mean by "not even at it for long"? Wasn't that insulting a man's pride?

It wasn't like his mind wasn't elsewhere, distracting him...

In a fit of anger, he aggressively snatched back his eighty cents, threw his coat over his shoulders, and left.

Meanwhile, Li Qi stepped off the bus and returned home.

The four members of the household were eating dinner. Seeing him wearing a brand-new police uniform, an unusual military-issued heavy cotton-padded coat, and gleaming leather boots, their jaws dropped in astonishment.

Li Li stood up, walked over to Li Qi, touched this and patted that, her eyes turning slightly red.

"Our younger brother looks so handsome in this outfit, just like a real policeman. If Mom could see this, she'd definitely be thrilled."

Old Man Li also put down his chopsticks.

"Where did you steal an outfit like this?"

Li Qi curled his lips.

"Is that any way to talk? What do you mean 'stole'? I went to the city these past couple of days, helped Political Commissar Zhou and the others with a small favor, and they rewarded me."

Old Man Li didn't make a sound. Instead, he lowered his head, the corners of his eyes glittering.

His third son had finally walked onto the righteous path; he could even help out the Public Security Bureau now. Having struggled all his life, wasn't it simply for his children to have proper pursuits and live in peace and safety?

If only the matriarch hadn't left this world so early, how wonderful that would have been.

Li Qi sat on the edge of the brick-bed (kang). His niece, Gao Junmei, hurriedly brought him a bowl and chopsticks, the little girl's eyes full of stars as she looked up at her young uncle in admiration.

So handsome.

Only Li Zhe looked somewhat sullen, shoveled down a few mouthfuls of rice, and retreated to his own room. Right before closing the door, he shot a hard, lingering glare at Li Qi's new clothes.

Sitting at his desk, he thought bitterly and resentfully: Third brother is so selfish, he won't even take off his new clothes for me to wear.

If he were wearing that military-issued heavy cotton-padded coat tomorrow at school, Deng Fengyan would definitely look at him with higher regard, and maybe even deign to speak with him for a while.

He felt that the atmosphere at home was getting worse and worse. Now they even expected him to get up and do chores; life had become much more miserable than before.

And now, they wouldn't give him the new bicycle, nor would they give him the new clothes. How could they be so unfair?

Clearly, he was the future hope of the family. Only when he successfully tested out and left through higher education could the whole family share in his glory.

Did they expect to rely on the brains of a shiftless good-for-nothing like the third brother to change the family's fortunes?

What did he even know?

Refusing to be a deputy section chief at the mine, he insisted on continuing to roam the streets as a delinquent. The man simply had no brains.

Just as his mind was wandering wildly, the courtyard gate was pushed open, and Wang Cheng barged in.

"Li Qi, get out here quickly! You're in big trouble."

Li Qi stepped out of the room with a face full of dark lines.

"My ass I am! What kind of trouble am I in?"

"What are you farting for? Why is your mouth moving then? Holy shit, where did you steal an outfit like this? Are you planning to dress up as a cop to scam people out of money?"

"Get lost, get lost, get lost! I haven't beaten you up in three days, and your skin's itching again, isn't it? Come on, get inside the room, climb onto the kang, and I'll loosen your bones for you."

Wang Cheng walked in with a cheeky grin. Having grown up together since childhood, this level of bickering meant nothing.

"Uncle, Elder Sister, eating dinner?"

"Ah, have you eaten yet? Join us for a bite. Junmei, hurry up and greet him. This is Uncle Wang."

"Hello, Uncle Wang."

Junmei obediently made to get off the kang to fetch a bowl for Wang Cheng, but Wang Cheng hurriedly stopped her.

"I'm heading home right now, just came to tell Li Qi something."

Li Qi threw on his heavy cotton-padded coat and walked out the door with Wang Cheng.

In the Northeast, a child might not have a job or a future, but upon seeing people or visiting someone's home, they had to greet them properly.

This was etiquette carved into their genes.

The two of them walked through the snow toward Wang Cheng's house, and Wang Cheng recounted what he had overheard at the hooker's place.

Li Qi frowned, looking at Wang Cheng.

"What the hell were you doing running over to the hooker's village? Let me tell you, you need to take Mine Director Lin's advice to heart. Don't let yourself stray into a ditch when you were on track to marry a primary school teacher. If you catch some damn disease on top of that, with your old man's temper, he'll actually beat you to death. Have you been peeing smoothly lately? Is there any nasty discharge lingering on your underwear?"

"Get lost! You acting like some old practitioner of traditional Chinese medicine, pretending to know everything—think you're a big wise guy, huh? Where would I get the money to visit a hooker? I just went to eavesdrop by the window! If I knew you were such a piece of work, I wouldn't have bothered coming to tell you, letting you get scammed blind so you'd finally learn your lesson."

"You wouldn't, because you're a good soul."

Li Qi grinned cheekily, hooked his arm tightly around Wang Cheng's thick neck, and half-mounted him. The two of them playfully shoved and wrestled each other in the snow for a good while, all the way until Li Qi escorted Wang Cheng to his doorstep before heading back home.

The trip there and back took over an hour. By the time he returned, his father had already laid out the bedding to prepare for sleep.

Li Qi sat on the northern kang, pondering for a moment.

"Tomorrow I'm going to buy a black-and-white television. There's no entertainment at all in the evenings."

"You look like a black-and-white television. If you've got money, save and spend it wisely."

Li Mantang shot him a sideways glare.

"When I buy it back, don't you dare watch it."

"Hmph! I'll watch it just to spite you!"

A prickly, proud old man.

Li Li brought a basin of foot-washing water for Li Mantang and placed the thermos on the floor for easy refilling, then sat down next to Li Qi.

"Younger brother, I finished getting our divorce certificate with Gao Jiaye today."

Li Qi nodded.

"It's good that you divorced. That entire family has not a single decent person among them. If you stayed with them, the days of suffering would still be ahead of you. You don't need to worry; once Aunt Qiu helps me buy back the market stall in a little while, if you're willing to work, you can do some trading. Or one day, I'll secure a place near the town's middle school, and you can run a small grocery store or a breakfast shop. Heaven doesn't starve a clever sparrow; with your capability, you'll never run out of a way to make a living."

Li Li nodded repeatedly.

She had never pinned her hopes on anything in her life—when she was young she listened to her mother, and when she grew up she listened to her husband.

Now that she was divorced, from now on she would listen to Li Qi. That sounded pretty good.

The family turned in early. The next morning, Li Qi got up at the crack of dawn, hopped on his beat-up bicycle, and headed out.

Go make some money!

For the past couple of days, Li Qi had been racking his brains for a way to get rich quick, and he actually managed to recall one specific incident.

In his previous life, during his lowest point, he used to watch over the arcade gambling machines for a boss out of town. Seeing how pitiful he was, the boss would occasionally invite him to share a meal and let him see a bit of the world.

After all, Li Qi was honest, had no friends, and wouldn't go around running his mouth.

Once, when the boss was entertaining a friend who had spent over a dozen years behind bars, that friend got drunk and broke down crying, pouring his heart out. Only then did Li Qi learn that this man was none other than Mu Yubo, a figure who had once shaken the entire Northeast.

Mu Yubo, along with three accomplices, had pulled off a massive heist in Heilongjiang Province.

The four of them had dressed in drag and disguised themselves as police officers, holding up a state-owned coal mine's monthly payroll—amounting to over a million yuan.

After committing the crime, the four split the loot evenly and scattered across various places to lie low.

Mu Yubo had hidden away in the deep mountains of Taihe City.

As a result, because he ventured out of the mountains to seek out hookers, he got caught.

Yet this fellow had an iron jaw and stubbornly refused to give up the location of the loot, insisting that his three accomplices had double-crossed him, leaving him with only ten thousand yuan which he had long since spent.

Since the other three accomplices were never captured, and the police searched the deep mountains for half a month without finding a trace of the stolen money, the case eventually went cold and was left unresolved.

In truth, Mu Yubo had stashed away 270,000 yuan. It was just that his hiding spot was exceptionally clandestine, completely impossible for outsiders to find.

Knowing that even if he escaped the death penalty, he would still be locked away for many years, Mu Yubo realized these funds were his ultimate hope should he ever get a chance at release.

Clinging to this sliver of hope, he performed exceptionally well in prison to earn sentence reductions, while someone pulled strings on his outside connections, finally allowing him to endure until his full sentence was served.

Yet when he excitedly went to retrieve the stolen cash, he discovered to his horror that the place where he had hidden the money had been turned into a quarry, and the entire mountain had been leveled flat...

Mu Yubo suffered a complete mental breakdown, plunging into heavy alcoholism. Not long after his release, he died of a cerebral hemorrhage brought on by excessive drinking.

During the final drinking sessions of his life, blind drunk, he would grab people by the hand and describe in vivid detail how covertly he had hidden the money back then, which cave it was in, how to climb up, and how it was preserved.

Then he would weep bitterly, cursing the heavens for being unfair and playing cruel tricks on him.

One of the times he grabbed someone by the hand, that person was none other than Li Qi!

Possessing a super-memory, Li Qi clearly remembered every single word Mu Yubo had uttered, down to his every gesture and facial expression.

By now, over a year had passed since Mu Yubo's arrest, and that pile of cash was very likely still sitting right where it was left!

Furthermore, after a whole year, police surveillance and monitoring had long since dropped to virtually zero.

270,000 yuan! In an era when the very term "ten-thousand-yuan household" hadn't even emerged yet, what kind of astronomical fortune was that?

He rode out excitedly, only to be called out by someone right at the alley entrance:

"Li Qi!"