Deep in the Night - Chapter 12

Gu Yuan sat in his office for a while. The new female assistant diligently brought him coffee, setting it gently near his hand.

Gu Yuan stared at his computer screen, not even glancing sideways. He picked up the coffee and took a small sip. The next second, he pulled out a tissue, spat the small sip of coffee entirely onto it, then nonchalantly crumpled the tissue and tossed it into the coffee cup.

The female assistant was left speechless.

The young woman was practically frozen in terror. After standing rigid for a moment, she picked up the cup and walked away, her steps stiff and awkward.

The new assistant held a master’s degree from a prestigious university and felt somewhat overqualified when applying for this entry-level assistant position. After joining, she had been determined to impress. Yet, half a month into the job, the boss hadn’t given her a single kind look. Everything she did was wrong; she couldn’t even pour a cup of coffee correctly.

The handsome, wealthy boss, a figure who had once seemed like a leading man from a soap opera, had devolved in her eyes into a devil in an Armani suit. If not for the difficulty of finding work these days, she would have stormed into the office and slapped Gu Yuan across the face with her letter of resignation.

The assistant stood bewildered in the pantry, staring at the coffee with the floating wad of napkin, so humiliated she was close to tears. Just as she was about to throw caution to the wind and go ask for sick leave from Human Resources, a voice came from behind her: “What’s wrong?”

The young woman turned around: “Assistant Fang!”

Fang Jin was wearing a white shirt and a black suit, his collar slightly loosened without a tie. His face was delicately pale from his recent recovery. His gaze drifted to the steaming cup of coffee:

“…Skim milk?”

“Yes!”

“One-quarter sugar?”

“Yes!”

“50% concentrated caffeine?”

“Exactly!”

Fang Jin sighed: “Make it again for me to see.”

The assistant sniffled and skillfully operated the imported coffee machine in the pantry, heating and frothing the milk. Soon, she produced a rich, aromatic concentrated latte. Fang Jin watched the entire process from the pantry doorway, waving away her offer to taste it. He then said, “The milk foam is too thin, not dense enough. It needs to be five millimeters thicker.”

The assistant was stunned.

Fang Jin said resignedly, “Never mind. Give it to me.”

He walked to his office, took off his jacket, and put down his briefcase. With a stack of documents clipped in his left hand and the coffee cup in his right, he headed to the General Manager’s office next door. Gu Yuan was still sitting at his computer. He only looked up when Fang Jin entered: “—Didn’t you take sick leave for the past two days?”

“I feel better today.”

Fang Jin set down the coffee. Gu Yuan picked it up and took a sip, then took the documents Fang Jin handed him and flipped through them. As he read, he habitually drank most of the coffee before praising him: “It’s a good thing you came in, or I wouldn’t have been able to drink anything warm.”

Fang Jin was speechless.

The assistant spying from outside was also speechless.

Fang Jin’s lip twitched slightly. Boss, you really are operating with double standards, he thought. Aren’t you afraid she’ll accuse you of workplace discrimination?

However, in Gu Yuan’s eyes, the focus wasn’t the coffee, but the person who knocked and walked in carrying the coffee. Yesterday, Fang Jin had been absent on sick leave. In the morning, Gu Yuan had a sudden flash of inspiration but no one understood him. In the afternoon, he needed financial German translation for a meeting. At noon, he wanted Assistant Fang’s special stir-fried oil-blasted prawns and Jinhua ham and tofu soup. For the evening negotiation, he needed a sharp, resourceful, and collaborative deputy by his side—someone to pass cues, offer subtle support, and help him secure millions of dollars in profits. And late at night, he wanted someone nearby to accompany him while he worked overtime… But Assistant Fang hadn’t come to the office.

After work, the air pressure around General Manager Gu was extremely low. Although he maintained his usual inscrutable, calm, indifferent, and well-mannered demeanor when he left the company, everyone felt the air around him was ready to erupt with thousands of bolts of thunder, ready to reduce the entire skyscraper behind him to ashes.

So, compared to yesterday, what did five millimeters of thin coffee foam matter?

Gu Yuan put down the documents, swiveled his leather armchair forty-five degrees, and looked at Fang Jin impassively: “By the way, there’s something I haven’t had a chance to tell you. About your heroic rescue the day before yesterday, and the beauty you saved who almost forced himself on you…”

Fang Jin’s face flushed. Just as he tried to explain, Gu Yuan interrupted him with a hint of mockery: “The john you beat up is the CEO of a listed investment company in this city. Afterward, he aggressively demanded the hotel review the footage to find out who beat him.”

Fang Jin’s expression subtly changed.

He suddenly recalled that Gu Mingzong had resolved this matter, likely through his Head of Security. But any action would inevitably leave a trace.

That hotel had closer business ties and a better relationship with Gu Yuan. If Gu Yuan had made inquiries afterward, would he have discovered evidence of Gu Mingzong’s involvement?!

“The hotel manager reviewed the footage beforehand, recognized the hero to be Assistant Fang, and simultaneously dispatched someone to notify the Gu family. To the CEO, the manager replied that the security footage for the Presidential Suite could not be shown to a single guest arbitrarily and required formal police intervention. The CEO, afraid his solicitation of a prostitute would be exposed, settled the matter by signing a confidentiality agreement with the hotel. After that, he dropped the matter.”

Gu Yuan leaned back in his large chair, his long legs crossed, speaking indifferently: “I really didn’t expect to run into such a sensible hotel manager who solved the problem on his own. You have good luck, Assistant Fang?”

Fang Jin knew him well. Although he was smiling, there was not a trace of mirth in his eyes.

It was a sharp gaze that could pierce through your skin and bones, seeing directly into your mind.

“…” Fang Jin hesitated: “Mr. Gu, about this…”

“There’s only one thing I find strange,” Gu Yuan interrupted him, the end of his sentence laden with a knowing insinuation:

“Tell me, after confirming it was you, why did the hotel not notify me, your boss, but skip me entirely and go straight to notify the Gu family?”

A faint sweat broke out on Fang Jin’s back.

He met Gu Yuan’s gaze, feeling for a moment as if he were being stripped bare. All the sordid, shameful secrets he had carefully hidden were laid open in broad daylight, exposed to this man who was looking down at him from a height.

A ridiculous thought crossed his mind: Did he find out?

No, impossible. It had only been one day—

“I apologize, Mr. Gu,” Fang Jin forced himself to meet Gu Yuan’s eyes, his voice sounding as steady as usual: “This was my fault. So that same evening, to avoid causing you trouble, I first contacted the connections I had established while working for the Gu family…”

He paused. Though his pace of speech was slow, every word had been rapidly cycled through his mind countless times before being uttered.

“Wang Yu, the Head of Security for the Group’s main company, and I had dealings before. After I came here to work as your assistant, I still maintained some contact with my former colleagues. So, after the incident the night before last, I immediately asked him to help investigate the guest’s identity. He must have then contacted the hotel the next day…”

Gu Yuan’s deep eyes narrowed slightly. After a moment, he replied with an noncommittal “Oh?”

“…I know it’s inappropriate to maintain such close ties with people from the other side while working for you, which is why I never dared tell you. But the night before last was genuinely my impulsive mistake, and later, fearing it would implicate you, I secretly asked an old colleague for help.” Fang Jin took a breath, calmly stating: “I apologize, Mr. Gu. I will be sure to pay attention next time and will not make this mistake again.”

They stood and sat, barely a meter apart. The office was eerily silent; the sound of the other’s breathing was clearly audible.

Gu Yuan toyed with a fountain pen, his expression seeming somewhat distracted.

“That’s more or less what I figured,” he finally said after a long time.

Fang Jin’s tense shoulder muscles slightly relaxed.

“But that’s not what I wanted to say.” Gu Yuan said lazily: “You are my assistant. Regardless of whether you ever return to the main company, you are nominally my man right now. When you act rashly and use my name, you must tell me about the clean-up afterward. Don’t ask others for help.”

He shook his head with a hint of mockery: “While your decision to save that child was meaningless and quite ridiculous, people make mistakes. An occasional lapse is forgivable. But to make a mistake and then hide it from me to seek help from others is utterly absurd. I am your boss. It is only right for you to come to me when you encounter trouble. You must remember this, understand?”

Fang Jin stared blankly at Gu Yuan. Only after a long silence did he gradually realize the full weight of his words.

“Mr…. Mr. Gu…”

Gu Yuan finally shifted his gaze from the pen to Fang Jin’s face, saying impatiently: “I’m just saying! The main point is that if you go asking others for help over such a trivial matter, it makes me look bad as your boss, understand?”

But all of Fang Jin’s senses were overwhelmed by an indescribable joy. The feeling was even more surprising and intense than when Gu Yuan had said, “I don’t want to see you hurt” at the cemetery.

—Come to me when you encounter trouble.

Don’t ask others for help.

This promise was completely unexpected for Fang Jin, like a crown falling from the sky and landing squarely on his head amidst a thousand people. Although he was just a fool who was never meant to wear that crown, the suddenness of the surprise and the brief moment of happiness struck the deepest, softest part of his heart.

“I understand…” he said softly, his voice carrying a careful tenderness: “Thank you, Mr. Gu. I… I understand. I will definitely not…”

“Don’t you dare start crying again!” Gu Yuan warned immediately: “I know you get a fever when you cry, Assistant Fang! You’ve used up all your sick days for the year!”

Fang Jin blinked. Gu Yuan, while intensely watching his unusually long eyelashes flutter with the movement, waved his hand impatiently: “Alright, get back to work. There are over twenty pending matters from yesterday waiting for you to handle. Come see me later!”

—

Fang Jin returned to his desk. Through the inner window, he saw Gu Yuan had swiveled his chair back to the computer, his full attention seemingly returned to his work.

Fang Jin opened his own notebook, but his peripheral vision was fixed on Gu Yuan.

Why would you give me such a promise? Why are you so good to me?

I have nothing to offer you in return.

Fang Jin averted his gaze, looking at the black computer screen in front of him, seeing his own lost reflection. He tried to recall anyone who had ever shown him kindness in his life, but his memory only conjured images of the Gu family’s well-trained servants, the cold, silent bodyguards, the various company executives… and Gu Mingzong’s always unreadable, emotionally opaque face.

Going further back, there was only the house collapsing in the roaring fire, where his parents lay.

If I had nothing to do with the Gu family, this thought suddenly surfaced in Fang Jin’s mind—

If I had no connection to Gu Mingzong, perhaps I could be Gu Yuan’s most trusted and relied-upon subordinate for life, and Gu Yuan’s goodwill and promise would continue—for ten, twenty years, perhaps forever.

Even if Gu Yuan eventually married, started a family, and had children, at least the position of his right-hand man would always be reserved for him.

To imagine himself still sitting next door to Gu Yuan’s office twenty years from now, able to look up and see his handsome, familiar face, breathing the same air with him every day, and retaining the right to “come directly to me when you encounter trouble…” Fang Jin’s heart felt light, as if it were filled with air.

If only he could completely sever ties with the Gu family…

If only his deal with Gu Mingzong could be buried forever beneath the surface…

Fang Jin took a deep breath, closing his eyes to force himself to calm down.

There are no secrets in this world. This humiliating secret, as long as it existed, would eventually be exposed. He had to calm down and patiently wait for his chance, to completely excise it from his soul before all the unbearable past was laid bare in the light of day.

You will find a way, Fang Jin, he thought.

You have struggled single-handedly in this world until now. You have walked through so many life-threatening predicaments. You will surely find a way to keep going.

There will be a way.

Fang Jin opened his eyes, slowly and thoroughly exhaling the breath from his lungs.

Just then, his mobile phone on the desk lit up. Fang Jin picked it up and saw a new text message. It was from Wang Yu, the Head of Security for the main company:

“Assistant Fang, Mr. Gu asked me to inform you to come to the XX Hotel at seven tonight.”

“We found the person who attempted to kill you that year.”

—

Precisely at seven, Fang Jin stood in the lavish hotel lobby. After a call, the receptionist bowed politely: “No problem, Mr. Fang. Please wait a moment.”

This hotel, which boasted six-star amenities, was one of the ventures Gu Mingzong had invested in and served as a director for. The original purpose of the investment was money laundering, which made the hotel’s outrageously high pricing both luxurious and rarely visited. However, because of this, the hotel had gradually become one of the local high society’s socializing hubs in recent years. Gu Mingzong recognized its immense social potential and, rather than withdrawing, further increased his investment, keeping it within the domain of his business empire.

Fang Jin stood in the lobby. Beyond the honey-colored marble floor and the majestic, floor-to-ceiling revolving glass doors were huge lawn fountains, garden pools, and an elevated vehicular bridge leading to the distant city center. Further away, the streets were lit up, traffic flowed, and countless pedestrians moved back and forth, like another distant, bustling world.

Fang Jin was slightly lost in thought.

Did those people, seeing this magnificent hotel, envy the guests who came and went, spending fortunes?

Yet, standing here, he only envied the people in the world who had a home to return to when dusk settled—whether it was a grand mansion or a humble cottage, it was, at least, a place to return to.

“Assistant Fang,” Wang Yu, the Head of Security, personally came downstairs and walked across the lobby to Fang Jin: “Hello, please follow me.”

Fang Jin followed him silently, taking the internal hotel elevator down to the fourth basement level. Stepping out, they were in a massive indoor underground wine cellar. Warm overhead lights shone on rows of mahogany wine racks, but the air was slightly damp and chilly.

Wang Yu gestured for him to proceed, then led the way toward the deepest part of the cellar.

Following him, Fang Jin’s gaze suddenly caught a dark patch on the side of Wang Yu’s black suit jacket, a spot that had darkened due to the humidity but wasn’t obvious in the golden-red light.

Whether due to the cold underground temperature or a psychological reaction, a sudden chill rose in Fang Jin’s heart as he stared at the dark fabric.

“We’ve arrived,” Wang Yu stopped at a wooden door at the end, opened it, and said: “Please.”

Fang Jin stepped inside. The room was wide and divided into two halves by a soundproof glass wall. On the side near the door, three armchairs were placed. Gu Mingzong sat in one of them. Seeing him enter, he asked casually: “Have you eaten?”

Fang Jin bowed his head in deference and said, “No.”

“Don’t eat yet. You might throw it up later.” Gu Mingzong pointed to the chair beside him: “Sit.”

Fang Jin straightened his jacket and sat down, glancing up to see that it was, predictably, Chi Wanru sitting in the other armchair.

Chi Wanru was as impeccably dressed and perfectly made up as usual, but her face looked stiff. Perhaps it was the lighting, but her profile had a subtly sinister cast. Following her gaze, on the other side of the glass wall, a bloody, mangled person lay on the floor. Their limbs were bent at strange, unnatural angles. If not for the faint rise and fall of their chest, one couldn’t tell if they were alive or dead.

Just then, two bodyguards on the other side pushed a door open and entered. They each grabbed one of the person’s hands and dragged them out, leaving a long trail of blood.

Immediately afterward, two more bodyguards brought in a person who was heavily bound with ropes, forcefully kicking him to the ground.

Fang Jin’s expression remained unchanged, but the tips of his fingers clutching the armrest tightened slightly.

He had witnessed this familiar scene many times and knew exactly what was about to happen.

“Wang Yu,” Gu Mingzong said, casually scrolling through his emails on his phone: “Give him a background briefing.”

Wang Yu answered, “Yes,” and turned to Fang Jin: “Before you went to study in Germany, you were kidnapped. Although you were rescued in time, the kidnappers escaped. For all these years, we never gave up tracing them. Last week, we finally apprehended these two individuals in the Northeast and escorted them back. However, they refuse to provide any clues about the mastermind, no matter what we do.”

As he spoke, a bodyguard on the other side of the glass wall pinned down the captive. The other produced a sharp knife and pressed it directly onto the captive’s leg.

“The one before was crippled after the interrogation,” Wang Yu said expressionlessly. “So, we are now questioning the second one.”

No sooner had he finished speaking than the bodyguard asked a question, and the kidnapper clenched his teeth and refused to answer. The bodyguard didn’t waste words. The next second, the blade struck and cut with ruthless precision, brutally gouging out his kneecap while he was alive!

“Aaaahhh—”

The scream almost pierced the thick, soundproof glass. Chi Wanru’s face instantly went deathly pale!

Fang Jin looked away.

—He knew exactly what Gu Mingzong meant.

The target of the kidnapping that year hadn’t been him, but Gu Yuan. Only through a twisted coincidence was it Fang Jin who ended up in that car. After being kidnapped, he was held in a deserted warehouse and starved for six days. At that time, he truly believed he was going to die.

He remembered being abnormally calm. He crawled through the warehouse, found a piece of wire, slowly sawed through the ropes on his wrists, then used the wire to create a trap to catch a rat. He crushed it to death and drank its blood to maintain his strength. He ate insects and drank the dirty water that seeped through the walls when it rained. He used the pain to force himself to stay conscious, exhausting every means to survive, and finally lasted until the sixth day when Gu Mingzong and his men found the warehouse.

At that point, he was semi-conscious. He later heard that he was severely emaciated, resembling a skeleton covered in skin.

Fang Jin didn’t know why his will to survive was so fierce. When he was young, he had thought that a poor, unlucky wretch like him had no hope even if he lived. But when the threat of death truly loomed, he erupted with boundless courage and a powerful will. There was not a single moment of self-pity or complaint. He simply used every means possible to live.

Even ants have the right to survival.

Perhaps this is the survival instinct of the weak, he thought self-mockingly later.

Fang Jin later learned that he had been the scapegoat for Gu Yuan, and the instigator was glaringly obvious.

At the time, there were rumors that the Gu family intended to formally welcome Chi Wanru into the family, but Gu Mingzong kept delaying, eventually exhausting Chi Wanru’s patience. In her desperation, she could only think of one way: to secure her status through her son. The biggest obstacle was Gu Mingzong’s eldest son, Gu Yuan, the legitimate heir of his formal wife.

The immense temptation of power and wealth finally drove her to take a desperate risk. But she mistakenly kidnapped Fang Jin and lost the only chance to silence him permanently. Afterward, the kidnappers escaped. Gu Mingzong likely knew she was behind it, but without concrete evidence, no one could unseat Gu Yang’s mother. Thus, the matter of Chi Wanru formally joining the family was indefinitely shelved.

Fang Jin took over a month to fully recover in the hospital before being sent to study in Germany soon after. He didn’t see the woman again until his last visit to the main residence with Gu Yuan.

Everything today was meant for Chi Wanru.

He was merely an accompanying guest.

The bodyguard dropped the bloody kneecap with a plop onto the floor. He turned and pressed down on the kidnapper’s other leg, measured the spot, and then plunged the knife in again.

“Stop… stop it!” Chi Wanru rose abruptly: “Stop!”

However, no one in the room moved; not even Wang Yu blinked.

Amidst the earth-shattering screams, the bodyguard quickly carved out the other piece of stark white, bloody kneecap. This time, he deliberately displayed it against the glass wall. Bloody, shredded flesh dripped down his hand. Chi Wanru vomited violently on the spot. Wang Yu immediately offered a prepared cup of water, saying respectfully, “Madam Chi.”

Chi Wanru slapped his hand away and rushed to open the door, but it didn’t budge.

“What exactly do you want?!” Chi Wanru cried out in collapse: “What will it take to stop this?!”

The room was silent. The blood and screams were blocked by the soundproof glass, like a cruel pantomime happening inches away.

Gu Mingzong’s demeanor was relaxed. “Wang Yu.”

Wang Yu bowed: “Yes.”

“What was my old rule for handling situations just like this?”

Wang Yu replied: “We flay the skin, dig out the bones, cut out the flesh, and pull the tendons. Even a dead man will speak. The last one being crippled was our mistake. This one won’t be. We must interrogate him until he reveals the mastermind.”

Gu Mingzong looked at Chi Wanru: “Did you hear that?”

Chi Wanru’s makeup was smeared, her hair was disheveled, and her chest heaved violently, like a swan that had been knocked into the mud. After a moment, she suddenly turned her attention to Fang Jin, but saw only the young man sitting in the high-backed armchair, gazing toward the other side of the glass wall. His profile was as calm and cool as a white jade carving, betraying no emotion.

Perhaps it was her delusion, but for a moment, looking at Fang Jin’s profile, she vaguely saw a shadow of Gu Mingzong.

It was a similar dark aura, exuding from the marrow due to years of being influenced by and witnessing his deeds.

“…So what if you interrogate the mastermind out of him?” Chi Wanru forced herself to lift her chin, but a tremor was unmistakable in her voice: “Under torture, coerced confessions are unreliable. How can you be sure the confessed person is the real culprit? Besides, so many years have passed; what good is it even if the real culprit confesses?”

Gu Mingzong contemplated for a moment and surprisingly agreed: “That’s true.”

He then turned to Fang Jin: “—Then let the victim decide. This kidnapper is yours to deal with.”

Chi Wanru abruptly looked at Fang Jin. She saw his indifferent profile, his eyelashes casting a narrow arc as they slightly lowered. His eyes were utterly calm.

Silence filled the room. Across the glass, the kidnapper screamed, struggled, and convulsed. Large pools of blood gathered on the floor, forming a horrifying puddle.

Fang Jin said softly, “Manager Wang.”

Wang Yu leaned in.

“Kill him.”

Chi Wanru shuddered violently, almost unable to believe the words came from Fang Jin’s mouth.

Gu Mingzong, however, smiled, seemingly unsurprised. He nodded toward Wang Yu, who was looking at him.

Wang Yu immediately issued an order to his subordinates through his earpiece. Gu Mingzong stood up, casually dusted his cuff, and said to Fang Jin: “No need to watch this part. Come up and have dinner with me.” He then turned to Chi Wanru: “You stay here and watch them finish the job before you leave.”

Chi Wanru leaned against the wall, utterly weak and unable to utter a single word. She watched with wide eyes as Fang Jin stood up expressionlessly, leaving the bloody mess behind him, and followed Gu Mingzong out of the room.

—

Leaving the wine cellar and arriving at the main lobby, they then took the all-glass scenic elevator straight to the hotel’s top floor, which housed the city’s most famous revolving starlight garden restaurant. Now that dusk had fallen, the restaurant’s ceiling was fully retracted. Through the glass layer, one could look out over the city’s prosperous, dazzling nightscape and the brilliant starlight overhead.

A candlelit table by the window was already prepared by the server: a white tablecloth, silver cutlery, and a large cluster of fresh lilies in a floral basket. Nearby, the elegant nocturne of a grand piano flowed, and the air held a subtle, rich fragrance of red wine.

Gu Mingzong indicated a bottle of wine and casually handed the gilt-edged wine list back to the server: “I didn’t expect you to be so efficient just now, so all the food I ordered is delayed. I thought, given your personality, you’d stall for another half hour.”

Fang Jin said: “I merely voiced the decision you had already made.”

“Oh? Since when have you become so obedient?”

Fang Jin stared at the flickering candlelight in the center of the table. In the faint, warm glow, his face seemed to radiate a soft light, yet his eyes were like a thin layer of ice.

“There is no path that allows everyone to live,” he said quietly. “One must make choices and sacrifices.”

A moment later, the server approached and poured a shallow layer of red wine into both their stemmed glasses. In the candlelight, the liquid was like a sparkling ruby, its movement casting a captivating, beautiful light in Fang Jin’s eyes—a sight one could hardly look away from.

“Mr. Gu,” he finally looked up, meeting Gu Mingzong’s gaze: “There is one thing I want to ask you.”

Gu Mingzong, who had been watching him from the other end of the table, now met his eyes and broke into a subtle smile.

—The smile was hard to describe. It contained a hint of sigh, a touch of encouragement, and a sense that he had seen something truly interesting.

He examined Fang Jin with this thoughtful gaze for a moment, then smiled and nodded: “Ask away.”

The piano music remained elegant, and the lilies released a delicate, refined scent. Nearby, a server in a waistcoat and tie, holding a tall silver tray, approached their table.

“—That year, you said I would have one chance to regret my decision in this life.”

Fang Jin looked at Gu Mingzong and slowly asked: “Does that promise still hold true now?”