Chapter 10: Nine Deaths, One Life
The time spent inside the coffin, in absolute darkness, was agonizing. I couldn't say how long I waited, but eventually I felt them prying the nails loose from outside.
When the lid was lifted, the capped man crouched beside the coffin and said, "Hurry up and get out. We need to reseal this right away. Did you get the stuff?"
I held up the severed finger. "Got it."
He nodded. "Good. Find your chance to leave."
I tried to climb out, but the corpse's legs were still tangled with mine, weighing me down. I had to sit up and pry his legs apart. His pant legs were oddly bulky—I couldn't figure out what was inside.
Once out, I crept up to the hearse window and peeked out. There really was a long funeral procession outside.
I said, "There are so many cars. How do I get away?"
"Come up to the passenger seat," the tattooed man said.
I moved to the front. He pointed at the mountain road ahead and said very seriously, "In a moment, I'll speed up a bit. There's a tunnel up ahead with an emergency pull-off area and an escape passage. Get in there as fast as you can."
"Won't it look suspicious if you suddenly stop?"
"No. After I stop, I'll walk back to the family's cars and tell them it's time—they should set off firecrackers when we exit the tunnel. While I'm talking to them, you slip away."
"Got it."
I sat in the passenger seat, my heart pounding.
The car entered the tunnel soon enough. The tattooed man pulled into the emergency area and told me to make my move, then went to speak with the following vehicles.
I waited until he'd flagged down the cars behind, then slipped into the escape passage and ran for all I was worth.
I finally burst out of the tunnel. The funeral procession was already far behind.
Breathing a sigh of relief, I climbed over the guardrail and scrambled down the hillside.
When I made it back to the desolate stretch where the mountain road began, Monkey Drake was still waiting, just as I'd expected.
The moment he saw me, he demanded, "Did you bring the body?"
I held out the severed finger. He stared at it. "You only needed a DNA sample—couldn't you have just clipped some nails?"
I said, "You're paranoid. If I'd only brought back nail clippings, would you have believed they came from Victor Li?"
"Good point. I would have suspected you."
He took the finger, placed it in a sealed bag, and turned to one of his men. "Listen carefully—tomorrow night is the original delivery deadline. You've got the cleanest record among us. Get to Hong Kong-Macau as fast as possible for the test. I've already contacted the lab over there. Do you know what 'fastest possible' means?"
"Yes. Nearest direct flight, I board immediately. If there's no flight, I drive nonstop. I've got my travel permit on me."
"Tell the lab to prioritize speed over everything. Money is no object—I've already asked around. The more you pay, the faster the results."
"Understood, Boss!"
"I'm still not comfortable. Take two more of our cleanest men. Split into three groups, three samples. I'm worried that if only one of you goes, a random accident could cause delays. Everything needs to be absolutely certain."
"Whatever Boss says!"
The man picked two others, and they drove off.
Monkey Drake rubbed his hands together. "My safety rests on these test results."
I couldn't help asking, "I brought you the body—we're square now, right?"
"Square? What are you thinking? Tie him up."
His men immediately pinned me down and bound my hands and feet again. Monkey Drake said coolly, "You cost me a whole box of gold—how could you possibly live? But don't worry. If the test confirms it's Victor Li, your family will at least be safe. When the time comes, I'll bury you in the ground too—at least you'll rest in peace."
"And if the results show the big client isn't Victor Li?"
"Then you're still a dead man, because I'll hand you over to the intermediary and tell them everything. I compensate with money, you compensate with your life. That's what I call fair."
Hearing this, my heart sank like a stone.
Monkey Drake said, "We can't stay here. Bring him along."
They threw me back into the trunk. In grim realization, I understood that since the fire, I'd been in one desperate situation after another—every single moment.
Fate seemed determined to deny me any chance, pushing me toward the cliff's edge at every turn.
Lying in the trunk, my mind was full of Elena and my mother. Since I couldn't escape death either way, all my past experiences began to flash before my eyes like a slideshow.
I remembered sitting at the dinner table as a child, vividly telling my parents about my dreams. I said I'd become a big boss someday, earn lots of money, and give them a good life.
My mother told me it didn't matter how much money I made—as long as our family was healthy and happy, that was enough.
My parents were liars. They worked day and night, exhausted themselves paying off my debts—and in the end, money still had them cornered.
I remembered lying in bed as an adult, holding Elena close. The stalled project had resumed construction for only a few days before stalling again. I told her life was too hard, constantly threatening to crush me, that I was as insignificant as an ant, unable even to defend my own rights.
Elena told me that as long as she lived, she would stand with her spine straight—never kneel, never submit, never diminish herself.
Elena was a liar too. In the end, she knelt before Howard Li, begging for his family's mercy—only to be humiliated. She was trapped by the very submission she'd sworn to avoid.
No...
The one trapping them was always me.
If my parents hadn't had a son like me, they wouldn't have toiled into their later years. My father wouldn't have waited for his birthday to eat a single dish of belt fish, and my mother wouldn't have suffered what she suffered.
If Elena hadn't married me—beautiful, gentle, compassionate—maybe she'd be riding in a private car, holding artisanal bubble tea instead of the budget stuff, happily asking her husband where they were going on their date.
Thinking of my failed life, I felt a strange kind of peace settle over me.
If I hadn't existed... perhaps their lives would have been better.
Tears streamed down my face. When the trunk was opened again, I was already weeping openly.
Monkey Drake glanced at me. "Scared of dying?"
"Terrified... genuinely terrified..." I sobbed. "There are so many people I care about. I've been holding them back all along, yet I still want to see them again. The world is so unfair—it was Swallow Lin who came after me first, and yet I'm the one paying the price."
"Your words move me deeply. So, for the sake of fairness, Swallow Lin will die alongside you."
He dragged me out of the trunk, and I found myself in an abandoned factory—though I had no idea which one.
Soon, his men dragged Swallow Lin out of another car.
Her hair was a mess. She was covered in wounds.
One of her hands had been severed, yet they'd still bound her arms and legs mercilessly.
Monkey Drake said flatly, "Did you really think I'd send her to a hospital? She botched the job—without her paying with her life, how do I explain this to the intermediary?"
"Boss! Boss, I was wrong, please—" Swallow Lin's earlier arrogance had completely evaporated. She knelt on the ground, trembling as she pleaded with Monkey Drake. "I'll never do it again, please give me a chance. Boss, my brother has been with you since the very beginning—he's your oldest follower!"
Monkey Drake lit a cigarette and sighed. "You know your brother's been with me the longest. Do you know why, after all these years, he's still just a low-level flunky?"
Swallow Lin was shaking too hard to answer.
"It's because you, you bitch, can't keep your hands to yourself! Back when I wanted to promote your brother, I already found out you were skimming off the top! If Tiger had just come clean, that would've been one thing—but every single time, he covered for you. How could I trust him? You worthless slut—I gave you so much money, and it wasn't enough, you had to drag your brother down too!"
Monkey Drake kicked Swallow Lin over, then grabbed her by the hair and roared, "I wanted to promote your brother years ago! But I'd already discovered you were running black market deals behind my back! Every time, Tiger cleaned up your mess—if I can't trust him, how can I promote him? You cheap bitch, I gave you everything, and you still weren't satisfied—you had to bring him down with you!"
Swallow Lin trembled uncontrollably. She stammered, "Boss... I was scared of being poor, truly scared. I couldn't control my greed. I admit I made a mistake, but I've never botched a job before—just this once..."
One of Monkey Drake's men couldn't hold back. "Boss, are we really going to let Swallow die? I'm worried Tiger won't be able to handle it. If he turns against us—"
Monkey Drake waved dismissively. "I've known Tiger for years. I know him best. He may have blood on his hands, but deep down, he's a coward. He'd never dare cross me."
"What if he goes to the police?"
"He's killed how many people in black market deals? You think he'd turn himself in? One confession and he's looking at a firing squad."
"You're right, Boss."
Monkey Drake suddenly fell into thought, muttering, "Wait, something doesn't add up."
"What?"
Monkey Drake looked at both of us. "It's too convenient. Swallow goes after you and happens to fail—and you, the one she failed against, happens to be connected to the police. How is that a coincidence? Her only failure, and it involves law enforcement."
His man blurted, "Boss, you think they're working together?"
Monkey Drake said coldly, "It's possible the siblings were already controlled by the police, using me to earn reduced sentences."
Swallow Lin panicked. "Boss, I swear I've never even met him before!"
"You think I'm stupid?" Monkey Drake smirked. "Little brother—are you two in on this together?"
"If I tell you something useful, will you spare my life?"
"No."
Since I was probably going to die anyway, I said, "Maybe you're not as clever as you think you are."
Monkey Drake considered this, then told his men, "Better safe than sorry—in this business, you need one hundred percent certainty. Tiger, come over here. But these three might be working with the police, so have him wait at the hill behind Huangjia Village. You go pick him up."
He tossed the car keys to the man, who nodded. "I'll go get Brother Tiger."
"If he actually shows up, slow down like you're stopping, then accelerate and run him over. Understand?" Monkey Drake said, his voice like ice.
The man's face went white. "Run over Brother Tiger? But what if he's not working with the police?"
"I'd rather betray the world than let the world betray me. Tiger couldn't keep his sister under control—even if I'm wrong about him, this is the punishment he deserves."
"Boss, Brother Tiger's been with us for years!"
"Do you want to go to prison?"
"No!"
"Then run him over! Check his clothes first—I'm worried he might be wearing a tracker. Hit him with the car first, then bring him back. Got it?"
Swallow Lin stammered, "Boss... if my brother pays with his life, and it turns out we weren't working with the police, will you let me go? We've been with you for so long—we may not have earned much credit, but we've put in the sweat. I promise I won't hate you for this. I'll be grateful for the rest of my life for sparing me—"
Monkey Drake kicked her square in the face. "The one thing I can't stand is the sound of your voice! If it weren't for you, none of this would've happened!"
Swallow Lin's face was covered in blood. She collapsed, sobbing, and finally fell silent.
I looked at these ruthless people and understood my fate.
Monkey Drake had me and Swallow Lin dragged to the pillars and tied up again.
He was so cautious—not just our hands and feet, but our entire bodies were bound, leaving not even the slightest chance of resistance.
I looked at Swallow Lin beside me and sighed. "Your brother's a beast, and you're even worse than a beast."
"What do you even know about me..." Swallow Lin said through her tears. "You haven't lived my life. What gives you the right to lecture me?"
"You can tell me."
"Why should I?"
I thought of Wendy Xu and sighed. "There was a girl who wanted to share her story with me, but I didn't agree. Then she died—died suddenly. I keep thinking... if I'd known she was going to die, I would have listened."
"I don't want to die, and I don't want to talk."
Swallow Lin sat beside me, crying for a long time, until she had no strength left.
She'd said she didn't want to talk, but once the tears dried up, she finally whimpered, "I was supposed to be a college student..."
Swallow Lin told me she was born into a family she hated.
She was seven years younger than her brother. After she was born, her grandmother hated her for being a girl, so when her parents went south for work, the old woman arranged to give her away to a wealthy family in the city, telling her parents the child had wandered off and gotten lost.
Seven-year-old Tiger Lin watched as his sister was carried away. He clung to the back of their pickup truck and followed it all the way to the city. When the vehicle stopped, Tiger immediately shouted that someone was stealing a child.
The wealthy family didn't dare carry that accusation. They quickly explained to the gathering neighbors that the grandmother had voluntarily given the child away. But Tiger wouldn't stop causing a scene, and finally, exasperated, they handed the baby girl back to him, telling him to carry her home himself if he was so capable.
They'd only meant to inconvenience him, but Tiger actually carried his sister out of the city on foot. When he couldn't carry her, he put her on his back. When his back gave out, he sat by the roadside to rest. He walked for a full day and night.
Eventually the wealthy family gave up and had Tiger taken back home.
Tiger never told anyone that his grandmother had given his sister away—he didn't want to cause a family rift. People assumed he'd simply found her and brought her back.
From that day forward, he stayed by his sister's side every single day. Even when he went to school in the village, he carried her on his back, terrified his grandmother would give her away again.
But their parents were always off working in the city, so it was still their grandmother who raised them.
The grandmother truly despised her granddaughter. If Swallow Lin took an extra bite of food at dinner, the old woman would slap her hand with chopsticks. When Swallow Lin wanted new clothes, she was forced to wear Tiger's hand-me-downs. Whenever they were left outside, Swallow Lin ran around dirty and unkempt, with no one paying attention.
Tiger doted on his sister, but he had no money himself. He collected scrap metal and stole iron from factories, selling it to buy her food. He saved up whatever he could and bought secondhand floral dresses from female classmates—everyone was happy to sell them cheap.
He'd come home with those dresses, bathe his sister, braid her hair, dress her in the best he could find, and make her look pretty.
At first, Swallow Lin loved being with her brother, but everything changed as she grew older.
From the time she could understand, her grandmother told her how much she hated having a granddaughter—how she'd wanted to give her away, but her grandson had brought her back.
Swallow Lin didn't understand at first, until one evening when she was sitting with her brother and grandmother at the village entrance, cooling off, and a girl returned to the village.
That girl wore a princess dress unlike anything Swallow Lin had ever seen—perfectly styled, with a beautiful hairdo, holding a magical girl's wand, shiny patent leather shoes gleaming, stepping out of a private car.
Her grandmother told her that the wealthy family—the one she was supposed to have been given to—had ended up adopting another child. But since the two families were on good terms, they still visited occasionally.
Swallow Lin looked down at her own secondhand dress, with its many worn patches and little bunny appliqués covering holes, some stains that wouldn't wash out—the ones her brother had sewn on.
For the first time, she felt the gap between her life and that other girl's.
She thought: If I'd been given away, would that be me stepping out of a private car?
As she grew older, the gap became harder and harder to bear.
When it was time for school, her grandmother refused to buy her a new backpack. Tiger went begging at relatives' houses and came home with a used backpack decorated with anime characters. Even after he scrubbed it multiple times, it was still grungy, with ballpoint pen marks traced over the surface.
Meanwhile, the other girl visited with a calfskin backpack perfectly coordinated with her private school uniform—elegant and expensive.
When it was time for middle school, Swallow Lin fell in love with the guitar. Tiger, who'd already graduated and started working, bought her a cheap one for about a hundred yuan—the sound was always slightly off-key. And that other girl? Her birth parents in the village bragged that she'd won a piano competition—a single piano cost over fifty thousand yuan.
Every time she watched Tiger work himself to the bone for her while she still lived in poverty, Swallow Lin couldn't help thinking: If my life was going to be this hard, why did you even bring me back?
In Swallow Lin's eyes, everything her brother did wasn't love—it was atonement.
It was the sin he owed her.
When he was little and didn't know any better, he'd pushed her into an abyss for life.
So when Swallow Lin was accepted into a private university and her family despaired over the tuition, she said without emotion: "Just have my brother pay for it."
Yes—it was what he owed her. He should be the one to pay.
When Tiger saw his sister get into college, he was overcome with emotion and agreed. He promised to cover her tuition.
But he broke that promise. By then, he'd already been working for Monkey Drake to earn money, and he ended up doing a year in prison.
Swallow Lin despised him.
She'd told all her friends she was going to university, but because of him, her family drained their savings trying to get his sentence reduced, and her dream of college evaporated.
Swallow Lin knew perfectly well—her brother was the one who'd ruined her entire life.
With nothing else to do, she let her brother support her, lounging at home all day. Eventually she decided that since her brother wasn't smart enough, she might as well join Monkey Drake herself.
Swallow Lin was smarter than Tiger, but she couldn't control her greed.
She knew the wealthy life she was supposed to have had—she'd been watching that other girl all along.
Whatever that girl had, she wanted too.
The first time she ran a double-cross, Swallow Lin did it herself—she plunged a pair of scissors into a buyer's abdomen.
Tiger was devastated. But Swallow Lin casually tossed the bloody scissors aside and said dismissively, "Then send me to prison."
That night, Tiger crouched by the corpse, smoking half a pack of cigarettes, before finally wiping the fingerprints clean and replacing them with his own. He buried the body and told Swallow Lin that even if the police ever caught her, she'd only been involved in gold trading, not murder.
From that day forward, Swallow Lin knew that no matter what she did, her brother would always atone for her sins.
He owed her—she accepted it without question.