Demons Beside You

“What event are you swimming?” Chen Zhao asked.

“Freestyle,” Normans said. “Fifty and 100 meters.”

“And you?”

“Freestyle, 800.”

“Let’s test your performance now. Who’ll go first?”

“I’ll do it,” Normans said.

Normans went to test first. Her performance for the 50 meters was 24.12 seconds. This wasn’t her best time. For the 100 meters, she got 54 seconds.

Next was Eveleigh. For 800 meters freestyle, it took her eight minutes and 40 seconds. After finishing, she was completely exhausted.

“Did I let you sit down?” Chen Zhao looked at Eveleigh.

“I’m tired. Can’t I rest?”

“Normans, didn’t you tell her the rules?”

Normans glanced at Eveleigh. “Don’t talk back to this *sshole. At least, think about your $200,000.”

Eveleigh stood up unwillingly and stood before Chen Zhao.

“Go down and swim 2,000 meters,” Chen Zhao ordered. “Both of you.”

…

“Andibell, find some men for me. I want to teach someone a lesson.”

“Kanter, who are you teaching a lesson?”

“A motherf*cker scammed me $5,000.”

“You want to beat him up on or off-campus?”

“Off-campus,” Kanter answered.

“Teach him a lesson to what extent?”

Kanter thought for a moment. “Break his arm.”

“That’s illegal.”

“Shut up, Andibell. Don’t think I don’t know about you.”

“Fine, but breaking an arm isn’t cheap.”

“How much?” Kanter asked.

“Three thousand dollars.”

Kanter considered this and nodded. “I accept this, but I have a condition.”

“What is it?”

“Destroy the IOU in his hands.”

“Sure.”

…

“Okay, today’s training is over.”

“We only trained for two hours and it’s over?” Normans looked at him with annoyance.”

“I’m hungry,” Chen Zhao answered matter-of-factly.

“You’ve been eating by the pool this entire time without stopping and you say you’re hungry?”

“I didn’t eat enough and now I’m even hungrier. Oh, eat whatever you want to eat today. Starting tomorrow, you won’t get that freedom.”

Thinking of that hellish month, Norman’s features twitched.

“Normans, is that guy’s training actually effective?”

“You can still back out now. You just paid a $100,000 deposit. If you wait until tomorrow, then we’ll really be on the way to Hell.”

“Is it that scary?”

“It’s scarier than you can imagine… Eat what you can today.”

“Why does it sound like it’s our last supper?”

“You can treat it as your last supper.”

“He can’t supervise us 24 hours a day. How can he control what we eat?”

“He can’t control what we eat, but he can make us not able to eat anything.”

“Impossible. He can’t do that unless he imprisons us.”

“That’s all I’ll say. Good luck.”

…

Chen Zhao didn’t notice an SUV following his RV.

“Andibell, are we really going to attack the owner of that car?”

Andibell’s face darkened. The guys he found all wanted to back out. It wasn’t just them. Even he wanted to back out too.

He didn’t know the identity or status of their target, but that was a three-million-dollar car! If the target wanted to find them, it wouldn’t be hard.

Kanter gave them $3,000. There were eight guys in the car. This meant that each one would get less than $400. Pissing off a millionaire for $400 was clearly a stupid choice.

Just then, a guy sitting in the backseat said, “That guy is driving such a nice car. He should be rich, right?”

The atmosphere in the car turned ambiguous. They were all ruffians who stole a little or fought every other day to make money for drugs. But now, someone seemed to want to do something even worse.

This made some of them feel uncomfortable.

But then someone else said, “If we steal the car, we’ll be rich.”

Everyone was tempted. Right, they didn’t have to kidnap someone. Stealing a car could work too.

It was a three-million-dollar car. If they sold it to the black market, even if they couldn’t sell it for that price, they could definitely sell it for a few hundred thousand dollars.

Andibell considered this. “Are you guys serious?”

“Andibell, are you gonna do it or not? If you’re not, then we’ll do it alone.”

To be honest, Andibell was tempted too. If this really could work out, they’d get a few hundred thousand. It was also risky though and they had a lot of people. Not everyone would have the same heart.

If anyone leaked information, it would be a disaster for them. In America, you could offend anyone but the wealthy.

“Who has a gun?” Andibell asked.

“Andibell, you want to kill him?”

“Just in case.” Eyes flashing, Andibell continued, “Anyone who wants to back out can do it now.”

…

“Hey, Chen,” Risfar called on the phone. “We captured a dozen guys. You might be interested.”

“Captured a dozen guys?” Chen Zhao was confused. What did this have to do with him? Why would he be interested?

“They’re Mexicans,” Risfar said.

Chen Zhao furrowed his brows. “Mexicans?”

“Yeah. These guys wanted to attack you.”

“Where?”

“There’s a street sign around 30 kilometers to the east of Highway 12. Turn left there.”

“In the desert?”

“A dozen people is troublesome to take care of in the city.”

Chen Zhao could tell that Risfar wanted to kill these people. He considered it. This time, he didn’t have any of that fake compassion. After all, this gang was too problematic. Even keeping one would cause endless problems. It was better to eradicate them completely.

After all, Chen Zhao wasn’t alone now. Fali was with him. If he was threatened, Fali may be affected as well.

Thus, eradicating completely was the best choice.

Since Risfar was willing to help him to this extent, there was no reason for Chen Zhao to keep hiding. At the very least, he couldn’t stay out of it.

“Okay, I’m coming,” Chen Zhao said.