Chapter 110 - 109: Introduced by Man’er

Words : 1259 Updated : Sep 19th, 2025

Chapter 110: 109: Introduced by Man’er In the private room at the end of the second-floor corridor of the Nightclub, a girl around eighteen or nineteen was dumped in a corner with her hands and feet tied. Not far from her, around a coffee table, five or six burly men were playing cards. Cigarettes dangled from their mouths, beer bottles littered the table, and their indolent demeanor betrayed their ease and leisure. The girl in the corner finally opened her eyes after an indeterminate amount of time. Pressing herself against the wall, she scanned the unfamiliar surroundings with terror in her gaze, muffled whimpers escaping from her mouth, which was sealed with duct tape. "Brother Hu, the girl’s awake." The muscular man sitting directly across from the girl noticed her stirring and called out to the man sitting at the head of the table. "Hmm." Gou Hu discarded the playing cards in his hand, took up a glass brimming with alcohol, and rose to his feet unsteadily. He was somewhat short, with a rodent-like face marred by shifty eyebrows. The excessive smoking had stained his teeth with a nauseating yellow-black grime, making his appearance greasy and repellent. As he approached step by step, Zhou Lu began to perspire lightly at her forehead. Trembling, she curled up into a ball, seeking even a sliver of security. "Are you afraid of me?" Gou Hu squatted in front of her, scrutinizing her with a sly grin, his eyes scanning her up and down. That lascivious gaze resembled the appraisal of merchandise at a market, deciding its worth. Zhou Lu, unable to speak, expended all her energy to shift herself sideways in an attempt to evade his gaze. In the next instant, however, the duct tape over her mouth was ripped off violently. "Speak. Are you afraid of me?" Gou Hu gripped her chin tightly, a sinister glint flashing in his eyes. "Please, I’m begging you, let me go." "I’ll give you any amount of money you want," Zhou Lu sobbed uncontrollably, the tears streaming down her cheeks seemingly endless and unstoppable. Avoiding direct eye contact with the man before her, she lowered her gaze in panic, silently praying that he might show her some mercy. Gou Hu despised women who cried incessantly. Irritated, he squeezed her cheeks and poured the glass of alcohol down her throat in one swift motion, silencing her. "Cough... cough, cough..." Zhou Lu choked so fiercely her face turned as red as if it were about to burst. Tears intermingled with alcohol dripped down her neck, soaking into her clothing. "So dull. I thought Man’er had introduced someone obedient." Gou Hu clicked his tongue in disdain, hurling the glass toward her feet, where it shattered into shards across the floor as he stood up. Several cuts from the glass etched into Zhou Lu’s calves, but she didn’t seem to feel the pain. Instead, she stared blankly, huddled in the corner by the wall. She no longer dared cry, no longer dared make a single sound. Beyond her hatred for Gou Hu, what consumed her was a boundless fear and the shock delivered by the name "Man’er." "Brother Hu, what should we do with the girl?" asked one of the burly men, leaning toward Gou Hu’s right and speaking in a low voice. Since they had been ordered by their superiors to capture her, they hadn’t dared lay a finger on her, petrified of making a wrong move and incurring disapproval from above. "Just scare her a little—that’ll do." With that, Gou Hu flopped onto the sofa, exuding an air of complete indifference. Watching him close his eyes, the burly man gestured to several others seated at the table, and together they escorted the shivering girl to the adjacent room. By the time Zhou Lu left the Nightclub, the crescent moon had been hanging against the pitch-black sky for hours. The dress she had put on that morning had been slashed in several grotesque streaks by a blade. Her hair was disheveled, and her swollen, walnut-like eyes made her look as though she had escaped from a mental asylum. She wandered aimlessly down the sparsely populated street, her hand clutching her phone trembling uncontrollably as her mind replayed the horrors she had endured in that revolting place. In the smoke-filled private room, women gyrated in obscene dances to please the group of burly men, willingly submitting to their control. They had forced her, yanking her hair, making her witness the depravity in excruciating detail, issuing warnings by her ears over and over again— "If you disobey, you’ll be next." Zhou Lu was utterly terrified. Although they hadn’t physically harmed her in the end, the psychological scars were indelible. The phone rang then. Slowly and hesitantly, she glanced at the caller ID. As she pressed the answer button, a torrent of curses erupted from the other end. Hearing her father’s familiar voice, Zhou Lu’s eyes filled with tears once more. Taking a deep breath, she lowered her voice to almost a whisper: "Dad, I want to go to City C to study. Can you help me with the paperwork?" Previously, she had adamantly refused to move far away, unwilling to part with her "best" friend. But now, all she wanted was to flee—to escape this filth-stained world. ** Yu Xinman had waited two days in the hospital, yet no message came from Zhou Lu. Even the texts she had sent had vanished into the void, unanswered. "Useless!" After making over a dozen unanswered phone calls, Yu Xinman lost her temper and hurled her phone onto the floor. Leaning against the headboard, her expression dark, she glared at the spider-web-like cracks on the screen, unable to quench the fire in her chest. "Xinman," Yu Baisheng opened the hospital room door and quickly approached her. "I need to pick up your mom right now; I’ll come back later to stay with you." Upon hearing this, Yu Xinman immediately straightened up, her eyes lighting up with a trace of joy: "Mom is coming back today?" Ever since Yuan Li had been taken away, Yu Xinman had felt like a rudderless ship, prone to anxiety without someone to guide her decisions. Fortunately, the wait hadn’t been unbearably long. Yu Baisheng nodded. After enduring these difficult days, his complexion finally looked somewhat less haggard. "We have Uncle Chen to thank for this. Without him, your mom..." "Is it the Chen Family your sister’s fiancé belongs to?" "Yes." At the mention of Yu Zhi, the smile on Yu Baisheng’s face diminished slightly. Smoothing the quilt draped over Yu Xinman, his gaze fell on the shattered phone on the floor. His brows knit briefly, but he didn’t ask any further questions. "Dad, when is my sister’s engagement banquet happening?" Yu Xinman blinked, her eyes as pure and limpid as a clear spring. Yu Baisheng hesitated for two seconds. "The Chen Family proposed December eighth." The initial plan had been for the banquet to take place at the end of next month, but the Chen Family had recalculated the dates and decided December would be better. "That soon?" Her expression was tinged with both surprise and an almost imperceptible trace of reluctance. "It’s not too bad." Unwilling to dwell on the topic, Yu Baisheng affectionately patted her head. "I’m running late; I need to go now." "Okay, take care on the road." Yu Xinman smiled as she watched him leave. As the door clicked shut, she let out a faint snort, her gaze gradually darkening into an abyss.

Chapter 110 - 109: Introduced by Man’er

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