Chapter 72

Chapter 72

Logically speaking, drug dealers shouldn't have let their guard down this much, but the cartel's top brass were all focused on Shen Dongqing, so they weren't paying much attention to the reports coming up from the lower ranks.

Of course, that carelessness also came from the fact that nothing had gone wrong before. They'd gotten too comfortable, and their guard had slipped without them even realizing it.

Xia Fei could've left by now, but the drug lord still hadn't made good on his promise. If he actually went overseas, coming back wouldn't be easy. And if the other guy failed again, they might not make a move at all, so he kept putting off leaving.

Every time Xia Fei thought about Shen Dongqing, he still ground his teeth in hatred. If it weren't for that guy, how would his career have gone down the toilet like that, leaving him stuck living off other people?

Xia Fei could tell that ever since he'd given up the drug routes, the cartel didn't value him much anymore. They still talked about avenging him, but whether it was really for him or for their own reasons—he had eyes, he could see the truth.

Xia Fei couldn't help sighing. He felt like his life had two major turning points: one was when he got into drugs, and the other was when his career ran smack into Shen Dongqing. Both times, his life took a nosedive.

Xia Fei was so wound up he could barely sleep, but he'd gotten high just a few hours ago, and as the high wore off, he was so drained he couldn't help passing out on the bed.

Xia Fei didn't sleep well. He kept vaguely sensing movement outside, terrified it was the cops coming to bust him, but when he jolted awake, it turned out to be his imagination.

This was the fallout from barely escaping the cops. When he was awake, he was fine, but the second he fell asleep, he'd start hallucinating cops showing up, snapping him awake mid-dream. Only after making sure no cops were there could he drift back off.

Waking up with a jolt three or four times a night was pure torture for Xia Fei. If he didn't want to see how Shen Dongqing's story played out, he'd have been itching to get overseas—at least there he wouldn't have to worry about cops popping up.

Xia Fei muttered a curse under his breath, curled into a ball, and dozed off again. He felt like he'd barely been asleep when he sensed something off again and snapped awake, but he stayed put in bed, not wanting to move, thumping his head and telling himself to stop hallucinating before trying to sleep again.

Just as he was about to doze off, the door was slammed open. Xia Fei was jolted fully awake, but before he could even sit up, he was slammed down and cuffed with both hands behind his back.

The cold steel of the cuffs instantly snapped Xia Fei back to his senses. Although the room was pitch black, he had already guessed who had come in.

A flood of curses exploded in Xia Fei's head. So much for safety. So much for laying low. He'd only been holed up here for a few days—how the hell had the cops already found him?

Xia Fei suddenly regretted not leaving sooner. If he'd taken off earlier, he might've already made it across the border by now. But now...

At the thought of the death sentence waiting for him, and the agony of going without drugs before his execution, Xia Fei's vision went dark and he blacked out on the spot.

The cops arresting Xia Fei figured he was faking it, but after turning on the lights and prying his eyelids open, they realized he'd genuinely passed out. Given Xia Fei's long history of drug use, they rushed him to the hospital.

Xia Fei definitely knew more—they couldn't let anything happen to him. At the very least, they needed to squeeze every bit of intel out of him before he could die.

These arrests weren't happening in just one spot. That night, the Ningchuan Anti-Drug Unit cleaned house—not a single dealer slipped through their fingers.

When Shen Dongqing woke up, he saw a message from Xiao Ze saying he could come out and play now.

This meant...

"Is everything resolved?" Shen Dongqing sent a message back.

"Resolved." Xiao Ze replied shortly after.

Shen Dongqing didn't press for more. He just felt the weight on his shoulders lift instantly.

After this whole ordeal, Shen Dongqing realized that with a criminal organization, either you don't poke the hornet's nest at all, or once you do, you go all in and burn it to the ground. Otherwise, once they got their hands free, they'd come after him without a second thought.

Shen Dongqing didn't dwell on the matter. For safety, and to keep the cartel off his scent, he hadn't gone out much for days. Normally he didn't think he was that into going out, but now he really felt the itch to get out of the house.

For ordinary people, going out to have fun usually meant staying within the city, since most of their time was spent working and they might not even have explored the whole city. But Shen Dongqing, as an outdoor streamer, had already been to almost every interesting place in Ningchuan City. If he wanted to have fun, his only option was to travel out of town.

Shen Dongqing quickly picked a destination—a well-established hiking tourist spot, the kind where there were vendors selling grilled sausages on the mountain. It was safe enough and suitable for beginners.

He acted on it right away. His car had just been repaired, so Shen Dongqing drove straight out.

"The air in nature is so fresh!" Shen Dongqing took a deep breath. His keen sense of smell would pick up all sorts of strange odors in the city, but in a natural environment, it could detect all kinds of refreshing scents.

Flowing water carried a faint fishy smell, but it wasn't unpleasant. Mixed with the sun-baked earth, it formed a very unique aroma.

Shen Dongqing felt at a loss for words for a moment, but this smell was truly strange—not exactly pleasant, yet somehow addictive to breathe in.

"Why is the streamer just standing there?"

"Whoa, the streamer seems to be smelling something. He's not going to find something suspicious again, is he?"

"No, that can't be, right?"

"Ah, this spot was recommended by me! I was just there two days ago—I'm shaking in my boots."

"Wait, everyone just assumes there's a problem by default?"

"I believe in the streamer's luck."

"Believe +1"

Shen Dongqing snapped back to reality from the strange smell and saw a bunch of people speculating wildly in the chat. He said helplessly, "There's nothing suspicious. I just feel like the summer water and soil have a really amazing smell. You really need to take a walk in this kind of environment."

Shen Dongqing stepped onto the stone stairs and looked at the dense trees around him. Actually, the trees in the city's green belts weren't few either, but those trees were too neatly trimmed. The trees in this forest, however, grew wild and unruly, full of untamed vitality, making Shen Dongqing want to climb one.

He wondered if this counted as humanity's primal wildness being awakened under the stimulation of the natural environment.