“So, I have no idea who this buyer is, we just connect and communicate through a middleman, some Canadian dude with a scary scar on his face.” while Angela was considerately helping Yewei get dressed, he started telling Angela and Jianmen about the buyer in Chinatown: “The middleman’s name is Tianyu, okay? You need to go to the Szechuan Wondrous Delight restaurant and ask for him, and ask him to deliver a message to the buyer. He told us the buyer did not want to talk unless we have the scrolls, but I guess you can try. Oh, right, you can also go to the Szechuan Wondrous Delight and ask for Timothy Chang, he’s the intelligence guy in Chinatown, and he should be able to help you out, if you give him enough cash.”

“Okay. And the people who want to steal that scroll from you, what can you tell me about them?”

“I don’t know! Besides De Niro, I don’t even know who else could have even known about the scroll!” Yewei moaned in pain as Angela helped him put on a shirt: “There are a few gangs in the area that are small to medium sized, the Taichi Gang, the Dry Cleaner Crew, the Viators, the Bleeding Daggers...”

“The Bleeding Daggers, what do you know about them?” Jianmen immediately cut Yewei off when he was about to continue listing names.

“Not much.” Yewei tried to shrug but he immediately had to stop because of the pain: “Ouch, ouch … they’re more of a small time player, I just know the leader is quite mysterious and apparently a little nuts. I heard he stabbed a guy and cut him 99 times just because the guy owed him a few hundred bucks. A bit of an overkiller even by Chinatown gang standards.”

“Where do they operate?”

“North side of Chinatown, actually not that far away from the warehouse… oh!” Yewei realized mid sentence the reason Jianmen asked about this gang: “You know something I don’t?”

“Just go to a hospital. You know how to find me.” Jianmen nodded and left the room.

“That guy’s some serious player, no?” after a few seconds, Angela asked Yewei.

“I have no friggin’ idea, I just met him today!”

Before Yewei and Angela even left the hiding place, Jianmen already found the Szechuan Wondrous Delight. As he entered the front door, he got a text message from Yewei: “Before you start asking, order a pot of Tieguanyin tea, a small cup of honey and a bowl of grass jelly with coconut milk. They will know that you come for business.”

“Interesting, noted.” Jianmen replied and walked into the restaurant. He then found a table near the internal stairs.

“Hello, what would you like for today?” the waitress walked over, placed a small paper menu on the table and asked Jianmen: “It’s still kinda early, so we only have lunch items, and we only have very limited options. We do have the full drink menu though, what would like first?”

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“I would like a pot of Tieguanyin tea, a small cup of honey.” Jianmen flipped through the menu and said: “A bowl of grass jelly with coconut milk.”

The waitress’s eyes quickly blinked for a few times, and then she gently bowed and told Jianmen: “Thank you for your order, I will ask them to prepare your drink and desserts immediately.”

When the waitress left, Jianmen sensed that atmosphere in the whole restaurant changed instantly, some of the guests already in the restaurant started staring at Jianmen discreetly like they were trying to read something from him. And with this simple reaction, Jianmen was able to conclude that possibly a lot of these “guests” in the restaurant were actually undercover employees of this restaurant. Seeing that this was a hub of criminal activity, he was not that surprised.

After only a few minutes, the waitress came back and told Jianmen: “We’re ready to serve you, can you come upstairs with me?”

“Of course.” Jianmen stood up and followed the waitress up the stairs and entered a spacious and luxurious looking room at the end of the hallway.

Inside the room, there was a desk at the back of the room and a couple of obviously armed men in suits standing on both sides. The waitress led Jianmen to the front of the desk and told him in a low voice: “Please wait here a little bit, our handler will come in shortly.”

Right after the waitress left, a side door opened and a middle aged man in red traditional Changshan walked in, carrying a small brochure with a close resemblance to some traditional Chinese books: blue covers and bound together by threads, with a couple of traditional Chinese words written on the cover.

The man sat down by the desk, laid down the brochure and took out an inkstone and a Chinese writing brush. And without acknowledging Jianmen at all, the man started grinding the instone for ink.

Out of courtesy, Jianmen waited patiently for the man to produce enough ink from the inkstone and finally dipped his writing brush in the ink.

“What business do you have here?”

“I want to deliver a message to Tianyu, about the acquisition of an antique item. And if possible, I would like to deliver the message in writing.” Jianmen nodded: “And, uh, I would like to talk to Timothy Chang. I would like to inquire some information from him.”

“Okay, this is your first time here right? Are you aware of the rules?” the man asked.

“No. I was sent here, they didn’t really tell me...”

“There’s a message delivery fee. And you have to tell us who sent you here. Failing either, you will not be able to walk through the door.” the man leaned forward and said in Cantonese: “I hope whoever sent you at least told you what kind of establishment you just walked into.”

“Money is not a problem.” Jianmen calmly brought out a small stack of cash - it technically did not belong to him but to the unfortunate assassin that tried to slit his throat: “How much? And I was sent here by Shanyi Qing.”

“Shanyi Qing huh? His body is not even that cold yet.” the man scoffed, “But whatever, his name is still good here until everything is finalized.”

“Finalized? Finalized how?”

“His area still needs to be claimed and managed, his supply chain is still up for grabs.” the man shook his head: “Gone are the good old days where business transfers were much less dramatic and bloody. And the cost is one grand for a newcomer like you. You’ll get a discount rate when your business is proven to be good.”

“Okay, you got it.” Jianmen counted the cash in his hand, and one thousand dollars took up the absolute bulk of the cash from the cash he took from the assassin.

“Just write your message here. ” the man passed Jianmen a piece of paper and his writing brush.

“Thanks.” Jianmen took the piece of paper and writing brush, then after some careful thought, he wrote in English: “Merchandise compromised. Don’t use.” And then he left his temporary phone number below.

“Nice old school hold of that writing brush.” the man nodded and said: “And you wrote in English and in regular script, that must be weird for you.”

“Yeah well, I know enough to adjust.” Jianmen shrugged.

“Nice, keep working on it, not many people nowadays still appreciate the old styles.” the man smiled: “And you know what? For the sake of the appreciation of the old styles, I’ll give you a discount on the intel you wanna buy. Tell me, what’d you wanna know?”

“So, you’re Timothy Chang? Nice to meet you!”