Fu Sang called Huo Wei three times in total, and each time it failed to connect.
If he remembered correctly, Huo Wei said before that the mission Zhuge Buhuo had taken pointed to some mountain valley in Yongfu.
It was normal for the signal to be poor in the deep mountains.
Fu Sang stared at the chat interface for a moment, then sent Huo Wei a question mark, turned off his phone, tossed it aside, and went to sleep.
The next afternoon, Da Shuangxi came to pick him up and drove him to a plot of land awaiting development in the new district.
By the time they arrived, Lin Jian and Zhuge Buyi were already there.
Fu Sang got out, took a deep breath of air, nodded, and said honestly, “It feels good, no major issues. Wealth can circulate.”
Da Shuangxi’s eyes went wide: “You haven’t even looked at anything yet…you just got out of the car and already have a conclusion?”
Fu Sang nodded.
Pausing, he added earnestly:
“I don’t need to put on any fancy shows. But if you want, I can shake a string of bells and make a show of it.”
“No need, ugh. Anyway, just take a look around, I trust your skills.” Da Shuangxi smiled.
“What would you like to drink? There’s a mall nearby. I’ll be your errand girl.”
“Anything.”
Fu Sang yawned, pulled a notebook from his small bag, twirled his pen, and stepped onto the undeveloped land.
He looked down, drawing a large circle on a blank page to represent the land beneath his feet. As he moved, he felt the energy flowing through the space, jotting notes and sketches as he went.
By the time he’d made almost a full loop, he finally crossed paths with Zhuge Buyi and the others.
Zhuge Buyi had been thoroughly reprimanded last night and then ruthlessly shut out. He got a deep understanding of Fu Sang’s temper and was now a bit afraid of him. However, he still respectfully greeted him with a “Little Martial Uncle.”
‘This kid is quite honest.’
Fu Sang nodded, then ignored him afterward, standing nearby and writing something in the last blank space on the page.
Zhuge Buyi peeked over curiously, “This is…?”
“A feng shui master’s notes.” Fu Sang answered, then glanced at him expressionlessly.
“You’re empty-handed…How are you planning to explain things to the client?”
“…Ah?” Zhuge Buyi blinked.
“Aren’t we just looking at feng shui…? I don’t really understand this… so I’ll have to ask Uncle for specific guidance on what to do.”
“Arranging feng shui, determining where to place things to make the best use of the terrain, maximizing the client’s advantages and benefits… Those are the skills we live by. I’m not about to teach them, am I?”
Fu Sang hadn’t come over to Zhuge Buyi just to discuss this anyway; he wrapped it up quickly.
Then he raised an eyebrow slightly and suddenly lowered his voice, calling him out of the blue:
“Zhuge Buyi?”
“Ah? …Yes.”
“Can you contact your brother?”
“My brother?” Zhuge Buyi genuinely found it hard to communicate with his little martial uncle…the topics always jumped to places he never expected.
Weren’t they just talking about feng shui? How did the topic suddenly shift to his brother?
He didn’t get it, but still explained:
“He took a posting from the Mountain Residence and went to Yongfu. He should still be there…”
“I know.”
Fu Sang snapped his notebook shut with a “pa”.
“Call him.”
“?” What was with this sudden command?
Zhuge Buyi didn’t feel inclined to obey, so he asked:
“Why?”
Fu Sang’s eyes narrowed slightly:
“To see if he can still answer.”
It was not “if he would answer,” but “if he can still answer.”
“You…” The subtle difference in phrasing finally made Zhuge Buyi realize that something was off. He looked at Fu Sang, snapped back to his senses, and quickly pulled out his phone.
He made a call, and sure enough, the call couldn’t get through.
“He’s out of contact, right.”
“No… how did you…”
Fu Sang didn’t answer. He just gave him a cryptic raise of an eyebrow and sauntered off, leaving Zhuge Buyi alone in the wind, questioning his existence.
Feng shui calculation wasn’t exactly high-difficulty work for Fu Sang. One lap was enough to wrap it up.
He recalculated everything in his notebook, confirmed it was correct, then verbally explained to Da Shuangxi what each marking meant, such as where to plant trees, where to place water features and sculptures, down to suggestions on the colors and shapes.
“Damn, so reliable, Sangzi?”
Da Shuangxi had only gone to the mall for a bit, and by the time she got back, the work was already done…and in such detail. It was hard not to be impressed.
She listened to his explanation but only half-understood, so she waved her hand.
“I don’t handle this stuff, and I don’t fully get it. How about tomorrow? I’ll take you to see my grandpa, and you can go over the specifics with him and his engineers.”
“I can’t. Something came up, I have to leave. What I just told you is everything. Do exactly as I said, and if the business doesn’t do well, I’ll give you my life.”
Fu Sang tore the page from his notebook, folded it twice, and handed it to Da Shuangxi:
“If you have questions, contact me. After-sales support is included.”
“Oh, oh, okay, got it… What’s the hurry? I was thinking of showing you around Shanghai for a few days and heading back to the capital with you.”
Da Shuangxi carefully tucked the page into the inner pocket of her coat, asking as she did.
“I need to go to Yongfu.”
With that, he glanced down at his phone.
Huo Wei had been silent for over 24 hours. Something was definitely wrong in Yongfu. Whether for sentiment or reason, he had to go check it out.
At the very least, he’d have to collect the young lady’s corpse.
“Oh, oh, is it urgent? When are you leaving? I’ll book your flight.”
“As soon as possible.”
“That urgent???”
Da Shuangxi knew Fu Sang was a born-and-raised Beijing native. In all the years she’d known him, she’d never heard of him having any ties to Yongfu. Now he was rushing over there…
Had someone offered him some six- or seven-figure deal and he was desperate to go collect the money??
Da Shuangxi didn’t get it, but she respected it and kept her questions to herself, pulling out her phone to book his ticket.
Just then, another person came running over to them.
“Martial Uncle!”
Zhuge Buyi arrived, quickly said “Sorry, sister” to Da Shuangxi, then pulled Fu Sang aside and cut straight to the point.
“How did you know my brother lost contact? Did you already know something? Did something happen to him?”
“Oh, he told me.” Fu Sang lied through his teeth, “He gave me a dream last night, telling me he was in danger and begging me to come save him. I did the calculations today, and sure enough, it was true.”
Zhuge Buyi was visibly stunned.
“…A living person can send dreams? Your spiritual perception is that strong?!”
Zhuge Buyi had often heard his family mention Fu Sang’s name. As the current “family’s number one genius,” he was inevitably compared to the former holder of that title, but he’d never met Fu Sang, so he had no concept of how strong he really was.
Now that he’d witnessed it firsthand, he offered a genuine word of admiration, only to be hit with Fu Sang’s next remark:
“Then again, maybe he’s not a living person anymore.”
“.” The kid’s face went pale instantly. Fu Sang’s mood improved a bit, so he graciously helped him out:
“Just kidding.”
“…”
Zhuge Buyi struggled to collect himself and fix his expression.
“I just heard you say you were going to Yongfu. What are you going there for? Is it related to my brother?”
“No, I’m going to eat Wenzhou fish balls.”
“Wenzhou is in Zhongzhe, and they’re Wenzhou lean meatballs. Fish balls are from Fuzhou.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
“…”
Zhuge Buyi cautiously asked, “You’re joking again, right?”
Fu Sang shrugged, answering everything but the question. “Wenzhou fish balls are delicious. I suggest you try some too.”
“.”
Zhuge Buyi could no longer tell which of Fu Sang’s words were true and which were false. Either way, every sentence was delivered with a serious and grave tone and expression, yet the content was absurd and bizarre. The sense of dissonance was so uncanny that it made one hesitate to draw any conclusions.
In short, whether Fu Sang was really going to Yongfu to eat Wenzhou fish balls or not, Zhuge Buyi had to follow him.
Although he also wanted to figure out what that strange, curse-like thing lingering on his good friend, one that seemed to have spread through the family over many years, truly was. But comparing the two, it was clear that his own brother’s situation was more urgent and severe.
So he made up his mind to stick with this person who seemed to be the only one in the know. He insisted on booking the same flight as Fu Sang, landing in the provincial capital of Yongfu that very night, then followed him out of the airport and took a bus to the city center. With no night buses or subways, Zhuge Buyi didn’t know why Fu Sang wouldn’t take a taxi but didn’t dare ask. He could only grit his teeth and follow him on a shared bicycle across half the city to the train station, where they boarded a train to Luyuan City.
In hard seats.
Sitting in the green train carriage, filled with the smell of smoke and stinky feet, surrounded by the “clack-clack” of the train moving forward, the shouting of card players, and the sound of snoring rising and falling all around, and then having to awkwardly move aside the head of the sleeping uncle next to him who had slumped onto his shoulder, Zhuge Buyi questioned for the thousandth time whether he was dreaming.
As the most prominent child of the Zhuge family’s main branch, all the family’s resources poured toward him. They would never let him suffer the slightest material discomfort.
This was the first time in his life he’d ridden a green train, and the first time he’d ever sat in hard seats.
Cramped in the middle of the seats, he looked up at Fu Sang across from him.
Fu Sang was holding a bucket of spicy beef noodles, eating with great relish.
“Little Martial Uncle…” Zhuge Buyi spoke weakly.
“Hm?”
“Is this also part of the plan?”
“What plan?”
“The plan to find my brother?”
“There’s no such plan.”
“Then what are we doing now?”
“Eating fish balls.”
“…” Zhuge Buyi rephrased the question, “Then why didn’t we take a plane or high-speed train?”
Fu Sang took a big slurp of noodles, chewed and swallowed slowly, then said:
“Too expensive.”
“.”
Zhuge Buyi considered himself someone who could endure hardship, but at this moment, he had to admit that this trip was still a bit too rough.
Mainly because this martial uncle was really unreliable!
“Aren’t you hungry?” Fu Sang twirled some noodles on his fork and glanced up at him.
Zhuge Buyi shook his head.
Fu Sang gave him an approving thumbs-up and offered a flat, emotionless compliment:
“Legendary endurance king.”
“?”
Zhuge Buyi spent the most unbearable half-night of his life on that train.
After finishing his noodles, Fu Sang looked at his phone for a while, then hung his earphones in and dozed off with his head down. By the time dawn broke and the train arrived at Luyuan Station, before Zhuge Buyi could wake him, Fu Sang magically awakened on his own, lazily stretching his neck and shoulders, grabbing his luggage, and getting off.
Zhuge Buyi hurried to keep up.
It was truly hard to imagine that just twenty-four hours ago, he had woken up on a two-meter bed in the most expensive hotel suite in Shanghai, yet now, twenty-four hours later, he was standing at an old train station with a smoky smell clinging to him, messy hair, and dark circles under his eyes.
And this absurd journey was still far from over.
Fu Sang dragged his suitcase out of the station and promptly boarded a worn-out bus.
After the bumpy train ride, they continued the journey on the bumpy bus. His eyes were tired, but his mind was still active, and Zhuge Buyi simply couldn’t fall asleep.
The bus carried a strange smell of gasoline, the windows were coated with dust, and the seats had a musty odor.
Zhuge Buyi watched the scenery outside the window, feeling that the surroundings were growing more desolate the farther they went. Most of the passengers were drowsy. About two hours later, a plump auntie wearing a military-style coat who was sitting in the front row stood up and yelled:
“We’re about to reach Yuebo County! Pay attention and get off if you need to!”
Sensing Fu Sang stir beside him, Zhuge Buyi followed like a zombie.
Yuebo County was a very backward little county, backed by mountains, with buildings that carried a distinctly 1980s flavor.
Zhuge Buyi continued trailing behind Fu Sang, the only person who might currently know his brother’s whereabouts.
Noticing that Fu Sang was checking his phone as he walked, though he knew it wasn’t good, Zhuge Buyi couldn’t help but peek at his screen.
A navigation app!
He felt somewhat relieved.
But he didn’t dare ask where they were going.
He was afraid Fu Sang would hit him with another “eating fish balls,” which would just be aggravating, so he kept his mouth shut and followed silently.
He followed Fu Sang through the streets and alleys of Yuebo County, turning through who knew which corners, until Fu Sang suddenly stopped, put away his phone, and stretched his arms up.
Zhuge Buyi looked up with great anticipation.
And then froze completely.
Fu Sang didn’t acknowledge him. He walked over to a plastic signboard with the huge words “Authentic Handmade Fish Balls” at the entrance, pulled out a large red plastic stool patched together with tape, and said to the shop owner:
“Two bowls of fish balls, two bowls of fish bone soup.”
After ordering, he grabbed a tissue to wipe down the greasy table, then looked up at Zhuge Buyi, offering an unusually enthusiastic invitation:
“What are you standing there for? Sit down and have something to eat.”
“…” Zhuge Buyi didn’t know what to say, so he simply said, “…Thank you.”
“Don’t mention it. I ordered for you, but you’re paying for yourself.”
“Okay…”
Steaming fish balls arrived quickly, and Zhuge Buyi shivered in the cold winter wind.
In the end, he still made one last attempt:
“Martial Uncle, weren’t we going to eat Wenzhou fish balls? These are from Fuzhou.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
“.”
