Chapter 6

Jiang Wei pulled out all the cash she’d earned from her part-time job, crumpled red bills, and shoved the entire stack into the driver’s hands.
“Please, you have to hurry!”
Her face was tense, her voice tight with panic as she kept urging him to speed up.
“What’s the rush? Relax. I’ll catch up,” the driver said lazily.
He steered with one hand, a cigarette pinched between the fingers of the other.
Jiang Wei’s expression cooled. Her tone dropped.
“Driver, the man in that van is my fiancé. He’s been kidnapped. Do you know Ling Group?”
The driver perked up instantly. His eyes lit in the rearview mirror.
“Of course I know. Their chairman’s always on TV, that Ling Xiucheng, loaded as hell. Don’t tell me he’s your husband? But he’s, what, in his fifties…”
He trailed off, then hurried to comfort her.
“Ah, doesn’t matter, doesn’t matter. Just hang in there a few more years and you’ll be set for life.”
The gossip fire in his eyes flared bright.
He flicked his cigarette out the window and stomped on the accelerator.
As expected, nothing motivated humans like scandal.
Jiang Wei kept weaving the story without blinking.
“He’s my father-in-law. My fiancé is the eldest son. Driver, you know how it is in rich families when they fight over inheritance…”
“Yes, yes, I know, I know. Crown princess, huh?” he said, almost reverent.
Jiang Wei nodded, face grave.
“Ours is a family alliance marriage. We’re still young, so it hasn’t been announced yet. It would affect the stock price.”
The driver straightened in his seat, suddenly very serious.
Of course.
In that world, even a breath from these people could shake the market.
But why would they kidnap the heir out of nowhere?
Feeling the car surge forward, Jiang Wei continued feeding him “inside information.”
“Yesterday, my fiancé took the company’s financial reports to confront the new Madam Ling. He ended up catching her with another man…”
She let the sentence dangle suggestively.
The driver was hooked, practically clawing at the steering wheel, pushing the car faster.
“Now his stepmother wants to get rid of him. You understand what I mean, right? And my husband’s two younger brothers… aren’t even my father-in-law’s.”
By the time she finished, her expression was the perfect picture of worried, wronged nobility.
The driver: !!!
He slammed his foot down, pedal to the floor, and stuck to the van’s tail like glue.
An exclusive, real-time front-row seat to a rich-family war?
No way was he missing that show.
They finally stopped at an abandoned chemical plant on the outskirts of the city.
Two burly men stood guard at the gate, eyes cold and predatory as they paced back and forth.
“Uncle, you can-”
Jiang Wei turned to tell the driver he could go first and, if she didn’t come out after a long time, he should… call…the police.
But the man was gone.
At some point, the driver had slipped away completely. The fantasy of “saving a rich heir and then living the rest of his days eating and drinking well under that heir’s protection” had been doused by a bucket of ice water the moment he’d seen these thugs up close.
A cold chill crawled up his spine.
Even if he did get a huge reward from the Ling family for helping… it wouldn’t matter much if he died before spending a cent. These men looked like the kind who killed first and asked nothing later.
Jiang Wei let out a quiet sigh.
“This is West Suburb 69, Changyang Road, an abandoned chemical plant owned by Xiangyu Co. Violent kidnapping. Six to nine suspects. Armed.”
She kept her voice low as she called 110, calmly reported the situation, and hung up quickly.
Before the police arrived, this was her chance to prove herself.
The plant had two floors. She circled around the back and started climbing up the pipes to the second floor.
Clang.
A few rusted screws came loose and clattered to the ground.
Jiang Wei grimaced.
Great. Nice going.
“Who’s there?!”
As expected, two men about ten meters out in front heard the sound.
She scrambled the last few steps and pulled herself onto the upper level. By the time one of them ran over, all he saw was a pipe still trembling slightly.
“Ma Zi, what are you staring at?” one of them called.
“I heard something just now. Maybe someone climbed up along the pipe,” the shorter, stockier man, nicknamed Ma Zi, narrowed his eyes and kept scanning upward.
Jiang Wei’s heart was lodged in her throat.
She clamped a hand over her mouth, forcing her breath to stay low and steady.
The noise had attracted Ling Ze’s attention too. The drug’s effects were wearing off; his mind was slowly clearing.
He glanced toward the sound, expression sharpening. He recalled what the old man had said, how in the Far East market, they’d just bitten off a chunk of the arms trade from foreign hands.
These men were likely hardened criminals, arsonists, killers, mercenaries.
Ma Zi raised his gun and fired a shot toward the second floor.
Crack,
“Meow, meow, ”
As if in response to the gunshot, a string of cat cries drifted from above.
“The hell are you doing?” the other man snapped.
“What are you panicking for? This place is deserted. Even if I shoot, nobody’s gonna hear a thing,” Ma Zi said carelessly, still convinced there was someone up there.
“You fucking idiot. There’s no stairs up there. You think someone climbed to the second floor just to hang out in the dark? It’s a cat. Who’d come out here in the middle of nowhere?”
The other man was already in a foul mood. The others had gone off to “find some fun,” leaving them stuck here babysitting the hostage. Now he had to deal with trigger-happy Ma Zi too.
Seeing Ma Zi about to fire again, he marched over and punched him. The two of them fell into a scuffle, drawing the attention of the guards at the door.
“I told you to cut it out! Boss said before he left there’s still chemicals and crap upstairs. If something explodes, it’ll blow your useless ass sky-high!”
As they argued and shoved each other around, Jiang Wei slipped quietly away along the upper level.
The climb had been hard enough; now the chemical stink on the second floor was making her throat itch. But she didn’t dwell on it.
Waiting for the moment they were most distracted, she flicked a small blade down near where Ling Ze was tied.
Ling Ze didn’t appear physically injured yet. He knew in this kind of situation exactly how to behave to maximize his chances.
As long as negotiations between his father and these people hadn’t completely collapsed, they wouldn’t be in a rush to kill him.
The blade dropped from above, almost landing on his thigh. He looked up sharply and saw Jiang Wei.
She pressed a finger to her lips, signaling him to stay quiet.
How did she find this place?
For a second, Ling Ze just stared, genuinely stunned.
Her lips were moving silently, trying to communicate something. Her thin face was tight with anxiety. An unfamiliar, strange feeling stirred in his chest.
For the first time, a girl’s face was imprinted in his mind with shocking clarity.
Pale and a little sickly, yes, but undeniably beautiful and delicately carved.
He’d grown up surrounded by women as plentiful as carp crossing the river, socialites, models, actresses, influencers. He never bothered to look at any of them.
Yet somehow, he was certain: put Jiang Wei among them and she would still stand out.
Jiang Wei had tossed the blade for him to cut his ropes, so when the police arrived, he wouldn’t be completely helpless.
But instead of moving, he sat there staring at her like he’d been scared stupid.
She had no choice but to repeat the cutting motion in exaggeration, pointing at the blade and then at the ropes. She added another series of gestures: she’d already called the police.
Watching her fret and wave frantically, Ling Ze inexplicably felt… amused.
The corners of his lips lifted before he could stop them.
He didn’t even notice.
Taking advantage of the chaos below, he shifted his body just enough to hook the blade with his fingers and drag it behind him.
He was almost through his ropes when,
The thugs who’d gone out earlier rushed back in, shouting that the police were on their way, and in large numbers.
Someone had tipped them off, they cursed. They scrambled to move Ling Ze to another location, only to discover his ropes were nearly cut.
The leader exploded.
If they weren’t in such a time crunch, the men who had stayed behind would’ve paid dearly for their carelessness.
“Ma Zi, what the fuck were you doing? Watching him? He was about to walk out the damn door under your nose!”
Ma Zi’s beady eyes flicked to the blade on the floor. He gave a harsh little laugh.
“He didn’t have that on him before. I told you something crawled in here, but you losers insisted it was a cat.”
He strode over and slammed his fist into Ling Ze’s face, following it up with a brutal kick.
The meaty crack of impact made Jiang Wei’s brow twitch. Her heart sank.
This was bad. Very bad.
“Where’s your little partner?” Ma Zi snarled.
Ling Ze clenched his jaw and said nothing.
Not satisfied, Ma Zi laid into him again, punches, kicks, each one heavier than the last. Before, when the bosses were still negotiating, they’d only tied him up. Now the deal had collapsed, the bosses had fled, the police were on the way.
This was life-or-death.
They weren’t bothering being “polite” anymore.
They’d be as savage as they liked, so long as he stayed alive long enough for them to squeeze every last cent out of his billionaire father.
A pack of desperate men beating him like mad.
Ling Ze spat out a mouthful of blood and roared, “Don’t come out!”
Jiang Wei’s nerves were frayed raw.
If she stood by and watched Senior Ling get beaten to death in front of her, she’d never sleep another peaceful night.
She was about to step out when his shout reached her.
He was still insisting she stay hidden.
She faltered.
Should she listen?
Somewhere deep down, she suddenly felt certain: whatever his flaws, Senior Ling had a core of… something like justice. How could she have thought he was all darkness before?
She winced at her earlier, unfair judgement.
But the beatings only grew more vicious.
Unable to stand it any longer, she stepped out from behind a concrete pillar, hands raised, teeth digging into her lower lip.
“I don’t have a gun,” she said, voice shaking.
Ma Zi stopped, eyes narrowing.
As he’d suspected, someone had come for this young master.
“Didn’t I tell you not to come out?” Ling Ze rasped, breath shallow.
He still wouldn’t behave.
Ma Zi rewarded him with another punch to the mouth. Jiang Wei flinched at the sight.
“I think it’s not too late for you to turn back,” she blurted, mustering every scrap of courage she had. “You weren’t born bad. There must be reasons you ended up here.”
The kidnappers stared at her, and then burst out laughing.
“You talk just like those cops,” one sneered. “Get your ass down here before I come drag you!”
When she climbed back down the pipe, they shoved her roughly beside Ling Ze.
Several pairs of eyes roamed over them, then lingered on her.
“So they are a pair of lovebirds. Tsk, tsk…”
“Tell your old man to bring thirty million in cash,” the leader drawled. “For him, that’s pocket change. Move it.”
Ling Ze’s gaze was cold as steel, fixed on the men in front of him.
This was the greatest humiliation of his life.
He fell silent, thinking.
If Jiang Wei had called the police, by now they should be closing in.
When he still didn’t answer, they decided he was too tough to break directly.
Time was running short so they turned to Jiang Wei.
One of them, already half-crazed with adrenaline and pent-up lust, reached for her, fumbling at the waistband of her pants.
The feel of those filthy hands made Jiang Wei shake uncontrollably.
She shrank behind Ling Ze, tears threading her voice.
“Don’t, please don’t”
Ling Ze’s eyes went razor-sharp.
Bound as he was, he could only fling his body backward, slamming into the man with his shoulder.
“Don’t touch her!” he snarled.
The words had barely left his mouth when a kick caught him in the ribs, sending him sprawling. He coughed up another mouthful of blood with a ragged groan.
The leader stepped in front of Jiang Wei, one hand at her collar, the other stroking her pale face with obscene leisure.
“Ling Ze, you won’t even cough up a little pocket change, and you still had the nerve to call the cops,” he said coldly. “Fine. Your little girlfriend can entertain the brothers first, see you all off on your way to hell. Consider it our thanks. Then we’ll send you along after her. Fair enough, right?”
Eyes squeezed shut, Jiang Wei trembled, her long lashes quivering like crow feathers in a storm.
For all her bravado earlier, she was still afraid.
She’d rushed here on nothing but hot blood and impulse.
Now that she was truly in their hands, surrounded by these men and their hungry, gleaming eyes, her nose stung; tears threatened.
But she held them back.
These men weren’t going to spare them because she cried.
Ling Ze groaned, every breath laced with pain. He truly could not bring himself to watch such an innocent girl, who had come here to save him, be humiliated and destroyed before his eyes.
“Don’t touch her,” he rasped. “I’ll pay. I’ll pay whatever you ask. Just let her go.”
Here’s the next part, in the same style and with all names and terms kept consistent: