Defeat

“What is happening?” Fang Yu lowered the binoculars. For the first time, his composure had broken completely. “What is happening?”

His two best people, taken down in under ten seconds.

He had known of Li Weiguo in a general way. Brave, not particularly strategic. Some kind of police combat championship, years back. In Fang Yu’s estimation, those competitions were pageantry — structured, refereed, nothing like a real fight. A determined man with a dagger could take apart any competition champion.

Let alone two coordinated professional killers.

He had never considered Li Weiguo a serious factor.

Now he understood he had been wrong. Li Weiguo wasn’t a variable he had underestimated.

He was the variable that had broken the plan.

“Enjoyed cursing people out earlier, did you?” Li Weiguo had both men by the collar, already beaten past the point of resistance, and was working through them methodically. “Go on then. Do it again.”

Each hit landed with a crack that made Little Wang’s scalp tighten. He had a genuine concern that the captain might not stop.

“Enough, Weiguo.” The squad leader stepped down from the van at last, his round face as cheerful as ever. “We need them conscious for questioning.”

Li Weiguo got a few more kicks in before he straightened up and exhaled.

“The situation was critical and you didn’t come out to help,” he said, turning around, still buzzing with it. “That’s not a great look, Squad Leader.”

“They had no firearms. What would I have contributed?” The squad leader’s eyes creased with amusement. “Four consecutive championships in the police combat competition. When it comes to a fight, I’ve never seen anyone better than you.”

He dropped his voice slightly and looked around. “And honestly, I couldn’t stand those two from the moment I saw them. Watching you work through them was satisfying.”

“Squad Leader, you really are—” Little Wang caught himself just in time and closed his mouth.

The squad leader’s expression didn’t flicker.

“I’m getting slow,” Li Weiguo said, looking down at the gash across his chest. He shook his head. “These two are professionals. If Wen Yiqian hadn’t warned us ahead of time, that could have gone very differently.”

He was quiet for a moment, going back over what Wen Yiqian had told him.

“These criminals are targeting the squad leader. The bank robbery is most likely a distraction.”

“There will be more of them than just the ones inside. Anyone attempting to approach the squad leader should be treated as a threat.”

The squad leader nodded slowly. “Little Wen is something else. He had all of it mapped out.”

“So you already knew who they were the moment they showed up,” Little Wang said, working it through. “That’s why you stayed in the vehicle.”

“If they came to kill me, and I don’t show myself, they don’t get an opportunity.” The squad leader said this with complete gravity.

Little Wang said nothing.

It was the most dignified justification for hiding he had ever encountered. Somehow entirely in keeping with the man.

Fang Yu stared at his phone for a moment, then dialed Monk.

Monk felt the vibration while he was driving, glanced at the screen, and something shifted in his expression. He hesitated, then answered. “It’s me.”

“Put the hostage on,” Fang Yu said.

Monk didn’t ask why. He had learned not to. He passed the phone back to Wen Yiqian without a word.

“Giving up already?” Wen Yiqian said, before Fang Yu had spoken.

A pause on the other end.

“I’ve felt something was wrong for a while,” Fang Yu said at last, his voice measured. “I couldn’t identify it until now.”

“Everything went too smoothly.”

“Every single thing proceeded exactly as I had planned. You went to the bank — just as I predicted. You agreed to the exchange — just as I predicted. That feeling of control, of watching every piece land where I placed it…” He exhaled. “It made me blind.”

“I understand now. Everything you did was to follow my plan. You read the entire shape of it from the beginning. And then you walked through it deliberately, step by step, so I could see exactly how hollow it was.”

“You’re giving yourself too much credit,” Wen Yiqian said pleasantly. “Perhaps you simply predicted my moves correctly.”

A faint smile in his voice. “I’m looking forward to your next one.”

“Even now,” Fang Yu said, with something between a laugh and a sigh. “Still mocking me.”

“You haven’t lost yet,” Wen Yiqian said.

“I have options left.” Fang Yu was quiet for a moment. “But I’m tired.”

The fight had gone out of him. He had no interest in continuing against this.

“You’re actually quitting.” Wen Yiqian’s voice shifted — something colder moving into it. “The game has barely started. I haven’t even found my footing yet. If you stop now, I’m going to be very unhappy.”

Fang Yu’s breath caught.

He remembered that feeling from the first time — the specific, suffocating sensation of being outmatched in every direction simultaneously. He had thought about it for months afterward.

“The first time,” Wen Yiqian said, and there was a trace of genuine irritation in it now, “I let you go deliberately. I was saving you for today. I haven’t even started enjoying myself, and you want to walk away?”

Fang Yu’s face went still. “You’re saying you let me escape.”

He had believed, after that first encounter, that he had managed a partial victory. He had lost ground, yes, but he had preserved a contingency and gotten out. Not a complete defeat. Enough to rebuild from.

He had spent all this time doing exactly that. Rebuilt his confidence. Prepared something he thought was intricate enough.

If what Wen Yiqian was saying was true —

The image came to him all at once. A chick turned loose in a yard. Allowed to wander. Fed just enough to grow.

The whole time it believed it was free. Believed the distance it had put between itself and danger meant something.

And then looked up and understood it had only ever been in a larger enclosure.

“I concede,” Fang Yu said. His voice was flat. Empty. “I’m sorry to have disappointed you. I can’t continue this.”

He hung up. He lay back on the floor of the empty room and stared at the ceiling.

In the car, Wen Yiqian glanced at the others — Monk, Monkey, Little Bai, all of them listening with barely concealed attention — and shook his head.

A quiet sigh.

“What a complicated creature.”

He turned back to the window.

“Every true thing I tell him, he looks for the hidden meaning. Every lie I tell him, he believes without question.”

(End of Chapter)