Chapter 194 - How To Bear Consequences
Translator: Lav
Editor: Seliniaki Ilikia
The driver shook his head and said, “I can’t decide this myself. You have to ask the head!”
“You see, sir, if I ask the head, then it’ll be lucky if you could get even 100 or 200 yuan. Would you like to reconsider?” Shi Lei shoved the whole box of cigarettes into the other’s hands as he spoke.
The driver was obviously hesitating. He took the cigarettes, but said, “Well, what about this: this is actually my cousin’s bulldozer and it’s helping out with the construction. I can call him over and you can talk to him.”
Shi Lei smiled. “That’s actually better.”
Not longer after, the driver brought his cousin over. They looked rather similar to each other, not too tall, but very buff.
The cousin looked at Shi Lei and asked, “You want to borrow my bulldozer?”
Shi Lei smiled, pulled out another box of cigarettes, and shoved it into that person’s hands without even opening it. “Yes, I want to borrow your bulldozer.”
“What do you need a bulldozer for?” The person accepted the cigarettes, his tone sounding much more pleasant.
“I need to demolish a wall in my yard and it would take too much effort to do it manually, so I wanted to do it at night and get rid of the broken bricks with this.”
The person nodded in understanding. “Not with 1,000 yuan. It’s fine if you use the bulldozer to remove construction waste, but using it to tear down a wall would damage it.
“Then you can decide how much,” Shi Lei quickly said.
“At least 2,000 yuan!” That person raised two fingers. His cousin sucked in a cold breath and thought: You can only sell this hunk of metal for about 10,000 yuan and something would definitely break along the way. The person in charge of the construction only gives you 3,000 to 4,000 yuan a week, and yet you really dared to open your mouth and ask for 2,000 yuan?
But he didn’t expect Shi Lei to smile. “2,000 it is.”
“Awesome!” The person’s eyes glowed. His cousin wanted to say something, but decided not to. The more his cousin earned, the more he would get as well.
Shi Lei looked at the time. Seeing that it wasn’t yet midnight, he said, “I need this at around 3 AM. It might be a bit far, around the old pier. It’s still early right now. If you guys aren’t busy, then how about I treat you to dinner?”
When the older of the two heard that they could have a free dinner, he told his younger cousin, “Get someone to take our place, give him some money, and we’ll go have dinner with this little bro!”
The younger one was also happy to have dinner. Since it was his cousin who said it, then he would be the one to pay for their replacement. So he found someone to take their place, gave him 30 yuan, and left for dinner with his cousin and Shi Lei.
On the way, the younger of the two dragged his cousin to the side and said, “Cousin, I’m the one he came to first. I could’ve not told you about it and gotten 1,000 yuan for myself. At 3 AM, I would’ve long since finished working and you would already be asleep. Now that you’ve earned 2,000 yuan, you can’t treat me unfairly.
His cousin rolled his eyes and said, “You’re only driving it. I’ll give you 300 yuan.”
“Cousin, that’s not cool…”
“Fine, fine, fine, 500!”
“800! I’m your family and you’re being unfair.”
His cousin pondered for a while, then stomped. “800 it is, then! But you have to pay for the subst.i.tute yourself!”
It was only 30 yuan, so although he was unhappy that his cousin was being stingy, he agreed.
They found a hot pot place. The three of them sat down, called for alcohol and four plates of lamb, and began to eat frenziedly.
With three gla.s.ses of alcohol down, the older of the two began to talk nonsense. The younger one was slightly better and didn’t drink that much, since he knew that he had to work later.
Soon, it was 3 AM and Shi Lei paid for the bill. The younger one was about to drive, but the older replied while drunk that he didn’t want to give him the 800 yuan. He insisted on driving himself and threw 500 yuan to his cousin, who could only take it angrily and go home to bed.
Shi Lei didn’t really care that much. No one would check if someone was driving while drunk in the middle of the night, so they took the bulldozer and headed straight for the factory.
It was the middle of the night and the place was dead silent. No dogs were barking. The moon and stars in the sky couldn’t even be seen. Shi Lei led the way. Although the older of the cousins had consumed quite a lot of alcohol, he still had a clear head, boasting to Shi Lei as he drove the bulldozer to the mansion.
When they arrived, the older cousin realized that something was amiss. “Isn’t there something wrong? It’s so quiet, and it doesn"t look like you need to demolish a house. And this house is perfectly fine. Why demolish it?”
“Well, I want to demolish it and then rebuild it,” Shi Lei continued to fool him. “The factory agreed to let my family extend it a bit. We want a small building in the yard, so don’t I have to get rid of this wall? It’s quiet because there’s no one living it in. They all moved. How can you still live here if it’s about to be reconstructed?”
The older cousin jumped down from the bulldozer, walked around the building with a cigarette in his mouth, and finally shook his head. “Bro, something’s not right. Open the door and show me. I’ll believe you if you have the key to the door.”
Shi Lei was embarra.s.sed. How would he have the key? “I’m only here to demolish the wall, so I didn’t bring the key,” he could only say.
“Bro, I can’t do that. I’m telling you, if I help you get rid of this wall and someone comes out and blames me…no, this won’t do.”
Shi Lei frowned. “How about this,” he said. “Look, your bulldozer’s almost useless now. Just sell it to me!”
When the older cousin heard that, he knew Shi Lei was going to do something bad. But his piece of c.r.a.p bulldozer could die of old age at any moment. It was a secondhand anyway and he’d used it for another three, four years after that. This Shi Lei guy didn’t seem to care about money. His eyes shifted. “150,000 yuan and it’s yours!” he said daringly.
“That’s too unfair. A new one is only slightly over 100,000 yuan. Yours is already like this. It’s probably something from ten years ago, and yet you ask for 150,000 yuan?”
The older cousin chuckled. “My bulldozer has a perk. The license plate is fake and the engine number is also rubbed off. If you decide to cause trouble, just jump off and run away. No one will ever find you. It’s hard to find a car like this. Otherwise, the family can investigate it and find the owner, and then trace it to you.”
Shi Lei thought that this indeed wasn’t bad, but 150,000 yuan was too bulls.h.i.t of a price, so he said, “50,000 yuan.”
“The lowest I’ll take is 100,000 yuan! Anything less and I’ll just pretend I came here for nothing. I won’t even take your 2,000 yuan.” The cousin knew that Shi Lei was desperately in need of it and refused to back down.
Actually, Shi Lei didn’t care whether it was 50,000 yuan or 100,000 yuan, since he had the money. However, whether spending the Black Card’s money counted or not was determined by the true worth of the thing that was being bought. This bulldozer was worth, at most, 10,000 to 20,000 yuan, which meant that Shi Lei would have to to fill in at least 80,000 yuan.
But seeing that the other party was refusing to back down, Shi Lei recalled that he had some private funds in the stock market. It would definitely exceed 100,000 yuan when he took it out next week, so he could afford to lose 80,000 yuan. The main point was that this bulldozer wouldn’t give any clues, so even if Qin Huaiyuan knew that Shi Lei was one who did it, he had no way of proving it to anyone else!
Shi Lei made his decision. “Fine! 100,000 yuan! Give me your account and I’ll transfer it to you!” He didn’t have anywhere to withdraw money at the moment, so it was lucky that the other had WeChat. Shi Lei added him and transferred 100,000 yuan. The person accepted the money with a laugh. “Bro, take it easy. Don’t hurt anyone. Rest a.s.sured, no one can ever find me, so they won’t find you either!” With that said, the guy left feeling pleased with himself.
Shi Lei had observed the older cousin carefully on the way there to make sure that he would not be unwilling to demolish the wall. Fortunately, he could also do it himself, since it didn’t require any skill, so Shi Lei learned how to operate it after taking a brief look as they were heading to the mansion.
He jumped on and checked the time. It was past 4 AM. Qin Huaiyuan, this is how you bear the consequences!