Chapter 195: Sister
Chapter 195: Sister
Gao Jing drove the big G along the Jingzang Expressway.
His thoughts were still on He Yuanbo.
He really hadn’t realized it had been over three years since He Yuanbo met his end.
Yesterday, after getting He Yuanbo’s phone charged, it had only been briefly powered on when Gao Jing received a call from Qin Qing.
It had seemed strange at the time.
Now looking back, it clearly wasn’t a coincidence at all.
It was highly likely that Qin Qing, fully aware her husband was dead, had kept calling this number over and over during those three years, hoping for a miracle.
The miracle hadn’t happened.
But it was her persistence that allowed He Yuanbo to be reunited with his loved one immediately and return home to find peace.
Gao Jing couldn’t judge He Yuanbo’s actions.
After all, he too had faced life-and-death trials repeatedly in the Great World and would continue to do so.
He only felt a deep sorrow for He Yuanbo and Qin Qing, this couple who loved each other so much.
What kind of deep love makes people willing to die for each other!
Gao Jing thought again of the Power of Faith that He Yuanbo had given him.
This was the most incredible thing.
He thought he understood the Power of Faith well, but he realized now how shallow that understanding truly was!
The more a person knows, the more they realize their own ignorance.
That was his deepest understanding at this moment.
The next morning.
Gao Jing arrived back in Yuncheng.
Compared to the icy, snowy Western Frontier, the climate of Jiangnan was much warmer. It was already the 29th of the twelfth lunar month. The festive atmosphere for the New Year was thick in the provincial capital, with crowds filling every street and alleyway.
Gao Jing got his car washed, paying three times the usual price.
Just after the wash, as he was about to get some food, his phone rang. “Bro, where are you?”
The timid voice on the other end made Gao Jing frown. “I just got back. What’s up?”
After listening, his voice became serious. “Where are you staying? I’ll come right away!”
He ended the call and immediately drove towards Xihe District.
It took some searching before he found the address mentioned on the phone.
It was in a very old, shabby part of the city, already marked for demolition. The lanes were too narrow for his car.
Gao Jing had to leave the big G parked by the main road outside and walk in.
After asking a few locals, he arrived in front of a row of dilapidated bungalows.
These low, single-story structures looked like privately-built additions, mostly rented out to migrant workers or used as small shops. In front of one such building, five or six people were clustered, and more onlookers stood around.
Thump! Thump! Thump!
A middle-aged man hammered his fist against the security door, shouting aggressively, “Ge Guizhi! I know you’re in there! Come out! Hiding won’t help!”
“Come out now!” others yelled alongside him. “Give us back our hard-earned money!”
Seeing this, Gao Jing’s expression turned grim.
He strode over and boomed, “Get lost, all of you!”
Everyone at the door jumped. The man pounding on it shuddered violently, almost losing control of his bladder.
Silence fell over the area.
After a moment, someone nervously stammered, “W-who are you?”
Gao Jing was tall, imposing, and dressed head-to-toe in designer brands. Even those lacking insight could tell he wasn’t ordinary.
They were all intimidated.
“Who am I?” Gao Jing sneered. “Who are you? Bullying a mother and her daughter like this?”
The man swallowed hard, trying to muster courage. “We’re not bullying anyone! We just want our money back! What’s it to you?”
“Yeah!” the others chimed in, encouraged. “We’re after our hard-earned cash! Paying debts is just fair!”
Gao Jing scoffed coldly. “Who owes you, go find them. Ranting and bullying innocent people? You should be ashamed of yourselves!”
“What did you say?!”
“Innocent?! Who even are you?”
“Think we’re scared? Why are you butting in?”
Gao Jing’s disdainful insult immediately angered all the debt collectors. They started shouting back at him.
One even insinuated mockingly, “Are you Ge Guizhi’s—”
“GET OUT!” Gao Jing roared furiously. “Don’t let me see your faces again!”
His mood was already low today. Seeing their ugly attitudes pushed him over the edge.
Unconsciously, he unleashed Crimson Snake Pressure!
It hit the group like a thunderbolt. They stood frozen, eyes wide, trembling violently, gripped by abject terror as if doomsday had arrived.
The one who’d made the nasty comment fared even worse – warmth spread uncontrollably down his legs, soaking half his pants!
It was a full half-minute before they snapped out of it.
With cries of fright, they scattered in panic.
The terror they’d just experienced was sure to haunt their nightmares for a long time.
In truth, they were lucky.
If Gao Jing had intentionally focused his pressure on them, it could have ruptured organs or even killed them from fright.
After chasing off the debt collectors, he stepped up to the slightly dented, cheap security door and rapped on it. “Aunt Gui, it’s Gao Jing.”
A moment later, the door was opened by a middle-aged woman with a frightened expression.
She appeared to be in her forties, dressed simply yet poorly.
Traces of her former beauty were still visible, but the silver hairs and wrinkles around her eyes spoke clearly of a life of hardship and exhaustion.
She stared at Gao Jing in disbelief. “You… you’re Gao Jing?”
This imposing young man before her looked so different from who she remembered, she almost didn’t recognize him.
“It’s me,” Gao Jing confirmed. “Yuanyuan called me, that’s why I came. How come you’re living here?”
Startled into awareness, she quickly stepped aside, flustered. “Oh! P-please, come in.”
Gao Jing nodded and stepped into the dark, cramped interior.
This makeshift dwelling was worse than the rented room he’d once lived in. Packed with clutter, the only recognizable furniture was a bed and a desk. It felt damp and freezing cold.
“Bro.”
By the desk stood a pale, thin girl of seventeen or eighteen, her eyes large and her hair slightly dry and faded.
She called timidly, her head bowed, unable to meet Gao Jing’s gaze.
Gao Jing couldn’t help but sigh.
This girl before him was Gao Yuanyuan, his half-sister!
Her mother, Ge Guizhi, was the second wife his father, Gao Hongbo, married after divorcing his first wife.
Now an ex-wife herself.
Gao Jing had met Ge Guizhi and had also met his half-sister Gao Yuanyuan.
They hadn’t lived together, so there wasn’t much natural affection.
But he did know a little about their circumstances.
Ge Guizhi and Gao Hongbo had divorced three years ago. Early last year, Gao Hongbo ran into the red with failed business ventures, accumulated massive debts, then fled overseas. Nothing had been heard from him since.
This wasn’t the first time Gao Hongbo had run away.
When Gao Jing’s grandfather passed away, Gao Hongbo had already been hiding from debtors.
A few years later, after returning to the provincial capital, Ge Guizhi divorced him, taking her daughter to start life anew.
“Mmm,” Gao Jing acknowledged Ge Guizhi. “Aunt Gui, those people were Gao Hongbo’s creditors, right?”
Ge Guizhi smiled bitterly. “Yes. They can’t find Gao Hongbo, so they come after me. They insist he left all his property to Yuanyuan and me. They even went to my workplace to make a scene.”
Gao Jing shook his head, unable to hide his distaste.
His father, Gao Hongbo, was the classic type – big talk, full of hot air and excellent at bullshitting.
But his actual business skills were terrible. Slight success could make him swell with overconfidence, inevitably leading to schemes that wiped him out.
Those creditors had likely been lured in by his pitches to invest or buy shares, only to be trapped alongside him.
“Actually, Gao Hongbo did okay in business the first couple of years,” Ge Guizhi continued. “He paid them dividends. Now that it’s lost, they show up demanding repayment. How could I possibly have money to pay Gao Hongbo’s debts?”
She began to cry. “They even got me fired from my job.”
Ge Guizhi had worked as a sales attendant in a department store.
The job was demanding, but it ensured she could support herself and her child.
Losing this job was what had brought mother and daughter to their current desperate state.
“Mom,” Gao Yuanyuan held her mother’s arm, her own eyes welling up.
Gao Jing couldn’t bear to see any more. “It’s alright now,” he said firmly. “Come with me.”
He hadn’t realized things were this bad for them. If he had known earlier, he certainly wouldn’t have withheld help.
No matter how terrible Gao Hongbo was, Ge Guizhi and Gao Yuanyuan weren’t responsible.
And Gao Yuanyuan was his sister!