Chapter 16: Lend a Hand (Seeking Collections, Recommendation Tickets, Monthly Tickets)
Yang Rui quickly changed into his casual clothes and walked onto the warship's deck. The work of organizing overseas Chinese to board the ship was still proceeding in an orderly manner. The number of people boarding seemed to have further increased, and in addition to Chinese nationals, there were also some foreigners. Yang Rui thought that the cabins prepared might not be enough, and wondered if he and his teammates should just make do in the hangar today.
“Captain Yang, over here,” Luo Jialing waved to him from not far away. It was only now that Yang Rui carefully observed this nominal colleague. Luo Jialing wore a pair of sand-colored work pants, her jacket was taken off and tied around her waist, revealing a black tight-fitting vest underneath, her curves subtly visible. Her shoulder-length short hair made her appear very capable and straightforward. Facing the sunlight, the gloom that had previously enveloped her seemed to have been blown away.
Yang Rui’s face reddened, and he couldn't help but secretly adjust his clothes again, straightening his back and walking over step by step. On the deck, two children were running around, a boy of five or six and a girl of sixteen or seventeen, their laughter filling the entire deck. A female soldier from the communications team was chasing after them, saying, “Little ones, don’t run around, be careful not to trip.” The various cabins were packed with overseas Chinese, but unlike their previous despondency, helplessness, and despair, everyone was now chatting and laughing.
“How about it, doesn’t seeing all this make you feel particularly satisfied?” Luo Jialing came to one side, turning her head to look at the city in the distance, billowing with thick smoke, which seemed so out of sync with the laughter and joy here.
Yang Rui sighed, “Yes, at the port earlier, a local came to see off his friend. When they parted, he cried and said, ‘Your country has come to pick you up, but my country is about to be finished.’” Yang Rui looked into the distance, “At that moment, I thought, if anyone dared to mess with my home like this, no matter who it was, I’d f***ing fight them to the death.”
Luo Jialing looked at him seriously, then frowned, then stepped back two paces and re-examined him. Yang Rui felt inexplicably bewildered and a little flustered. Just as he was trying to figure out the situation, he heard Luo Jialing sigh and say, “Sigh, no matter how I look at him, he’s a soldier.”
Yang Rui’s face was full of question marks, “I am a soldier!”
Luo Jialing rubbed her forehead, just as she saw the girl chasing Lu Xuan running over. She pulled her into an embrace and said with a smile, “Little Dong Qin, can you help your elder sister out?” The little boy in front was also finally caught and picked up by the female soldier.
Dong Qin turned her head, her youthful face, smooth and full of collagen, flushed from running. “Auntie Luo, what is it?”
Luo Jialing’s smile froze on her face. She glanced at Yang Rui, who almost burst out laughing, and then retaliated by slapping Dong Qin’s backside hard. “Just like Xu Chuan, such a good kid, why did she have to grow a mouth?”
Dong Qin jumped away like a rabbit, shouting with a red face, “You really have no respect for your elders!”
“Don’t misuse idioms, you stinky girl!”
Yang Rui fearfully separated the two who were pulling at each other, and said weakly, “What exactly did you call me out here for?”
“Oh, I almost forgot the main business,” Luo Jialing tidied her messy hair and said seriously, “I’m not messing with you anymore.” She picked up the binoculars hanging on the railing and handed them to Yang Rui, “Outside the main gate, second silver-gray SUV on the right side of the road.”
Yang Rui took the binoculars and looked in the direction Luo Jialing indicated. “That car has been there all morning. When I came over just now, I glimpsed it and felt that the person inside was very familiar.” She looked at Yang Rui and continued, “I originally wanted to find this guy to cooperate, but even in plain clothes, I can smell the gun oil on him from dozens of meters away. So, I’m asking for your help.”
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Dong Qin took the binoculars from Yang Rui’s hand and looked at them. “Tch, I’m not going, what does it have to do with me?” With that, she threw the binoculars into Luo Jialing’s arms and was about to leave.
Luo Jialing’s eye twitched. She stopped her, “You’d better think this through. My family runs a bookstore, you know. I’ll call Xu Chuan, and he’ll happily order dozens of sets of test papers and send them over to you.”
Upon hearing this, Dong Qin’s face instantly turned pale. She gritted her teeth and said word by word, “You ~ are ~ ruthless.” She pushed Luo Jialing away, “I’m going to change my clothes.”
“Hurry back!” The voice was filled with the joy of victory, earning an internationally recognized gesture in return.
“Hmph, trying to contend with me, old lady!”
Yang Rui watched with a headache, frowning and saying, “Comrade Luo, she’s still a child. Isn’t it bad to involve her?”
“A child?” Luo Jialing rolled her eyes at him. “She’s developed so well, how is she like a child?”
Yang Rui’s face darkened. Luo Jialing also felt that her words might have crossed a line. She then asked, “Captain Yang, how many people have you killed?”
“Alright, I’ll rephrase the question,” she said, seeing Yang Rui’s face getting darker and darker, “How many criminals have you shot and killed?”
Yang Rui replied grumpily, “About 7.”
“In our relatively peaceful country, 7 is actually quite a lot. I killed 3 rebels today, making a total of 15 including previous ones. Do you know how many people that child just now has killed?”
“At least add a 2 in front of your 7.” Yang Rui looked up at Luo Jialing in shock, seemingly trying to find signs of a joke on her face, but the woman’s expression was exceptionally serious.
“So, in such a chaotic region, never underestimate anyone, not even a child.” After saying that, both of them fell silent. This truly wasn’t a good topic.
Yang Rui thought of something and asked, “Earlier, you said that in the last operation, two of you sacrificed…?”
Luo Jialing froze for a moment, raised an eyebrow, and the corners of her mouth turned up. “You actually believed it?”
“Huh?” Yang Rui’s tone rose.
“Don’t tell them, I lied to them.” Luo Jialing leaned closer, feigning a whisper, “Because of this, they will absolutely not cause me any trouble afterwards. Whatever I say goes.”
Yang Rui shifted to the side, wanting to distance himself from this woman who had shattered his worldview multiple times in a very short period. He opened his mouth, exhaled a cloudy breath, “That’s good, it’s good that no one sacrificed.”
Luo Jialing smiled, “How could there be any sacrifice in such a minor matter? We only spent 50,000 yuan on the entire intelligence, and the other party sent over the hostages’ location and the surrounding defense situation.”
“This can be bought?”
“Of course, most of it is bought with money, but the main thing is knowing who to buy from and how to verify the authenticity after buying.” ……
Not long after, Dong Qin bounced back, but she hadn’t changed her clothes as she said she would. She held out a mobile phone and said, “No need to go, my brother will come over to bring me something later, and he said he’ll take care of it.”
Luo Jialing’s eyes lit up. “What is he bringing you?”
“My passport and ID card, there’s no way I’d carry them on me.”
“Ha, then how did you get on the ship, guard, there’s a stowaway here.” Luo Jialing pretended to shout at Yang Rui.
“Tch, so childish.”
