Chapter 17: Club

Decapitating Devils Club.

This resounding name made Bai Yan recall his eerie memories of sharing a bed with a ghost’s head from the night before, leading his color to change into a slightly less healthy one. The other two also suspected that something dangerous was about to happen and cautiously kept out an eye.

With just its name, it already conveyed to the three people that this club was not good news.

As they slowly walked past the long hall, the master and the unnamed person both entered a room with the three following suit.

There were many members of the club. When they saw three new faces, they all stopped talking and stared at them. A scholarly-looking man immediately stood up and asked politely, “Boss Gu and Boss Wang, who are these three individuals behind you?”

“These are my driver, my bodyguard, and my butler.” Their master said with a courteous smile, “These three are also very interested in this matter, and I guarantee you that we can trust them.”

“Since Boss Gu gave us his guarantee, I won’t say anything else.” The scholarly-looking man glanced at their name tags and secretly took note of their names.

After their master finally took his seat, the other members of the club began to excitedly share their newly acquired resources with him.

“Don’t you simply buy beheading videos from the dark web? That kind of thing could be bought with money. How could that be more interesting than Boss Gu’s book? This was carefully organized by Old Gu himself!”

“Oh, you’ll know it when you see it. It will definitely be a better surprise for you all, more than Old Gu’s book! Whoever still disagrees after seeing it can cut my head off tonight!” The fierce-looking man trembled with fury, clearly disgruntled by the praise the master was getting. “Enough of this talking. You there, whoever is new, come and help me with this video!”

The man suddenly pointed at Bai Yan, and in turn, Bai Yan looked at his master for approval. When he nodded slightly, Bai Yan stepped forward to receive the disc and put it into the disk player.

After a moment, the screen in front suddenly radiated a faint fluorescent light. Everyone couldn’t take their eyes off of it and watched it attentively, patiently waiting for the ‘surprise’ Boss Zhao was avidly boasting about.

“Save…Save me!”

“Please, uncle, please let me go!”

At the beginning of the film, there was a scene of a girl kneeling and desperately begging for mercy.

To be honest, this short film’s quality was substandard at best, and the filming techniques were only ordinary, but everyone was silently waiting to see the ‘surprise,’ so for the time being, no one dared ridicule the third-rate quality of the film.

The girl’s feet appeared to be tied up and in the middle of the moving picture was the girl ceaselessly kowtowing.

When they all saw this, the older members of the club started to yawn out of sheer boredom. They have all seen decapitating videos like these thousands of times before, but they still gave off the same expression to prevent Boss Zhao from flying into a rage out of humiliation.

However, when the film was halfway through, the impatience on their faces disappeared and morphed into absolute disbelief and excitement.

“Uncle, please forgive me! I am willing to work like an ox(1) for you…ah!”

In the film, the girl was mercilessly slaughtered and chopped in half by an ax, her lifeless head rolling off to the floor with its eyes still wide from horror.

However, the members were not focused on the girl’s head rolling on the ground before them. No, they were all focused on the hand carrying the ax that had a long scar on it.

Seeing this minute detail, they all couldn’t help but cast a side glance in Boss Zhao’s direction, secretly peeping at his right hand.

Upon closer inspection, the scar on Boss Zhao’s right hand was exactly like the one the executioner had.

Many of the club members all muttered anxiously in their hearts after watching the full video. Miss Liu dressed in the sultry red dress had something to say. Hardly covering the amazement plastered on her face, she loudly exclaimed, “Oh, I didn’t expect that you, Old Zhao, to do the job yourself and videotape it! He is indeed the first one to be more amazing than Boss Gu!”

“Exactly.”

“Compared to Boss Gu’s book, Boss Zhao’s short film is better!”

When everyone found out that Boss Zhao executed the scene himself, one by one, the club members changed their opinions and turned to compliment Boss Zhao’s video, making Boss Zhao extremely pleased with himself.

However, as an adept butler, Bai Yan had always been paying close attention to any changes in the master’s expression.

He found that after everyone had indifferently tossed aside the master’s book, the master’s face drooped down, obviously unhappy about having his spotlight taken.

As the master dwelled on his dreary mood, he began to find some faults in his three servants.

When everyone was surrounding Boss Zhao and showering him with praise, the master gloomily asked his servants, “What did you think of Boss Zhao’s video?”

“I…I think it’s so-so…” Liu Kui felt annoyed yet frightened when the master abruptly asked him a question. In his eyes, the members of this club were all perverted homicidal maniacs. All of them should quietly go to prison and swallow bullets, but now, since he was surrounded by a group of murderers, he had to answer against his convictions. He was truly afraid that if he said something wrong, these decapitating devils would seal his lips and ruthlessly chop him up, like some kind of animal.

“My opinion is the same as his, but I thought that your book was great!” Lu Tianyi saw the whole video from the beginning to the end and with great difficulty, he resisted the urge to take out his gun and take a shot out of it. He simply forced out an uncomfortable grin and squeezed a sentence out through gritted teeth.

“How about you, butler. What did you think of the video?”

“I think that this video was shot intentionally that way, but it can’t even compare to your book. Everyone can make this kind of video, but not everyone can write it well.” Bai Yan flattered him sincerely.

After listening to Bai Yan and Lu Tianyi’s answer, the man’s face gradually looked better.

But when he saw Boss Zhao’s smug demeanor, unbridled anger quickly serged forth in his heart.

The master’s head started to become scalding hot with anger, making him unable to restrain his emotional impulses.

Under the control of this unstoppable impulse, he heatedly ordered Liu Kui, “Driver, I have some props stored in a room, help me get them!”

“Ah? Me?” Liu Kui was a little reluctant to fetch the things he was told of. Walking around lost and confused in this crowd of decapitating devils, who knows what kinds of mishaps will happen to him, “I’m not familiar with this place. Sir, would you rather have someone else to go get the items?”

“No, I want you to get them. If I order you to go get them, then you go get them. Where did this nonsense come from.” The master ominously tilted his face downwards, “That room is easy to find. When you go out, take a left turn and then walk straight. If you see a door with a saw painted on it, then that’s it.”

“In that room, I stored an axe. You will surely see it as soon as you enter the door. When you find the axe, bring it to me immediately. Go now!”

“Very well, sir.” Liu Kui begrudgingly went off, not daring to try and challenge the master’s authority.  

…

The master said that the room was close by, but Liu Kui still had not returned after going off for so long.

After around ten minutes, the master couldn’t sit still any longer. He talked to the person beside him and left, leaving to go to the room where the ax was stored.

“Why on earth did Old Gu go and fetch the axe?”

“Who knows! There’s no head here for him to cut off, maybe he’s going to perform and whip out the big battle axe haha.”

Seeing the master hastily depart, the rest of the club started to gossip about Boss Gu and did not pay mind that Bai Yan and Lu Tianyi were still there.

“You said that Old Gu was a cultured intellectual, but I never expected for him to scowl for not getting his way. You don’t know this, but he used to have a good temper.”

“The two of you know each other from before?”

“Yes, I am acquainted with him when he first joined the club! He used to be noble and virtuous, unresponsive to political and material pursuits, which was not a good fit with us at all. He was also unwilling to take part in our club activities before. Who would dare invite him over? He was not afraid of what we were doing in the club and could have easily left if he couldn’t stand being with us…”

“If that’s the case, don’t tell me that Boss Gu’s character has changed a lot since then?”

“Yes, that is the case. After his son’s tragic accident, he no longer kept up his facade of a good person and his personality has completely morphed into something else, but even during that time, even he would have never thought that he’d turn out like this. He only joined the club half a year ago. It was after joining the club that his character suddenly changed into a violent one.”

The club members talked about the master’s private business openly. Meanwhile, Bai Yan was listening carefully to this newfound information and when he heard the words ‘half a year,’ his heart beat excitedly and couldn’t help but remember last night’s encounter with the delivery guy, his words echoing in his mind.

The mistress’s house also began ordering dead cat and dog meat half a year ago.

All these anomalies started occurring half a year ago.

As the master hadn’t returned from his excursion, the club members continued to shamelessly gossip about the master.

From their descriptions, Bai Yan pieced together an image of a charitable businessman. Half a year ago, the master was certainly a person who did not have any interest in the decapitation and was a good person who detested crimes and the despicable rats that committed them. However, after half a year, his personality began to change drastically, so… what happened during these six months?

Could his son’s accident be the cause of this extreme change?

After much thought, Bai Yan was still perplexed about this mystery. As he was considering all sorts of possibilities, the man who was familiar with the master relentlessly persisted to gossip about the master.

“Honestly, Old Gu is also very pitiful. The younger son unfortunately died in an accident a few years ago and his older son went crazy half a year ago. He only has one son left and is unfortunately insane. He would be better off having another one!”

Wait a minute, this younger son died a few years ago?

Bai Yan’s eyes immediately contracted from shock. If the younger son had already died long ago, then what did they see in the villa?