Translator: Timothy_ Editor: GlobeGlotter
Ye Mo sneered, “I repeat: I am not interested. Please go away.”
The blonde suddenly said, “It’s quite rare for a Chinese person to come to this town. You here on holiday? Perhaps I can show you around town. I know of a lot of places other people don’t. The ghost house, spinning battlefield, underground fighting… Anywhere you want to go, I can bring you there, and I charge very little. Just give me 300- No, 200 USD, and I can serve you for a day.”
Ye Mo thought, ‘This is my first time in town, and it’s not like I’m familiar with the place. If someone could show me around, it would save me a lot of time.’ And the blonde girl’s Chinese was fluent, so they could communicate just fine.
Thinking about this, Ye Mo suddenly asked, “What’s your name? And, are you in need of a lot of money?”
Hearing this, the blonde quickly said, “I’m Annie, and yes, I really do need all the money I can get. If you get tired, I can even go to bed with you – you just need to give me 200 USD.”
“No need to go to bed with me. First, just tell me if there are a lot of Chinese here, and where do they usually live? Also, how much do you know about the history of this town? How long have you been living here?” Ye Mo asked.
The blonde quickly answered, “I was born here. My father is a blacksmith, so I know the place very well, just like, just like-”
She wanted to use a fancy metaphor, but her knowledge was limited, and she couldn’t think of one.
Ye Mo didn’t mind. He nodded and said, “Take me to the Chinese region. There’s someone I wish to find.”
“Find someone? Oh, great! As long as you’re looking for someone Chinese, I can help you find them. You know, people call me the white Chinese,” Annie kept talking, “If you want to find a Chinese person, you need to go to the Mengtang Street underground boxing ring. That place has the second greatest amount of Chinese people in town. Perhaps the person you’re looking for is there.”
There was no way Sister Yan would be there. Ye Mo shook his head without thinking, “Why take me the second best place? Take me to the place with the most Chinese.”
“Oh, ok. Mr, what’s your name?” Annie asked.
“I’m Ye Mo. Now, just take me to the place with the most Chinese.” After Ye Mo spoke with her for a while, he found that she wasn’t as annoying as he had thought. Perhaps she simply really needed money. If she could take him to find all the Chinese around, he wouldn’t mind giving her some money.
Annie said, “Mr Ye Mo, the place with the most Chinese is the Chinese Back Street, but we have to pass the underground boxing ring to get there. That way, we will also spend less time to see all the Chinese we can.”
Ye Mo looked at her glimmering eyes and knew that even if she was right, there must be some other reason she persisted on going there.
To Ye Mo, no matter what it was, he wouldn’t care at all.
As though realizing her words might arouse sime misunderstanding, Annie quickly explained, “You can see Chinese masters fight there, but if you’re really not interested, we don’t have to go.”
“It’s fine, we might as well go.” Ye Mo waved his hand casually. No matter what masters were there, he wouldn’t have to worry. This was only some small American town, after all.
Seeing this, Annie was even happier and exclaimed, “Oh god, you’re the best! What a gentleman.”
“Alright, just hurry up and go, and call me Mr Ye from now on.” Although Annie was clearly in financial trouble, she wasn’t depressed about it at all and made things quite cheerful. Ye Mo also felt a lot better.
“Hey sweetheart,” a white man chewing gum walked by Annie and Ye Mo, and said with very broken Chinese.
Annie ignored the man and pointed at an alleyway, saying, “You can enter the underground boxing ring form there, let’s go.”
The man saw Annie ignore him, so he walked past Ye Mo and Annie and also entered the small alleyway.
They only walked for a bit before people started brushing past them hurriedly. The Chinese amounted to 40% of everyone present. No wonder even some random white man knew a bit of Chinese.
After walking past the alleyway, Annie took Ye Mo to a very big hall. There were a lot of people there, and it was very boisterous and rowdy. Small stalls were everywhere, people were drinking, playing car games, eating and even taking drugs. Ye Mo found the place had people of all sorts of skin colours.
Annie smiled to Ye Mo apologetically, “Mr Ye, it’ll get better after we properly enter, this hall is a bit too chaotic. But there are also Chinese here – perhaps there might be someone you know.”
Annie seemed to know a lot of people here. As soon as she came in, a bunch of people started greeting her.
But Annie knew what her main purpose was and seeing that Ye Mo didn’t like this place, she took him further underground quickly.
At the entrance, Annie stopped and looked at Ye Mo awkwardly, “Mr Ye, could you lend me 200 dollars for now? Trust me, I won’t cheat you out of your money.”
A couple hundred dollars was like a couple of leaves to Ye Mo. He took out 200 dollars and handed them to Annie.
“Thank you Mr Ye. Ehm, let’s go in.” Annie’s expression seemed like she didn’t just get 200 but 20k.
Ye Mo sighed. Those who were content with what the small things they got were always happy.
The two came to the door and Annie gave the $200 entrance fee and took Ye Mo in.
Ye Mo saw the boisterous crowd and immediately knew that Annie probably had her own thing going on and that that was why she had wanted to come there. But Ye Mo saw that there were indeed a lot of Chinese. A few of them were shouting in front of the stage.
“Annie, you’re here so early!” a very fluent Chinese speaker said.
It was an Asian young man in his 20s. He seemed to have some head injuries and was bandaged. He looked at Ye Mo.
Annie was going to make Ye Mo wait while she looked for the young man, but he had come out unexpectedly. Annie gave 300 dollars to the guy awkwardly and said, “Ye Mo is my new friend. Don’t worry about anything and go sign up first. I came to see your match tonight.”
Ye Mo realized that that 300 dollars had completely come from him.
The young man hesitated befire taking the money and said, “I won’t let you and Sister Sisi down.” Then, he turned into the crowd and entered the competing area.
“Sorry, Mr Ye, I might have tricked you a bit, but don’t worry, I will take you through this entire town for sure. If the person you’re looking for is really here, I will find them for you,” Annie apologized.
Meanwhile, as Ye Mo looked at that young man, he felt a sense of familiarity.