It was not until evening did Ego arrive. He was indeed so reckless that he just left his car in the gutter, got out with his willpower and found himself a free ride. Luckily, he didn’t run into any more trouble all the way to Chengdu.

The three of them met in a restaurant called "Bones". It was a successful chain restaurant in Chengdu famous for its dishes of bones, and their specialty was the Bones Pot. Su Bai and the fat guy had been napping in a cafe all afternoon, so they were still a little sleepy when they saw Ego, while Ego was looking quiet messy.

"Come on, let’s feast! I’m starving!"

Ego was surely starving after such a long journey.

Su Bai got himself some soup. The fat guy had too many snacks in the afternoon so he didn’t have much appetite either.

After having some ribs, Ego recovered some of his energy. Then he noticed that Su Bai and the fat guy were sort of bored.

He checked his watch. "Don’t tell me you guys are already falling asleep; the night is young!"

Su Bai smiled and lit a cigarette.

The fat guy rubbed his eyes and let out a long breath.

"You two dumbs! A wonderful nightlife is yet to come! A life like yours is not complete, you know?"

"That’s because some jerk told us he’d be here in half an hour but didn’t show up until four or five hours later! We’ve been waiting in the cafe and listening to those lyric songs, which worked even better than a lullaby! I’m falling asleep right now! Can you please hurry up with your dinner? Let’s go find a hotel, have a nice sleep and talk later."

"Sleep? Come on, I’m not a frequent visitor in Chengdu, how can I waste such a wonderful night?" Ego picked up another rib and started eating.

"You got a mistress here or something?" Su Bai felt funny. He had spent quite a few days with Ego in the last story, so he already knew Ego’s personality. If flirtation was a crime, then this guy would have been punished a thousand times for it.

"Bah! Mistress? That’s harsh! Well, have you ever heard of the salsa dance in Chengdu? It’s quite famous." Ego looked at Su Bai and the fat guy with an ambiguous smile.

The fat guy shook his head, "Local dance? Not interested. Recently, since tourism has become a new fashion, all villages and towns are equipping their residents with strange ethnic clothes that even themselves have never seen before; then they put on the clothes and dance to empty the tourists’ pockets. Not interested."

Hearing "salsa dance", Su Bai wasn’t intrigued at all.

However, Ego still noticed something from his look. He pointed at Su Bai:

"Look, he knows! What, you have been to a salsa dance looking for a soul mate?"

Su Bai drank his orange juice and shook his head, "Only heard of it."

"Fine, since neither of you have been there, I’ll show you the fun tonight. My treat."

Su Bai flicked his cigarette. "It won’t cost much anyway."

"Ha! How can you know the price if you have never been there! I’m not a niggard, okay? It’s not only the dance, I’ll also cover all the expense after midnight."

The fat guy finally got his hint and immediately got intrigued, "Really? That sounds like fun."

"Actually it’s elegant. Looking for your soul mate, then go from spiritual communication to the body and reach to a point where you are intimate with each other spiritually and physically." Ego introduced like a veteran in the demimonde.

"Hell! I’m having an itch in my belly. Have you finished your dinner? Lead the way now!"

The fat guy urged impatiently.

Ego took a tissue paper, wiped his mouth then stood up and waved his hand.

"Let’s go. Men can only know one another if they have fought together and gone whoring together. What’s coming next is a massive group task; it is necessary for us to grow some true friendship before we enter that story world."

Su Bai was still sitting there.

Ego and the fat guy stopped after a few steps, turned their heads around at the same time and stared at Su Bai.

"If someone won’t go whoring with us.. Do you know what that means?" Ego asked the fat guy.

"It means that ‘someone’ is already planning to betray us." The fat guy answered ironically.

Su Bai raised his hands as a surrender and put some money on the table.

"Let’s go."

...

The place that Ego had chosen was a rather high-end one in Chengdu, even a single admission ticket would cost RMB 500 Yuan. Of course, the girls here weren’t cheap; they couldn’t be called over for dance or to be touched with ten or twenty Yuan in cash. According to Ego, lower-end clubs were full of old women who were no longer pretty, but in here, there were all notable girls, usually teachers or white-collar ladies earning extra incomes instead of ordinary call-girls.

Su Bai was holding a cigarette among his fingers. When they walked in, a man in black pointed at him:

"Your cigarette. Put it out."

Su Bai held the cigarette, smoked and kept walking.

The man stretched out his hands to catch Su Bai: "It’s a rule."

Ego suddenly turned around and kicked the man in the belly. The man fell down, pressed his stomach with both hands and couldn’t get up.

"Watch it!" Ego said relentlessly.

None of the security guards said anything. The three of them continued walking.

"Bai, why not give up your cigarette? There’s no need to destroy our mood with trouble." The fat guy complaint.

Ego patted on the fat guy’s face, "There’s no such rule of ‘no smoking’ in a demimonde like this. They were just testing us, you know? If you put it out as told, they’ll see us as losers ready to spend no more than just 500 RMB Yuan for just one night of fun, in which case no high-end service will be provided. Got it?"

"Sh*t! You should have told me earlier! I’ll break that guy’s legs, then the top girls will come to us, right?"

"..." Ego.

"..." Su Bai.

It wasn’t very noisy in the hall. Some men and women were dancing to a lyric song. The hall was big, and around the stage were couches hiding in the darkness, which could provide some privacy for the customers. In a word, it looked like those Japanese erotic pubs.

The three of them had just sat down when five girls walked to them. These girls were not extremely pretty or wearing exquisite make-up, but they looked graceful, as if they had decent jobs in daytime, unlike those professional courtesans.

"Pick your favorite, Fatty." Ego said to the fat guy.

"How many?" Fat asked.

"Three."

"Okay, this one, this one, and this one."

Fatty picked three girls, and these girls really knew how to behave— they immediately walked to him; two of them sat beside him and the last one sat on his lap, which made him very satisfied.

Ego chose a mature lady who looked a little older than the others. He had always been into this type.

Then a tiny girl came and sat beside Su Bai.

"Come on, let’s have a drink. Bottoms up!"

Ego proposed a toast to everyone.

Su Bai picked up his glass and handed it over to his girl, "Drink it for me."

"That’s gonna need.."

Before she could finish, Su Bai took out his wallet, drew out a stack of bills and stuffed the money into her cleavage.

The girl immediately drank up all the liquid in both glasses without saying anything.

"Yo-ho, that’s impressive." Ego blinked to Su Bai. "You must be a veteran in demimonde."

Just then, the music changed into something exciting. Many men and women who were sitting beneath the stage were now stepping up to join the dance. Men were petting the women, and the women letting them; they couldn’t do anything more than touching anyway.

Fatty and Ego also left for the dance with their girls, while Su Bai just sat there with his legs crossed and eyes closed.

"Handsome, come and dance with me.."

Su bai shook his head, "Sit here. I need to use the washroom."

Then he stood up and went to the washroom.

There was a strong smell of disinfectant fluid; it must have been cleaned up a short while ago. He took some water, splashed it onto his face and then wiped up with some tissue paper at hand.

From the cubicles came the heavy breathing and the rubbing against toilet. Every corner here was filled with the sense of lust.

Su Bai didn’t go to the dance hall. He went to the second floor, leaned on the handrail and watched the men and women downstairs indulge themselves in sensual pleasure.

"Why not join them?"

An exquisite man in red suit with well-combed hair came to Su Bai with a glass of red wine.

"Not interested," Su Bai answered frankly.

"Ha ha, you’re not into girls? Then.. how about boys?" The man asked.

Su Bai smiled, then suddenly seized the man by the throat and pushed his face against the steel bars. The man’s face twisted in pain.

"Piss off as far as you can."

After the man was let go, he immediately left while sobbing. Must be heading to the restroom to refine his make-up.

Just then, a servant passed by. Su Bai’s eyes followed him. There were several glasses of red wine on the servant’s tray, but Su Bai was the only one who could sense from such a distance that it wasn’t red wine in those glasses, but fresh blood which was just drawn out from a human body.

Taking a deep breath, Su Bai licked his lips..

.. He...

.. had finally found his own enjoyment.