Sha Qing

Chapter 102: The Crocodile & The Leopard (2)

The prison guard glanced at the inmates walking around the hall and hesitantly said, "It's recreational time, so they're probably...... in the activity areas, right?"

"I don't need 'probably'. Contact the surveillance room and tell me within a minute where that new Chinese kid is." said the prison warden.

The prison officer immediately used his intercom to contact the surveillance room and a few moments later, he replied, "In the central lounge on the 8th floor."

Johnson turned his head to signal at Leo, and the two once again took the elevator down to the eighth floor. They walked towards their destination, passing by the strolling, chatting, and singing inmates who were under the watchful eye of prison guards, until they arrived at a relatively quiet lounge.

The scene before them was unexpected- or at least, completely unexpected to the black-haired agent.

At a square table next to the sofa, four men of different appearances were sitting around: an old man with gray hair and a hooked nose, dressed in an old-fashioned straight military uniform; a bald, brawny Asian man with a left eye deformed by a scar; a gentle-looking, pale, thin young man with glasses, and lastly, a person wearing prison clothes, with visible bandages...... Sha Qing.

Hell, if he's not mistaken, the little squares that are neatly lined up on the table are ...... Chinese mahjong?

"Èrtǒng." The old man in military uniform threw a tile and slowly exhaled a smoke ring with his cigar.

"Huh! Dāndiào Èrtǒng!" The bald-headed man sitting on the opposite chair laughed and went to draw tiles.

"Wait," he reached out a finger and pressed the Èrtǒng tile, "I want to block your Hú move."

"-Fuck! Does this newcomer understand the rules in here? You dare stop my move?" The bald man yelled in a mixture of Putonghua and Fuqing accents as he slammed the table.

"There's no such thing as brothers or friends in this game. If you break the game's rules, be careful of bad luck while playing." Sha Qing threw out a sentence unhurriedly.

The bald man's face was grim, and even the veins in the back of his head became prominent.

The abnormally thin young man with glasses next to him gently touched the back of his hand, while saying in a trembling, half-dead-like voice, "Old Ghost, without rules, nothing can be done."

The bald man retracted his hand like being licked by a venomous snake, and glanced at the other side with some fear.

On the sofa with its back to the door, there were two prison officers with cups of drinks. One of them took the cup and lightly knocked it on his colleague's hand, smiling smugly, "Look, I won. I told you to bet on the westerners."

The other shrugged sarcastically in chagrin, "Watch out for newcomers not owning up to it. Don't forget that Lucas, who not only didn't pay his dues but also tried to go to the warden to sue you for accepting bribes."

"So I gave him a good lesson on a subject called 'Hey kid you need to recognize the laws of prison survival otherwise you'll get beaten up'." He pointedly poked the baton at his colleague's waist.

Outside the lounge, Leo turned to look at the prison warden's reddened old face with a cold expression, "Can you introduce me to the other three people on the gambling table and their relationship with your men?"

Johnson, ashamed into anger, breathed heavily and his fat body almost shaking. A bellows-like wheezing sound came from his throat, but he was not so angry as to lose all his senses. With gritted teeth, he identified them one by one,

"That old man, Liu, is the division chief of Khun Sa's drug cartel in the Golden Triangle; the baldhead, Chen, boss of the Ghost Shadow, a Chinese gang in New York; the one with glasses, Gan, a professional killer of the Hong Kong Big Circle Gang. To be able to play poker with them at the same table, it seems that our newcomer's influence isn't small, right?"

He glared at Sha Qing, taking out his anger on the innocent man, then said to Leo in a bad tone, "Well then, agent - I'll give you an hour with that fellow. Is that enough?"

The muscle at the corner of Leo's mouth twitched imperceptibly and replied stiffly, "No need!" And with that, he turned to leave.

The two prison guards who took part in the bet turned their heads inadvertently, and upon seeing the huge body standing outside the door, their faces went pale. Their supervisor, on the other hand, bellowed, "You two, come to my office, right away! The rest of you, return to your respective rooms!"

Leo strode out of the aisle, his fists clenched in anger.

I knew it was a huge and stupid mistake to come here! He mentally yelled at himself.

I must have been crazy to even think that a felon with an expertise level like that of Sha Qing would suffer losses in prison! That guy is like a fish in water now. I bet he's feeling so comfortable, like a leopard who finally arrived in the jungle.

Compared with the determination he finally made after all kinds of contradictions and struggles, Leo felt humiliated.

I will never give a shit about that bastard again! Leo swore to himself and decided that when he gets back to the office, he would find a random reason to give Rob a good beating.