Three days later, Di Zhen was still wandering the streets.
It wasn't hard to find jobs, but suitable ones were rare. In his job - hunting, he'd encountered quite a few scammers. With Di Zhen's shrewdness, he naturally wouldn't be deceived, but it was still annoying.
Just then, he saw a red - haired young man furtively following a couple. Taking a closer look, wasn't that guy Geng Hao, the one who'd slipped away that day?
The couple entered a hotel, and Geng Hao squatted beside the flowerbed at the entrance, taking a few photos with his phone. Di Zhen suddenly slapped him on the back from behind. Geng Hao was startled. Turning around, his face immediately broke into a big smile. "It's Brother Di! What are you doing here?"
"Are you stealing again?"
"No, you've got it all wrong. I'm taking candid photos!"
"Candid photos?"
"Brother, I've got a proper job now." Geng Hao patted his chest proudly. "I work at a detective agency. The two who just went in are a married man and his mistress. His wife hired us to collect evidence so she can sue him when they get divorced. What are you doing here, bro?"
"I'm looking for a job."
Geng Hao's eyes lit up. "Hey, why don't you come work with me? With your skills, being a private detective would be a piece of cake."
A private detective? It sounded a bit like being a policeman.
Di Zhen pondered and said, "It doesn't hurt to take a look."
Geng Hao smiled. "I'm going back anyway. Let's go together!"
Geng Hao hailed a taxi and took Di Zhen to the downstairs of an "Integrity Information Consulting Company". Geng Hao explained that in China, detective agencies can't be directly registered and are usually named information consulting companies or marital affairs investigation agencies.
"So it's illegal then?" Di Zhen said.
"Come on, we're not stealing or robbing. We're just running a business. How can it be illegal? Maybe it's a kind of macro - control to prevent there from being too many private detectives and taking away the policemen's jobs." Geng Hao's sense of the law was quite simple.
They climbed the narrow and dim stairs. The walls of the passage were plastered with small ads, looking like a mess of makeshift posters, giving off a suspicious smell.
When they reached the second floor, there was a shabby door with the words "Verify information and find people, professional and efficient" written on it. Geng Hao pushed it open. On the right was a set of modular sofas arranged in a "hui" - shaped pattern, with a large tea table in the middle. On the left was a desk, and there was a row of cabinets against the wall, filled with books and files.
The room was very old. The ceiling fan was rusty. Maybe the rent here was cheap!
In one corner of the room, there were parallel bars installed on the ceiling. A muscular man with a crew cut wearing a black vest was panting as he did pull - ups. His whole body was soaked in sweat, and the scar on his back was glowing red.
"Hey, Brother Kai, where's Boss Mu?" Geng Hao greeted.
The big guy stopped, unscrewed a bottle of water and took a drink. Then he poured some on his head and wiped it roughly with a towel. "I went to buy some cold jelly. Who's this guy?"
"Brother Di, he's my friend. He's here looking for a job!"
The big guy sized Di Zhen up and down. "Wow, little bro, you've got a good build!"
"New here?" At this time, a man sitting on the sofa nearest to the door sat up. The magazine covering his face slid onto his stomach. This man was lean, with dead fish eyes and large, gaudy tattoos showing on his shoulders. "Looking for a job? What can you do?"
Di Zhen replied calmly, "Investigating cases!"
The big guy asked, "Graduated from the police academy?"
"No, I never went to school."
"Hey, here comes a Sherlock Holmes!" The man with dead fish eyes smiled at the big guy, then turned his head and said contemptuously, "You've got a lot of nerve. The recruitment notice said the minimum requirement is a bachelor's degree. What use is an illiterate like you? To clean the place?"
Geng Hao said, "Brother Di is really good. Brother Di, show us a little something!"
"Shut the fuck up. Did I talk to you?" the man with dead fish eyes shouted.
Di Zhen didn't have a good impression of the man with dead fish eyes, and his enthusiasm for the job had dropped by half.
"Do you always act like such a jerk?" Di Zhen asked.
"Stupid big guy, private detective work requires high intelligence. You can't do it. Just get out of here!" The man with dead fish eyes waved his hand.
"Um... Brother Di is really, really good. He can do [b]hypnosis[/b]!" Geng Hao strongly recommended Di Zhen to the two of them. As a new guy, he had been bullied a lot. He was hoping that Di Zhen would work with him so he'd have someone to back him up.
"I can do [b]hypnosis[/b] too. Once I open a book, I'm out like a light." The man with dead fish eyes laughed.
"Anyway, let's wait for Boss Mu to come back and have an interview. Brother Di, take a seat first!" Geng Hao was still trying to smooth things over.
Di Zhen walked over to the row of cabinets and took a look. There were quite a few files, which meant this place had been in business for a while. He casually picked up a file. The man with dead fish eyes shouted, "Is that something you can touch?"
"Big Guy, I won't help you if you get beaten up later!" the big guy laughed.
"Sorry, I've got a bit of a bad temper when I wake up." The man with dead fish eyes suddenly apologized. "New guy, let me pour you a cup of tea!"
"No, thanks."
"Don't be so polite."
The man with dead fish eyes picked up the teapot, went next door to wash it, then came back and filled a cup to the brim. Di Zhen immediately smelled a stench of urine. The big guy covered his mouth and laughed.
Geng Hao frowned because he had been treated the same way when he came here a couple of days ago. The taste was really unforgettable.
"Drink it while it's hot!" The man with dead fish eyes pushed the cup over. "I don't know if you like this flavor."
Di Zhen sat down, looked at the full cup of murky yellow liquid, raised his eyebrows and said, "You want me to drink this?"
The man with dead fish eyes sat there boldly, rolled his eyes and said, "I'm offering you this. If you don't drink, you're dissing me, Big Guy." Then he pointed at his own face with his thumb.
Di Zhen sized this guy up carefully. Though he was thin, he was wiry. He had scars on his body and calluses on his hands, looking arrogant. Did he call himself "Big Guy" because he was ex - military? Even so, he was just a slippery old soldier!
"If you want to work here, you have to drink this cup of tea," the burly man chimed in, eager to see a good show.
"This... This ain't right... Boss Mu ain't back yet... Let's wait till after the interview," Geng Hao said.
"Shut up!" the guy with dead fish eyes glared at him, then turned his eyes to Di Zhen. "Drink it or not?"
"What a warm way of hospitality here!"
Di Zhen tapped the table lightly, picked up the cup, slowly raised it to his lips, and suddenly gulped it down.
After putting the cup down, it was empty, but the smell of urine still lingered.
The guy with dead fish eyes slapped his thigh and burst into laughter. "Good man! I'm real impressed!" Suddenly, he noticed Geng Hao and the burly man looking at him strangely, and then he smelled the stench of urine in his mouth.
He exhaled into his palm and sniffed. The strong smell of urine made the guy with dead fish eyes stand up in shock. "Why is it in my mouth! What kind of sorcery did you use!?"
Di Zhen said calmly, "I drank it. The tea is good. It's 37 degrees. Just the right temperature!"
"Ugh!" The guy with dead fish eyes rushed to the restroom and vomited frantically.
Actually, after Di Zhen tapped the table just now, he covered the teacup with his hand, stared into the guy with dead fish eyes' eyes, and said, "Do you believe I can drink this whole cup of tea with my palm?"
"Nonsense. I don't believe it!"
"Watch closely!"
Di Zhen slightly tilted the teacup and slowly moved his hand away, exposing a section of the cup wall. The guy with dead fish eyes was concentrating on his palm. Unexpectedly, Di Zhen suddenly slapped him on the neck and growled in a deep voice, "Sleep, friend!"
"What are you doing..."
"Go to sleep!"
The guy with dead fish eyes even struggled a bit, but finally fell into hypnosis.
Then Di Zhen picked up the teacup and said to the guy with dead fish eyes, "You're very thirsty now. This is a refreshing and sweet drink!"
The guy with dead fish eyes woodenly reached out his hand, picked up the teacup, and gulped it down. After finishing, he even licked his lips, as if still unsatisfied.
Geng Hao and the burly man beside them were stunned. Di Zhen asked them, "Can you keep it a secret?"
Geng Hao was on Di Zhen's side, so there was no need to say. The burly man was just there to watch the fun. He didn't care whose it was. He clapped his hands and praised, "Kid, you're really good! Does he know nothing now?"
Di Zhen put his finger in front of his lips to signal silence. Then he took the teacup from the guy with dead fish eyes' hand and said, "You'll wake up when you hear me tap the table, and you'll forget what happened between my first and second taps on the table!"
Then he tapped the table lightly. The guy with dead fish eyes woke up with a start and saw Di Zhen leisurely picking up the teacup and "gulping it down", completely unaware that he had got what he deserved...