Chapter 35 — I'll Be Your Hostage

Gu Mengyao stared at the man she had pinned beneath her in disbelief. He had actually stood up for her at a moment like this? Was he not afraid of dying?

To be sure, Gu Mengyao understood that Wei Zhao had taken a great deal of her father's money, but no sum of money could be weighed against a life. No one was indifferent to his own life, and Gu Mengyao was not foolish enough to believe that Wei Zhao had risen now merely to "take a man's money and spare him his troubles."

For an instant, Wei Zhao no longer seemed so detestable to her. At the very least, he was a man of true standing. Gu Mengyao asked herself whether Zhong Yongliang would have stepped forward at such a moment. Surely he would not; perhaps he was even more frightened than she was, his head ducked low.

Hm? Why was she comparing Wei Zhao with Zhong Yongliang? Gu Mengyao shook off these impractical thoughts. This was no time to be thinking of such muddled things.

"Damn it." The bald man had not expected anyone to complicate matters. Taking a hostage was something others would flee from, yet this man in front of him was charging right in?

"Who the hell are you? Did I call for you?" The bald man frowned and glared viciously at Wei Zhao. "If you don't want to die, get out of the way."

"You need a hostage, don't you? What difference does it make who it is?" Wei Zhao shrugged. "Relax, I'll cooperate."

"Motherfucker!" The bald man flew into a rage. What was with this brat, always ruining his plans? Fury surged up in his chest, and he raised his gun and fired at Wei Zhao.

At Wei Zhao's current level of cultivation, even a shot fired at such close range could not harm him. Ever since he had begun practicing the Xuanyuan Dragon-Taming Art, his reflexes had grown extraordinarily sharp; a slight turn of his body was enough to dodge the bald man's bullet.

Yet in the very instant Wei Zhao turned aside, alarm flared in his heart. Behind him stood a young girl, and the bald man's bullet was traveling on a downward slant. If Wei Zhao dodged, the bullet would strike the girl behind him, and if it did, she would either die or be gravely wounded.

Wei Zhao gritted his teeth and twisted his body back, meeting the bullet head-on. It tore into his thigh at an angle. Pain of that intensity could no longer cause him much suffering, yet he still frowned.

Fortunately, he had positioned himself well enough: the bullet lodged in the flesh and did not shatter the bone.

"Ah!" A cry of alarm rose unbidden from the crowd, and Gu Mengyao and Shen Yushu both clapped their hands over their mouths. Wei Zhao had taken a bullet.

Yet Gu Mengyao and Shen Yushu had seen it perfectly clearly: Wei Zhao could easily have dodged that shot, but for fear of harming the girl behind him, he had taken it head-on.

At that thought, a measure of anger crept into the look Gu Mengyao cast at the girl behind Wei Zhao.

"Son of a bitch, there really are people who aren't afraid to die." The bald man was astonished. Was this brat in front of him insane?

"Boss, there are more and more cops outside..." One of the robbers ran over and whispered to the bald man.

"Damn it." The bald man cursed, then jabbed his gun at Wei Zhao's head. "Since you're so eager to be a hostage, you can come along. Ma Liu, keep an eye on this kid."

"You got it." Ma Liu drew his gun and pointed it at Wei Zhao's head. "Kid, who told you to put on airs at a time like this? Playing the hero isn't so easy."

Wei Zhao said nothing, weighing in his mind whether to make his move here or wait a while longer. Here, for one thing, the robbers were too scattered, which was not favorable for him; for another, there were far too many people around, and once any large-scale panic broke out, it would be even harder to act.

"You, girl, on your feet." The bald man had fixed his sights on Gu Mengyao and would not let her go. Once again he aimed his gun at her.

For some reason, Gu Mengyao was suddenly not as frightened as before. With a look she stopped Shen Yushu, who wanted to rise with her, and stood up resolutely.

Shen Yushu had meant to stand up together with Gu Mengyao, but Gu Mengyao's eyes told her not to come, to go back and find a way to save them. So Shen Yushu naturally would not act on impulse.

"Let's go." The bald man pressed the muzzle of his gun against Gu Mengyao's head and said.

Wei Zhao was somewhat puzzled as to why the bald man had singled out Gu Mengyao and would not let her go. Could he have taken a fancy to her looks? That was the only explanation Wei Zhao could think of, for he could find nothing else about Gu Mengyao worth the bald man's trouble.

By rights, one hostage should have been enough. In negotiations with the police, what mattered was not how many hostages you held, but whether you held any at all. Even with a single hostage in hand, the police would not act rashly.

"Listen up, all you cops outside." The bald man's subordinate, the one who had gone out earlier to shout at the police, stood in the bank's doorway and resumed shouting: "Pull back a hundred meters, all of you. And after we get in our car, don't send anyone to follow us, or we'll kill the hostages."

Outside the bank, Qiu Lingshan frowned at once when she heard the robber's words. She was naturally unwilling to retreat a hundred meters, but at the thought of the hostages still inside the bank, she had no choice but to sigh and say to her subordinates, "Fall back."

In truth, Qiu Lingshan had never been in favor of surrounding the bank so ostentatiously; it only put psychological pressure on the robbers and drove them to do something desperate. Had they surrounded and trailed them covertly, perhaps the robbers would not have chosen to take hostages at all.

But Qiu Lingshan's suggestion had been dismissed by the bureau chief as individual heroism, which left her deeply frustrated.

The bald man was quite satisfied with the police's current behavior. With his gun at Gu Mengyao's head and Ma Liu's gun at Wei Zhao's, they walked out of the bank together.

"Yaoyao!" Uncle Qing, standing beside Qiu Lingshan, suddenly caught sight of Gu Mengyao in the robber's grasp. His heart lurched and he cried out.

"Mr. Li, you know one of the hostages?" An uneasy feeling rose faintly in Qiu Lingshan's heart.

"That is Mr. Gu's daughter, Gu Mengyao..." Uncle Qing was extremely tense. Mr. Gu was away on business; if anything happened to the young lady at this juncture, his fault would be grave indeed.

"What..." Qiu Lingshan was stunned, and her anxiety deepened. How had the robbers, of all people, happened to choose Gu Pengzhan's daughter as a hostage? The very thing she feared most had come to pass.

Qiu Lingshan had no choice but to report the situation to the chief over the radio: "Reporting to the chief, one of the hostages is Gu Pengzhan's daughter, Gu Mengyao..."

The police chief was breaking out in a cold sweat as well. Hearing that the robbers had indeed chosen Gu Mengyao as a hostage, he was startled. "Be prudent. You must be prudent. Do not act rashly under any circumstances."

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