Chapter 464: The Old Slow-Simmered Soup Has Boiled Dry—This Scene is Deadly |
In the curtain of rain.
"Pfft—"
A muffled, gut-wrenching sound cut through the downpour.
The sound of flesh being violently pierced by a hard object.
Ghost Claw Chen's withered, skeletal hand—as tough as iron—
slammed without any resistance into Uncle Long's chest.
Even though the entire crew knew those were silicone props and a blood pack,
at that moment, the visual impact still left everyone's minds blank.
Uncle Long's white Tang suit, already soaked through by the rain,
Five finger holes, horrifyingly vivid.
Bright red liquid spurted straight out.
The bitter smile on Uncle Long's aged face hadn't even faded yet,
before he flew backward, both feet leaving the ground with the help of wirework.
"Cough!"
Midair, Uncle Long opened his mouth,
and a thick spray of blood mist erupted, staining his graying beard red.
"Thud."
The sound of a heavy body hitting the ground.
Uncle Long didn't fall anywhere else—he landed squarely,
right in front of the trembling A Jie.
Mud and water splashed, splattering Jiang Ci's face.
A Jie, played by Jiang Ci, stared wide-eyed
at the old man before him, whose chest was a bloody mess,
with only breaths leaving and none entering.
"OLD MAN!!!"
A scream, piercing and cracked, tore through the rain curtain.
Aunt Feng had gone mad.
The heroic woman who had just unleashed the Lion's Roar shed all her glory,
turning back into a helpless old wife about to lose her husband.
She threw herself forward recklessly, even slipping and falling on the slick ground,
crawling on hands and knees to Uncle Long's side.
"Block it... block it!!"
Aunt Feng's trembling hands pressed desperately against Uncle Long's caved-in chest.
Blood oozed out between her fingers.
No matter how hard she pressed, she couldn't stop it.
Uncle Long's eyes began to glaze over.
But he didn't look at Ghost Claw Chen, the man who had killed him, nor at the devastated alley.
He struggled to roll his eyes, looking at his old wife holding him,
then at the terrified "little kid" A Jie beside him.
Uncle Long raised his hand.
That hand still had shards from the Cattail-leaf Fan embedded in it, bloodied and torn.
He wanted to touch Aunt Feng's face, or maybe pat A Jie's head, to tell the kid not to be afraid.
But when his hand reached halfway, his strength gave out.
"Old woman..."
Uncle Long's voice was so faint it was barely audible.
At this moment, according to the script,
he was supposed to say "The Red Boat will never sink" or "Fight them to the death."
But the veteran actor playing Uncle Long changed the lines at this very moment.
He looked at Aunt Feng's tear-twisted face,
and with tremendous effort, his lips twitched,
revealing a gentle, helpless smile—the kind he always wore when cooking.
"The heat... is overdone..."
Before the words faded.
That hand suspended in midair fell heavily.
It crashed into the muddy water, silent ever after.
The heat was overdone.
Meaning this dish called "the underworld" had been simmered too long, the pot boiled dry, bringing out bitterness.
Meaning that in his entire life, he had pushed himself too hard, and now it was time for his life to end.
The rain fell harder and harder.
In the middle of the alley, Ghost Claw Chen stood alone.
His black long robe was washed by the rain,
and at his feet was a puddle of blood-tinged water.
He was panting heavily, his chest heaving violently.
That fight had injured him internally too—his eardrums were ruptured, and his ears were now filled with a constant ringing.
But he felt no joy of victory.
In his murky eyes, the red light gradually receded.
Ghost Claw Chen lowered his head, looking at his still-dripping hand.
Then he looked at the distant body slowly growing cold,
and the young man lying on the ground like a dead dog.
No fun.
Really no fun.
Killing a few weaklings—what did it matter if he won?
This underworld was long gone from the one that once made his blood boil.
All that was left was a pile of rotting flesh and the stench of money.
Ghost Claw Chen slowly turned around.
He didn't spare A Jie another glance.
In his eyes, that young man curled up in the corner
didn't even qualify for a second move from him.
Killing trash like that was beneath him, dirtying his hands.
"From now on..."
Ghost Claw Chen, back to the crowd, spoke with a weary, disinterested tone.
"This alley belongs to the Tiger Gang."
With that, he waved his hand and, stepping over shattered tiles and bloody water, walked step by step into the depths of the darkness.
Jiang Wen didn't call "cut."
He stood behind the monitor, his eyes locked on one corner of the frame.
There, A Jie was there.
Everyone thought the climax of this scene was over,
even Old Zhao, the cinematographer, instinctively wanted to breathe a sigh of relief.
But Jiang Ci in the frame moved.
He knelt in the muddy water, holding Uncle Long's cooling body in his arms.
Aunt Feng had already cried herself unconscious, lying to the side.
Jiang Ci lowered his head, looking at Uncle Long's face, still carrying a smile even in death.
That face had been smiling at him just yesterday.
The overwhelming sense of loss finally shattered the last shred of A Jie's sanity.
"Ha... ha..."
Jiang Ci opened his mouth wide.
A hoarse, broken stream of air escaped his throat.
It was the sound of someone, under extreme grief, whose vocal cords were spasming, unable to cry out.
His facial muscles twitched; his features twisted together in pain, making him look ugly and fierce.
This wasn't the kind of beautiful tear-jerking moment you'd see in idol dramas.
This was the pain of having your heart ripped out and stomped into the ground.
Slowly.
The grief in Jiang Ci's eyes solidified.
His once vacant gaze, washed by the rain, gradually focused, condensing into a single pinpoint.
There was no light in that point.
Only a black hatred that could swallow everything.
Jiang Ci reached out.
His hand was steady—terrifyingly steady.
Gently, with extreme tenderness, he closed Uncle Long's eyes, which had never shut.
Then.
His hand fell into the mud.
He groped around.
He grabbed the broken Cattail-leaf Fan, already shredded by Ghost Claw Chen, now just a half-length of bamboo skeleton.
It was Uncle Long's favorite fan in life.
"Crack."
Jiang Ci's fingers tightened.
He stared at the direction where Ghost Claw Chen had disappeared.
At that moment, A Jie died.
That young lion-dance boy who wanted to be a hero had his innocence completely extinguished in this bloody rain that night.
The camera slowly pulled back,
giving a wide-angle shot.
In the bitter wind and rain, the ground was a mess.
The young man knelt beside the corpse, clutching the bloodstained broken fan.
Until Ghost Claw Chen's figure completely disappeared at the edge of the frame.
Until the heavy sense of grief became suffocating.
"Cut..."
Jiang Wen's voice rang out.
Extremely low, extremely deep.
As if afraid to disturb this grand death.
This "cut" didn't bring the usual relief and cheers.
The sound technician took off his headphones, his eyes red, the back of his hand wet with tears he had wiped away.
The makeup artist covered her mouth, her shoulders heaving, not daring to make a sound.
Even Xiao Wang, the usually carefree set assistant, was now staring blankly at the scene, his boxed lunch long cold.
It hurt too much.
This scene wasn't acted out.
It was a piece of flesh forcibly carved from the heart.
"Crash..."
The word "cut" drained the last shred of Jiang Ci's soul.
His body tilted, and he collapsed limply into the muddy water.
But he still clutched the bloodstained fan skeleton tightly in his hand.
"Uncle... Uncle Long..."
Jiang Ci muttered, his eyes unfocused, his whole body still trembling.
"Hey! I'm right here! Right here!"
The "corpse" on the ground suddenly moved.
The veteran actor playing Uncle Long sat up from the mud,
yanked off the still-oozing blood pack on his chest,
and hugged the trembling Jiang Ci.
"Young man! Wake up! That was acting! The scene is over!"
The veteran actor patted Jiang Ci's back, his voice urgent and full of concern.
"It's okay, it's okay now..."
Jiang Ci looked up, dazed.
At the old man before him, rosy-cheeked and full of vigor, despite being covered in blood and filth.
"The heat... the heat..."
Jiang Ci's voice was hoarse.
"The heat was perfect!"
Uncle Long laughed heartily, rubbed Jiang Ci's wet head, his eyes full of admiration.
"In this scene, kid, your heat was simply divine!"
Jiang Ci was stunned for a full two seconds before his soul slowly returned to his body.
Behind the monitor, Jiang Wen struck a match to light a cigar.
He watched the old man and the young man embracing in the rain and exhaled a puff of blue smoke.
In that hazy smoke, the acting-fanatic director revealed a strange and satisfied smile.
"This kid..."
Jiang Wen muttered under his breath, "He's going to tear the sky apart."
He flipped to the next page of the schedule, where four bold characters blazed with murderous intent:
[UNCLE LONG'S FUNERAL]