"Yifei, haven't you noticed that the atmosphere around the apartment complex has been exceptionally bizarre over the past couple of days?"
Hu Yifei was humming a bright, cheerful tune as she stepped out of the elevator into the iPartment hallway, only to be immediately intercepted by Zeng Xiaoxian.
"The atmosphere? It seems entirely normal to me," Yifei replied, eyeing his shifty, anxious expression. "By the way, why haven't you left for the radio station yet?"
Looking at Zeng Xiaoxian's cowardly posture, Yifei instinctively compared him to the refined, imposing billionaire landlord she had just sparred with.
'They aren't even operating in the same species, let alone the same league,' Yifei thought, shaking her head in mild amusement.
"I am trying to discuss a serious, critical matter with you!" Zeng Xiaoxian pressed, attempting to puff out his chest—though with his distinct appearance, seriousness was a stretch even on his best days.
"Fine, fine," Yifei shrugged, leaning against the wall. "Spit it out. What on earth happened?"
"I genuinely feel like Sekiya and Youyou have run into a massive relationship wall over the past forty-eight hours!"
"Pfft! I assumed you were about to report a real disaster," Yifei waved her hand dismissively. "Youyou is Ziqiao's biological aunt. That useless bastard Ziqiao tricked Meijia into absconding with eight hundred thousand yuan of the Landlord's rent money—it's completely natural for Youyou to be stressed and depressed over her nephew's crime! And Sekiya is her boyfriend, so of course he's worrying himself sick trying to support her!"
"Admittedly... what you're saying makes a lot of sense," Zeng Xiaoxian nodded slowly, before his eyes narrowed with intense curiosity. "Wait a second. You've been wandering around like a depressed zombie for weeks over that missing money. Why are you suddenly beaming with joy today? Did Meijia and Ziqiao actually wire the cash back?"
"You wish!" Yifei tossed her long hair back with a scoff. "If those two chaotic hustlers voluntarily returned eight hundred thousand yuan today, I would wash my hair while performing a one-handed handstand!"
"Then why are you practically glowing?" Zeng Xiaoxian asked, squinting at her radiant face.
"I had a long meeting with the Landlord today, and we officially worked out a solid plan to clear the entire debt!" Knowing that trying to hide it from the apartment gossip machine was impossible, Yifei simply laid out the truth.
Zeng Xiaoxian jumped back a full step, his jaw dropping in absolute horror as he looked her up and down. "You... you didn't agree to pay off an eight-hundred-thousand-yuan debt with... that, did you?!"
"Say another word and I swear to God I will slap you into next week!"
The second Yifei caught his sleazy, suspicious gaze, her temper exploded, and her right hand instantly curled into a deadly fist.
"No! No! I was joking! Purely joking!" Zeng Xiaoxian squeaked, putting his hands up in self-defense. He knew Yifei's fierce, independent character better than anyone; she would rather punch through a brick wall than ever trade her body for financial relief.
"Get out of my sight!" Yifei rolled her eyes in exasperation. She had known all along that nothing intelligent ever came out of the radio host's mouth, yet she had still stupidly indulged his questioning.
"Hey, Yifei! Don't leave me hanging! What method did you actually come up with?" Zeng Xiaoxian pleaded, scurrying after her. If he were so easily driven away by a threat, he wouldn't hold the nickname 'Scoundrel Zeng' in the apartment complex! "Tell me, little Feifei!"
To ordinary white-collar workers in Shanghai, 800,000 yuan was an enormous fortune. Zeng Xiaoxian wasn't obsessed with money, but no one in their right mind turned down a secret for resolving a massive debt!
Yifei shot him a look of absolute disdain. "The regional UFC Women's Championship takes place in two months. The purse for reaching the top four semifinals exceeds one million yuan. If you're so desperate for cash, why don't you sign up and give it a try?"
"Ah...! I..."
Zeng Xiaoxian's voice died in his throat. Stepping into an octagon against world-class professional fighters—the mere thought made his knees turn to jelly.
"Move aside. I'm going to take a shower and sleep," Yifei swatted him away, striding into her apartment. Having finally unburdened her soul of the heavy guilt, she needed a long, uninterrupted sleep to recharge her physical energy for the upcoming UFC training regimen.
While Hu Yifei was slipping under her comfortable duvet, Gu Li was squatting in the corner of her industrial steel cage, her entire bare body trembling violently.
It was entirely unrelated to hypothermia!
Although she had been stripped completely naked and drenched in cold water, the environmental control system inside the underground holding facility maintained a precise room temperature of 26°C. While slightly chilly, it was far from freezing.
The sole reason her body was shivering violently was because her abdominal system was on the absolute verge of an explosive biological collapse!
Over ten hours had elapsed since her capture in the subway station, and Gu Li felt as though her internal organs were twisting into burning knots.
'Is anyone out there?! Please... is anyone out there?!' Gu Li wept internally in absolute despair.
When Nan Xiang had been standing over her cage earlier, Gu Li had prayed for the crazy woman to disappear. But now, trapped in total, pitch-black silence, she desperately wished someone would return.
A massive, high-intensity laser spotlight mounted to the ceiling shone directly downward, completely enveloping the steel cage in blinding white light. The sheer glare rendered it impossible for her to see anything beyond the iron bars, preventing her from determining whether she was trapped in an underground basement, a soundproof warehouse, or an industrial laboratory.
Beyond the illuminated radius of a few meters, the room was swallowed by absolute darkness. She couldn't shake the terrifying suspicion that dozens of unseen eyes were standing silently in the shadows, watching her humiliation.
"What is that former heiress doing in there?" Number Six asked, leaning closer to the high-definition monitoring screens while popping a fresh cherry into her mouth.
On the closed-circuit feed, Gu Li was desperately clutching the iron bars, her face pale and twisted in excruciating agony as her hips twitched unnaturally.
"Hmph! I had the kitchen staff heavily lace that cold steak with high-potency liquid laxatives before I threw it into her cage," Nan Xiang replied with a dark, satisfied smirk, handing a bowl of fresh fruit to Number Six. "She's been holding it in for over three hours!"
"You are truly vicious," Number Six chuckled, taking the cherries and settling into her chair.
On screen, Gu Li's psychological composure was violently fracturing. The excruciating, searing cramps ripping through her lower intestine were completely beyond her physical capacity to endure. Her refined, high-society features were contorted into a mask of pure agony.
"Come on, let's place a quick bet on how long Miss Gu can hold her bowels!" Number Seven and Number Eight called out, stepping into the monitoring suite with snacks in hand.
The domestic handlers quickly began laying down cash on the table. After all, their official duties revolved around maintaining Adrian's private collection; whenever the Young Master was away from the estate, their schedule was exceptionally relaxed.
"AAAAAAAHHHHHHH—!"
With a sharp, agonizing shriek from Gu Li that echoed through the basement, a violent torrent of liquid waste violently erupted from her rectum!
Thankfully, at the absolute last second of self-control, Gu Li's survival instincts had forced her to shift her hips through the rear iron bars of the cage, causing the vast majority of the filth to spray outward onto the concrete floor outside her enclosure.
Nevertheless, due to the sheer force of the biological explosion, a portion of the waste splashed back against the steel mesh, coating the interior floor and spraying across her bare thighs and back.
"WAAAAAAAH! WAAAAAAAH—!"
Miss Gu collapsed flat onto the floor of the cage, bursting into hysterical, soul-crushing tears.
Just two short weeks ago, she had been the undisputed, untouchable heiress of the multi-billion-yuan Gu Group—a prominent high-society socialite accustomed to pristine luxury, designer haute couture, and absolute deference from her peers. Yet in a fortnight, she had been hunted down, stripped bare, locked in an aggressive dog cage, and forced to soil herself like a wild animal.
The catastrophic contrast shattered her mind, driving her to the absolute precipice of a total mental breakdown.
In the monitoring room, Number Eight casually cracked open a sunflower seed, looking at the screen with a mild frown.
"If she gets herself covered in that much filth, won't the Young Master hold us accountable for ruining his new plaything?"