Hell's Handbook

Chapter 67: Han Mengyao

“Other matters? The company doesn’t pay you enough so you have to moonlight?” asked Tang Ning with a joyless smile.

“No, no, it’s my personal issue,” said Su Jin with a smile. “I’m going to woo your cousin.”

“Are you serious?” Tang Ning was surprised. She looked Su Jin up and down a few times, then gave him a thumbs up. “You’ve got guts! How very manly! Your self-sacrificing act of offering yourself to a tiger is admirable indeed.”

Su Jin burst out laughing. “Hey, she’s your cousin, not a tiger!”

“And it’s because she’s my cousin, I know her well. Plenty of guys have tried to woo her, but none have survived more than three days with her. You’ve spent more than a month and you still want to woo her, so it’s only natural for me to feel great admiration for you!”

“If I don’t volunteer to be tortured, then who will? So? Are you going to agree to my conditions or not?”

“Well, given your fearless attitude, I have to agree to your demands. But over the next two days, I need you to be there with the client. After that, I don’t really care about how you schedule your time.” Tang Ning made her requirements very clear and was also very supportive of Su Jin’s initiative to woo her cousin.

Since his superior had been so agreeable, Su Jin had to show his gratitude. “Don’t worry, Miss Tang. I’ll make sure the client is satisfied with our services over the next few days!”

Tang Ning said to Kevin, “Mr. Kevin, I’m sure you heard him. I hope all of you will work well together over the next few days!”

“Of course, of course. Thomas has shown great admiration for Mr. Su’s Chinese kungfu and has been pestering me to arrange for him to learn from Mr. Su. This is a wonderful opportunity for Thomas to learn from Mr. Su!” said Kevin with a laugh. Then he turned to Su Jin and said, “Mr. Su, we’ll be in your care for the next few days!”

“Of course, of course.” Before this meeting, he had knocked Thomas out while Ye Yun had threatened to slice Kevin’s arm off, so he felt a little awkward about this situation.

But Thomas rushed up to Su Jin and said excitedly, “Mr. Su, I really have tremendous respect for Chinese kungfu, so I hope that you can give me a few pointers!”

“Are you sure about that? Chinese martial arts requires one to learn how to be beaten up before you can learn how to beat others up, you know?” said Su Jin with a cheeky grin.

Thomas’ smile froze upon hearing that. He remembered how terrifying Su Jin’s punch that day was. He was an elite bodyguard who had been through war and other dangerous missions and wouldn’t have come here if not for the significance that Thor Security Services had placed on their deal with Stellar Skies.

In fact, when he had first arrived, he hadn’t thought too highly of these Asians who had a much smaller build than himself and felt that their average size made them unsuitable for becoming fighters. But Su Jin and Ye Yun had really opened his eyes to more possibilities. Not only had he suffered at the hands of Su Jin, but even his team leader, one of the top ten bodyguards of Thor Security Services, had been unable to defend himself against the seemingly frail and weak Ye Yun. After hearing about what happened between Ye Yun and Kevin after he had been knocked out, Thomas became even more determined to learn Chinese martial arts.

“Then…could you go a little lighter on me the next time?” asked Thomas a little more timidly.

Su Jin shrugged in response. Tang Ning told him that he had to meet the client the next morning, so after leaving the office, Su Jin gave Ye Yun a call to ask her out for a meal, but he couldn’t get through to her.

“Her phone’s off? Or did it run out of battery?” Su Jin scratched his head.

The next morning, Tang Ning brought Su Jin, Kevin and Thomas to a bungalow in the suburbs. It was located in the suburbs but it definitely cost a bomb. It looked about as large as the place that Kano Mai’s friend owned and Su Jin estimated that it cost a few hundred million. Besides being rich enough to afford the land, one needed the right connections to obtain such a large piece of land in S City.

After entering the bungalow, someone inside brought them to see his employers, who was the person stated in the documents, Han Mengyao. She was practicing taekwondo in an arena within the bungalow.

“Hello, Miss Han,” Tang Ning greeted Han Mengyao.

Han Mengyao wiped her perspiration away, took a sip of the water that her servant had brought and nodded at Tang Ning. “Oh, you guys are here. Please make yourselves comfortable.”

Everyone sat down and Tang Ning said, “Miss Han, this is the team of bodyguards the company has put together for you. Mr. Kevin is one of Thor Security Services’ best bodyguards and he has prior experience in protecting important political figures from various countries. Mr. Thomas is an expert in a wide variety of fighting techniques. Mr. Su Jin is Stellar Skies’ Security Services Manager and he is extremely well versed in Chinese martial arts.”

Su Jin did a double take when he heard Tang Ning announce his position as Security Services Manager. He couldn’t believe that Tang Ning had seriously given him a managerial position. He instinctively wondered if his salary was also going to increase.

“Chinese martial arts? I’ve learned that before too, but…Chinese martial arts takes too long to master and you can’t achieve much in a short time, so I turned to other forms of martial arts instead,” Han Mengyao said to Su Jin with a smile.

“That’s very true,” Su Jin nodded in agreement.

“When did you start learning martial arts?” Han Mengyao asked casually.

Su Jin paused to think of a good answer, then said with a laugh, “Oh, I was pretty young. I don’t really remember anymore.”

The Special Police and the Department of Supernatural Affairs had already done a thorough investigation on Su Jin’s background, so Han Mengyao knew everything about Su Jin. In fact, she possibly even knew him better than he knew himself.

She knew that Su Jin came from a poor family, so it was impossible for him to have learned martial arts from a young age. As the old adage goes, the poor don’t practice martial arts. Anybody who practiced martial arts had to consume large amounts of meat and other rare herbs to build up their bodies, so it was impossible for a poor person to learn martial arts.

“Well, even though I gave it up years ago, I still have great interest in learning it. I wonder if I could exchange some pointers with Mr. Su?” Han Mengyao suddenly got up and posed this question to Su Jin.

As Su Jin hesitated, Tang Ning agreed to it on his behalf. “Mr. Su, I think Miss Han is afraid that we’re not up to the job. Why don’t you show her what you’re capable of?”

Su Jin had no choice but to stand up as well. Han Mengyao stood in front of him and said, “Mr. Su, I’ve learned taekwondo, karate, kendo and Brazilian jiu-jitsu, so I’d advise you to tread with caution.”

He was surprised to hear that this woman was trained in so many techniques, but he nodded slightly and motioned to her to start sparring.

Han Mengyao took a small leap forward, twisted her body slightly and brought her right leg up in a kick towards Su Jin’s neck. After training for so long in his Hell Domain and having a superhuman body, Su Jin was very well versed in many fighting techniques now.

He was very surprised by Han Mengyao’s kick because he could tell instantly that she wasn’t here to spar with him. That kick could kill a person. Also, she was lying earlier. Not only did she know Chinese martial arts, but she was an expert in it.

Su Jin curled his toes so tightly that his shoes tore, while he took a deep breath and let out a “HA!” that pushed his chest in so hard that all the air seemed to go into his neck and make it swell up just as Han Mengyao’s foot hit it.

Bam! Su Jin remained in the same position. Han Mengyao went flying backwards instead.

Actually, even if Su Jin hadn’t done that, Han Mengyao’s kick wouldn’t have hurt him in any way. But if he didn’t do something physically obvious like that, it would make him seem impossibly superhuman, so he did it just for show.

After Han Mengyao landed, she slammed a palm against the floor, rolled over and used one arm to lock itself around Su Jin’s legs in hope of using a jiu-jitsu technique to bring him down.

But his toes were firmly curled into the ground like ten steel nails, so Han Mengyao quickly discovered that she couldn’t move him at all and brought her other fist up to punch him in the balls.

Su Jin lost his temper at this. There was definitely something very wrong with this Han Mengyao. She was definitely making fatal attack after fatal attack on purpose. On top of that, she didn’t need bodyguards if she could fight like this. Not even Kevin or Thomas was her match either.

He stretched a palm out to block Han Mengyao’s fist, then twisted his legs hard. Han Mengyao let out a yelp of pain as Su Jin’s legs hurt the very arm she tried to hurt him with first.

Tang Ning could sense something wrong with the situation and quickly tried to cool things down, “It’s just a friendly match, isn’t it? Let’s end it here!”

Su Jin remained expressionless as he relaxed his legs and pulled Han Mengyao up. He smiled and said, “It’s normal for a martial artist to be fired up at times!”

Han Mengyao let him pull her up, then smiled back and said, “You’re right, Mr. Su. I was too excited about finding a sparring partner and went overboard. I hope you won’t take it to heart.”

“Wow! That was awesome!” Thomas started clapping and cheering loudly for them. He was into muscle training and control as well, so even though he didn’t know much about Chinese martial arts, he could see that the two of them had combined technique and strength perfectly as they fought.

Han Mengyao beamed at Tang Ning and said, “Miss Tang, I am very pleased with this team you’ve brought today. I’ll count on them to take care of me.”

“I’m glad you’re pleased with them. It’s a deal then.” Tang Ning shook Han Mengyao’s hand, then said to the three men, “I will leave Miss Han to the three of you. I still need to attend to other matters in the office, so I’ll leave first.”

After Tang Ning left, Han Mengyao instructed her servants to prepare rooms for the three men, then left them, pretending that she was going to bathe.

She walked to the second story and walked into one of the rooms. Yang Tianzheng was sitting in the balcony. He had watched Su Jin and Han Mengyao’s exchange earlier.

“Shifu!” Han Mengyao stood in front of Yang Tianzheng and said respectfully, “What are your thoughts about Su Jin?”

“He’s…not an ordinary person!” said Yang Tianzheng.