The Versatile Master Artist

The feeling of a slight corner-lifted smile is beyond words to describe, carrying a penetrative infectious power far greater than hearty laughter.

This is the heroic demeanor that can only blossom between the eyebrows of a man in the prime of his life, after accomplishing an undertaking worthy of his pride.

Dazzling and alluring, it makes people long for more.

Even later when he fell to the bottom, volunteering day after day in an orphanage, he could not erase the spirit of youth that once filled his memories.

”And that’s when the turning point of my life happened.”

Uncle Ah Lai suddenly fell silent. He stroked the newspaper on the table, the smile in his eyes gradually dissolving until only endless desolation remained.

”Three trucks.”

Uncle Ah Lai lightly extended three fingers.

”Three trucks? What do you mean?” Gu Weijing expressed some confusion.

”I was still responsible for part of the drug enforcement work at the time. My soldiers intercepted a convoy on the highway going to the harbor to load ships, wherein three trucks were filled with high-purity heroin,” Uncle Ah Lai said softly.

”Just three trucks?”

”Just three? Brother Gu, do you know how much this methamphetamine is worth?” The doorman looked at this young man from the Ivory Tower and asked with a smile.

”Tens of thousands of US dollars?”

Gu Weijing shook his head.

He had only heard of the previously expelled Brother Fu from Fitz High School, who allegedly spent several hundred dollars a week just on using psychedelic drugs.

But Gu Weijing had no concept of how much the heroin from three trucks was worth.

”When drug enforcement was the strictest in North America, high-purity heroin could be sold for over $200 per gram, four times more expensive than gold of the same weight,” Uncle Ah Lai shrugged.

”Based on my experience in drug enforcement, these three trucks of heroin are at least worth $390 million. This is just the starting price. If it is transported to the United States, it would easily fetch at least five billion dollars. In Japan or Singapore, it might sell for ten billion. If successfully transported to the drug-enforced East Xia...”

Uncle Ah Lai joked, ”Perhaps I could make it onto the list of billionaires?”

$390 million?

Even someone like Gu Weijing, who was indifferent to the concept of money, was shocked by this figure.

Indeed, war and drugs are the most profitable industries in the world.

Similarly insane, perhaps, is only the high-end art industry.

”Moreover, the convoy used for transportation was all military vehicles,” Uncle Ah Lai added lightly.

Gu Weijing fell silent.

He knew that in the chaos of Southeast Asia, anyone bold enough to use military-plated trucks to transport billions of dollars worth of heroin in Yangon must be someone of significant influence.

”Whose goods were they?”

Uncle Ah Lai quietly mentioned the name of a general, a warlord in central Myanmar who was known as a local emperor and a name familiar to everyone in Yangon.

After the ceasefire agreement, most warlords in Myanmar no longer waged war against the government forces.

In exchange, many of these warlords, still commanding loyal divisions, entered the upper echelons of the government.

They are the true wielders of power within the country.

”No wonder.”

Gu Weijing shook his head, realizing the immense pressure that would come from meddling with their goods.

”I can’t remember how many influential figures called me that day, advising me to be smart. Nor can I recall how many generals issued orders demanding I let it go.”

Uncle Ah Lai laughed and gently knocked on the table: ”The warlord’s adjutant drove to find me, with two sacks of US dollars in the trunk.”

”It wasn’t those briefcases you see in TV dramas, but actual large burlap bags used for flour, filled with bribes, all green US dollars. The adjutant said they initially prepared two million dollars, but the bag couldn’t fit all, so they temporarily brought just about one point eight seven million dollars. They asked for my leniency.”

”That great warlord even called personally, advising me to be smart and follow him, promising a generalship within five years.”

”How did you respond?”

”How could I possibly let it go, how could I possibly let it go,”

Uncle Ah Lai spoke softly, his brows gradually tightening, the veins at the corners of his eyes throbbing, his teeth clenched as if grinding a piece of hard iron.

”I was from a drug enforcement military background, and I had promised Dad... to be a good man!” he spat out harshly, his features twisted like a madman.

Gu Weijing slowly gripped his pen.

If Uncle Ah Lai had agreed to their terms, he certainly wouldn’t be in his current position today.

But if this matter had been exposed, it shouldn’t have been silent either.

Heroin worth hundreds of millions of dollars is definitely a case big enough to attract worldwide attention, one that would be tracked and reported for years.

”So I... ordered my subordinates to transport all this goods to the primitive jungle outside Yangon, pour gasoline and destroy it, and then ordered the troops to withdraw.”

Heroin can decompose at several hundred degrees, and the high temperatures of burning gasoline are enough to destroy the drugs.

The doorman’s tone became flat: ”It is said that for weeks in a radius of ten kilometers, the monkeys and birds affected by the smoke behaved particularly agitated.”

”Just like that?”

Gu Weijing felt a bit disappointed.

Seeing the fierce expression on Uncle Ah Lai’s face a moment ago, he thought he would hear some exciting story of a brave battle against a warlord.

”What else could I do?” Uncle glared at Gu Weijing.

”I didn’t let it go because I promised Dad to be a good person. I didn’t make it public because all I wanted was to live well. Sadly, I wanted to make peace... but they still wouldn’t let me go.”

The doorman gave a desolate smile.

Turning hundreds of millions of dollars worth of goods into smoke, who knows how many people that offended, Uncle Ah Lai wanted to pretend it never happened, but the warlords wouldn’t have it.

The rest of the story was cliché.

Not long after, Uncle Ah Lai was suspended and investigated, then branded with a false charge and thrown into prison. They were going to execute him, but it was only because a few old superiors desperately stood up for him that he barely managed to keep his life.

The doorman spent three years in prison, enduring all sorts of hardships. After surviving mounds of corpses and seas of blood, he ended up losing a leg in the national prison.

”Do you know what’s the darkest humor about this?”

The corners of the doorman’s mouth twisted bitterly.

”I found out after getting out of prison that six months earlier, that warlord had also been taken down in a political struggle by his rivals. Heard his entire family was fed to crocodiles, and he didn’t even live longer than me. I lost everything, but didn’t even have a revenge target.”

Uncle Ah Lai’s eyes were empty, shaking his head: ”Drug lords selling drugs, officials selling drugs. Drug lords harming people, officials harming people. Just a moment ago a ruthless butcher, shake hands with a ceasefire agreement down the line under the United Nations mediation, and they become your superiors. Brother Gu, this is the natural law of this land.”

”A good man does not live long, but a wicked man a thousand years.” Uncle Ah Lai’s tone at this moment was like that of a philosopher.

”I’ve come to understand, the rich and powerful, there isn’t any good thing among them, is there? Brother Gu, being able to study art at an international school, you rolled out from a pile of gold and jade, I believe your kind heart is genuine, I also like you.”

”But can you say, did your family earn their wealth that clean? The money of the wealthy here is too dirty, I don’t want to take it, so let’s not talk about hiring me.”

Uncle Ah Lai smiled, waved his hand.

Gu Weijing looked at the doorman’s neither happy nor sad vacant eyes and found himself momentarily speechless.

A great philosopher once said, during the primitive accumulation of capital, every pore dripped with filthy blood. Uncle Ah Lai might not necessarily have gained deep insights or enlightenment in ideology after experiencing such tumultuous highs and lows in life.

Gu Weijing felt his state was more akin to the worldview of post-suffering, melancholy oppression found in Ryunosuke Akutagawa’s writing.

The world seems like a Rashomon,

Man eats man, man tramples man.

Dark and chaotic, devoid of any life interest, to want to live on, a good man may also become a bad man, there is no boundary between the world and hell.

Gu Weijing captured the look in Uncle Ah Lai’s eyes at that moment, recalling Elder Cao’s insightful remark.

Looking at the sketch paper, the eyes still left blank, he suddenly came to an epiphany.