A Dish Best Served Cold (The Man In Rage)
Chapter 1106 Night Chat

But of course, this wind only hit the small time hooligans that hung out along the streets. The big players like Li Er and Lei San weren't going to suffer too much in the short term.

A few of their smaller businesses and gray areas of interest were affected, but it wasn't enough to harm their core business, so the impact was negligible.

The ones who were hit really hard were people like Wu Wei-Tao, who had actual power over population and its infrastructure.

Most of the world was still rather calm and peaceful, and Jiangdong was beginning to get rather lively because Ye Fan and Qiu Mu-Cheng's wedding was about to happen.

Meanwhile, Li Er was going crazy with making preparations. He had to take care of the guest list, the banquet, the decorations, the traffic control and security in Yunzhou. Everything was under his charge. This was Mr Chu's wedding and it was a very important life event. Li Er didn't dare to slack off at all.

Thankfully, his younger sister, Li Xue-Qi, had helped to share some of the burden with him.

All the preparation work finally came to an end just one day before the wedding itself.

Everything was just waiting for the next day to arrive.

It was already evening time, and Mr Chu's wedding banquet was to be held the next day.

After being super busy for the past few days, Li Er finally had the time to breathe a sigh of relief. He took a nice soak in the bathtub as he listened to an opera at the same time and allowed the warm water to wash away his fatigue.

But just after Li Er breathed that sigh of relief, a phone call came.

His expression changed.

He left the house all by himself without even bringing a bodyguard or allowing a driver to send him out. He put on his sunglasses, threw on a black jacket and disappeared into the night.

Li Er only reappeared outside an old theatre in the outskirts of Yunzhou.

This theatre had been around for several decades now.

Li Er used to watch performances here before he became successful.

This theatre had seen Li Er through his most difficult times in life.

After that, he gained the support of Ye Fan and shot to success.

But even though he had become the richest man in Yunzhou, he still loved to watch these musicals and operas.

When he had extra time, he would come here by himself to watch a performance.

"Li, you're here! The show has already started, and it's your favorite sort of opera," the boss of the theatre greeted Li Er warmly. They had obviously known each other for a long time. There was no ingratiation and no bootlicking.

They spoke to one another like real friends who shared the same interest.

"Zhang! I hope everything's been well with you," Li Er smiled in return.

Many things had changed over the years, but Zhang's attitude towards him had never changed.

He was friendly even when Li Er was still poor.

And even after Li Er had become the infamous Master Er of Yunzhou, Zhang remained as friendly as genuine as ever.

Don't worry about me, I'm sure I'll outlive you," replied Zhang jokingly.

After a short banter, Li Er walked into the theatre.

There were only a small handful of people in the audience.

The number of people on stage singing numbered even more than the people watching.

But Li Er didn't find this strange anymore. He scanned the seats, then started walking towards a man seated in a corner.

"Master Er, you're here."

The man took a while to notice that Li Er had arrived.

"Mayor Wu, you like watching such operas too?" Li Er sat down next to him.

The man Li Er met in the theatre was Wu Wei-Tao, the former mayor of Yunzhou. He was no longer in a finely tailored suit, but a simple shirt and pants. He didn't look much different from the rest of the audience in the theatre.

"I do. When I was a child, our family was very poor, so the one thing I looked forward to was watching these operas with my grandparents over the Lunar New Year. Those opera troupes only put up shows during the New Year, and after a while, I began to like these Chinese operas."

"But I don't like the way Peking opera singers sing. These Yu opera singers are more palatable. But after my grandparents passed on, I didn't watch these operas anymore. I thought such operas had already gone extinct in Yunzhou, and I really didn't expect to find one here."

"Master Er, you're really terrible. Why didn't you tell me about such a wonderful place until now?"

Wu Wei-Tao was here only because Li Er had asked to meet him here over the phone earlier.

Li Er chuckled. "You're really too far from the ground these days. You're the mayor of a city and you take care of the thousands who live in this city, but you don't know this city as well as I do. But you're right, most of the people who liked watching these operas have already passed on, and very few youngsters are interested. If I didn't continue supporting this theatre, I think the owner would have sold it at least five years ago."

Li Er spoke slowly and his voice carried a great attachment to this particular theatre.

For some reason, Li Er felt lonelier as he grew older.

He remembered going out with his friends to fish and watch operas after school.

But as time passed, the people around him kept changing.

The only few left who were close to him were Lei San, Chen Ao and a few others.

That was why Li Er had been angry and pained to watch Chen Ao betray Mr Chu, but also pleaded with Ye Fan to spare Chen Ao's life even though Li Er might have died for doing that.

The world was huge, but Li Er didn't feel like he belonged anywhere.

The only thing that seemed to belong to him was this old and rundown theatre.

Li Er didn't dare to imagine what would happen to his lonely heart if this theatre should cease to exist.

"Alright now, Mayor Wu, let's get down to business. I don't think you called me out tonight just to watch an opera, right?" Li Er suddenly asked.

Wu Wei-Tao laughed bitterly. "Don't call me Mayor Wu anymore. I've been kicked out of the civil service already."

"What?" Li Er frowned. "What happened? You mean Yanjing's side has made a move?"

Wu Wei-Tao nodded. "Didn't you know about it? Jiangdong's government is in a mess and a lot of governors have been fired because of this matter. Also, they have begun cleaning up the streets again. At the moment, only the hooligans dabbling in vices are being affected, but at the rate this is going, the investigations and arrests will eventually reach businessmen like you."

Li Er's face paled slightly.

He had been too busy with the wedding to keep tabs on what was currently happening in Jiangdong.

"I did expect this. I knew Yanjing wouldn't let this go. But I didn't expect their revenge to come so swiftly and I didn't expect you to be removed from office just like that. I only hope that the wedding tomorrow car go on smoothly."