Chapter 63.1: Those Hands Are Way Too Fast, Aren’t They?
Chen Dong was a little dumbfounded at first.
The people from Gao Family Village were getting closer and closer, and Feng Qiangdong was refusing to come over. Chen Dong was so anxious he could have died. He had even been considering firing a warning shot. Who could have expected Jiang Xia to suddenly whip the handcuffs off his belt and drag Feng Qiangdong over in restraints!
The moment he saw the man in front of him, Chen Dong immediately snapped out of it, cheering inwardly.
Beautifully done!
Now that they had brought the man over, dealing with the people from Gao Family Village would be much easier.
As for the people from Matun Village, if he and Captain Zeng forcibly handcuffed someone, the conflict would escalate immediately. But Jiang Xia was different. She was young, and she was a female police officer. Even if she did forcibly handcuff someone, there was still plenty of room to defuse the situation.
They just couldn’t let the villagers snatch the man back. If they did, all their efforts would have been wasted.
With that in mind, Chen Dong quickly took two steps to the front right, positioning himself between Feng Qiangdong and the villagers to keep the two sides apart.
He watched both sides tensely, still feeling rather fortunate.
No wonder Jiang Xia had achieved so much at such a young age. She really was quick to react and decisive enough to act. The moment she saw things going south, she grabbed the man—and she did it fast. Even the way she’d taken the handcuffs from his belt had been so quick and smooth that he hadn’t felt a thing…
Hmm? Wait. Something seemed a little off.
Chen Dong scratched his head, a hint of confusion creeping into his mind.
Was the handcuff case on his belt really that easy to remove?
Feng Qiangdong stumbled, swayed for a moment, and finally managed to regain his footing.
His mind was still in a daze.
Hadn’t he been hiding beside the village chief just a moment ago? How had he suddenly ended up handcuffed and dragged into the middle of a group of police officers?
And the one who’d dragged him over was a female officer, no less!
Feeling humiliated, Feng Qiangdong shouted as he yanked his right arm, trying to pull free. His legs even started moving as he attempted to head back.
“Hey, I haven’t broken any laws! Why are you police handcuffing me for—Ow!”
Before Feng Qiangdong could finish speaking, a sudden, excruciating pain shot through his right shoulder. He immediately let out a scream.
At a time like this, Jiang Xia wasn’t about to waste time arguing with him.
The moment she’d dragged him over, she’d switched hands, twisted his wrist behind his back, and moved directly to a position diagonally behind him.
In a pure contest of strength, Jiang Xia definitely wouldn’t be able to keep him under control. But what made humans human was their ability to wield the power of knowledge.
Thank goodness for the restraint techniques she’d learned at the police academy! And thank goodness for Uncle Shu and the other instructors’ lessons on human anatomy and practical combat. Joint locks were just too damn useful!
Twisting his arm counterclockwise, Jiang Xia barked, “Shut up! Stand still!”
As she spoke, she reached for his left arm. Taking advantage of the brief moment when the pain in his right shoulder left him unable to move, she snapped the handcuffs onto his left wrist, too.
Several villagers tightened their grips on the wooden handles of their farm tools and exchanged bewildered looks, completely at a loss about what to do.
By all rights, Dongzi had been forcibly handcuffed and dragged over by the police. He hadn’t even been involved in the grave robbing. How could they let the police get away with treating him like that? They should have immediately rushed forward and taken him back.
But the person who’d done it was a young female officer, which made things awkward.
Biological differences were a fact of life. A man hitting a woman was simply b*llying her. So, whether it was a mass brawl between families or an armed clash between villages, the unspoken rule in the countryside was that men fought men and women fought women. What kind of man would lay hands on a young woman?
They had their pride to think about, too!
And so, although the people of Matun Village were furious, they advanced toward Chen Dong in protest, voicing their displeasure without actually trying to seize Feng Qiangdong by force.
Some of the villagers even found themselves grumbling inwardly.
A single female police officer had managed to handcuff Dongzi and drag him away. What a useless piece of work!
“The police have actually handcuffed someone!”
One of the villagers even tried to pass this hot potato to the village chief. “Chief, what do you think we should do?”
What else could they do now that the people from Gao Family Village were already right in front of them? It wasn’t as if they could start fighting the police and Gao Family Village at the same time!
The village chief of Matun Village was beginning to think that it would be best to settle things peacefully, but he didn’t let it show on his face. Instead, he turned to the police officer in charge and demanded indignantly, “Look at your subordinate, Officer! She clearly doesn’t know how to follow orders! How can she just handcuff someone from our village like that? Hurry up and tell her to take the handcuffs off Dongzi and send him back!”
Well done!
Seeing how things were unfolding, Zeng Jun immediately cheered inwardly. Since the villagers hadn’t resorted to violence, he felt much more at ease. Now, faced with the village chief’s accusations, he put his talent for the art of evasive conversation to work, responding in a vague, noncommittal manner.
“Ah, yes, well, um…”
As he mumbled his agreement, his gaze had already shifted toward the people approaching from Gao Family Village. He smoothly changed the subject.
“Hey, isn’t that old man leading the group from Gao Family Village Gao Hongwu? And is someone carrying a hunting rifle?!”
By the end of his question, Zeng Jun’s voice had shot up an entire octave.
He had no time to keep arguing. Hurrying forward, he headed toward the people from Gao Family Village, shouting as he went, “Stop! All of you, stop right there!”
Jiang Xia had also gotten a clear look.
She hadn’t been mistaken earlier. Someone really was carrying a long hunting rifle!
A wave of lingering fear washed over her.
Thank goodness she’d acted quickly. Otherwise, the consequences would have been unimaginable.
“It’s over! The people from Gao Family Village are here to kill me!”
Feng Qiangdong, who had also spotted the hunting rifle, couldn’t help trying to retreat. The villagers behind him began to panic as well. Some instinctively backed away, while others shouted angrily.
“Who doesn’t have guns in their village?! I’ll go back and get mine right now!”
“Feng Qiangdong, you stay right there!”
Jiang Xia immediately held Feng Qiangdong in place. Then she shouted at the villagers who were still daring to advance, “Nobody takes another step forward!”
There were now only three or four meters between the two sides.
Four police officers in green uniforms stood right in the middle of three or four hundred people. They were like four green leaves caught in a swiftly flowing river—conspicuous yet insignificant, liable to be swept beneath the surface by the surging current at any moment if they weren’t careful.
Fortunately, the villagers of Matun Village really did stop advancing.
At that moment, Huang Xueling’s heart was pounding wildly. She was panicked and terrified, but her sense of duty kept her rooted to the spot. She didn’t flee in the face of danger. In fact, when she heard Jiang Xia’s sharp command, she even reached out and firmly restrained Feng Qiangdong herself.
She had no idea what she was supposed to do, but there was no way she could go wrong by listening to Jiang Xia!
The two of them held on to Feng Qiangdong, refusing to let him escape back to his fellow villagers.
Meanwhile, on the other side, Zeng Jun was still locked in a tense standoff with the people from Gao Family Village.
“Stop right there!”
“There’s police here!”
“Why are the police here?”
“Don’t tell me Matun called them!”
The people at the front of the Gao Family Village group had spotted the officers some time ago. They immediately jumped to conclusions and assumed the police were on Matun Village’s side. Some even began cursing directly at the officers.
“Out of the way, you lousy dogs! Get lost!”
They didn’t slow down, continuing to advance. Some had already raised their farm tools horizontally in front of themselves.
Seeing the situation grow increasingly dangerous, Zeng Jun took another two steps forward, planting himself directly in front of the villager carrying the hunting rifle.
Chen Dong stopped overthinking things, too. He promptly stepped up beside Zeng Jun, spreading his arms and using his own body as a human barricade to block the villagers.
“Everybody stop! What the hell do you think you’re doing? Do you really think the law doesn’t apply to you? If anything happens today, the city will send in the armed police and the military! Which one of you wants to find out what that’s like?!”
After delivering that stern warning, Zeng Jun immediately softened his tone and tried to reason with them.
“We police officers are here to deal with this matter. Don’t worry. Every single criminal involved in the grave robbing will be arrested!”
“We have the suspect here with us now. If it’s confirmed that Feng Qiangdong was the one who robbed the grave, the police will naturally execute him by firing squad. You can attend the public trial then, and perhaps that will bring some comfort to the old man in his grave! But if you resort to violence, that’ll make you murderers, and you’ll be the ones facing a firing squad! Do you really want your parents to have to bury their own children?!”
After a barrage of scolding and persuasion, the people at the front of the Gao Family Village group finally began to calm down a little when they saw Feng Qiangdong being firmly restrained by Jiang Xia and Huang Xueling, his hands cuffed behind his back.
The police really had arrested Feng Qiangdong!
They hadn’t come here to help Matun Village after all?
This realization put the people of Gao Family Village considerably more at ease. Those at the front gradually came to a stop, no longer pushing forward.
Meanwhile, Gao Hongwu, standing in the middle of the crowd, had tears in his eyes.
He was already nearing fifty, yet he couldn’t stop the tears from streaming down his face. Choking with emotion, he spoke up.
“Comrades from the Public Security Bureau, he dug up my parents’ graves! We have evidence! People from our village have often seen him wandering around the edge of my fields for no reason!”
“I know, I know you’re angry. But we can’t drag ourselves into trouble over this. If something happens to you, what will become of your wife and children?”
Zeng Jun continued patiently reasoning with him. “Everyone, move back! Call the village chief and the village Party secretary over. Let’s sit down and talk this through properly.”
After much coaxing and persuasion, he finally managed to get the people from Gao Family Village to retreat to a point twenty meters away, where they could wait for the time being.
Taking advantage of the opportunity, Chen Dong turned to the people from Matun Village and urged them to retreat twenty meters as well.
The two groups were now temporarily separated by a clear dividing line, like the Chu-Han boundary of old. However, they were still holding their weapons and had not surrendered their guns.
Even so, Jiang Xia and the others finally breathed a sigh of relief.
At least they’d managed to restrain the man!
As long as he was under control, it would be much harder for a fight to break out.
“Stop! Don’t fight! Whatever you do, don’t start fighting!”
Several loud shouts suddenly came from a distance. Jiang Xia looked up and spotted three police officers riding bicycles rapidly toward them.
They were probably the local patrol officers from the police station who had been searching the area. They must have rushed over as soon as they heard what was happening.
Three officers still weren’t nearly enough, but having them was better than having none.
People from both villages remained where they were, watching each other warily while selecting representatives to come forward. Taking advantage of this brief lull, Jiang Xia hurriedly questioned Feng Qiangdong.
“Feng Qiangdong, the two villages have gotten into armed clashes more than once, haven’t they? Was it because of the fights over selling vegetables in the city? Have you been stirring up trouble behind the scenes?”
Feng Qiangdong immediately jolted in fright.
They hadn’t said a single word about any of that. How had this female police officer figured it out?
Feng Qiangdong shook his head, trying to bluff his way out of it. “No! How would I know anything about that?”
Jiang Xia promptly drove her leg into the back of his knee.
“Enough!”
She said sternly, “Think you can keep trying to fool us at a time like this? Didn’t you claim you were being wronged? If you don’t explain the situation clearly now, you’ll end up taking the blame for everything!”
This police officer was way too sharp!
It’s not my fault, Feng Qiangdong grumbled inwardly. I’m just the middleman who put the pieces together. It’s those people from Gao Family Village who are arrogant, greedy, and stupid. They’re the ones who got themselves into trouble.
Feng Qiangdong stamped his feet a couple of times to ease the pain, then hurriedly tried to defend himself.
“Hasn’t the situation changed over the past few years? Our village started supplying vegetables to the city and managed to make a bit of money. They got jealous when they saw that, so they went into the city to sell vegetables, too. Fine, let them sell! But they refused to pay protection money to the vegetable boss in the city, so they got beaten up.”
“Then, instead of going after the vegetable boss and fighting back, they came looking for trouble with our village. They insisted we’d sold them out. Ha! Clearly, they’re the ones who don’t follow the rules! We haven’t even brought up the fact that they tried to steal our market stalls!”
“In short, we’ve had several fights over this already.”