Before I turned twenty-five, I never believed in fate.
Even to this day, I don't buy into the concept of destiny. I've always felt that a man's path lies beneath his own feet.
We can't choose how we live, but we can choose how we die.
But looking back now at those twenty-odd years, I suddenly realize that some things truly seem ordained by Heaven. A shift of just a hair's breadth can lead to a vastly different outcome.
Wang Hai was running ahead, and I was chasing behind. People in the train station scattered in panic. In those days, the train stations in small county towns on the southwestern border didn't have armed police patrolling on guard.
So, holding a triangular scraper, I moved as if entering an uninhabited land. Forget about good Samaritans stepping up to help; no one even dared to spare me a second glance.
Wang Hai ran for his life, but he was injured. Not only had I severed the tendon in his right hand two days ago, but he had also taken several chops to the body back then.
In less than a minute, I caught up with him, grabbed him by the back of his collar, and yanked him into my arms.
Wang Hai's right hand was useless, and his left hand didn't have much strength. Even though he reached back to pry at my hand gripping his collar, it was just a futile struggle.
I raised the triangular scraper in my hand, aiming to stab it into Wang Hai's upper body.
Then, something ordained by Heaven happened.
A seven or eight-year-old kid—perhaps scared because everyone around him was running—lost his wits. While everyone else ran away from me, he ran toward the direction where Wang Hai and I were brawling.
Crying and rubbing his eyes constantly, he was screaming for his mom.
I was sitting on the ground dragging Wang Hai; Wang Hai was lying on his back, my butt was on the ground, my upper body upright. Just as I raised the triangular scraper to stab down, this kid suddenly bumped my right hand holding the knife.
My nerves were strung tight, so even a light bump gave me a start, and I couldn't help but turn my head to look.
In that split second of distraction, Wang Hai, whom I had tightly gripped by the collar, burst out with the energy of a man fighting for his life. His waist arched up at an impossible angle, and he slammed his head hard against my chin.
"Chu the Second, I know it's you. I heard your voice. You want to kill me, right? Come on, come on!"
"Let's see if you can stab me to death today!"
Wang Hai was acting like a madman. He reached up with his only good hand, grabbing the woolen hat covering my face, trying to rip it off.
My chin was throbbing from his headbutt, and my vision was going a bit black.
Plus, with so many people in the station, I absolutely couldn't let him take my hat off. If someone saw my face, even if I wasn't processed by the authorities, I'd have to flee far away from home.
In my desperation, I let go of the triangular scraper with my right hand and twisted back to grab Wang Hai's hand reaching for my hat.
Wang Hai only had one hand left, after all, so he was no match for me. I subdued him in a few moves, pinning his head with my knee and twisting his left arm behind his back.
The dropped triangular scraper was a bit too far; I couldn't reach it.
Luckily, I still had a dagger on me.
I pulled the dagger from my waist with my left hand. Wang Hai's face was pressed against the ground, his legs kicking wildly, but no matter how he struggled, he couldn't get up.
"Ah! Ah! Chu the Second, I'm going to kill your whole family! You just wait!"
Looking at Wang Hai acting like a mad dog, I didn't feel a shred of sympathy. I stabbed the knife right into his waist.
I thought this one stab would end him, but Wang Hai, after taking the blade, struggled even harder, like he was on stimulants.
He almost bucked me off his back. Anxious and ignoring everything else, I stabbed blindly at his waist, landing a total of four strikes.
Blood flowed all over the ground, yet those four stabs didn't take his life.
I started to panic. Is killing really this hard?
"Wang Hai, you bastard (zazhong), are you part turtle (wangba)? How are you so tough? You're still not dead after all that?"
This was my first time stabbing someone, and I had zero experience. If I held the triangular scraper I had earlier, one strike would have absolutely claimed Wang Hai's life.
But I was using a small dagger—God knows where my dad got it—that didn't even have a blood groove. I didn't know that after stabbing, you need to twist the blade to maximize the damage.
So, despite several consecutive stabs, I hadn't caused lethal damage to Wang Hai.
Wang Hai was still struggling, and I was furious. "Motherfucker (Cao ni ma), always talking about killing my whole family. I'll slit your throat and see how you kill my family then!"
Pressing down on Wang Hai's left arm with my knee, I grabbed his hair and yanked his head back.
The dagger moved toward his throat. If I couldn't stab you to death, I'd just drain you right here.
Just as my dagger extended halfway, someone hooked my shoulder from behind.
"Stop it, Number Two, you can't do anymore. The cops (bukuai) are here."
It was Mustache Yang's voice. He was wearing the same woolen hat as me, covering his mouth and nose, standing next to a blood-soaked Xu Rang.
Xu Rang picked up the triangular scraper, and then, together with Mustache Yang, they dragged and pulled me toward the exit to escape.
We had just left when a group of cops rushed in with guns drawn.
"Stand still! Stand still!"
"Don't move! Or we'll shoot!"
Hearing that voice, I didn't need Xu Rang and Mustache Yang to drag me; I swung my arms and ran on my own.
At the exit, Chen Qiang was wearing a felt hat, sitting in the driver's seat with the door already open. After the three of us rushed into the car, Chen Qiang stepped on the gas, and the car flew out like an arrow from a string.
...
I still remember the scene of stabbing Wang Hai at the train station clearly. I have returned to that small train station in my dreams countless times in the dead of night.
In the dream, I stood to the side like a bystander, watching my younger self brawling with the one-handed Wang Hai.
I thought, what if I hadn't been bumped by that kid? What if I hadn't let go of that triangular scraper? What if I had slit Wang Hai's throat before running away? What if...
If so, would the fates of many people have changed because of it?
If I hadn't let go of the triangular scraper and stabbed Wang Hai to death with one blow, I would have a blood debt. Even three stints in prison wouldn't clear it; I'd be looking at a suspended death sentence at minimum right now.
But if I had stabbed him to death, then in 1999, he wouldn't have made his powerful return from Southern Yunnan, leaving all those vivid, living people forever in 1999.
That year, Wang Hai and Old Fish returned with a vengeance. Xu Rang fled to Yangcheng, Old Wolf got out of prison, Xu Feilin's brother-in-law had his hamstring cut by me, and I was on the brink of a complete break with Chen Qiang.
That year, I was surrounded by enemies on all sides—it was truly a situation of certain death.
It was also in that year that I committed my first gun crime in Liuxiang Town, completely parted ways with Chen Qiang, and switched to follow Xu Muye.
The fuse for all of this seemed to be that I didn't cleanly finish off Wang Hai at the train station.
All of this felt as if it were ordained by Heaven.