You want to play hardball with me? You're not even worthy!

A look of pleasantly surprised relief appeared on Lin Jianguo’s face as he wept tears of joy, finally seeing a ray of hope breaking through the gloom.

Old Man Lin took a hard drag on his cigarette holder, drawing in a wisp of residual smoke from the already extinguished pouch. His face scrunched up, though the wrinkles between his brows relaxed slightly.

From the very beginning, even in the depths of despair, the father and son had one last straw to clutch at—Chen Huajiang.

With Chen Huajiang stepping forward, the two of them knew this hurdle could be cleared, but they also knew there would be no future after this.

Lin Jiayan tightly gripped Chen Huajiang’s arm, her face a complex mix of emotions—gratitude intertwined with profound sorrow.

Why was her husband, Chen Huajiang, taking on such a burden? It was all for her.

In her heart, she understood this was her husband repaying a debt of gratitude: back then, she had insisted on marrying him against all odds, and her parents and eldest brother had not stood in her way.

Such kindness was the kind that dwindled with every use, and this time would be the very last.

Lin Jiayan was grateful for Chen Huajiang’s love, yet she also loathed her father and eldest brother for repeatedly stirring up such catastrophic messes.

"Open the door," Chen Huajiang said.

Hearing this, the mother-in-law, who had been bracing herself against the door from inside, slid back the two bolts and let the people outside enter.

"Damn it, I knew there was someone inside!"

"The Lin family's girl is here too. She’s got money. If you don't pay us what you owe today, don't blame us for being rude!"

"The factory hasn't paid us our wages for half a year! If we don't get our money today, we're not leaving!"

They were a group of young workers wearing the uniforms of the match factory and carrying clubs. Their leader, in particular, wore a defiant and ferocious expression as he stared fixedly at Lin Jiayan, raking his eyes up and down her body.

Such individuals existed everywhere, commonly known as troublemakers—those adept at stirring up trouble.

Chen Huajiang had seen similar types back at the Red Flag Factory; in fact, both he and Liang Long had once belonged to that very breed.

However, his own rebelliousness had a bottom line and a conscience. He would stand up against men like Gou Weidong, never against those weaker than himself.

*Crack!*

Chen Huajiang struck him directly across the face with a hard slap.

The troublemaker who had been leering at Lin Jiayan was sent sprawling to the ground by the single blow, clutching his mouth and unable to recover his senses for a long time.

"Brother Hao!"

"Damn it! Who the hell do you think you are, hitting Wu Hao?"

"Are you looking to die?"

After a long moment, the crowd finally snapped back to reality. They hauled Wu Hao to his feet while simultaneously leveling their shovels and water pipes at Chen Huajiang.

"I am Chen Huajiang, the Lin family's son-in-law."

"This isn't a place for you to bark and holler, nor is it somewhere you can run wild."

***

Chen Huajiang swept his gaze over them and said coldly, "Damn it, you dare hit me? Get him!"

Wu Hao roared with bitter hatred, raising his shovel first and hacking it straight down toward Chen Huajiang’s head.

"No!"

"Watch out!"

"Huajiang, be careful!"

The members of the Lin family turned as pale as sheets with fright; none of them had expected the situation to escalate into violence the moment it began.

In particular, Lin Jiayan was so terrified that she buried her face in her hands, shrieking in horror.

*Bang!* Chen Huajiang, having anticipated the move, lashed out with a swift kick that sent the charging Wu Hao stumbling backward to the ground.

Without missing a beat, he grabbed a wooden chair nearby and brought it smashing down toward the young man rushing forward on his front right with a water pipe.

With a loud crack, the wooden chair shattered into pieces, and the young man’s body listed sideways before he crashed to the floor, stumbling a couple of steps.

Chen Huajiang lunged forward in a flash, grabbing Wu Hao’s hair with his left hand while using the remaining wooden leg of the chair in his right hand to press against the man's throat.

"Brother Hao, is it? You want to act tough with Chen Huajiang? Do you even have what it takes?"

Chen Huajiang stared down at him with cold, disdainful eyes, pressing the sharp wooden splinter further forward until it pierced the other's skin, drawing beads of blood to the surface.

Wu Hao was gripped by sheer terror. Looking up at the icy, ruthless gaze of Chen Huajiang before him, his heart filled with dread.

There was a profound terror in the face of life and death, and at that moment, he felt nothing but the imminent threat of mortality.

Yet, a troublemaker’s instincts still compelled him to grit his teeth and spit out, "If you've got the guts, kill me! But if you kill me, you'll be rotting in a prison cell too."

*Thwack!* Chen Huajiang did not pierce him further; instead, changing the thrust into a strike, he used the blunt back end of the wooden stick to smash into the other man's temple, instantly knocking Wu Hao out cold.

The people around them were completely dumbfounded. Everything had happened far too fast, and Chen Huajiang’s ruthlessness had stunned them into silence.

That was precisely Chen Huajiang’s intention. When dealing with such troublemakers, one must never show weakness; show weakness and they would grow arrogant, but show strength and they would crumble.

In a sense, although these men appeared to be factory workers, they were fundamentally no different from street thugs and hoodlums.

The moment they came to the Lin family's home brandishing weapons to demand money, they had never harbored any decent intentions.

Anyone with even a shred of brains and common sense could see that this was a trap set by the match factory to frame the Lin family, shifting the factory's own crisis onto the shoulders of Lin Guoshan.

Did they really think Lin Guoshan, a mere street vendor, could afford to underwrite a match factory's debts?

"You want to play hardball with me?"

Chen Huajiang said coldly, dragging Wu Hao’s leg to pull him away before he hoisted the body up and flung it outward.

"Ah! Help!"

Suspended in mid-air, Wu Hao finally broke down, shrieking in shrill despair.

***

The Lin family's apartment was on the fourth floor; a fall from this height would result in either death or severe disability.

"He's killing someone!"

"Murder!"

Wu Hao’s cronies also began to shriek in absolute terror.

*Thud—*

"Sister, Sister!"

"Daughter, my daughter!"

Inside the apartment, upon hearing the cries of "murder" from outside, Lin Jiayan could no longer bear the strain and collapsed to the floor, fainting dead away.

The household descended into utter chaos. Old Man Lin and the others panicked, some frantically pressing their thumbs into her philtrum while others fanned her to revive her.

Hearing the commotion inside, Chen Huajiang felt a pang of deep worry, yet he forced himself to suppress his anxiety for his wife.

"Scared already? With that little bit of nerve, you thought you could play games with Chen Huajiang?"

Of course, he hadn't actually thrown Wu Hao over the edge; he was still firmly gripping the man's ankle.

At that moment, holding one of Wu Hao's ankles in one hand and the bloodied wooden stake in the other, he looked down at the dangling man with utter contempt.

Wu Hao's body swayed helplessly in the open air. Having long since turned as pale as a corpse, he had even wet his pants from fright.

Faced with Chen Huajiang’s mockery, he no longer dared to utter a single word in retaliation.

Terror and fear had completely overtaken him, and he was paralyzed by the dread that Chen Huajiang might actually let go and drop him to his doom.

Suddenly, Chen Huajiang caught sight of someone standing at the entrance of the residential compound below, a cigarette dangling from his lips as he looked up at them.

The man was strikingly conspicuous, attired in a tailored suit beneath a heavy cloak, his hair slicked back with pomade, complemented by pleated trousers and polished black leather shoes.

Such an outfit would be nothing out of the ordinary in later generations, but in the present era, it was exceedingly rare.

One had to understand that in this day and age, people who wore suits were already as rare as phoenix feathers and unicorn horns, let alone someone pairing it with a black cloak and hair gel.

That kind of fashion would not spark a minor trend until around 1987, and would only become widely seen during the Lunar New Year of 1988.

That was because the movie *A Better Tomorrow* had been released domestically via videotapes in 1987, and only then did the image of characters in suits and cloaks with hairspray become socially accepted.

Yet, this was currently 1986, and *A Better Tomorrow* hadn't even been screened yet. Such attire was virtually unheard of and unaccepted within the mainland.

People from the coastal regions, or perhaps places like Taiwan—definitely not locals from Nanming City.

With just a single glance, Chen Huajiang had already made a preliminary deduction regarding the stranger's identity.