Polluted Jianghu: 新年少鹏

From the outside, you hadn't noticed just how large the Colored Wolf Pagoda is. At the minimum, it's a city block. The first floor alone, from the sweep you and Yuexia did, once in, gives you internal galleries, a closed off theatre section, and private glass playing towers, as well as of course, a bar stocking the finest shit. Multiple ones. "Don't get drunk," Yuexia says. "Seriously."

"I wasn't," you say. "I really wasn't. You got a plan?"

She's staring at the gamblers. "I wanna play some games."

"You're gonna get bilked."

"As if you know me. What're you going to do?" Scattered across the arms of the rich and wealthy (and also fucking old) are fresh faced meat just like you. Yuexia follows your gaze. "You'll try to swap?"

"Possible."

"Good luck." With that, she rolls up her sleeves and drops into a free spot in a poker game. You scratch your cheek. It really does seem like she's constantly shit out of luck, but when the hands are shown she comes out a respectable third. You begin to suspect that she's hustled before, and you respect the hell out of that. After the second round, where the players are getting an inkling, she quits the table and goes to find another one.

Mad respect. Clearly she doesn't need your services as a thug, so you casually slip on by, picking up a discarded champagne tray as the waitress hurries over to console a furious customer who's pissed as hell that Colored Wolf doesn't accept his empty Alipay wallet. With your suit vest and burgundy shirt, you look just like a waiter. Just a couple shades off, and you're missing a name tag, but who looks at that? No one. Just refill a couple of drinks, and then when it's empty, you slip off to the double metal doors that always have a kitchen behind them.

"New face!" A shriveled up prune of a manager finds you. "Where's your badge?" Her spidery hands grab your shirt. Disengage contact. If she figures out that the make is different, your game's up.

You step back. "Sorry," you say, tone contrite. "It's hectic out there. It must have come loose somewhere."

She snorts. "Incompotent, clumsy. Get a new badge, and when this day is over, don't step into the Colored Wolf again."

Oh no. Whatever will you do. Well, this is a wrinkle, because you're gonna have to duck her, but eh. You nod, expression appropriately arranged, and exit, scene left. It's easy to find the fitting room, where you rummage around for a key card, just in case the elavator or the staircase is locked. Kicking in the lock might be simple, but obvious.

You're checking a discarded pair of pants when something metal flicks open at your neck. "Buddy. Pal." A voice, sweet as arsenic honey. "Stand up and face me."

"Oooor…"

"C'mon, you know the game."

Guess you do. The guy making the threat is a head taller than you. His face is vaguely lupin in a way you can't quite describe, but it has something to do with his canted, golden eyes. "Mr. Se?" you hazard.

"Buddy, you learn so fast." His iron fan, long as his forearm, is snapped open and lightly pressing on your jugular. "Now, you want to get up to the second floor, you're going to have to be a lot more subtle, my escort friend."

"Damn. What gave it away?"

"I'd be such a shit floor boss if I couldn't hear the very angry Ming Jian, or, ah, the snakehead, demanding to see my master." The iron fan shuts closed. "Off you go." He sniffs. "See you next time!"

You walked out back into the main plaza thoroughly cockblocked. You didn't even get a fight out of that, and it seems like everyone but you knows about you. Half out of spite you lift a fat man's wallet and buy yourself a drink at the bar. "Tough day?" the bartender asks.

"Urk. Yeah." At least the tequila and lime goes down smooth. "Goddamn. Why's it so hot in here?"

The bartender leans in. "Between you and me," he says confidentially, "players feeling hot and muggy make dumb decisions."

You raise the glass. "To the house, then." The bartender chuckles and goes off on another customer, who's a similarly- you catch yourself. That was hilarious. Now that your bruises are clear you're calling yourself handsome. The point is, he's probably in the same business you're pretending to be. You raise your glass again when he catches you. He's got long hair, and weirdly, a full forehead tattoo, some ancient bronze bas-relief of some kind of bird transferred to his forehead. "How's life?"

"Could be worse," he drinks. Some kind of fruity cocktail. "Standing around places looking pretty. Pay's shit too."

"We should unionize." He laughs. You laugh. Back to the drink. What can you do? He seems pretty confident in himself. As you're pondering this and that, another man, this time in a fresh undercut, stops by.

"We havin' a party here?"

"Fuck yeah. Bartender, give him what he wants."

The man pumps his fist. "Best day of my life. Hey, you mind if I call some friends over?"

"No, not at all. Shit. Let's make it a party." This is met with general acclaim, especially with the small pseudo boy band approaching twelve o'clock. You can swap with one of them. Plan. Set.

How are you going to get a card?
[1.1] {Pain is a Teacher} Drunken Oblivion: Get all of them drunk. Easy pickings.
[1.4] {Harmonious Society} Kowtowing: Beg one of them (to be decided) to swap with you, once you've isolated a mark.
[]- Sleight of hand: None of this talky shit. Just wait, lift a wallet, hey, presto, you're gone.

Life is good. Well, life isn't. But now, you have a cup of something hard, you have friends- well, fake colleagues- to chat with, and the room here is warm. Your suit is not stained with mud and dust, baked into a hard shell from the sun's rays. And the last thing you've eaten was actual food and not like, insect grubs. Because you fucked up on the rationing and you were three days away from the nearest town.

You blink. That was a strong memory. Honestly, you wouldn't mind that one being consigned down the mental gutter. The taste of insect lymph coats your mouth like mucus. It doesn't go away even after you drain the tequila.

"Y'all right there?" One of the escorts asks you. It was… Chang, right. Sichuan dude, had a mohawk sometime in his life, but he chopped it down and grew out the sides to look more respectable. Sad day for him, you suppose. "Drinkin' kinda heavy."

"Ain't my money," you say, raising your glass. Everyone laughed, and toasted to that. The conversation proceeds. Complaints about people you don't know, about how terrible their tailors were, and how much it cost just to rent a shithole fly by your ears. You don't have anything to add, so you don't. And neither does the man with the forehead tattoo, who winks at you every time you look at him and his frankly very impressive tattoo.

Luck's on your side. The kid Liang, who's apparently a failed idol, is flashing his fancy third floor ticket out and about, boasting about his sugar mommy. There. That's your guy. "Third floor?" Chang asks. "That's a little pricey. What're you doing here with us proles, if you got a pass?"

"Air up there too rich," Liang explains. "I feel out of place, you know."

"Man, get used to it. We're all out of place. Just learn to fake it. Ain't that right?" Everyone nods. Liang gets another drink.

"Ah, another time, fellas." He taps his very expensive leather watch. "Think that's my break. Let's meet up again."

"Shit. What time is it?" You ask, sliding off of the stool.

"Ten twenty."

"Yep, that's me up." Liang nods, and walks off into the crowd. You say your goodbyes to the lads, vaguely keeping track of Liang's presence. He's headed to the north side, where you remember that there was a bathroom there. Perfect. Things are finally headed your way.

Even the bathroom is luxurious. There's full length mahogany stalls, and a two way mirror reflecting so much light that the entire shitter room dissolves into a golden, sparkling haze. The fucking shitter. Liang's in there, using the urinal. You could… nah, punching him out of the blue is too cruel. So you go up to him and tap him on the shoulder. "Ming Jian?" Liang asks.
"What are you-?"

"Look, I need something from you."

"Shit, comrade." He sounds a bit tipsy. "You could have just asked. Y'pretty cute, anyhow." You blink. You have no idea where this is going, but you could guess from how he locks his bacardi flavoured lips with yours. There were a lot of things you were expecting but this ranked kinda low. His hands locked around your neck, and it was so hot and sweet you wish it would last forever.

But it cannot. Nothing ever does. You fished his wallet out of his pocket and traded it with the fat man's wallet. It's still got more money in cash than he will likely see in a month. "There," he breathed, "see you around, again, Ming Jian."

"Ain't ever gonna happen."

That was fucking surreal. But at least, you consider as Liang waves you goodbye, you have the card for the third floor. Bet Yuexia didn't even get that far. All black and gold, displayed under plastic. There was nothing else worth mentioning in it, just some spare fifty yuan bills.

"Fuck off, you didn't," she says when you find her after winning a cool hundred grand at a card game. "I'm about three quarters of the way there, and you just skip to the third floor? Luck really does favor idiots."

"Don't hate me, be me," you shoot back.

She shivers. "I don't wanna be an alcoholic. Okay. Go up first. I can win another three million before these suckers figure out I'm hustling them."

"Don't need a bodyguard?"

"Nah. These guys aren't even fit to be my punching bag."

You wonder if she was always like this, and you just hadn't noticed, or if she changed somewhere in between meeting you. She's a lot more cocksure, more… thuggish, that's the word. She was pretending to be Guo Jing when you met her, and now she- man, it'd be narcissistic to say she's kinda like you now. Hell, maybe she was always like this, and it's just now you've seen that phase of her.

Elevator. You step into the brass capsule and press the passcard to the panel, and hit the third floor button. No response. You hit it again. Still nothing. Third time is not the charm. The camera stares at you from a corner, a red iris calling you bitch. Fuck it, then. No one's stopping you just yet. The crowd below you crawls like ants. No sign of security, but they might be waiting for you on the second floor.

Fuck it. You're game. You flip off the camera and hit the second floor button, and the elevator goes up smooth. You were jumping from foot to foot, ready to do some real damage, when the door opens. More ostentatious lights, more of the first floor, but somehow richer. More rarefied. And most importantly, you have company.

Just one. That doesn't mean anything, and neither does the fact that she only comes up to your chest and looks younger than Yuexia mean anything too. "T-the Colored Wolf Pagod. Pagoda," she stutters her way through the greeting, in a very very sharp suit, "w-welcomes the Li Family's young P. Peng."

"Oookay," you say with some degree of hesitance. "D'you have a name?"

"I have the pleasure of being named. Iron Tower Hua Li."

This is the third thing that has iron in their epithet. Something must be in the water in this town. "Li Peng? That's my name?"

"Si F-fei extends his. Greetings to the young master. And, and invites him to e-enjoy the pleasures of the second floor."

"But not the third," you note.

She bows. "A-and I am empowered. To stop you if you try."

[1.2] {Wrathful Manifestation} Ascend to the Third: You want this to be over with. This cancer of a tower.
[1.4] {Harmonious Society} Wait for Yuexia: You're a team.

A/N: So the previous deadline was a fucking lie.