A group of people carried Long Wu onto the vehicle, then scurried away looking defeated.

The ones who didn't get on the vehicles also fled quickly, a couple hundred people vanished in the blink of an eye. Zhou Kai and the others were baffled.

"Damn it, what the hell do they want?" Zhou Kai asked with exasperation.

"Who knows?" Li Qiang responded with a wry smile.

"Gou Dan, you little shit, you've done a good deed." Beside him, Liu Cheng laughed heartily.

"I... I didn't kill anyone, did I?" Gou Dan was somewhat scared.

"What's there to be scared of?" Liu Cheng slapped Gou Dan's shoulder and said, "Who among us isn't risking their necks? If Long Wu is dead, then he got what he deserved. No one to blame."

"Heh heh..." Gou Dan chuckled dryly.

By the time the police arrived at the scene, both parties had already disappeared without a trace. Leading the police was Chen Jianjun and others; their response time wasn't fast considering it was nighttime and gathering police forces took a while. So by the time they arrived, both sides had left, leaving only a pool of blood on the ground.

Long Wu was taken to the hospital, and after a thorough examination, there was no serious harm. The thrown knife had only pierced his chest, barely hurting the flesh. After a suturing surgery, he was fine with no problems at all. Long Wu was sweating cold bullets; he had thought the knife had hit his heart. It was a good thing there was no serious harm; otherwise, he would have been done for.

"Motherf****r, truly damn unlucky." Long Wu cursed through his teeth.

"Big Brother, we can't just let this slide, right?" one of the underlings asked.

"No way," Long Wu clenched his teeth: "We've already come this far, we can't back down. In a few days, I'm going to negotiate with Lin Chuan. He must return the transportation market territory to us, that place is a gold mine."

"Right," the underlings nodded in agreement.

Having heard about Long Wu's misadventure at Haiqing Pool last night, Dongbei Hu looked down on him.

"A bunch of losers," the big-bearded man sneered.

"Exactly!" Dongbei Hu nodded, "With Feng Taibao gone, what can Long Wu amount to? He thinks just by gathering a bunch of people, he can stay firm, not realizing that his stability is solely due to the equilibrium between the Tiger Gang and Lin Chuan. Otherwise, with Long Wu's abilities? He would have been wiped out long ago."

"Big Brother, how about we just get rid of Long Wu." The big-bearded man frowned and said, "Having such a jester in Jiangbei City is really an eyesore."

"No!" Dongbei Hu shook his head and said, "Keep him around!"

"Why?" the big-bearded man inquired.

"Third Brother, you say," Dongbei Hu smiled as he looked at Qiu Wuming.

Qiu Wuming smiled and said, "Big Brother's intention is nothing more than to let Long Wu cause trouble for Lin Chuan. Even if he can't pose any real threat to Lin Chuan, he can at least be a thorn in his side."

"Haha, you know me well, Third Brother!" Dongbei Hu burst into loud laughter.

As for last night's incident, Lin Chuan didn't take it to heart at all.

"Relax, that guy Long Wu can't stir up any real trouble," Lin Chuan stated.

"Having this guy around, sooner or later, he'll cause trouble," Zhou Kai said with dissatisfaction, "Brother Chuan, why not just get rid of this brat. With our strength, are we afraid of him?"

"Long Wu's gang is just a collection of riffraff, they scatter as soon as you hit them. They pose no threat," Lin Chuan smiled and then said, "Such people, just ignore them. If you really fight them, you could hurt your own strength. Why bother?"

Zhou Kai thought about it and found Lin Chuan made sense, so he nodded and said, "Alright, you make sense. To inflict a thousand damages on the enemy, you'd lose eight hundred yourself. We shouldn't stoop to deal with such vermin."

"That's right," Lin Chuan nodded, "As long as they don't threaten our interests, there's no need to bother with them."

Under Lin Chuan's guidance, Zhou Kai and the others quickly understood.

Lin Chuan drove to the City Committee.

Right at the entrance to the lounge, he could hear the noisy chatter coming from inside.

When Lin Chuan walked in, Luo Guoqing came up to greet him: "Brother, good news."

"What is it?" Lin Chuan asked curiously.

"There's going to be a raise," Luo Guoqing chuckled, "Finally, they're going to improve our benefits."

"That's great news," Lin Chuan nodded.

At that moment, Luo Guoqing continued with a sigh: "Although it's a pay raise, it's not fair."

"What do you mean?" Lin Chuan asked, puzzled.

"The Song brothers are now making over six thousand a month, while we aren't even making four thousand," Luo Guoqing said helplessly: "With this salary increase proportional to wages, they get another five hundred, and we only get two hundred. Is that fair?"

"What's the basis for this proportional standard?" Lin Chuan asked curiously.

"Who knows, it's all up to the leaders!" Luo Guoqing replied with a bitter smile, holding the pay slip in his hand, "This month, even with the raise, I only made three thousand six hundred bucks. Dammit, they're almost at seven thousand now. They work comfortably for a month, which equals us busting our butts for a month. It's so damn unfair."

At this moment, a coworker in the break room handed Lin Chuan his pay slip and said, "Lin Chuan, you've timed it right. You've been working for less than a year, and your monthly salary has increased by over two hundred."

Lin Chuan glanced down and, though his increase wasn't much, he recognized that it was fair since he hadn't been with the company long. Besides, he wasn't very proactive at work, often skipped shifts, and was regularly late or left early. However, Luo Guoqing and the others were extremely diligent, complaining little, doing more work and tasks than anyone else.

They may look like drivers on the outside, but they're almost like the logistics staff of the entire City Committee. Whenever there's an event at the City Committee, people are basically pulled from the break room to help. Whether it's moving things or running around, up and down... It's almost always Luo Guoqing and his colleagues who are called into action.

But what about the Song brothers?

Their jobs are easy. Aside from Song Ming going out for inspections, they only have to drive him to and from work. Other City Committee officials don't dare to ask the Song brothers for a ride, even if other drivers from the break room are busy at work; no one dares to boss them around.

These two guys are also often late or leave early, yet their salaries rise faster than anyone else's. Clearly, this isn't fair.

Naturally, Lin Chuan was annoyed. He spoke up and said, "Luo Guoqing, why don't you guys band together? Go ask Minister Chen for an explanation."

"That's not possible," Luo Guoqing quickly shook his head, "Unless we no longer want to have our jobs."

"But this is a legitimate demand. What's not possible about it?" Lin Chuan frowned.

"Forget it," Luo Guoqing shook his head, "The money is enough to feed the family, and we can save the year-end bonuses to buy a house for my daughter later. That's life for us."

"Yeah, who dares to go to Minister Chen, unless they don't want to get ahead?" Other people nodded in agreement.

Luo Guoqing represents the typical oppressed class in China; they clearly face injustice but don't dare to make a sound of protest. They're filled with notions of oppression and exploitation. To keep their jobs stable, they'd rather suffer some grievances.

"Damn it!" Lin Chuan exclaimed, tossing his hand in the air and heading towards Minister Chen's office.

It wasn't that Lin Chuan wasn't afraid of power and authority; it was because he could no longer stand idly by. He couldn't bear to see people like Luo Guoqing oppressed and bullied. He also couldn't stand the smugness of the Song brothers. If he didn't speak up about it today, worse abuses might happen tomorrow.

Minister Chen was drinking tea in his office.

At last year's National People's Congress meeting, it was decided to increase the salaries of municipal government staff, a policy that had finally been implemented this year. After a City Committee meeting, it was decided to increase everyone's salary proportionally.

That's easy to say, but in practice, the range of this increase can be quite broad. People like Tang Yumeng and Song Ming of such status probably don't care much about the raise. High-level leaders like Minister Chen also aren't too concerned about how much it is raised by; those who truly care about the salary increase are probably the grassroots officials and low-level, front-line staff.

Bang...

Suddenly, the door to the office was kicked open.

Minister Chen, who was sipping his tea, was startled almost into jumping by the noise, and he shouted angrily, "Who is it? Do you have a death wish?"

Lin Chuan walked in with a somber face, and when Minister Chen saw it was him, he hastily asked, "Lin Chuan, what are you doing? Are you trying to revolt?"

"Minister Chen, why is it that Song Wen and Song Wu get an increase of over five hundred while we only get two hundred?" Lin Chuan began his interrogation: "Isn't this too much of a bully? Is their work harder or more exhausting than Luo Guoqing and his colleagues? Why should they get seven thousand, while we only make a little over three thousand?"

Hearing this, Minister Chen immediately smiled: "Lin Chuan, working at the City Committee, you should accept the organization's arrangements."

"Who is the organization? Is it Song Ming?" Lin Chuan scoffed.

Bang...

Minister Chen slammed his palm on the table, his anger rising: "What nonsense. Can you speak such recklessness?"

"I don't care, either raise Luo Guoqing and their salaries to seven thousand, or drop the Song brothers' salaries to just over three thousand," Lin Chuan said disdainfully, then added: "Universal equal pay is the only way to convince everyone. If you can't be fair and just in this matter, how can you expect officials to be fair and just to the common people?"

"You!" Minister Chen frowned, gritting his teeth, "I'm not in charge of this affair. If you want everyone to have the same salary, you should go to Vice Secretary Song."

"Alright," Lin Chuan said with a cold laugh.

Watching Lin Chuan's retreating figure, a hint of a smile appeared on Minister Chen's face. In fact, he was annoyed by the Song brothers as well, and now the person who might be able to deal with them was probably Lin Chuan. With Tang Yumeng as his backing, Lin Chuan naturally had nothing to fear.

Turning around, Lin Chuan headed straight for Song Ming's office. Just as he reached the doorway, he was stopped by the secretary. Song Ming's secretary was a tall man who wouldn't let Lin Chuan anywhere near Song Ming's office.

Song Ming was in his office talking business with a few subordinates when he suddenly heard a commotion outside.

"Go see what's the matter," Song Ming instructed.

As the subordinate got up, the office door was pushed open. Lin Chuan walked in, dragging Song Ming's secretary with him.

"Vice Secretary Song, sorry to disturb you," Lin Chuan started.

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