Sha Zhu's Rebirth in the Courtyard: Starting with Hitting Someone in the Head

Chapter 63 An Eye for an Eye

On Saturday afternoon, He Yuzhu, with his head covered and wearing gloves, squatted in the abandoned courtyard house in Huai Shu Lane. The courtyard wall was still relatively intact, except for a few cracks at the top. Most of the main house in the courtyard had collapsed, with broken tiles and bricks piled up all over the ground.

He squatted inside the courtyard wall and waited for about twenty minutes. His spatial perception spread out, covering a range of thirty meters that perfectly encompassed the narrow passage at the entrance of the alley.

A bicycle appeared at the edge of his senses. Wei Dong wasn't riding fast; his schoolbag was slung across his body, and the bicycle bell jingled with each bump.

He Yuzhu stood up, pushed off with his feet, and his whole body rose into the air. The hidden power of Xingyi Quan stretched from the soles of his feet to his waist and hips, and he flipped over the courtyard wall and landed in the alley.

The knees were slightly bent when it landed, making almost no sound.

The bicycle was only two steps away from him. Before the boy could even turn around, the wooden stick swung out and struck him squarely on the back of the neck. Wei Dong's body went limp and he slumped off the bicycle, his notebooks scattering all over the ground.

The bicycle lay overturned in the middle of the alley, its rear wheel still spinning freely.

He Yuzhu dragged the boy to the edge of the alley and made him sit against the wall. He looked down at the boy's right leg and chose the same spot as Yang Honglin's: the middle of the tibia.

He reached out, and a wooden stick appeared in his hand. He gritted his teeth and struck it hard. The crisp sound of bones breaking was swallowed up by a gust of wind blowing through the alley.

The boy groaned in his unconscious state, his body twitched, and his right calf caved in.

He Yuzhu crouched down, his spatial perception penetrating the area. The broken bone was fairly clean and hadn't pierced the skin. He pressed his hands against the boy's calf and slowly applied force to align the broken bone.

He took out two pieces of wooden splint and a roll of bandage from his storage space, and used them to set and immobilize the broken leg, wrapping the bandage with just the right tightness. After finishing, he straightened up and glanced at the ground; his shoe prints were imprinted in the alley.

He first used his spatial storage to collect the layer of soil with footprints in the abandoned courtyard. Then he took out a mop, cleaned the soles of the shoes, and mopped the surrounding ground several times. After cleaning up all the traces, he put the mop back into his spatial storage.

He made sure nothing was left behind, then looked at Wei Dong and said, "Kid, you're out of luck. But you also enjoyed the benefits Wang Xia brought, so you're not wronged."

After saying that, he took off his hood and gloves and strode away.

When Wei Dong was discovered by passersby, the sun was already setting.

An old man pulling a cart was passing through the alley when he saw a bicycle lying in the middle of the road and a boy sitting against the wall with a splint on his right leg. He called out to him twice but got no response, so he quickly shouted loudly.

Several nearby residents heard the noise and ran out to lift the boy onto a cart and take him to the hospital.

The nurse on duty at Hongxing Hospital recognized the boy immediately; he had spent the whole day with his parents there last week.

The nurse rushed to the third-floor ward, pushed open the door, and stood in the doorway. "Comrade Wang, something has happened to your son."

Wang Xia leaned against the pillow, drinking water from an enamel cup in her hand. The cup slipped from her fingers and fell onto the blanket.

"His leg is broken. He was just taken to the emergency room downstairs."

Wang Xia's husband pulled back the blanket. The stitches on her left leg had been removed, but the knee joint hadn't healed properly, and she gasped for breath in pain whenever she moved.

Ignoring the pain, he shuffled his left leg off the bed, the pain making him wince as he stepped on it.

Wang Xia had already gotten out of bed, but the soft tissue inside her knee was still swollen, and she couldn't bend her right leg. So she hopped on one leg toward the door, and almost fell over when she got there.

Wei Dong lay on a stretcher in the emergency room. His face was covered in dust, he had an abrasion on his forehead, and his right calf was immobilized by two wooden splints and neatly bandaged.

When Wang Xia saw the two splints, she swayed. The orthopedic doctor held up the X-ray and examined it under the light, saying it was a midshaft tibia fracture with a relatively clean fracture surface, indicating it had been broken with a blunt instrument.

After the lower leg was broken, they even put a splint on it for bone setting. The doctor said, "Could it be the work of a culprit? Was this person here to hurt someone or to save someone?"

The boy was awake, sweating profusely from the pain. Seeing his mother limping into the emergency room, his lips trembled before he could finally speak. "Mom... I didn't see who it was... they hit me from behind... I woke up in the hospital."

Wang Xia moved to her son's bedside, reached out to wipe the dust off his face, and then looked down at the splint on his leg.

The splint was neatly applied, and the bandages were just the right tightness, even better than what a nurse would do. This kid has never suffered much hardship growing up; he's never even been in a fight in the alleyways.

My right leg is broken now. Even if it heals, I'll have to stay in bed for several months. I don't know if I'll be able to walk with a limp in the future.

The person who could actually do it was him setting his bones. What kind of nonsense is this? Is it like giving a slap followed by a treat? Or does the child have no grudge against him, and he just doesn't want to cripple the child?

Wang Xia stared at the splint on her son's leg, and the face of He Yuzhu flashed before her eyes. She remembered what Director Zhang had said: Yang Honglin's leg was broken, but He Yuzhu was completely unharmed.

This man always acted with discretion. Hitting Yang Honglin was revenge, and setting his son's bones was also within reason. He didn't want the child to die, nor did he want him to be crippled for life.

He just wanted her to see that he could act, and he could also back down. He wanted her to be afraid.

Her husband, leaning on a borrowed crutch, came down from the third floor and walked to the emergency room entrance. He saw his son lying on a stretcher with his right calf immobilized by a splint, and his face turned pale with fright.

He moved to the edge of the bed, looked down at his son's splint, and asked, "Doctor, is my son's leg alright? Will he be permanently disabled?"

The orthopedic doctor said, "Don't worry, the person who set your son's bone is very skilled. It will heal in a little over two months, and he won't be disabled. This person's bone-setting skills are better than mine."

The couple breathed a sigh of relief, feeling much more at ease.

The orthopedic surgeon glanced at the X-ray again, placing his finger on the fracture line. "Look here, the fracture surface is precisely aligned without any misalignment. The person who performed the procedure is skilled. The bone setter's strength was precise, and the splint was applied just right."

He put down the film and looked at Wang Xia and her husband, "Do you know who did it?"

Wang Xia and her husband exchanged a glance but neither spoke.

Wang Xia shook her head. The orthopedic doctor didn't ask any more questions, took off his glasses to wipe them, and turned to change the dressings for other patients.

Wang Xia wiped away her tears and, leaning against the wall, moved to the public phone booth. The operator connected her to Deputy District Head Zhou's office.

As soon as Deputy District Chief Zhou picked up the receiver, Wang Xia's voice was harsh. "My son's leg was broken. He's lying in the emergency room at Hongxing Hospital now. Last time it was a threatening letter, and today my son's leg is broken. Yang Honglin's leg is broken too. Deputy District Chief Zhou, that He Yuzhu is a madman; he's taking us down one by one. If you don't step in, you'll be next."

Deputy District Head Zhou said he understood and hung up the phone.

He leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes, the words Wang Xia uttered echoing in his ears: "If you don't step in, you'll be next."

A purchasing agent from a supply and marketing cooperative, in his early twenties, broke Yang Honglin's leg, got himself completely unharmed, and even forced Yang Honglin to say thank you in public. He gave Wang Xia and her husband acupuncture in their knees, and now he's broken their son's leg.

He Yuzhu is no ordinary person; he's also quite ruthless, even targeting innocent children.

How to deal with him? He hasn't gone all out yet. There's nothing in this world that can't be discussed.