That some wolves wear the softest wool.
…
Wei Jiang walked the narrow corridor to the office with measured steps, his steps, ever heavy. Every step carried more weight than the last. The walk to the boss's quarters felt longer than usual.
The walls of the prison, once familiar and predictable, seemed to stretch and lean inward with every step, shadowed by flickering lights and muffled sounds behind steel doors. Wei Jiang walked alone, posture rigid, hands behind his back, boots echoing like a steady metronome counting down to something inevitable.
He reached the small, dimmer office that Dong Yingming had been using of late—the one closer to Yao Ziyang, further from the polished world he'd once ruled.
He wasn't a man who faltered. He never had been.
But lately… he was beginning to realize he could.
The older, unused corridors closer to the central control wing were dim and lined with peeling white paint. But at the end of the hallway, through a thick steel door with no label, sat a room that felt far more dangerous than any cell.
Dong Yingming's old office.
A quiet knock.
"Enter."
Came the voice from within. Calm. Too calm.
The door was cracked open, letting out a thin ribbon of cigarette smoke and silence. Wei Jiang opened the door and stepped inside then bowed slightly, his hands behind his back.
The office was spare and dimly lit. No personal items. Just a desk, a single lamp, a large twin size cot, an old couch and Dong Yingming. He was sat behind the old but polished desk, sleeves rolled to the forearms, cigarette burning idly between two fingers. The ashtray beside him was full.
Wei Jiang stood straight, bowing his head slightly.
Dong Yingming hunched in a chair he rarely used anymore. The office was clean, but its emptiness made it cold—like the ghost of power rather than the throne itself. Papers were stacked in perfect order. A single photograph frame was turned face-down.
"Report."
Dong Yingming said without looking up.
"Reporting in, sir. The boy is stable. His fever is steadily going down and his cough has stopped."
Dong Yingming said nothing.
Wei Jiang kept his voice even.
"I stayed with him until the late morning. Dr. Zhang left some additional medication. All other matters are calm."
Still no reply.
Wei Jiang continued to stand straight.
"No incidents occurred during the night. He ate lightly this morning. Quiet but responsive."
It was half-true.
Yao Ziyang was quiet. And responsive.
But not because he was stable.
Because he was unraveling.
And because Wei Jiang hadn't protected him.
Dong Yingming tapped ash into a tray, eyes narrowed on the glowing tip of his cigarette. He said nothing for a long stretch.
Then:
"Nothing else?"
Dong Yingming asked. His tone was mild. Almost too mild.
Wei Jiang's fingers twitched behind his back.
"No, sir."
Dong Yingming's eyes were sharp and unreadable. He tapped his cigarette against the glass edge of the ashtray again, watching the ash fall like snow.
"You're lying."
Wei Jiang didn't flinch.
"Sir?"
Dong Yingming looked up, eyes like polished sharp diamonds. Flat. Heavy.
"In that case, tell me…"
His voice was casual, but cold.
"Why did I hear from Chang Xiao that Xiao Yao was found wandering the corridor last night. Alone."
Wei Jiang's hands clenched behind his back.
Dong Yingming stood.
He moved slowly around the desk, each step unnervingly calm.
"I asked Chen Bo why you took his shift."
He said softly.
"He said nothing. Which tells me everything."
Wei Jiang's breath caught—but his expression didn't shift.
Dong Yingming didn't raise his voice.
He didn't have to.
"You let him leave the cell. You left him alone…"
He said, still in that quiet, lethal tone.
"After everything."
"I—"
Wei Jiang tried, but stopped himself. The words sounded weak even before they left his mouth.
"It wasn't intentional."
"No…"
Dong Yingming said.
"That's the problem. It never is."
He continues.
"I don't like incompetence, I don't like secrets. And I especially don't like it when the one I trusted to guard him—"
His voice dipped.
"—leaves him alone long enough for him to cry himself unconscious in a hallway."
He took each step slowly.
There was a certain grace in the way he moved, restrained violence behind every gesture. As he came around the desk, close enough for Wei Jiang to feel the heat radiating from his body, close enough to see the faint tightness in his jaw.
"You've been sloppy, Wei Jiang."
A pause.
"Twice this week. Once with Zhao Heng, now this."
Wei Jiang stood firm, but inside, the knot of shame and jealousy twisted tighter.
'He doesn't even know what it meant to hold that boy while he cried. To see him crumble thinking he'd been discarded like trash.'
Still, he didn't speak. Didn't defend himself.
Dong Yingming raised his hand.
Wei Jiang didn't flinch—but he felt the blow before it landed.
The blow came fast.
A backhand across Wei Jiang's face, hard enough to stagger him sideways.
But Wei Jiang didn't react. Didn't raise a hand to block it. He only exhaled, quietly, as if absorbing the guilt along with the pain.
A clean, hard strike to the side of the jaw. Not brutal. Not wild. Just sharp and precise. A statement.
Wei Jiang staggered slightly, then righted himself, eyes forward.
Dong Yingming's voice was low.
"You don't get to falter. Not with him."
Dong Yingming stepped closer, now nearly chest to chest with him. He said, voice low and deliberate.
"I've let things go before. But lately, I get the sense your loyalty is being… divided."
Wei Jiang's jaw clenched.
"My loyalty is to you."
"Is it?"
The question hung there.
Not yelled. Not barked.
Just… asked.
With dangerous calm.
Wei Jiang said nothing.
Dong Yingming turned his back, walking toward the window with his cigarette pinched loosely between his fingers.
"He's not like anyone I've dealt with before…"
He said suddenly.
"He doesn't have a mask. He's soft. Too soft. And if you keep projecting your need to be someone's savior onto him…"
He didn't finish.
Just flicked ash again and stared out over the concrete yard.
Wei Jiang's voice came hoarse, steady:
"Understood."
Dong Yingming stared at him for a long moment. His gaze lingered—not just on the bruise blooming along Wei's cheek, but on something deeper. A shift in him. A quiet, unwanted change.
He turned away.
"Leave."
He muttered.
"Get out before I give into the temptation to break something else."
Wei Jiang saluted with a clenched fist, bowed silently and left the office, his face stinging and his chest tight—not from the hit, but from what he didn't say. What he couldn't say.
That he did care.
The door shut behind him with a cold click.
Out in the corridor, he leaned briefly against the wall, hand pressed to his cheek. The pain was sharp—but the shame sharper. Not from the punishment. Not even from the failure.
But from what he felt.
He wanted to protect Yao Ziyang.
And that—that—was becoming more dangerous than anything the Underworld boss could do to him.
Because, somehow, Yao Ziyang had become the only thing he still wanted to protect.
…
The heavy office door clicked shut behind Wei Jiang. His footsteps fading down the hallway with a military rhythm—measured, restrained, trying too hard to sound composed.
But he didn't know he'd left an audience behind.
Dong Yingming returned to his seat, one arm draped over the armrest of his leather chair, eyes on the door for a beat too long. His fingers tapped once against the table—slow, deliberate, rhythmic. A thoughtful silence.
Behind one of the tall filing shelves, hidden in the very back of the office, darkness shifted.
Chang Xiao stepped forward from behind a tall filing cabinet, the stack of folders still tucked under his arm. He looked calm, as usual, but the set of his jaw betrayed a faint tension.
He had stood without a sound for nearly fifteen minutes, listening, as instructed. It wasn't the first time Dong Yingming had asked him to stay invisible during a conversation. It wouldn't be the last.
Dong Yingming didn't look up. He sat behind the desk, absently toying with a silver pen.
He finally looked at him, something unreadable in his gaze.
"He's losing focus."
Dong Yingming said simply.
Chang Xiao nodded.
"It shows."
Dong Yingming glared toward Chang Xiao.
"You saw it too?"
"I did…"
Chang Xiao's mouth twitched—half a smile, half a grimace.
"He's compromised."
Dong Yingming's eyes narrowed slightly.
"Not fully…"
Chang Xiao clarified.
"But close. His reports are getting vague. And tonight, he left out too many things. His eyes linger too long. His silence isn't discipline anymore—it's distraction."
Dong Yingming gave a mocking chuckle. Ridicule painted his stoney face.
"He thinks he's being subtle."
"He's not."
Chang walked toward the desk, posture easy, one hand settled behind his back while the other pressed the folders closer to his chest.
"The moment Yao Ziyang so much as shifts in bed, Wei Jiang notices. He watches him like prey—though he probably thinks he's protecting him. The lines are blurring."
Dong Yingming leaned back in his chair, exhaling slowly through his nose.
"I suspected as much."
He murmured.
"He's not stupid…"
Chang Xiao added.
"Which makes this worse. He knows better. That boy's gotten under his skin."
There was a beat of silence.
Dong Yingming didn't respond immediately.
Then:
"He's been with me for years. Loyal."
"And loyalty bends when feelings get involved..."
Chang Xiao said plainly.
"I don't think he'd betray you—not consciously. But emotionally? He's already halfway gone."
The silence between them thickened.
Then, Dong Yingming said flatly.
"Watch him."
Chang Xiao nodded once.
"Already started."
Dong Yingming pushed the pen aside and gestured to the folders. He leaned forward, resting his elbows on the desk. His fingers found the edge of one of the folders that Chang Xiao had brought and handed over. Seven files, neatly stacked, waiting.
"Keep watching him. Don't interfere unless you have to. I want to see if he slips further."
Chang Xiao dipped his head.
"Understood."
"All right, now let's talk about the dead ones."
Dong Yingming said.
Chang Xiao stepped forward and glanced at the desk, each man's name tabbed in a different color—coded by year. The photographs clipped to each one were grainy, some older than others, some already yellowing at the corners. But the faces were clear.
Dong Yingming opened the top file.
The first photo inside was already familiar—one of the men who had once been a plaything, long before Yao Ziyang. Handsome. Clean-faced. Now dead.
"Seven…"
He muttered.
"All gone."
Handsome. Soft-eyed. Beautiful, in different ways.
All dead.
"All seven…"
Chang Xiao said quietly.
"None survived. Three suicides. Four killed in fights with other inmates. Spread across five years."
Chang Xiao elaborated.
"None of them raised red flags before it happened. All separate wings. Different guards. Different years."
"Still too neat."
"Maybe…"
Chang Xiao's voice stayed level.
"Or maybe you just choose fragile men."
Dong Yingming's lips quirked—whether in amusement or bitterness, it was hard to tell.
"I don't remember any of them being quite like him."
He said quietly.
"Yao Ziyang?"
Dong Yingming's thumb hovered over the edge of Yao Ziyang's mugshot photo.
"He bleeds easier. But he clings harder."
Chang Xiao gave no opinion. But his eyes sharpened. Dong Yingming leaned back once more, resting his head against the high back of his chair.
Dong Yingming's hand moves and hovers over another photo.
"Which one was the most recent?"
Chang tapped the top folder.
"Zhou Feng. Transferred to another facility three months after you got bored. Stabbed during a laundry dispute. No known enemies. Just… bad luck."
Dong Yingming didn't speak.
He flipped through the profiles one by one. Not rushing. Not flinching. Just staring at their recorded end dates, as if reading the expiration on something once useful.
"And nothing suspicious?"
He finally asked.
"Coincidences. Nothing concrete. But seven is a pattern, not a fluke."
Dong Yingming leaned back again, gaze distant.
"And now there's Yao Ziyang. Lucky number eight."
Chang Xiao said nothing.
Dong Yingming studied the men's photos on his desk—taken months and years ago at intake. Still innocent, in that doomed way all people who first get locked up once looked.
"Make sure Wei Jiang stays in line…"
Dong Yingming said after a moment, voice low and sharp.
"Keep your eyes on all three…"
He said at last.
"Yao Ziyang. Wei Jiang. And Liu Zhihui's little toy."
His tone turned colder.
"That one's too friendly for his own good."
Chang Xiao's brow lifted slightly, but he didn't question it.
"Understood."
Chang Xiao stepped back into the shadows without another word, as silent as he'd arrived.
And Dong Yingming sat alone with the files—flipping slowly through the pages of dead men's lives, haunted by the possibility that the next one might be his little lover's file.
The moonlight bled pale across the polished floor of the old office, a soft sheen brushing over the stacks of files and cold tea left untouched.
Dong Yingming sat in his high-backed chair, elbows resting on the desk, sea blue eyes fixed on a folder he hadn't turned the page of in over ten minutes.
Seven dead men.
Not a single one had left clean.
He closed the file without looking and pushed it aside.
'This was supposed to be different.'
But it wasn't. Or maybe it was — and that difference is what frightened him most.
Chang Xiao stood quietly, not intruding, not offering words, simply present in the way only Chang Xiao could be.
Dong Yingming didn't glance up.
"I told myself keeping distance would protect him…"
Dong Yingming murmured.
"But look where that's gotten us."
Chang Xiao stepped forward, silent steps clicking softly over stone.
"You were trying to give him space. Let him recover without your shadow suffocating him."
Dong Yingming's eyes flicked up.
"And now he's collapsed. He thinks I've replaced him. He's frightened, sick, confused—and I wasn't there."
His jaw tightened. A rare show of emotion leaked through the mask he wore so well.
Chang Xiao folded his hands behind his back.
"Then don't stay away."
Dong Yingming studied him for a long moment.
"You think I should go to him?"
"I think…"
Chang Xiao said, his voice calm but sincere.
"You're already there in your head. Your feet are just slower than your heart."
Dong Yingming scoffed quietly.
"Poetic."
"It's true."
Silence fell again. Then, Dong Yingming stood. The movement was swift, not dramatic, but final in its intent. His black coat shifted behind him as he stepped around the desk.
"I won't play the ghost anymore…"
He muttered.
"Let Wei Jiang stew in his own mess."
Chang Xiao didn't question the sudden shift. He simply followed. Not as a watchdog. Not even as a subordinate.
But as someone who, more than anyone else in the organization, had known Dong Yingming the longest—and believed that even a man with bloodied hands should deserve someone warm to hold onto.
The corridor beyond the office felt colder than usual. Every step the boss took was faster than the last.
Because this time, he wasn't walking toward power or control.
He was walking toward someone he wanted—and needed—to keep.
Nothing will stop him now. Consequences be damned.