Tokyo Drift Arc (12)

Tokyo Drift Arc (12)

Zhang Heng knew that Takeda Tetsuya was hiding some kind of story. Why had he chosen to give up at the very last moment after obtaining the DK title? Why had he divorced his wife afterward, sworn never to touch a steering wheel again, and then contacted his daughter again after all these years...

An excuse like developing a gambling addiction might fool an inexperienced little girl like Ameko, but Zhang Heng had spent so many sleepless nights with the fisheries shop owner that he knew this seemingly weak-willed guy actually had stronger self-control than anyone. He bet on horse races too, but only for entertainment.

He only placed a few bets each time and stopped regardless of whether he won or lost. A real gambler could never be so rational.

Sure enough, no one who could step onto the world-class stage was an ordinary person.

To stand out among countless geniuses, both talent and hard work were indispensable. No one without self-control could ever become a top-tier driver.

But Zhang Heng had never asked Takeda Tetsuya about his past. It was not because he did not care, but because he feared he was not strong enough to handle the matter.

At the time, his driving skills had still been mediocre. He was frantically absorbing knowledge like a sponge and had yet to complete Takeda Tetsuya's hellishly difficult drift training. So Zhang Heng used a rather shameless tactic from single-player games—stalling.

Relying on his absurdly long gaming time, he deliberately avoided triggering the plot and instead buried himself in grinding levels elsewhere. He finally raised his driving skill to LV2 and completed the modifications to the L300.

Even without what happened tonight, he had planned to have a proper talk with Takeda Tetsuya soon. Though they had no formal master-disciple relationship, they had one in all but name. That dead tsundere fisheries shop owner said one thing, but his actions were honest. Zhang Heng had long been suspicious—how could someone with his current level of business have so many orders, with every destination more remote than the last?

He had secretly opened one of the foam boxes before and found that it was labeled "lobsters," but filled with pebbles.

So the supposed increase in deliveries was merely an excuse someone had used to adjust the pressure according to his progress.

...Hopefully, he was not too late.

Carrying his bow and arrows, Zhang Heng ran to the entrance of Takeda Fisheries, only to unexpectedly see Ameko. She should have been asleep in bed at this hour, yet for some reason she was here.

Ameko had taken a taxi and arrived slightly before Zhang Heng. Before the car had even fully stopped, she had rushed out. Staring at the fisheries shop already swallowed by flames, she collapsed helplessly to the ground.

Zhang Heng was about to go help her up when two tattooed men in sunglasses and black gloves suddenly rushed out of a dark blue Toyota Voxy that had been parked nearby. They grabbed Ameko from the ground and dragged her toward the car.

The girl struggled and screamed desperately. The taxi driver beside them could not bear to watch, but just as he opened his door to get out and help, a pitch-black gun barrel pointed at his head.

The driver's courage instantly vanished. He did not dare linger, hurriedly pulled his head back in, and started the car, wishing he could get as far away as possible.

The men from the Toyota Voxy were not worried that he would call the police. All they needed was two minutes to abduct their target.

But unfortunately, things often did not go as planned. The next moment, something tore through the night.

The gunman only heard a sharp whoosh before a piercing pain shot through his right hand, making him unable to hold the pistol any longer.

An arrow that had flown from nowhere pierced straight through his palm.

His companion was startled and tried to drop Ameko and flee, but Zhang Heng, hidden behind the bus stop sign, gave him no chance. He narrowed his eyes and released the taut bowstring in his hand. The second arrow struck the other man's calf.

However, their accomplices in the Toyota Voxy reacted quickly as well. From those two arrows, they immediately located Zhang Heng and swiftly moved the car to block the way.

Zhang Heng knew he had to take a risk now. He pulled the hood of his clothes over his face and sprang out from behind the sign. He kept firing arrows at the windows to stop the other side from attacking him from range while quickly seeking an angle to get behind the vehicle.

But there was still a considerable distance between him and the Toyota Voxy. By the time he had circled halfway around it, the two injured men had already knocked Ameko unconscious and, gritting through the pain, dragged her into the car.

Zhang Heng's final arrow flew in close to the car door, skimmed past the driver's seat, and finally embedded itself in the dashboard. It scared the driver into a cold sweat, but the doors swiftly shut right afterward.

The Voxy started up and sped toward the road.

At that moment, Zhang Heng was exceptionally calm. The direction he had moved in had not merely been to get to the other side of the Voxy; he had also been closing in on his L300 parked by the roadside.

Seeing that those men were about to escape, he put away his bow and arrows and leaped into his delivery truck at top speed. When he had gotten out earlier, he had been cautious enough not to lock the door, leaving the key in the ignition in case of an emergency.

Now, those little details bought him precious time.

Before starting the L300, Zhang Heng looked up at the rearview mirror again. The Voxy had already disappeared from view.

Anyone else in this situation would probably have had no choice but to give up, but not Zhang Heng. For the past nine months, he had delivered goods every night for a certain unscrupulous fisheries shop owner. He knew the surrounding area like the back of his hand, as though a 3D map existed inside his mind.

He knew there was a fork in the road roughly three hundred meters in the direction the Voxy had gone. Two seconds later, through the open window, he heard the sound of tires scraping against the road and knew that the other side had turned there.

Without wasting another second, he decisively started the engine, swung the truck around, and brought it up to 100 km/h in under four seconds. He reached the intersection in almost the blink of an eye. Zhang Heng did not slow down. With a Liftoff oversteer, the L300 carved out a stunning arc utterly at odds with its bulky body. In the next instant, it had completed the turn, and Zhang Heng shoved the gear all the way down.

The motor stripped from a supercar let out a deep roar in the darkness.

Zhang Heng reached the second intersection in only forty-five seconds, but there was still no sign of the Voxy. Without hesitation, he turned again.

This was the most difficult moment. He had started a minute and a half later than them, so for the first half of the chase, he could only rely on his own judgment. If he took the wrong turn, he would completely lose Ameko's trail.

But Zhang Heng had no other choice. He could only trust himself and trust the old friend beneath him. Ahead of the intersection was a straight stretch over three kilometers long. Unless their car was moving at an unbelievable speed, there was no reason he should not see even its taillights after making the turn. So Zhang Heng continued steering and completed a second drift. At last, from the corner of his eye, he caught sight of the Voxy turning again farther up the road.

Got you!

This time, however, Zhang Heng did not choose to continue tailing them. After the L300 had gone only five hundred meters, he turned early and charged straight into a closed coffee shop, smashing through its front glass doors and knocking over two tables. Then he burst out through the back door and plunged into a shopping mall.

?(?ω?)?Thank you all for the tips and reading-list recommendations. I've received your enthusiasm~