60 A Close Call

What's that smell!

When Yuan Ge arrived at the bottom of his flat building he smelled a faint odour of rotten cabbage.

Oh no!

He screams in his mind and immediately rushes up the stairs as fast as he could. When he reaches the security door of his flat, the smell is even more pungent and there is no doubt that it is coming from his own place. If he listens carefully, he can even hear a subtle hissing sound from inside.

Little loony must have committed suicide!

A fine sweat immediately breaks out on Yuan Ge's forehead. He meant to help him by bringing him home... but has he done a bad thing with good intentions? If this kid died in his home, just forget about continuing to be a film director. He would probably be held legally responsible if the parents decided to sue him! Yuan Ge suddenly feels that what he has done before is so immature, mainly due to his own wishful thinking. Just because of the boy's appearance and the name "Rong Qiuchen", he has let himself be carried away.

With a heavy heart and trembling hands, he unlocks the door quickly with his key.

Fortunately, he did not see the boy lying on the floor, but standing in front of the stove, trying to light the gas burner!

"WHAT THE FUCK!!! STOP! STOP! STOP! STOP IT RIGHT NOW!"

Yuan Ge rushes forward and violently yanks Rong Qiuchen away from the stove, flings him onto the sofa and points at his nose, shouting, "Are you fucking crazy! It's going to explode! You can't do that even if you want to die! From now on, just sit there. Don't move, and don't touch anything in the house!"

Hearing the sound of Yuan Ge opening the door, Rong Qiuchen's face was overflowing with heartfelt joy. However, before he could properly greet Yuan Ge, he was flung onto the sofa by him all of a sudden, and was reprimanded in such a harsh manner. He felt aggrieved and tried to explain, "Childe Yuan, it's getting late. Qiuchen just wanted to make you something to eat …"

But Yuan Ge has no time to listen to him or his grievances. Covering his nose, he first opens the cupboard door under the gas stove, turns off the main valve, scans the room to make sure no appliances have been turned on, then rushes to the door and opens it as far as it can go, followed by opening all the windows of the flat.

"Are you out of your mind?! Do you want to kill yourself that badly?! Smell the air yourself! The methane level in the kitchen must have reached 15% already!" Yuan Ge comes back into the sitting room and yelled at Qiuchen, "It was a mistake to bring you home. Thank goodness you didn't manage to light the gas burner, or we would have been blown to bits! The point is, you can kill yourself if you want to, or even get me killed and blow up my home, but think about the street we live on! Yandai Byway, what a busy street that is! With such a high methane content, if there was a fire, a small brick building like this would not be able to withstand it and would have collapsed in an instant. Look out the window and see how many people are on the street and how many shops are downstairs. If this building catches fire, there will be a big explosion if we are unlucky. Are you really crazy or are you just pretending to be crazy?"

Yuan Ge's tone hasn't softened in the slightest. He finally showed his teeth - no longer as a gentleman, but as a stern director who used to barking orders at his crew, scaring Rong Qiuchen into cowering in the corner of the sofa like a little mouse.

"Childe Yuan … I … you …"

"You what you! Luckily we're all using natural gas now, otherwise you would have succeeded in killing yourself as you wished!" Yuan Ge grunts and collapses onto the sofa, feeling exhausted. The good mood he'd just had after the audition has all but gone out of the window. He should have known this was an idiot, so what the hell was he thinking, leaving him at home alone! Yuan Ge is filled with horror of hindsight. He cannot condone Rong Qiuchen's behaviour despite his pitiful, aggrieved look, so he gets up and takes him to the nearest police station.