These days, Chen Guoxiang felt both tense and excited, expectant and fearful, causing him two sleepless nights in a row.

This was due to various reasons.

Firstly, he still owed 700,000 in gambling debts. His ex-wife, Ni Yuhua, refused to ask Chen Feng for more loans, and he himself had nowhere to borrow from anymore. If he couldn't repay when the time came, he wouldn't be able to keep his hardware store, and he might also face various means of debt collection.

Secondly, there was the matter of Gao Xinfu. Gao Xinfu contacted him five or six days ago. Their mothers were cousins and had a good relationship, so the two had known each other since childhood, and because they were close in age, they grew up playing together.

In the second year of middle school, Gao Xinfu's father unfortunately died in a car accident, so he dropped out of school, first working in a local factory with his mother, and when he became an adult, he went to work in other places.

After Chen Guoxiang graduated from junior high, he lingered around home for two years before looking for Gao Xinfu. They both worked in an electronics factory in Shen City. A few years later, with some savings and support from their families, they went to a third-tier city in the north to open a phone store together.

At that time, their luck was quite good. The phone store business was very successful, earning them over 200,000 in the first year, and each got a share of over 100,000.

Then, like many business partners, they could share hardships but not wealth. Although they hadn't completely fallen out, they tacitly agreed not to partner up the following year and chose to run their businesses separately.

Chen Guoxiang took a step back, leaving the original store to Gao Xinfu, and went to another small county to start anew.

As a result, Chen Guoxiang was quite lucky. The next year, his phone store alone earned him over 100,000, but Gao Xinfu didn't make much profit.

After that, their contact gradually diminished, meeting mostly during the New Year when they returned to their hometown, having a drink together.

Until Chen Guoxiang got married and had children, Gao Xinfu married a beautiful woman from another place and opened a small supermarket in an urban village in Lu City.

But the good times didn't last long. When they got in touch again, Gao Xinfu had already gambled and owed over a million. His wife immediately divorced him, he sold his house and transferred the supermarket to repay the debt, and his once wealthy family fell back into poverty. His mother died in anger shortly after.

At that time, Gao Xinfu asked to borrow money from him, and of course, he didn't lend any.

Then the two basically lost contact until one day, Gao Xinfu suddenly called him, crying, saying he desperately needed tens of thousands of yuan to save his life, and if he didn't lend it to him, he would really die.

They had known each other since childhood and understood each other's personalities. Since the last time Gao Xinfu borrowed money from him to pay off his gambling debts and got nothing, their relationship had hit rock bottom, and they basically were no longer friends.

Gao Xinfu had a very strong sense of self-respect, and he wouldn't ask for help unless absolutely necessary. 𝑓𝘳𝘦𝑒𝑤𝑒𝘣𝘯ℴ𝘷𝘦𝓁.𝑐𝑜𝑚

So, unless it was a matter of life and death, Gao Xinfu wouldn't possibly ask him for money again. After hesitating for a bit, he eventually transferred 50,000 yuan to him.

At that time, he had already opened his current hardware store, business was very good, plus his wife was kind and beautiful, and his son was obedient and sensible. Life was very comfortable.

Fifty thousand yuan wasn't much to him at the time, considering their childhood friendship and that it was life-saving money, Chen Guoxiang didn't begrudge it, and he was even prepared to never get it back.

It could be said that Chen Guoxiang was quite loyal to his friend, Gao Xinfu.

Therefore, after sneaking back from Northern Myanmar, Gao Xinfu, who no longer had any family, contacted his childhood friend immediately. At that time, Chen Guoxiang had just divorced and was deeply in debt, arguably at the darkest moment of his life.

Gao Xinfu came to find him, and the two drank together in the hardware store, spoke freely, and gradually reminisced about their impulsive younger days, pouring their hearts out to each other.

In their conversation, they discovered that they were both victims set up by Ma Laoliu's gang.

Now, Chen Guoxiang was being hounded by Ma Laoliu's gang for debts, just as Gao Xinfu had experienced years ago, only much worse. They smashed his windows at night, threw firecrackers into his house, and posted large-character posters on the village bulletin board at his hometown, socially condemning him.

Worse still, they harassed his mother almost every other day until she passed away from anger, and those debt collectors were responsible for at least half of it.

Once he was even caught by a few people and hung upside down from a tree for more than two hours, nearly crippling his foot.

Finally, after his mother's death, the debt collectors somewhat quieted down.

He was still short by 300,000 at the time, and the other party, knowing he truly had no money, didn't continue with aggressive methods of collecting debt. Instead, they demanded he work hard to earn money to pay off the debt in installments, of course with interest, warning him he must pay on time, or they'd sue him in court, affect his credit, and certainly find him to make him pay.

At that time, although he had already started to despair about life, he still had a glimmer of hope, hoping his life would soon return to normal. According to their arrangement, he only needed to pay back 10,000 each month, and by paying 120,000 a year, it would be paid off in three years.

But how could an ordinary person afford to pay 10,000 a month to repay a debt? He could only go far away again, heading south like years ago when he was eighteen, returning to Shen City, entering an electronics factory again, as if caught in a cycle.