Godfather Of Champions

Thinking of the lawyer, Tang En took his phone from his pocket. He had been shutting off his phone since he left Nottingham, as he did not wish to be disturbed in Spain. Because they were on their way home, he turned it back on.

He had just turned his phone on, when he saw that he had many messages. He glanced through all the names. There was Des Walker, Kenny Burns, and Ian Bowyer. Most of them were from people he knew. Perhaps these were all just casual calls. Then Pierce Brosnan\'s name appeared. The reporter had Tang En\'s number, but had never contacted him before. Tang En continued to scroll down and saw that Walker had sent him five messages in one day.

The content of the messages was generally the same, asking where he was, explaining that there was something urgent, and for Twain to call back as soon as he saw the text.

Tang En knew that Walker was not the kind of person who would mess around with him. If he was that anxious, it might mean that something major had happened.

So, he gave Walker a call.

"Tony? Tony! Tony where are you?" He had just answered and Walker immediately came at him with the question.

"I\'m in the airport in Madrid."

"Oh, Sh*t! You\'re traveling?"

"Eh, yes. I went to Spain."

"Do you always shut down your phone when you travel?" Walker interrupted Tang En again.

"Hey, Des. What\'s going on?"

There was silence from Walker\'s side for a while, and then he sighed, "It\'s not something I should tell you over the phone. You just hurry back and find us at Forest Bar. The only thing I can tell you is that, Tony, you have a big problem to settle!"

Jude did not notice the change in Tang En\'s facial expression, as she was still playing with her Totoro toy. Tang En put his phone down and zoned out.

What kind of trouble? Serious to the extent that even Walker, who was always calm, was panicking?

Tang En brought Jude back to Branford Gardens Street in Nottingham and saw that a group of people was waiting for them. There was a white Ford car parked in front of his house with a middle-aged couple in it. The lady had a nice body with a lovely figure, and the man looked like a well-mannered, white collar type. In addition, there was a fat woman with them and a bunch of reporters all carrying cameras with excited faces. The mob was completely blocking the way from Tang En\'s small garden to his house.

Tang En stared at them. The abusive parents have found her? Fine. It would be better if this could be talked over face to face.

The woman saw Tang En and Jude, who was holding hands with him, and she became excited.

"Jude! Jude!" She shouted, walking toward her to take her hands, but Jude avoided her.

Tang En tried to protect the girl behind him and attempted to talk nicely with her parents. "Ma\'am, I think—"

He was cut off by the lady who screamed, "Give me back my daughter!"

The man came up to pull back the overly excited lady, and then he nodded politely to Tang En. "I am sorry. My wife really misses her daughter."

Tang En was kind of pissed off at the neurotic woman, but he calmed a bit with the man who seemed more reasonable. "I understand, but I think we still need to—"

Before he finished his words, the man was frowning and yelling at Jude who was behind Tang En.

"Jude Jordana! Have you had your fun? The holiday is over!"

Tang En could feel that Jude was frightened, and he said to the man disapprovingly, "Please mind your words, she is a child…"

The man did not bother about Tang En and, continuing to stare at Jude, said to her in harsh tone, "Jude, do you want me to repeat my words? Do you know how worried your mom was? As soon as we heard you were here, we came to wait for you, and we\'ve been waiting for you for days! It\'s time to come back with us, now!"

Tang En was confused by what was going on, and he turned back to look at Jude, who was hiding behind him. The girl hugged the Totoro toy in front of her, only showing her eyes, which looked at the two men with fright.

"Jude, what is he talking about?" Tang En frowned.

The girl kept silent for a while, but eventually lowered her head down. She said softly, "They\'re my parents."

"Your abusive adoptive parents?"

The man looked at Tang En, wondering what in the world he was talking about.

Jude shook her head. "They are my biological parents. Sorry, Uncle Tony. I lied to you. There are no cruel adoptive parents. My dad and mom wanted me to train as a model during vacation, but I didn\'t want to. I hate the boring training and the vicious trainer! So I just told them that I came to England to visit my Auntie, and then I came here…"

Tang En closed his eyes and shook his head. He actually got conned by this little girl! Do my instincts and better judgment drop when faced with cute children? He opened his eyes and saw the fat old woman approaching him. And this is the Auntie Ryan that Jude spoke of? God… I even imagined living with her!

The man pulled Jude away from Tang En and said, "I am thankful to you for caring for Jude all this time. We\'re sorry about the trouble she caused you. Thank you." He said the words with very little heart and then took Jude to the car.

The door closed. Tang En saw Jude look back at him, and then she was hugged tightly by her weeping mom.

The old woman came up to him and shouted angrily, "You better have a good lawyer! You can expect a court summons soon!" After spewing the harsh words, the old woman also went to the car, which sank down when she got in inside.

When she was yelling at Tang En, all the reporters were taking pictures as if they had finally obtained some valuable news. However, Tang En was in no mood to bother about the old woman\'s threats and reporters\' harassment. He was stunned and just blankly watched the car drive off. In the car, Jude sat in between her parents with her head lowered and did not turn back.

The large stuffed Totoro toy had been left on the road, and its white fur had some dust on it, which made it seem dirty.

Tang En bent down, picked it up, and dusted it off softly. After that, he sighed while looking at this poor creature with round eyes and its mouth opened, yet unable to talk.

He then turned and looked at the frenzied media reporters. Unexpectedly, he did not throw any harsh language at them and only walked back to his house with his luggage.

The holiday is over, isn\'t it?

Although Tang En did not really feel like it, he still went to Burns\' Forest Bar to meet Walker. For him, losing Jude and possibly getting a court summons was too much trouble. What else could be more serious than that?

But Walker had news that would shock Tang En out of his muddleheaded state.

"Tony, we heard about Jude. But I advise you to put that out of your mind because you have bigger trouble." Walker put a few Nottingham local newspapers on the table and told Tang En to read.

--Nottingham Forest receives financial support from America!

--Nigel Doughty has officially retired, and his son Edward Doughty is going to replace him as the new chairman of Nottingham Forest

--New chairman, new manager

Below this news was a picture of two people. Tang En recognized the one on the left as Edward Doughty. The one on the right, who was shaking hands with Edward and grinning from ear to ear, he did not recognize.

"Who is he?" Tang En pointed at the photo and asked.

Walker answered, "Stan Collymore. The new head manager of Forest."

Tang En looked at Walker unbelievably, his eyes widening with the growing anger and shock. Walker looked away and said softly, "Edward said he wanted to contact you, but your phone was off. The League matches are going to start on the 9th of August and it\'s already the end of June. He said that the team needed to confirm the head manager as soon as possible."

"So my manager\'s title is f*cking useless now?!" Tang En shouted. Too many awful things had happened in one day, and he could no longer suppress the anger in his heart.

Burns put his hand on Tang En\'s shoulder. "Calm down, Tony."

"How can you ask me to calm down, Kenny? When the team was handed over to me, what was the situation? We made it to the playoffs, and now he wants to replace me! What do you—"

"Tony!" Burns raised his voice and tightened his grip on Tang En\'s shoulder. "You\'re forgetting… the word \'substitute\' has always been in front of your title!"

Tang En was stunned to hear this. Burns was right. He was just a substitute manager. Though he had done so much for the team, and Nigel had said that he would fully support him, there had been no contract made that removed the "substitute" from his title. What gave him the illusion that he was already the real manager?

Walker continued to explain. "Tony, though Edward\'s decision is very unacceptable from an emotional standpoint, the truth is, he did not do anything wrong. The contract you signed with the club as a substitute manager was until the end of this season. Originally, Nigel had said that he wanted to have you sign a formal contract after your performance in half of the season. However, who knew that he would announce his retirement right after this season?"

Tang En collapsed in his chain and muttered to himself, "So, I must return to managing the youth team with nothing gained for my efforts? Right?"

No one answered his question. He gazed intensely at Edward Doughty and Stan Collymore on the newspaper, as if he could see through them.