Chapter 263

The whole city was permeated with a sense of tension as if a storm were coming. On the boardwalk by the sea, a fisherman pulled hard on the fishing rod in his hand; the taut fishing line didn't know when it would snap.

Under the pitch-black sea surface, a huge terror seemed to be hidden. The moment gusts of fierce sea wind swept the waves and slapped against the reefs, it bloomed like a thunderclap!

With a boom!

The gloomy sky quickly began to rain. The few pedestrians on the road ran to nearby places where they could take shelter from the rain and stood there, looking at the dark sky.

Those who had just arrived in New Jincheng didn't seem to be used to the sudden change in weather here. One second it was still bright for ten thousand miles, and the next second, dark clouds drifted from nowhere, completely covering the entire sky.

The heavy rain carried the fishy, salty smell unique to seawater, as well as the smell of the vigorous vitality of the turn of spring and summer—a fishy smell emitted by the soil and vegetation.

"It looks like this rain won't stop for a short time."

Under the eaves by the road, someone among those taking shelter from the rain said out of boredom.

People at this time were not yet obsessed; they were not obsessed to the extent of braving the heavy rain to continue walking. Everyone would take shelter from the rain like normal people.

Ma Zi lit a cigarette. The sudden rainstorm made his cigarette seem to have been smoked by the moisture, feeling a bit damp, and the smoke was also particularly heavy.

"Don't know how long it will rain.", he said, but it was also like asking.

The old man beside him looked at him with a chuckle, as if wanting to find the shadow of his past on his young and immature face.

He didn't mind sharing his experience and insights with young people, "At least another fifteen minutes. Actually, I really like the sudden rainstorm. This will make us all stand here and rest for a while, wait for a while."

"Life is very interesting. We are all chasing, but we don't know what we are chasing."

"Sometimes stopping, standing for a while, thinking for a while, when we set off again, will make us walk faster."

The others looked toward him. The old man was satisfied; this was what he liked.

Boys and girls in their youth like love, and in their prime, they are obsessed with money. Only when they reach middle and old age will they realize the value of health.

After they are completely old, one night, they will suddenly realize, I am fucking old!

This is very cruel.

But cruelty does not mean that life is only left with darkness. Passing on his experience and life history is what he considers a meaningful thing.

Ma Zi nodded with a smile, "How do you distinguish that it will take fifteen minutes to dissipate?"

The others were also very curious. The old man said with a smile, "When you have lived here for sixty years and watched perhaps thousands of such rains, you will be able to be like me, knowing everything like the back of your hand."

Perhaps it was the old man's chat that dissipated the sense of strangeness among the people taking shelter from the rain. They also began to chat, talking about the recent arrests of smuggled alcohol by the Hazardous Materials Bureau everywhere.

It had been a week since the Lucky House was closed down. Although it had already started business again, those who had lived here for a long time knew that things had just begun.

The locals became a bit uneasy, while the outsiders couldn't feel this.

They talked about many things and also talked about the upcoming dock workers' union competition. It was probably this; it was said that it would be very lively, and people were not forbidden to go and watch.

Ma Zi was smoking on the side, listening to them talk about these things, and for no reason, he suddenly felt a sense of relief.

His undercover life during this period had not been easy. He was very, very careful every day, fearing that he would reveal some flaws and bring about a fatal disaster.

However... he felt that these people were very stupid. Those people in the Lanse family still hadn't discovered that he was actually an undercover agent.

What made him a bit annoyed was that he could never get any major intelligence, and at the same time, he couldn't pass the news out in time. For two consecutive weeks, every time he passed the news out, the bar would move.

He would have doubts at first, but now he felt that it was bad luck, or the timing chosen was wrong.

He wanted to talk to the contact person again to see if they could change to passing news every two or three days so that he could "make a contribution" and move a step closer to being a "Federal person."

The heavy rain indeed stopped after twelve minutes. The remaining sparse drizzle could no longer stop people from hitting the road.

The old man took off his hat and said goodbye to everyone with a smile. Many people also said goodbye to him, feeling that he was a very interesting person.

Ma Zi came to the place he had agreed upon with the contact person. He actually didn't see the contact person, but he and the contact person had agreed that he would write the intelligence on a piece of paper and then tuck it into the two-hundredth page of the public phone book in front of him.

After he left, the contact person would come over and take away the intelligence tucked in the phone book.

Every time, the place where they met was not the same. This was to prevent being discovered. Who knew if those seemingly silly peers would have a few smart ones quietly following him?

Not long after he came to the phone booth, he opened the phone book and tucked the note recording some intelligence into the phone book.

It recorded the work of those people he could currently contact. For example, Aierwen would mainly follow Lanse and make decisions when Lanse was not around, which could be considered the number two figure.

Mo Lisi was responsible for search, tracking, infiltration, surveillance, and other work, which could be considered the number three figure.

Hai Lamu was responsible for combat work. Some things he had boasted about were also recorded by Ma Zi on the note, such as Hai Lamu saying that he had killed dozens of enemies while facing the strafing of more than a dozen guns.

Although this kind of thing was obviously unbelievable at a glance, he still wrote it down because he didn't like Hai Lamu very much.

He had collected all the similar personnel information and intelligence he could collect. Now that they couldn't pass out useful intelligence, the contact person, or rather, the Hazardous Materials Bureau side, had changed their thinking.

They hoped that they could provide more intelligence and evidence about the Lanse family's crimes. As the power of the Hazardous Materials Bureau grew, perhaps at some point, they could make arrests just based on "I feel," without any substantial evidence.

As for Lanse, he couldn't contact him; he had only seen him from a distance a few times and felt that Lanse was a "formidable character."

After he finished all this, he seemingly made two phone calls, but in reality, he didn't make any, left the phone booth, and walked away without looking back.

What he didn't know was that not long after he left, someone in a coffee shop diagonally across the road got up to pay the bill.

And in the process of him paying the bill, another person entered the phone booth.

When the contact person finished paying the bill, crossed the road, and came to the phone booth, he unexpectedly discovered that the intelligence that should have appeared on page two hundred was gone.

He chased out of the phone booth, looked around, and didn't find Ma Zi, nor did he find anyone who could have taken the intelligence!

He kicked the trash can by the road with force and returned to the Hazardous Materials Bureau to report this matter to his superiors.

However, the high-level agents and Director Dai Er were currently dealing with those bars.

Actually, after sealing off the Lucky House, Director Dai Er had gradually calmed down after talking to the mayor on the phone.

However, having no way out, he had already decided to fight these evil forces in New Jincheng to the end!

Now, his mind was full of how to deal a heavy blow to these criminal forces. He had even mentioned the idea of searching the entire dock warehouse area on a large scale.

This idea was suppressed by the mayor. Currently, they were only offending gangs, and the local politicians hadn't entered the field yet.

God knows if they had hidden anything in the dock warehouses. If they were also alarmed and entered the field, they would be even more passive.

At the current stage, they were still taking the crackdown and sweeping of underground bars as their main work. They had already taken down several bars in the Starlight District and the Bay District, causing the operators behind these bars to suffer heavy losses!

At such a time, he had no heart to discuss the life and death of an undercover agent.

Ma Zi wandered around outside, bought some cooked food, and returned to the office.

He greeted the people he met, and after sharing some food, he began to work.

He was just about to start moving things when Ailun called out to him, "The boss is looking for you."

Ma Zi clapped his hands and stomped his feet. There was a thin layer of mud on the wet ground. After wandering around outside, the soles of his shoes were all muddy.

He had been getting along well with Ailun during this period, especially when he learned that Ailun had also joined halfway, his attitude was even better.

"Did he say what he wanted with me?", he asked tentatively.

Ailun shook his head with a smile, "Who knows?"

"But I heard that a new bar is about to open. Maybe he'll let you be the manager..."

This was a joke, but it did make Ma Zi feel a bit moved. Sometimes he was quite conflicted. If it weren't for the strong desire to become a Federal person, perhaps he would also submit to his current life.

He took out a handkerchief to wipe his hands, "I'll go right now."

Ailun greeted him from behind, "Don't forget me after you make it big!"

He waved his hand while walking toward the inside of the room, "I won't. I'll let you be the bartender then..."

He took a deep breath. This was the first time he had been summoned by Lanse alone during this period. He was a bit nervous. To be honest, he was afraid that he would reveal a flaw.

After he did some psychological construction for a while, he knocked on the door of Lanse's office, "Boss, Ailun said you were looking for me?"

"Come in."

The door opened. Yisen stood behind the door looking at him. Actually, the two were about the same age, but Yisen's eyes made him feel afraid.

He didn't know that this was a kind of look that only those who had dealt with their own kind would have—a look of indifference to life.

He squeezed into the door from Yisen's side. Hai Lamu was sitting on the sofa trimming his nails with a dagger. Everything looked very calm, just like usual.

He composed himself and appeared in front of Lanse. Lanse let him sit in a chair.

"I heard that you've been doing very well recently. You're very active in your work, and your mind is also very sharp.", Lanse opened the cigarette case and signaled him to help himself.

Ma Zi took out one of the cigarettes and lit it, "Thank you, Boss.", he took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. The pressure was also much less, "These are all things I should do."

Lanse placed a note on the table, leaned forward, and pushed it over, "Is this also something you should do?"

At this very moment, Ma Zi's brain went blank for a short time. His instinct told him to run!

But his reason told him that he couldn't run away. The best way now was to sit where he was.

His hands were shaking a bit. He held the cigarette and put it into his mouth, taking a fierce breath. One could see the process of the tobacco being quickly ignited by the suction.

"Boss..."

"Call me Mr. Lanse."

"Mr. Lanse... I don't know what to say."

Lanse looked at Ma Zi, "You've been here for more than half a month. You should be able to see clearly that we are different from those gangs."

"We don't collect protection fees, we don't blackmail or extort ordinary people, we won't cheat or rob them. We just sell alcohol and provide protection for some girls' business, but we never force them."

Lanse spread his hands, "Perhaps from the perspective of Federal law or those big shots, some of the businesses we operate are illegal."

"But from our own perspective, every one of our businesses is legal, reasonable, and fair."

"You cannot stop people from drinking, just as you cannot stop them from breathing air. If the big shots in Congress say that breathing air is also wrong, then are we all going to die?"

"Maybe I'm not a good person, but I'm definitely not a bad person either. I won't hurt ordinary people for no reason."

"But you all always think about hurting me to get what you want. This is actually not right!"

Ma Zi felt a tingling sensation all over his body. He swallowed a mouthful of saliva, but even this very ordinary action made him feel a trace of difficulty.

"Mr. Lanse.", he wanted to speak, but Lanse stopped him by shaking his head.

"You had three chances, Ma Zi.", Lanse's tone was filled with some regret. This emotion made Ma Zi extremely nervous!

Ma Zi seemed to have realized something, and he hurriedly shouted loudly, "I am innocent, Mr. Lanse..."

He still tried to stand up, but just as he exerted force, he was pressed back into the chair by Yisen.

Lanse scratched his eyebrows, "When people are judged after death, everyone will say they are innocent."

"But whether you are truly innocent, I believe you know better than I do!"

Early the next morning, Ma Zi's contact person came out of his apartment. He currently lived in an apartment not far from the Hazardous Materials Bureau.

It was a house he bought, but his other family members didn't live here.

What happened yesterday made him feel some unease. He planned to find a way to withdraw Ma Zi. Regardless of whether he was exposed or not, the contact person felt that he was in danger.

Ma Zi was arranged by him. Perhaps others didn't care about Ma Zi's safety, but he still had a little sense of responsibility.

He planned to take the initiative to contact Ma Zi and bring him back safely.

Just as he was about to leave the apartment gate, he suddenly heard someone exclaim outside. Just as he was about to go out to see what had happened, suddenly, a... figure fell from the sky outside the apartment gate!

It plummeted downward, bounced up again, and then began to swing back and forth outside the gate.

The contact person looked at the head, whose neck had been stretched very long and had clearly broken into several sections, with only muscle and skin connecting it to the body, tilted and looped in the rope.

His mouth was sealed, his eyes were dug out, two fingers were inserted into his ears, and his eyes and a tongue were nailed into his hands.

Many people had already vomited when they saw this. The contact person seemed to have thought of something, rushed out of the apartment fiercely, and looked toward the roof, and sure enough, saw a head poking out.

That person showed a mocking smile on his face and then disappeared very quickly.

"Fuck!", while asking the apartment manager to call the police, he took off his coat and rushed up to the top floor along the stairs, but when he opened the iron door of the top floor, there was already no one here.

The sound of a car starting came from the alley, which made him rush to the side of the back street, lie on the edge of the roof, and look down. Two cars had already started and were driving toward the outside.

He cursed a few more times and gave up on chasing, because he knew he couldn't catch up.

When the cars entered the road, as long as they made a few turns, they could shake him off. He had no chance at all.

When he came downstairs, the police had already arrived. They took Ma Zi down from the noose and put him into a body bag.

He would be sent to the coroner and then messed up.

Looking at the actions of these police officers who did not respect the corpse, the contact person showed his credentials, "Agent of the Hazardous Materials Bureau, this is my informant..."

Several police officers squinted at him, didn't speak, and continued to treat Ma Zi's corpse very roughly.

This made the contact person even more annoyed. He just pushed one of the police officers, and the other police officers' hands all pressed on their holsters while staring at him together!

This action also made him calm down in an instant. He raised both hands and took two steps back, "I will complain about you."

The leader sneered indifferently, "Do whatever the fuck you want!"

The contact person was very annoyed but had no way to deal with it.

He knew that this was Lanse and the Lanse family demonstrating to him, but he was powerless!

At the same time, another undercover agent was also killed in the same way.

The police soon took the corpse away and opened an investigation.

Lanse had left two undercover agents.

The first undercover agent had not contacted anyone until now, which even made Lanse and others suspect if they had guessed wrong?

There was another one left by the Hazardous Materials Bureau. Lanse needed to disguise him as a lucky person so that he could continue to pass some intelligence to the outside.

Sometimes, using the Hazardous Materials Bureau is far more convenient than doing it yourself.

The death of the two undercover agents made Lukaer feel that the time had come, and the Lanse family began to recruit people again. Under his arrangement, Beinuo also quickly mixed into this batch of people and became an peripheral member of the Lanse family.

Lukaer and Beinuo had discussed that they could not contact each other too frequently, and they couldn't even meet or get close when they were in contact.

This was a very dangerous mission. In order to let Beinuo break into the core layer of the Lanse family, Lukaer also promised him that no matter whether he had committed any criminal acts, or even murder, during his time in the Lanse family, it would not be recorded in his file!

Only in this way could Beinuo climb up with all his might!