Chapter 457

460. Chapter 453: Seeking Help, Refusal, and Targeted Strikes

The spacious room was piled high with money boxes sent from various bars, and the young people of the family sat together, quickly sorting the banknotes in the boxes.

Lanse sat on the sofa to the side, holding a cigar in his hand. Actually, he didn't like cigars very much because they couldn't be inhaled into the lungs, but recently he seemed to have found a bit of fun in them.

A very powerful cigar, smoking it is like drinking alcohol; it gives a slight feeling of dizziness.

This is because a large amount of nicotine acts on the brain, causing dizziness due to the excessive secretion of various hormones.

So, after taking two puffs, you have to stop for a while.

However, this feeling of dizziness will gradually decrease as he smokes such cigars frequently.

Humans also have a resistance to nicotine; the more you ingest, the stronger the resistance, and you will become dependent on more intake to achieve happiness.

But after stopping the intake for a period of time, all of this will reset.

People kept bringing in boxes and then dumping the money onto a specially made table.

The table had a grid pattern, and its gaps were just right for coins to fall through.

The coins would clatter down the chutes under the table, which were sprinkled with talcum powder, for screening and sorting. Eventually, one-cent, two-cent, and five-cent coins would automatically fall into the same box.

As for the banknotes on the table, they would be placed into boxes to the side by these young people according to their denominations.

Lanse didn't often come to check the sorting of these revenues; he just had a bit of interest today.

The air was filled with an unpleasant smell, like the smell of fermented, slightly sour grease.

These smells came from these banknotes and coins.

The grease on people's bodies would remain on the banknotes, and bacteria and the like would cause them to start fermenting, producing this "scent of money."

Some people like these smells, but some people don't like them very much.

When the box used to hold banknotes beside someone was almost obviously full, it would be replaced.

Then, there were specialized people who quickly straightened the money in the box and tied it together with rubber bands.

This was a whole operation similar to an assembly line, except there was no conveyor belt here.

After these funds were counted, they would be sorted again. Small denominations would be issued as wages to gang members and to those in work clothes.

Large denominations, ten-dollar and twenty-dollar bills, would be taken to Lanse's underground vault to be stacked and stored.

This is also the reason why he wanted Mr. Qiaobafu's bank; his basement was almost full, and he needed a safer, more suitable place to store this money.

He even had a more radical idea, but this required stronger support.

He was thinking about some subsequent plans when his thoughts were interrupted.

"Lanse, phone call..."

Deruixi, wearing a white shirt and a brown vest, stood by the door and said.

Lanse looked back at him, got up while supporting his knees, carried the ashtray, and walked into the office with the cigar, then closed the room door.

"Lisa wants to talk to you; you can call her number."

It was Aierwen's voice; she had dialed the phone directly to the villa, but Lanse was not at that villa right now.

Lisa rarely took the initiative to contact him; something must have happened.

He called Lisa back, and the phone was answered quickly, "They said you wanted to talk to me?"

Lisa said "Hmm," "Pang Da looked very aggrieved after he came back. I asked him, and his promotion plan fell through."

Lanse frowned. He had also put in effort to make Pang Da a senior agent. He had consumed two warehouses just to make Pang Da's record look impeccable.

"What did he encounter?"

Lisa didn't know, "He didn't tell me, and I'm very worried."

"I know, I will talk to him."

After hanging up the phone, Lanse sat and thought for a while before returning to the hall. People didn't pay much attention to his return; they were all focused on getting the money sorted out.

Actually, when they first heard that their job was this, everyone felt that this job was not boring. Dealing with money, how many people crave this?

But after a long time, they finally couldn't stand it, and even physical reactions appeared: nausea, wanting to vomit.

Now each group only works for two days, and then is replaced by another group. In the eyes of these people under Deruixi, counting money has become a punishment.

"Today's revenue is at least over one hundred thousand dollars." Deruixi had very rich experience, and he was also the one delivering the alcohol, so he knew exactly how much alcohol these bars sold, and how much was here.

One hundred thousand dollars in revenue, with a net profit of about forty percent, forty thousand dollars in net profit—this is the exorbitant profit of alcohol!

Lanse nodded slightly, "We still need to continue to expand. The Port District and the Empire District are places where poor people live. They have to think for a long time just to buy a fifteen-cent drink. It's hard for us to make big money here."

"Only by going to better places can we make more money!"

Deruixi had no objections to this. Meiluo came in from outside carrying some food and placed it on the table, "Eat something."

Lanse let everyone else come in. Hiram grabbed a beef rib and stuffed it into his mouth. Lanse glanced at him, "You'd better have washed your hands."

Hiram rolled his eyes, ignored Lanse, and continued to gnaw on the beef on the rib. Deruixi laughed and said from the side, "I'll tell you an interesting thing..."

Hiram suddenly froze for a moment. He put down the beef rib and pounced on Deruixi, which made everyone a bit... at a loss!

Deruixi laughed loudly while quickly saying amidst Hiram's roar of "Shut up!", "He used to eat his boogers when he was a kid, so he doesn't care at all!"

Others couldn't help but laugh loudly when they heard this. Lanse also laughed from ear to ear, "Some people are like this!"

Hiram took a rubber band out of his pocket and tied his hair up, "You're dead, Deruixi, even if your sister comes, it won't help!"

The two of them got into a scuffle again, while others started cheering for them!

No one went to break up the fight. It's not that they were really fighting; this was just a way of expressing friendship and camaraderie!

Eventually, Deruixi rode on Hiram and pressed his head to the ground. In hand-to-hand combat, Hiram's fighting ability was not as good as Deruixi's, but once weapons were involved, the result would definitely be the opposite.

"Alright, come over and eat something."

The few of them grew up together and came to the Federation together, so their feelings and relationships were better.

Hiram climbed up and, taking advantage of Deruixi not paying attention, kicked him in the butt, making him almost trip, which finally let out a breath of frustration.

Several people sat at the table laughing and joking, eating food.

Those young men who were counting money were also eating. This is not a capitalist's factory; they wouldn't exploit their labor so tightly.

As for Lanse being here today, they were actually quite excited.

Although everyone is brothers, wanting to see Lanse is really not an easy thing.

They wouldn't talk about any urgent matters; they were all very ordinary things.

A young man asked, "Boss, when are we going to grab another piece of territory?"

They had just heard Lanse say that the Empire District and the Port District were places where poor people gathered, and they should go to better places.

As members of the Lanse family, they felt proud of their family and also hoped it would become better and better.

Someone followed up, "Everyone is saying that we should have become one of the new Five Great Families, but someone refused to let us join. Is it true?"

Lanse felt obviously surprised when he heard these questions, but not too surprised.

When a person cares very much about something, they will spontaneously collect all information and clues related to this matter.

This is a manifestation of their love for the family.

Lanse put down the rib in his hand and thought for a while, "Compared to joining the Five Great Families, what I prefer is conquering them!"

The room went quiet for a moment, followed by an outburst of cheers...

In the evening, a van and Lanse's motorcade returned to the villa together, and several people took several boxes of money to the basement.

In the basement, many piles of cash had already been stacked neatly, and now they had increased a bit more.

Before going to sleep, Lanse said casually, "Tomorrow, find something else for the people of the Liji Group to do."

The next morning, Pang Da came out of the study. After a night of thinking, helplessness, and acceptance, his mood was slightly better now.

Watching his wife busy in the dining room, he hurried over, "This should be left to me. We think we should hire a maid; this is not the time for you to be busy."

Lisa nodded; she did feel a bit overwhelmed.

Her belly was gradually getting bigger, and various physical reactions began to appear. Some things were becoming extra strenuous or extra uncomfortable to do, so she no longer insisted on doing everything herself.

After the two of them finished breakfast together, Pang Da kissed Lisa goodbye and drove to the office.

His colleagues looked at him cautiously at this time, and didn't find any negative emotions on his face. They tried to talk to him, and he could now barely face this problem calmly.

"... This was decided by the higher-ups. You can't blame Director Dai Er. To the higher-ups, he is actually the same as us; there is no opportunity to speak up."

"I'm fine, don't worry about me. Whether I am a senior agent or not, we all love our work!"

Very high consciousness. Sometimes the level of consciousness has nothing to do with personal ideological realm; it is purely forced out.

Not long after he sat down, the phone on the desk rang, "Come out and talk?"

Pang Da's expression didn't change, and he said in a low voice, "Okay." Lanse gave him an address, and he hung up the phone and walked outside.

"An informant might have some clues."

Others didn't say anything. He had recently cracked several smuggling cases, and some people were very interested in his informants, thinking that this informant might be a member of those smuggling criminal groups.

They were also curious about how he bought off these informants, but curiosity could only be curiosity. It wasn't convenient for them to ask, and even if they asked, Pang Da wouldn't say.

The meeting place for the two was in a car wash. This was a manual car wash. Although there were so-called automatic car washes in Jinzhou, overall, it was still manually controlled by staff.

It just changed people holding tools to wash cars into machines holding tools to wash cars. It is said that because of this, the price of car washing doubled!

After the car entered the car wash, the rolling shutter door was pulled down, and Lanse opened the car door and sat in.

"I heard your promotion failed?"

Pang Da frowned, then his tone softened proactively, "They parachuted a senior agent in. Now we don't have any extra positions here, so I can't move up."

After all, he had taken Lanse's benefits, so he had to give Lanse an explanation.

"How is your relationship with your colleagues, and how is your relationship with this parachuted senior agent?"

Pang Da wasn't quite clear about the purpose of Lanse asking these things, but he still said truthfully, "I can only say it's very average. After all, they are all senior agents. If it weren't for missions, we most likely wouldn't see each other."

"And...", he paused and looked at Lanse pointedly, "I've been very much in the spotlight recently!"

Lanse nodded knowingly. Being in the spotlight meant that some of those senior agents must be unhappy.

A junior agent outperforming them at work would make them look very incompetent.

Perhaps some people are not so narrow-minded, but as a super power department, there must be narrow-minded people!

"As for that parachuted guy, I haven't seen him yet."

He looked at Lanse, not knowing why Lanse was asking these things.

Lanse smiled and spread his hands, making a gesture similar to a "slash", "If a senior agent vacancy appeared now, wouldn't you be the most hopeful one?"

Regarding this point, Pang Da was very approving, "Yes, but obviously, it's unlikely that there will be a vacancy waiting for me now."

The expression on Lanse's face made him feel a little uneasy, and he also sensed something, "This is a dangerous job, Pang Da. You should have received some warnings when you joined."

"They want you to be prepared to sacrifice. After all, you are facing heinous criminal groups and dangerous militants."

"If someone has an accident..."

"Your opportunity will come!"

Pang Da's eyes widened, "Are you crazy?"

"I can't... just because I want to be a senior agent, let you kill my colleagues. I'm not that crazy, Lanse!"

He urged repeatedly, "Don't interfere in this matter. This is my bottom line!"

Looking at his very serious appearance, Lanse shrugged. He didn't want to push Pang Da too hard either.

So far, he hadn't been able to develop a second inside contact. The Hazardous Materials Bureau is a very special department; its power is too great.

This kind of department is difficult to corrupt in the early stages because these people, carefully selected from various departments, still harbor some "ideals," and colleagues don't really know each other.

The drawbacks caused by the fermentation of power have not yet begun to show, just like the unions and labor federations at this time.

It might take until these people who hold power begin to rot before it becomes easier to get more inside contacts.

Without new inside contacts, Lanse wouldn't put too much pressure on him. After all, the information he passed back was still very useful.

"I'm just giving you a suggestion; you don't have to accept it."

"Since you can't be promoted to a senior agent recently, then just do your job well."

Lanse said as he pushed open the car door and stepped out, "Have a pleasant work."

He smiled, shook his head, and left.

Pang Da sat in the driver's seat, watching the workers who had gathered around again start to wash his car. He had a very complicated mood at this moment.

He was struggling—inner struggle, moral struggle. Eventually, his reason overcame his desire. He let out a heavy sigh and lit a cigarette.

The white foam covered his entire front windshield. Some dust and dirt on the windshield were taken away by them, leaving only two bright windows.

Just like his clear heart at this moment, spotless.

For the past two days, the general manager had arranged for quite a few people to guard the warehouse at the pier, just for fear of similar things happening again. Fortunately, no one came to find trouble in the past two days, which made him breathe a sigh of relief.

He didn't know if the vice president had handled this matter, but he secretly guessed that it hadn't been handled.

If they had handled it, they would definitely notify him now. The general manager's only thought was to hold on until the commissioner arrived.

The other party should arrive at noon, and there is not much time left until noon now.

There were still some goods to be loaded onto the ship in the morning. He heard that the headquarters had already placed some of the goods at the northern port instead of diverting them over, and would only come over after coordinating and solving these problems.

Although doing this increased some transportation costs, it was better than being mixed with irritating industrial waste, which would not only lead to total scrapping but also require spending extra money to handle it himself.

Just as he was thinking about these things, a quarrel suddenly came from the warehouse. He frowned and walked toward the warehouse. Some dock workers were arguing with their employees.

The two sides were no longer just arguing verbally; they had already started pushing and shoving. The situation was about to escalate. He strode over, "What happened?"

The worker standing at the very front turned around and looked at him, looking him up and down, "Your people look down on us!"

The general manager's gaze turned to his own employees. One of his employees said softly, "These workers were cursing while working, it was very unpleasant."

"I just told them to shut up..."

Before the general manager could say anything, the leading worker suddenly shouted, "You look down on us workers, we're not fucking doing it anymore!"

"You move it yourselves!"

"Brothers, let's go!"

In just one or two minutes, all thirty or forty workers in the warehouse left cleanly. The general manager sighed heavily.

He glared at the employee, then walked into the duty room and dialed the service company's number.

"We had some misunderstanding with the workers here. Can you send some more workers over?"