Chapter 1420: Werewolf Mission Broker—Xia Qing

Inside the meeting room beside the farmland, Xia Qing finished her fragrant steamed egg and vegetable-diced-meat fried rice, and upon hearing that Yang Jin really was staying behind to shovel snow, she felt a bit glum. "Isn't your squad supposed to be swamped at this time?"

The blizzard had just passed—how could the squad not be swamped?

Yang Jin answered with a smile, "Busy. The reason I'm staying in the territory is, first, Brother Luo's treatment has reached a critical stage and I need to stay to protect his safety; second, Liao Wen contacted the Mad Sand Squad's Wu Cangsong yesterday, and I need you to make two trips to Territory No. 7 so Wu Cangsong understands our relationship with Third Brother and gets his mindset right. Third is to conveniently clean out a few spies inside Territory No. 1. The helicopter maintenance costs will be split evenly between Hui One and Hui Five, and it's leaving on the 12th. Do you want to go ahead and give the North and South wolf packs a heads-up?"

Hearing that Yang Jin had arranged the helicopter maintenance so quickly, Xia Qing's expression softened at once. "Where is it being serviced? How long will it take?"

Yang Jin replied, "It'll be sent together with our base's six military helicopters to the military's 579 Aviation Repair Factory at Lan One Base. If there are no complicated issues or parts shortages, one month will be enough; otherwise it could take several months. Ours is a new machine, so there probably won't be much problem. I talked it over with the deputy base commander last night—we can send two people to the Lan One Repair Factory to follow along and learn the whole time. The Green Dragon Squad will send one. Does Sister Qing have a suitable candidate? If not, I'll send two."

The helicopter parked on Mountain No. 49 belonged to Xia Qing, which was why Yang Jin had asked her.

Xia Qing ran through the candidates in her head, and there really were two. "The Ninth Center has five retired aviation maintenance soldiers. I'll discuss it with Brother Yue to settle on a candidate and then let you know. Thanks."

Zhang San, Xia Qing, and Yue Haiying were building the Ninth Center into a department that could both farm and fight, so transport tools were naturally within their scope of consideration. Therefore, when recruiting veterans, they took on a batch of talent from the corresponding military branches. Now that such a rare free learning opportunity had come up, of course Xia Qing had to send someone to take part.

Hearing that Xia Qing had aviation maintenance soldiers on hand, Yang Jin was envious. "Can Sister Qing transfer one to me?"

The Green Dragon Brigade commander with over six hundred members actually had the nerve to open his mouth and ask her for people?!

Xia Qing beamed. "Ninth Center employees sign five-year labor contracts. If they quit voluntarily, they have to pay a hefty penalty. If the employee Squad Captain Yang picks out is willing to jump ship, and the Green Dragon Squad is willing to pay his penalty for him, you can go talk it over with our center's HR director. Considering that Squad Captain Yang helped us line up this learning opportunity for the helicopter maintenance, we can knock a tenth off the penalty."

Yang Jin scooped a big spoonful of steamed egg into his mouth and complained, "Sister Qing, did the Waist-Snapping Wolf learn its negotiation skills from you?"

"No, it's self-taught." Xia Qing set down her spoon and asked, "I'm leaving the territory to you. I'll get in touch with Old Four and head to the Southern Experimental Zone as soon as possible to divide up the supplies for your team and his."

Before the helicopter was sent in for servicing, Xia Qing had to clear out everything that required her to travel far.

Seeing Xia Qing pull out her phone, Yang Jin sighed, "Sister Qing's phone is really good quality. During this blast, more than thirty of our disaster-response team's phones had problems."

Xia Qing, holding her phone, immediately looked up. "Is there compensation?"

Yang Jin grinned. "Yes. Sister Qing's share has been filed by me too."

The points compensated by Hui One and Hui Five—turn them down and you'd be a fool. Working with smart people really saved so much worry. Xia Qing's voice warmed noticeably. "Thanks."

Yang Jin said with a smile, "Sister Qing's too polite. Later, ask Old Four if he can let Vice Captain Watching Huo Zhun go with you to take stock of the supplies. If so, I'd like to tag along with Sister Qing and see the big picture too."

Xia Qing didn't dial the number, just looked quietly at Yang Jin.

Possessing both Brain Domain and Visual dual-system evolutions, and combined with his understanding of Xia Qing, Yang Jin naturally knew what she was thinking.

He didn't dodge Xia Qing's gaze at all and answered sincerely, "The fact that you associate with the wolf packs and can mobilize them is already a semi-open secret among Hui Three's upper echelons. The wolf packs' combat power is too overwhelming—that's both a plus for you and a source of greater danger for you."

"Although the base commander has issued strict orders, the news will leak out sooner or later. By then, your open enemies, like the Blaze Squad and the Phantom Squad, will try every means to kill you or wipe out the wolf packs as quickly as possible; your hidden enemies, like the Blue Blood Alliance and the bases competing with ours for resources, will either want to capture you and the wolf packs for research, or try to win you over, threaten you, or even find ways to control you, in order to control the wolf packs."

"Relatively speaking, the risks you and the Northern and Western wolf packs face right now are higher than those of the Southern wolf pack, because the Southern wolf pack is already under our base's open protection. Does Sister Qing know why Blaze wanted to control Blind Tiger this time? They want to use Blind Tiger to get deep into the Divine Grass Grove forest area to look for yi stones and uncontaminated spring water, to fill Blaze's supply shortfall."

As Xia Qing's dealings with the wolf packs grew more frequent, the risk of her being exposed grew greater and greater. Yang Jin actively worked hard to learn from Xia Qing how to communicate with the wolf packs—both to reduce the potential risks Xia Qing faced and to strengthen the Green Dragon Squad's overall combat power.

After explaining Xia Qing's situation to her, Yang Jin offered his suggestion: "So, I think Sister Qing can pick out people she trusts and let them make contact with the wolf packs, to dispel outside speculation that you possess an evolved ability to communicate with beasts. When the time is ripe, Sister Qing can have the wolf packs team up with the Green Dragon Squad, or even our base's special forces, on a few public missions. That would be equivalent to bringing the wolf packs under the protection of our base officially and the Green Dragon Squad, and the enemy would become more cautious and wouldn't dare make a move lightly."

After explaining his considerations and suggestions, Yang Jin met Xia Qing's appraising gaze head-on. "Sister Qing, even if we deepen cooperation between our base's humans and the wolf packs, your position is still irreplaceable. Because the wolf packs are extremely wary—you're the first, and for a long time to come the only, human who can win the wolf packs' trust. Of course, this is just my idea, for reference only."

Having figured out Yang Jin's purpose, Xia Qing nodded. "I'll ask Old Four and see if I can bring you along."

When Xia Qing first started trading with the wolf packs, she had indeed thought about not letting the wolf packs come into contact with other humans, so that she could be the exclusive middleman between the wolf packs and humans and earn a large amount of supplies.

As her contacts with the wolf packs increased, Xia Qing discovered that the wolf pack leaders' Brain Domain evolution far exceeded her expectations, and her thinking changed accordingly.

The wolf pack leaders had their own ideas, and their choices were not something Xia Qing could fully decide. So Xia Qing dealt and traded with them with an attitude of equality, and did not excessively interfere in their contacts with other humans.

With the two leaders of the Northern wolf pack, Xia Qing would repeatedly bring up that there were bad people among humans and tell them to be careful. With the two leaders of the Southern wolf pack, Xia Qing didn't even need to say much—the old wolf had already fully understood this point many years before meeting Xia Qing.

What she could do was help the wolf packs screen and pick out humans they could cooperate with.

Yang Jin, the Beard Feng squad, and Watching Huo Zhun—four people in total—were the candidates Xia Qing had picked out as suitable for cooperation. That was why she had accepted the yi stones, taught Yang Jin how to communicate with the wolf packs, and why she had taken the initiative to propose to Old Four sending other people over to carry out missions with him.

Hearing Xia Qing's words, the secretly tense Yang Jin instantly relaxed, and with a beaming smile he proposed a collaboration: "Thanks, Sister Qing. When you introduce wolf packs and humans to take on missions together in the future, you can take a cut—that is, you take on the role of a werewolf mission broker. If Sister Qing finds it troublesome, I can be your agent. Name your fee, Sister Qing, any amount is fine, I'm not picky."

A mission broker is a middleman who accepts commissions and specializes in finding, evaluating, and assembling suitable teams for specific missions or projects.

A mission broker is not only responsible for investigating the backgrounds of recruits and assessing their skills, but also for negotiating with candidates on behalf of the client regarding mission pay, responsibilities, and other cooperation details, and for handling logistical coordination and information intermediation. Mission brokers with deep seniority and wide connections are quite popular in every safe zone.

Yang Jin was right—the role Xia Qing played when introducing humans to team up with the wolf packs was indeed that of a mission broker. But there was one point where he was wrong.

Werewolf mission broker Xia Qing stood up, leaned forward, and smiled even more brightly than Yang Jin. "It's already the eleventh year of the catastrophe, now. Does Squad Captain Yang really think that when I introduced you four to team up with the wolf packs for a mission five days ago, I wasn't charging a broker's fee?"

Only after watching the iron rooster turn into a fire rooster did Xia Qing contentedly pick up her phone and dial Old Four's number.