Shadow Empire

Chapter 255 Failure
Betrayal, betrayal, how do you say this?

It's like a membrane.

Before breaking this membrane, a lot of psychological preparation is needed, as well as some things that are suitable for the situation, such as encountering some irresistible forces and ultimately having to choose this path.

Then they will slide into the abyss step by step, but at the last moment, they will try to hold this bottom line until it is truly broken.

Once exposed, some things become meaningless. The previous persistence and perseverance become a joke at this moment, and the mentality will change rapidly.

It is even possible that because this membrane has been broken, some resources and benefits that were previously unavailable have been obtained, thus viewing selling out and betrayal as a normal means of transportation.

People often say that once values ​​are established, they will not change. In fact, this view is wrong. The reason they will not change is that the power for change is too weak.

When the power of change is strong enough, all three views will change.

Ponda breathed a sigh of relief after hearing what Lance said.

"Don't bother Lisa and my family."

Lance agreed with a smile.

Ponda didn't have a very good impression of him yet. "If there's nothing else, I should go back to work."

He didn't want to say any more words to Lance. His membrane, the bottom line in his heart, had just been pierced, and he needed to calm down.

But Lance obviously intended to talk to him a little more.

"If you get a major tip-off and uncover hundreds of thousands of dollars' worth of liquor, will that help your promotion?"

Ponda, who had originally planned to hang up the phone without asking any question, suddenly felt his heart beating faster.

He even swallowed his saliva, "You said... hundreds of thousands?"

"Well, with hundreds of thousands of bottles of wine, I believe that Congress and the Hazardous Materials Administration need to set a new benchmark, a flag."

"If you get this clue, will you be reused?"

Ponda fell into deep thought. There was no doubt that he would be taken seriously by Director Dell, even if only temporarily.

Now everyone can feel the pressure on Director Dell. As a vertically managed law enforcement agency, the director represents the biggest manager at each level.

It is not good to use rulers, but some of them do exercise the powers that only rulers have.

He thought a lot and struggled with his thoughts. He knew that this was Lance's "bait". As long as he took the bait, he would slide deeper and deeper step by step.

At this moment, he suddenly understood one thing!

When he was a child, he thought the fish were stupid. His father and grandfather loved fishing, so he asked them, couldn't the fish find the hook next to the bait?
His father and grandfather didn't answer, and he thought the fish was stupid at the time.

Why would you eat the fish if you can clearly see the hook?

But at this moment, he suddenly understood how the fish felt, because he himself was like a fish.

He knew there was a hook hidden in the bait, but he couldn't help but swallow it.

He kept his sanity and asked, "What do I have to give?"

The devil's voice came from the receiver, "We are friends, and friends should help each other."

Without waiting for Ponda to respond, Lance ended the conversation. "I will call you soon and tell you the exact location. I have something else to do now."

A busy tone soon came from the receiver, indicating the end of the call. Pang Da looked at the receiver in his hand and suddenly felt a little lost.

He returned to the office, and his colleagues jokingly asked, "Have you talked to your girlfriend?"

Ponda scratched his head a little embarrassedly, "No problem."

As his colleagues clamored about when they could attend their wedding, he returned to his seat, but he could no longer focus on the clues as all he could think about were the words Lance had told him.

Hundreds of thousands of smuggled liquor!
With this achievement, he might even become a high-level agent!

More income and a better future, only in this way can we build a safe, reliable and warm home for the injured Lisa!
Maz felt an indescribable sense of relaxation these past two days, as if... suddenly there was no longer any pressure.

He had felt a lot of pressure before, as if someone was always watching him, but he never noticed who was watching him.

Ultimately, he could only chalk it up to undercover syndrome; the contact who trained him talked to him about it and said he'd had a nervous, uneasy feeling at first.

Once he gradually adapts to his current life, he will soon no longer have that feeling.

He spends every day in a working atmosphere that he can't describe. He gets up at nine in the morning, eats something, and starts working.

He initially thought that gangs didn't need to work, but he didn't expect that gangs also needed to work, move things, or do other things. After lunch, the afternoon was free time, with at least four or five hours.

Just get to the bar before 5:30.

He was a dream chaser from outside the area, who was eventually exploited by capitalists and became penniless. Eventually, with the help of his identity as an imperial immigrant, he joined the Lance family.

So he has no friends or family here.

The contact person would contact him once a week, and he would need to write down what he had recorded on a piece of paper, then roll it up and put it into a cigarette.

At that time, the contact person will appear around him, and then he will ask the contact person for a light and hand the information disguised as a cigarette to the other party.

It was a perfect plan. He and his contact had rehearsed it several times and could already do it naturally.

Today was the time they had agreed on, and after lunch, he returned to his room.

After double-checking the marked cigarettes, he packed himself up and prepared to go out.

"Maz, are you going out?"

Alan, who was playing darts with others, asked before leaving.

Maz smiled and nodded, "Go out for a walk, it's a bit boring."

Alan shifted his position while holding the club, "You should go find a girl and relax, they'll give you a good discount!"

Maz's face turned a little red. He had been in love before, but never had a relationship beyond friendship. This topic made him feel a little embarrassed.

He didn't want to continue pestering her, so he walked out of the company. After he left, the people who were playing darts stopped...

After leaving the company, Maz walked along the sidewalk to the east. His eyes searched the sidewalk, and sometimes he would suddenly look back to make sure no one was following him.

What he didn't know was that the two cars were following him alternately.

There is an intersection to the east of Wanli Office, and there is a small garden on the side of the road.

There used to be a lot of homeless people gathered here, but since the Lance family came here, the homeless people have disappeared.

No one knows where they went. Some say they went to work, while others say they were driven away. Who knows?
Now this place has become a place that nearby residents like to come, where they sit and chat.

Some elderly people also set up a few tables in the small garden and chat around the tables or play cards.

Here Maz spotted his contact, sitting on a bench by the road, reading a copy of the International News.

There was such a look of surprise on his face that he ignored a car parked on the side of the road.

He wanted to walk straight over, but thinking of the connection process, he started to perform.

He put a cigarette in his mouth and then fumbled around in his pockets. Even a non-smoker would know that he might be looking for a lighter or matches.

But it seems like he forgot to bring it. He has such a bad memory at such a young age. What will he do when he gets older?
He glanced at his contact reading a newspaper on the bench, and his heart began to beat faster, with a strong, thumping force.

He took out the cigarette containing the intelligence and handed it over, "Sir, do you have a lighter?" The man glanced at him, examining him for a few seconds as if he were a stranger, then hesitated, took his cigarette, and took out a lighter.

He used the newspaper to cover his movements, put the cigarette in his pocket, replaced it with another one, and then lit it himself.

Even if someone observes, they won't think there is anything wrong with it.

After a brief eye contact between the two, Maz lit a cigarette, said thank you, returned the match to the other party, and left.

The whole process lasted less than two minutes and was very smooth. There were almost no noticeable flaws, except that Maz's expression was a little exaggerated.

Maz returned to the company without encountering any obstacles along the way, and greeted others enthusiastically.

He received the first money after joining the Lance family.

As a latecomer, he was not eligible to get dividends from the family's profits, but Lance was not too bad to them. Although he had just joined, he received the standard federal salary.

If he has done anything else, such as resolving disputes, there will be other subsidies.

He bought some food and distributed it to everyone. Everyone thanked him enthusiastically, but what he didn't notice was that almost all the food ended up in the trash.

Ethan stood in Lance's office and looked at Maz, "Why not kill him now?"

Lance was looking at the recent revenue situation. The price of alcohol was still rising. He looked up and glanced at Maz running around outside the blinds. "It's easy to kill them. One bullet will do."

"But pretty soon they'll send in a second group of undercover agents, and then a third group, and it'll never end."

"We will use him to pass on some wrong information now, so that the Hazardous Materials Administration will realize that it is meaningless to send undercover agents, and then we can get rid of him."

He paused, "Has the bar moved yet?"

Deresi on the side nodded and said, "They have moved away."

At Lans' request, the bar has now become "lightweight". To put it simply, the decoration of the bar has become simpler and no longer pursues complete decoration.

There is a bar counter for the bartender to pour drinks, and there is no need for sofas or chairs. Everyone drinks while standing.

For alcoholics, they don’t care whether they drink standing or lying down, as long as they have wine.

The wooden wine glasses were not worth much, and there was nothing valuable in the entire bar except the wine.

In addition, alcohol is served on a per-serving basis, so even if the bar is busted, the loss would only be a batch of alcohol worth a few hundred or a thousand dollars.

This method turns the bar into a "disposable" one. As long as there are enough venues, the location can be changed every day.

All the bars where Maz and other undercover agents have worked will be moved tonight. The old drunks know how to find these bars, but as for the new drunks?
If they were really drunkards and really citizens of the Empire District, they would have their own ways to know where these bars were and how to get in.

Maz's superior returned to the Hazardous Materials Administration soon after getting the clue. He excitedly opened the cigarette and took out a piece of paper rolled into the same size and thickness as the cigarette.

Carefully spreading it out, it recorded the location of the bar, its opening hours, and some key words he had heard.

For example, "warehouse", "dock", "smuggling ship"...

This piece of information was extremely important, so the contact person immediately went to see Director Dell. Director Dell was very satisfied after seeing it, and also gave instructions, "I won't ask you who he is, but bring him back tonight to reduce the possibility of his exposure."

"As for the rest, we'll talk about it after you come back. Go and gather some manpower!"

The contact persons were very excited and began to apply for manpower and supporting resources. They were looking forward to the arrival of night.

At eight o'clock in the evening, the agents, who had just finished their meal and rested for a while, received the notice and began to act.

This time they dispatched more than 30 people and an armored vehicle, and everyone was armed and headed to the Imperial District.

The Empire District has now become synonymous with "danger" in the eyes of many people. The Lance family's frequent bloody incidents have made people feel the bloody atmosphere of more than a decade ago.

Including these law enforcement officers, they would feel unsafe if they did not carry a large number of weapons.

Along the way, they did not sound the sirens and tried to take remote roads. When they were only one intersection away from the designated location, they suddenly accelerated, sounded the sirens and rushed over!

During the searches of bars over the past period of time, they found that giving people in the bar some time to react would only make them more confused!

The drunkards would rush outside, and the bar would be unable to stop the chaos from within.

But when they rushed into the alley, it was unbelievably quiet!
Some reporters who had obtained the intelligence also rushed over from the surrounding areas. In the end, all that was left for them was an abandoned bar.

The contact person bent down with a grim expression and picked up a wooden wine glass from the ground. The wall of the glass was still very wet and exuded a strong smell of alcohol.

This shows that it has been used by people not long ago.

But now, it's all over.

This also confused him. Was the news leaked, or was Maz lying?

The reporters didn't care about all this and kept pressing the shutter buttons frantically. The spotlights lit up the basement as bright as day!
At the same time, Maz walked into the new bar with a slightly pale and ugly face. From the doorkeeper to the bartender to the manager, they were all the same people as before, but the place was not the same as before!
His first feeling was that he had been discovered, but he soon got information from others -

"We change locations every week. The greyhounds from the Hazardous Materials Administration have too keen a nose and chase too closely. This is Lance's decision."

The uniforms of the Hazardous Materials Administration were a grayish-white color, a very fashionable color at the time, and some people now call them "greyhounds," a derogatory term for them.

This news gave Maz a headache, because he only delivered the message once a week. So every time he delivered the message, it would be outdated. He had to find a way to contact the contact person.

The bar business is still as good as before, even a little better!
Because Nick's wines began to be marketed on a large scale, these wines have a higher alcohol content than beer, but the price is not high.

Many beer drinkers have started drinking this home-brewed wine, as the higher alcohol content gives them a more satisfying drunken experience.

The whole room was filled with a strong smell of alcohol.

At the same time, at the dock, several men in blue work clothes came to a warehouse.

After they confirmed that there was no one in the warehouse, a guy quickly opened the door of the warehouse with tools he made himself.

They left one person to keep watch while the others went into the warehouse.

In the warehouse they looked through a large amount of goods, did not find what they wanted, then closed the warehouse door and moved on to the next one.

Mello found some reliable people who were closer to Lance and the Lance family to help them find which warehouse had the wine.

In addition to giving them a reward, they will also become peripheral members of the Lance family and receive extra money from the company every month.

Although it’s not much, who wouldn’t want such a free benefit?

And joining the Lance family means they will never be bullied again.

Whether you are bullied by outsiders or by your own people.

Recently, some individual phenomena have appeared in the blue work uniform group. After losing the external survival pressure, some internal problems began to be exposed.

For example, there are "work bullies" who don't work themselves but require others to complete their work in exchange for not being bullied by them.

Perhaps this is the bad nature of human beings, which will always exist in any world, any era, and any cultural environment.

In fact, Melo was not quite clear about this matter. In addition to being busy with the affairs of the law firm, he was also reviewing his lessons and preparing to go to university to study law.

People who are bullied due to slight negligence in management are actually not willing to cause trouble.

Because they couldn't tell whether the person bullying them was just an illegal immigrant like themselves, or an external member of the Lance family.

After visiting more than a dozen warehouses, the few people finally found one.

As soon as the locksmith entered, a smile appeared on his face because there was a faint smell of alcohol in the air!
They turned on the lights and looked at the mountains of wine, with ecstasy on their faces!

(End of this chapter)