Chapter 387: Chapter 387 Bai Ze’s Tactics (Please Subscribe)
After hearing Bai Ze’s words, everyone in the room lowered their heads and kept silent. He was right; if the Investigation Hall found out there were only two Oarfish, they would go to great lengths to keep them, even at some loss.
With this in mind, Lawrence didn’t say anything more. Glancing at Shitang Longsi lying on the floor, he said disdainfully, "What about him? That mechanical kid is ruthless, both arms crippled — he’s a waste now! Do we still have to bring him along?"
As he sat in his chair with his legs crossed, Bai Ze kept tapping his own temple with his fingers. He looked at Shitang Longsi, who was thrown to the ground with his head buried deep in the dust, and sighed lightly, "You all go out first!"
The three of them exchanged glances, nodded, and turned to leave the room. After the gentle click of the door closing, Bai Ze leapt from his chair and sat cross-legged in front of Shitang Longsi. He gently poked Longsi’s immobile head with his finger and softly said, "You must be very unwilling, right? Being forced to such a state by a brat who’s only been trained for a year and is a rank lower than you on the ground!"
Shitang Longsi, lying in front of him, still said nothing, though his upright body twitched slightly. Bai Ze held his chin and looked toward the ceiling: "Both you and Hartman are proud, believing your bloodlines, your powers, to be unique, so you never accepted the organization’s transformations. But in my eyes, Baal performed much better than you did in today’s battle. At least he held off two—no, three people until finally being captured. And judging from their last decision, it’s clear that, in their eyes, Baal is much more important than you. You were thrown back like a piece of trash!"
With Bai Ze’s fingers tracing circles in his hair, Shitang Longsi still didn’t say a word, but his body trembled more frequently. Bai Ze applied a little pressure to Longsi’s head with his hand and continued: "Do you still want to maintain your now-worthless pride? If it were me, I’d leave you here now. Rest easy, I’ll make sure you die swiftly, and your embarrassing state today will remain a secret. I’ll tell your master you fought bravely with your sword against formidable foes until—"
"Stop it!"
"Until the very end, severely injured—"
"Stop it!"
"And died. How do you like this ending?"
"I told you to stop!" Shouted Shitang Longsi, who had been pinned down with both arms severed. Using all his strength from his abdomen, he pushed Bai Ze away and struggled to stand up.
Looking at Shitang Longsi kneeling before him, tears streaming down his face, Bai Ze pulled a handkerchief from his coat and wiped off the saliva sprayed on his own face by Longsi’s emotions, lamenting, "Don’t you like this ending? Still want to live on? Then you’ve underestimated our tolerance for failure. This was your second miserable defeat."
"Do as you wish, whatever you want to do to me, transform me however you prefer! As long as you make me stronger, so I can personally kill Pei Yan and his entire family! Do whatever you want, even if you turn me into a devil, a monster, I don’t care!" Shitang Longsi pleaded, bowing his head to the ground.
"I will report to the higher-ups and strive to get you this opportunity. Love and hate are the best driving forces for progress, aren’t they?" Bai Ze gently patted Shitang Longsi’s head, stood up, stretched, and contemplated, "As for whether you can personally kill Pei Yan, it will depend on whether he survives the night. Drive the tiger to swallow the wolf, huh? Du Guangyuan played his hand well. We might as well learn from it and hope the little gift I left for the Investigation Hall will be appreciated!"
Meanwhile, Pei Yan had already arrived at the riverside to assist the Three Pristine Department in clearing the river surface. Watching the calm, tranquil Yangtze River before him, Pei Yan leaned against the railing, taking out a cigar and slowly lighting it with a match.
"Oh, it’s worthy of fieldwork, smoking is such a high-end stuff!"
Hearing the voice, Pei Yan looked up to see Sun Changzong, the leader of this outer cleaning mission, smiled, and offered the cigar in his hand. The other party repeatedly waved his hand in refusal, saying, "I’m not used to that thing; this will do just fine!" As he spoke, he pulled a pack of cigarettes from his pocket.
After lighting a cigarette for Sun Changzong, Pei Yan put the cigar in his mouth, exhaled a long smoke ring, and relaxed himself with a sigh: "I usually just smoke cigarettes; it’s only after finishing a mission that I have one of these. It’s become a habit!"
"I understand, passed down from Gu Shenghui, right?" Sun Changzong said with a smile as he leaned against Pei Yan.
Pei Yan raised the cigar in his hand and asked, "You’re here, so who’s managing the district?"
"Most people from that district have been evacuated, leaving only the task of cleaning the water source and restoring the site!" Sun Changzong said as he turned around, placing his hand on the railing, and looked at the river with a sigh: "It’s more dangerous here compared to there. Moving the populations of two districts surely won’t cut it; we can only establish a simple defense measure and then quickly search through it, hoping those with God’s Desire haven’t gone to the extent of insanity."
Pei Yan also turned around, following Sun Changzong’s gaze to the river, which was now adorned with lights. Narrowing his eyes, Pei Yan watched water patrol boats tirelessly moving across the water’s surface and pointed, asking, "What’s all this for?"
"It’s checking. It doesn’t matter whether it’s some mythical beast or if their words are true or not; as long as it’s considered an exotic beast or a creature capable of causing such a disaster, there’s bound to be energy within that doesn’t belong to this world. The river surface is undergoing a net-style search, and any discovery will trigger an alarm," Sun Changzong said while exhaling a smoke ring and continued, "Gosh, these God’s Desire folks sure know how to mess with people. There’s no rest for the night. Even if this river segment is fine, to be safe, the top will definitely expand the inspection range; finishing all of this won’t take less than a week!"
Hearing this, Pei Yan nodded and remarked, "You guys have it pretty tough, too. With the chaos on our battlefield, it’s not easy for you all either!"
"Who says it isn’t? None of it is easy, bless our hearts! Cleaning the site is one thing, but after draining the water, what do we do with the ground? Those cracks, that trace of water damage, how do we explain it to people? Just fabricating the scene is painstaking, and that’s not all—tonight’s situation has been witnessed by the entire neighborhood. Fortunately, you managed the electronic equipment, but you can’t control word of mouth!" Sun Changzong said, flicking his cigarette butt toward the river and shaking his head helplessly: "Afterward, the cyber police department will be busy deleting posts and controlling comments. I used to think you in the field department were risking your lives while us in the Three Pristine Department worked to the bone but without danger, which was worth it. But now, according to this trend, our Three Pristine Department may soon be directly involved in combat."
After listening to Sun Changzong’s complaints, Pei Yan patted Old Sun on the shoulder in comfort. At that moment, a voice in his earpiece left him stunned; his face turned ashen as he stood frozen on the spot.