Empire of Shadows

In the spacious room, money boxes sent from various bars were piled up. The young men of the family sat together, quickly sorting the banknotes inside the boxes.

Lance sat on a sofa to the side, holding a cigar. In truth, he didn’t particularly like cigars because he couldn’t inhale them into his lungs, but recently he seemed to have found a little pleasure in them.

It was a very powerful cigar; smoking it felt like drinking liquor, giving a slight dizzying sensation.

This was due to the large amount of nicotine acting on the brain, the dizziness produced by the excessive secretion of various hormones.

So, after two puffs, he had to pause for a while.

However, this dizzying sensation would gradually lessen as he smoked such cigars more often.

Humans also have a resistance to nicotine. The more you take in, the stronger the resistance becomes, and you also become dependent on a larger intake to feel pleasure.

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

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

The table had a grid-like pattern, its gaps just wide enough for the coins to fall through.The clattering coins would slide down a talcum-powdered chute under the entire table, being sorted and separated. In the end, one-cent, two-cent, five-cent, and various other coins would automatically fall into the same box.

And the banknotes on the table would be placed into boxes on the side by these young men, according to their denominations.

Lance didn’t often come to check the sorting of these incomes; it was just that he was a little interested today.

The air was filled with an unpleasant smell, like fermented, somewhat sour grease.

These smells came from the banknotes and coins.

The oils from people’s bodies would be left on the banknotes. Bacteria and other things would cause them to start fermenting, producing this “smell of money.”

Some people liked these smells, but some didn’t.

When the box next to someone used for holding banknotes was almost full, it would be replaced.

Then, a special person would quickly straighten the money in the box and tie it together with a rubber band.

This was a whole assembly-line-like operation, except that there was no conveyor belt here.

After these bills were counted, they would be sorted again. The small denominations would be distributed as wages to the gang members and for work uniforms.

The large denominations, $10 and $20 bills, would be taken to Lance’s underground vault and stacked neatly.

This was also why he wanted Mr. Jobav’s bank. His basement was almost full. He needed a safer, more suitable place to store this money.

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

As he was thinking about some subsequent plans, his thoughts were interrupted.

“Lance, the phone…”

Dracy, wearing a white shirt and a brown vest, said from the doorway.

Lance looked back at him, got up supporting himself on his knees, took the ashtray and cigar, and walked into the office, then closed the door.

“Lisa wants to talk to you. You can call her number.”

It was Elvin’s voice. She had called the villa directly, but Lance wasn’t at that villa now.

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

He called Lisa back. The phone was quickly answered. “They said you wanted to talk to me?”

Lisa hummed in affirmation. “Ponda came back looking very wronged. I asked him, and his promotion plan fell through.”

Lance frowned. He had also contributed to Ponda becoming a senior special agent. He had used up two bars and a warehouse just to make Ponda’s record look impeccable.

“What did he run into?”

Lisa wasn’t clear. “He didn’t tell me, and I’m very worried.”

“I understand. I’ll talk to him.”

After hanging up the phone, Lance sat and thought for a while before returning to the main hall. The people didn’t pay much attention to his return; they were all engrossed in figuring out the money.

In fact, when they first heard that this was their job, everyone felt that this job was not boring. Dealing with money, how many people longed for that?

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

Now each group would only work for two days, and then be replaced by another group. In the eyes of Dracy’s men, counting money had become a punishment.

“Today’s income is at least over $100,000,” Dracy had rich experience. He was also the one who delivered the liquor, so he knew how much liquor the bars had sold and how much was here.

An income of $100,000, with a net profit of about forty percent, which was a net profit of $40,000. This was the huge profit of liquor.

Lance nodded slightly. “We still need to continue to expand. The Port District and the Empire District are where the poor live. They have to think for half a day to buy a fifteen-cent glass of wine. It’s hard for us to make big money here.”

“Only by going to better places can we make more money.”

Dracy had no objection to this. Mello came in from outside with some food and placed it on the table. “Have something to eat.”

Lance had the others come in. Hiram grabbed a beef rib and stuffed it into his mouth. Lance glanced at him. “You’d better have washed your hands.”

Hiram rolled his eyes, ignored Lance, and continued to gnaw on the beef on the rib. Dracy said with a laugh from the side, “Let me tell you something interesting…”

Hiram was suddenly taken aback for a moment. He put down the beef rib and pounced on Dracy, which made everyone a little… at a loss.

Dracy laughed heartily, and amid Hiram’s roars of “shut up,” he quickly said, “He used to eat his boogers when he was a kid, so he doesn’t care at all.”

The others couldn’t help but burst out laughing after hearing this. Lance also laughed so hard he couldn’t close his mouth. “Some people are like that.”

Hiram took a rubber band out of his pocket. He tied his hair up. “You’re dead, Dracy. Even if your sister comes, it’s useless.”

The two of them started to scuffle again, and the others began to cheer them on.

No one tried to break them up. It wasn’t that they were really fighting; this was just a way of expressing friendship and camaraderie.

In the end, Dracy was riding on Hiram, pressing his head to the ground. In hand-to-hand combat, Hiram’s fighting ability was not as good as Dracy’s, but once he got a weapon, the result would definitely be reversed.

“Alright, come and eat something.”

The few of them had grown up together since they were young and had also come to the Federation together, so their feelings and relationships were better.

Hiram got up and, taking advantage of Dracy’s inattention, kicked him in the butt, almost making him fall. Only then did he feel relieved.

The few of them sat down at the table, laughing and joking, and started to eat.

The young men who were counting money were also eating. This was not a capitalist’s factory; their labor would not be exploited so tightly.

They were actually quite excited that Lance was here today.

Although everyone was brothers, it wasn’t really an easy thing to see Lance.

They wouldn’t talk about anything important, just very ordinary things.

A young man asked, “Boss, when are we going to take another piece of territory?”

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

As members of the Lance Family, they were proud of their family and also hoped that it would get better and better.

Someone followed up, “Everyone is saying that we should have become one of the new Five Families, but someone refused our entry. Is that true?”

Lance was obviously surprised when he heard these questions, but not too surprised.

When a person cares a lot about something, they will spontaneously collect all the information and clues related to it.

This was a manifestation of their love for the family.

Lance put down the rib in his hand. He thought for a moment, “Compared to joining the Five Families, I prefer to conquer them.”

The room was silent for a moment, and then erupted in cheers…

At night, a panel van and Lance’s convoy returned to the villa together. A few people took a few boxes of money to the basement.

The basement was already neatly stacked with many piles of cash. Now they had added some more.

Before going to bed, Lance said, as if casually, “Tomorrow, find something else for the people from the Liji Group to do.”

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

Seeing his wife busy in the dining room, he quickly walked over. “I should be the one doing this. We think we should hire a maid. This is not the time for you to be busy.”

Lisa nodded. She did indeed feel a little overwhelmed.

Her belly was gradually getting bigger, and various physiological reactions were beginning to appear. Some things were particularly difficult or uncomfortable to do. She no longer insisted on doing everything herself.

After the two of them had finished making and enjoying breakfast together, Ponda kissed Lisa goodbye and drove to the office.

His colleagues were all looking at him cautiously at this moment. Not finding any negative emotions on his face, they tried to talk to him. He could now face this problem with a modicum of composure.

“…This was decided by the higher-ups. You can’t blame Director Dale. To the higher-ups, he and we are actually the same, with no opportunity to speak up.”

“I’m fine, don’t worry about me. Whether I’m a senior special agent or not, we all love my job.”

A very high level of awareness. Sometimes, the level of awareness has nothing to do with one’s personal ideological realm; it is purely forced out.

He had just sat down when the phone on his desk rang. “Want to go out for a chat?”

Ponda’s expression did not change. He said in a low voice, “Okay.” Lance gave him an address. He then hung up the phone and walked outside.

“An informant might have a lead.”

No one else said anything. He had recently solved several cases of smuggled liquor. Some were also very interested in his informant, believing that this informant might be a member of those smuggled liquor criminal groups.

They were also curious about how he had bought off these informants, but curiosity could only be curiosity. It was not convenient for them to ask, and Ponda would not say if they did.

The two met at a car wash. It was a manual car wash. Although there were so-called automatic car washes on the Golden State side, overall, they were still manually controlled by staff.

It just changed from people washing cars with tools in their hands to machines washing cars with tools. It was said that because of this, the price of a car wash had doubled.

After the car entered the car wash, the roller door was pulled down. Lance pulled open the car door and got in.

“I hear your promotion failed?”

Ponda frowned, then his tone softened on its own initiative. “They parachuted in a senior special agent. Now we don’t have any extra positions, so I can’t go up.”

After all, he had taken advantage of Lance. He had to give Lance an explanation.

“How is your relationship with your colleagues, and with this parachuted-in senior special agent?”

Ponda was a little unsure of the purpose of Lance asking these things, but he still said truthfully, “It can only be said to be very ordinary. After all, they are all senior special agents. If we are not on a mission, there is a high probability that we will not see each other.”

“And…” he paused, looking at Lance meaningfully, “I’ve been in the limelight recently.”

Lance immediately nodded in understanding. Being in the limelight meant that some of the senior special agents were definitely not happy.

A subordinate agent had surpassed them in their work. This would make them seem very incompetent.

Maybe some people’s minds were not so narrow, but as a super-powered department, there were definitely people with narrow minds.

“As for the guy who was parachuted in, I haven’t met him yet.”

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

Lance smiled and spread his hands, making a gesture like a “丿.” “If a vacancy for a senior special agent were to appear now, wouldn’t you be the most hopeful?”

On this point, Ponda was very much in agreement. “Yes, but it’s obvious that it’s unlikely there will be a vacancy waiting for me right now.”

The expression on Lance’s face made him faintly uneasy, and he also sensed something. “This is a dangerous job, Ponda. You should have received some warnings when you were inducted.”

“They want you to be prepared to make sacrifices. After all, you are facing vicious criminal groups, dangerous armed elements.”

“If someone has an accident…”

“Your chance will come.”

Ponda’s eyes widened. “Are you crazy?”

“I can’t… just because I want to be a senior special agent, have you kill my colleague. I’m not that crazy, Lance.”

He repeatedly warned, “Don’t interfere in this matter. This is my bottom line.”

Looking at his very serious appearance, Lance shrugged. He also didn’t want to push Ponda too hard.

So far, he had not been able to develop a second inside line. The Bureau of Hazardous Materials was a very special department. Its power was too great.

This kind of department is very difficult to be corroded in the early stages, because these people, who have been carefully selected from various departments, still hold some “ideals,” and they don’t really know each other.

The drawbacks of the fermentation of power have not yet begun to show, just like the union and the Federation of Labor at this time.

It might be necessary to wait until these people who hold power begin to rot before it becomes easier to get more inside lines.

Before there was a new inside line, Lance would not give him too much pressure. After all, the news he sent back was still very useful.

“I’m just giving you a suggestion. you can choose not to accept it.”

“Since you can’t be promoted to senior special agent for a while, then just do your job well.”

Lance pushed open the car door as he spoke and stepped out. “I wish you a pleasant work.”

He smiled, shook his head, and left.

Ponda sat in the driver’s seat, watching the workers who had re-surrounded his car begin to wash it. He had a very complicated feeling at this moment.

He was struggling, an internal struggle, a moral struggle. In the end, his reason won over his desire. He let out a heavy sigh of relief and lit a cigarette.

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

Just like his translucent heart at this moment, spotless.

These two days, the general manager had arranged for many people to guard the warehouses at the docks, just in case something similar happened again. Fortunately, no one had come to cause trouble these two days, which made him breathe a sigh of relief.

He didn’t know if the vice president’s side had already handled this matter, but he secretly guessed that they had not.

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

The other party should be arriving at noon. There was not much time left until noon.

There were still some goods to be loaded onto the ship in the morning. He heard that the head office had already placed a portion of the goods at the northern port, instead of transferring them over. Only after coordinating and solving these problems would they come over again.

Although doing so increased the transportation costs by a portion, it was better than being mixed with irritating industrial waste, which would cause everything to be scrapped, not to mention having to spend extra money to dispose of it.

Just as he was thinking about these things, a sound of argument suddenly came from the warehouse. He frowned and walked towards the warehouse. Some of the workers on the docks were arguing with their employees.

The two sides were not just arguing verbally, but had already started to push and shove. The situation was about to escalate. He strode over. “What’s going on?”

The worker at the front turned to look at him and sized him up. “Your people are looking down on us.”

The general manager’s gaze turned to his own employees. One of his employees said softly, “These workers were cursing while they were working. It was very unpleasant.”

“I just told them to shut up…”

Without waiting for the general manager to say anything, the leading worker suddenly shouted loudly, “You look down on us workers. We’re not fucking doing it anymore.”

“You can move it yourselves.”

“Brothers, let’s go.”

In just one or two minutes, the thirty or forty workers in the entire warehouse had left. The general manager let out a heavy sigh.

He glared at that employee, then walked to the duty room and dialed the service company’s number.

“We’ve had a misunderstanding with the workers. Can you transfer some more workers over?”

(End of chapter)