Empire of Shadows

Sixty minutes ago, in a roadside phone booth, a middle-aged man in a trench coat stood inside, pinching a burning cigarette.

He kept nodding at the phone, his expression like he had eaten shit.

“…I don’t care how you do it. I just want to see this son of a bitch named Lance White in the newspapers. Do you understand what I mean?”

“Lying on the ground or somewhere, with a hole in his head. That’s all I want.”

“As for how you do it, I don’t care.”

The director slammed the phone down. The gunmen had told him it would be difficult to find a suitable opportunity to make a move on Lance in the short term.

When Lance went out, there were always three or four, four or five cars, with a large group of people following.

The place he lived was heavily guarded, he had no fixed habits or routes, and after arriving at a location, his bodyguards would clear the area first before he would get out of the car…

Trying to intercept and kill him on the road was basically a very difficult matter, unless they brought in more people.

Twenty or thirty people, or more, might have a chance.With fewer people, it was impossible.

But the director who had contacted them wouldn’t listen to their explanations. Now he just wanted a result.

The specialist and his team had been completely “wiped out.” Not only had the corporate group lost face, but they also had to face huge compensation.

The president, the chairman, now they just wanted to vent their anger.

If they could get rid of Lance, even if it meant paying them a large sum of money, it would be acceptable.

The company’s purpose was very simple. It was to tell others through such an incident that if you want to get a sum of money from the company through extortion or the like, no problem.

As long as you are prepared to die, then come on.

This was a matter of attitude.

When a wild dog bares its teeth at you, and you don’t fight back resolutely, then more wild dogs will try to provoke your authority, to test your majesty.

This wasn’t a question of money or not; it was a matter of stance, of attitude.

Looking at the hung-up phone in his hand, the man in the trench coat kicked the base of the phone booth. He cursed, and then came out of the phone booth and got into a car on the side of the road.

“They are demanding that we make a move as soon as possible,” he said, pinching his cigarette and taking a big drag, his irritable emotions constantly surging.

The person next to him couldn’t help but complain, “The success rate of making a move now is too low, unless we can find more people, or find a sharpshooter.”

“But we can’t possibly mobilize so many people here in a short time, and we can’t find any sharpshooters here either.”

Hitting a target from a few hundred meters away?

It sounds quite reliable, but people who have never tried it simply cannot understand the difficulty of doing so.

In this era where the accuracy of firearms is not so precise, and you also have to consider problems like wind speed, trajectory, and distance, a sniper who can hit a human-sized target from a few hundred meters away only exists in the army, and is very rare.

In the end, they still had to get close to the target.

But approaching the target without some “add-ons,” there was only one possibility—getting wiped out.

“We have to think of a way. If it really doesn’t work, we’ll just go back and tell the Boss that we can’t do this job.”

After the few people in the car had thought for a while, someone suggested, “We can use explosives.”

The gazes of the others were all focused on him. He continued, “Anyway, all they want is Lance to die, not that we have to kill him in a certain way.”

“We’ll kidnap a character who is very important to Lance, and then have him come to the rescue in person.”

“Set up some explosives. As long as he comes, we’ll send him to heaven.” He made an explosion gesture with his hand. The others actually thought this plan was feasible after hearing it.

“No need for aiming, no need for many people, just a bait, and then wait for him to come to the door.”

This was indeed a good method, but there were also some problems.

Someone asked, “Who should we kidnap?”

“His sister?”

The person who had proposed this suggestion waved his hand. “No, Lance is an Empire immigrant, but his sister is a Federation citizen. Don’t you know that they have a way to make foreigners become Federation citizens recently?”

“Maybe he would hope that nominal sister of his would be finished even more than we do, so that no one could expose his identity.”

“Then who do we kidnap?”

“His girlfriend, or his good friend?”

Lance’s “good friends” were basically all gang members, and all very fierce gang members. They could attack these characters to provoke Lance, but the possibility of kidnapping these people to lure Lance out was not very high.

They had also observed Patricia, but Patricia was now in the villa, and there was a security team of more than a dozen people providing protection outside the villa.

With just a few of them, not to say that there was no chance at all, but even if there was a little chance, it would require a heavy price.

In the end, the person who had raised the question gave a role he thought was suitable—

“William, William Lawrence, Lance’s girlfriend’s father, and also his partner.”

“He just became a municipal councilman and is running around everywhere every day. His schedule can be found out.”

“He is an important partner of Lance, and also his girlfriend’s father. Lance will definitely come.”

The person in the driver’s seat asked, “What if he doesn’t come?”

“The possibility of you knowingly walking into a trap is not high. It’s very likely he will have his subordinates come to the rescue.”

The person who had proposed this idea could only shrug and say, “Then we’ll detonate the bombs and leave this place, and let the Boss and those big shots negotiate.”

After the few people had thought for a while, they agreed to his idea.

It wasn’t difficult to know what William was going to do for the day. His daily schedule was almost transparent. All you had to do was call his office.

Soon, they knew that William was still in his office and was about to leave, so they drove their cars to the outside of William’s office and waited for him to come out.

After lunch, they indeed saw William get into a car, and then they followed closely behind.

The car William was in was very fast. They had to speed up as well, otherwise they might be shaken off at a red light.

“I’ve looked at the map. The street they’re on will have fewer and fewer people. When there aren’t many people on the road, we’ll make a move.”

Just as they were discussing when to make a move, William in the back seat of the car in front suddenly turned his head and looked at them through the rear window.

And at that moment, they knew they had been discovered.

“Fuck, ram them.”

The few of them grabbed their assistants. The man in the trench coat in the passenger seat had the driver ram them, trying to find a way to stop the car.

The simplest way was to sharply turn the steering wheel when the front of their car was at one-third to one-half of the rear of the other car’s speed.

This would force the other car to lose control. At such a high speed, it would definitely crash into the side of the road.

At that time, they would pull William out of the car, take him into their car and leave, and the matter would be solved.

Of course, they did indeed do this. The driver floored the accelerator. Vaguely, he was almost in a position to intercept. He looked at the back seat of that car with a slightly expectant and twisted smile.

The terrified expression he wanted to see did not appear in his eyes, only a man holding a gun.

“Fuck!”

“They have a gun!”

The front of the car, which should have rammed them, suddenly swerved away after the driver slammed on the brakes.

The moment the gunshots rang out, this kidnapping case turned into a car chase and firefight.

The man in the trench coat in the passenger seat kept cursing. He took out his weapon and fired at the opposite car. “Hit their tires, hit the tires.”

Two people, they might have fired a dozen or twenty shots, and finally hit a tire.

The car William was in swerved violently and crashed into a shop on the side of the road. The car also stopped.

After the violent impact, his whole person was in a daze, as if someone had turned off the lights, and the whole world was also a patch of black.

The violent impact had given him a concussion. The sound of gunshots constantly ringing in his ears was still telling him that this place was not safe.

But now he couldn’t even stand up. He could only curl up behind the car door, watching a dark shadow constantly firing in front of him.

The occasional flash of the muzzle could light up some of the world’s colors, but it would quickly return to darkness.

He didn’t know how long had passed. William suddenly shivered.

Something wet and hot dripped onto his face, and at the same time, a heavy body also pressed down on him. The dim world in his eyes also began to gradually become bright again.

He pushed away the guy who was pressing on him. He had been shot in the face, and one of his eyeballs was almost falling out.

Hot blood and a mess of things dripped all over his face. A strong fear rose from the depths of his heart.

When fear reaches its limit, it gives birth to anger.

He pushed the body onto the seat next to him, while forcefully prying at the body’s fingers.

When a person dies, their extremities will sometimes be in a state of tension. He broke several of this guy’s fingers before he could get the pistol into his own hands.

He wiped the blood from his face, raised his hand, and fired two shots.

He had used a gun before, and knew how to use one. The boys of the Lawrence family had had their own hunting rifles since they were young.

There were many animals around the farm that would cause them trouble, such as coyotes, rabbits, foxes, and even wild boars.

These animals would bring huge losses to the farm. They would kill the livestock on the farm, and some would make a mess of the fields.

So they would have their own hunting rifles from a young age. In the summer and autumn, under the leadership of the older generation, they would shoot these small animals everywhere.

This was the first time William had fired a gun at a person. The stimulus of the bullets whizzing past him brought a sharp secretion of adrenaline.

He felt incomparably powerful, invincible, at this moment.

The firefight between the two sides lasted for one or two minutes. William had touched all over the bodyguard’s body and could no longer find any other magazines. And in his pistol, there were not many bullets left.

There were still three people in the car, one bodyguard, one of his assistants. The three of them were all ducking down, not letting their bodies be exposed to the sight of those people.

He ejected the magazine and glanced at it. There weren’t many bullets left. Now he could only hope that the other side didn’t have many bullets either.

After all, no one would carry a whole box of bullets when they went out to do business. Even if they did, there would be no time to load them.

Most people would carry three to five spare magazines, which would add up to about fifty to sixty rounds. If all these bullets were fired and the winner was still not decided, then it wouldn’t make much difference if there were a few more or a few less bullets.

At this time, William’s mind was still very chaotic, but suddenly he was taken aback for a moment, and then he shouted, “I am William, I am Lance’s partner. Can someone help me?”

A faint sound of cursing came from a distance. These people also understood what William meant. They tried to rush over, but after William fired two shots, those people shrank back again.

No one is not afraid of death, not even these gunmen.

Now what William needed to do was to drag out the time, until Lance’s men arrived here.

He had heard that on Lance’s turf, there were his patrol teams.

“Whoever it is, I hope they can come over as soon as possible,” he made the most serious prayer of his life.

The phone suddenly rang. Alan glanced at Lance’s unlit room and picked it up directly.

Then his expression changed dramatically. He immediately shouted, “Some people come with me, bring your weapons,” and ran outside as he spoke.

The place where William was attacked was in the city center, but the place he was going to today was the Empire District, because he was going to the Empire District to choose a piece of land, so this was already the junction of the city center and the Empire District.

Someone had heard William’s shout. They told Bolton about it, and Bolton’s call reached here.

“Fuck, fuck!”

The gunman in the trench coat hid behind cover. He looked at the car that had clearly lost power and William who was shouting inside, but he didn’t have any other good solution.

Now he had to make a decision. Should he risk going over to grab the person and take him away, or should he leave Golden Port immediately?

He looked at the others, the buddies who had come here with him to do this job. Every one of them would avoid his gaze.

He knew that they were unwilling to rush up.

In fact, this problem had the same result for him. He asked himself, was he willing to risk rushing to the front?

Without any internal struggle, he gave himself an answer.

No, he was not willing to risk rushing to the front, which was why he had looked at the others.

Now, he knew that everyone’s thoughts were the same.

There was never a group that could maintain such a high degree of ideological consistency, except in this matter.

Since everyone was unwilling to take the risk, then they could only leave.

Their mission this time was not to shoot a worthless what’s-his-name municipal councilman, but to kidnap him.

When they found that they couldn’t do the kidnapping, there was no need to stay. This operation had failed.

“Go…” without any hesitation, he gave the order to retreat.

The few people quickly got into the car, as if they had been trained a thousand times, quickly found their positions. The car was immediately started, and then the steering wheel was turned, and the accelerator was floored towards another road.

Just as the vehicle was about to leave, a car from the side crashed into them…

Twenty-something minutes later, Lance arrived at the hospital.

William was leaning against the hospital bed.

“Are you injured?” Lance walked to the chair by the bedside and sat down.

William stretched out his hands in a gesture of self-display. “They said I have some concussion, some wounds on my body, and I was cut by glass shards.”

He thought of the young man who had died on him. “That… the guy next to me, he…”

Lance pursed his lips. “He’s dead. You don’t think he can survive a shot to the face, do you?”

Although there had been similar rumors, saying that someone had their chin shot off by a bullet, or had survived a shot to the head, these were isolated cases after all.

The bullet had penetrated the young man’s skull base. He was as dead as could be.

William’s mood was a little low. “I’m sorry.”

Lance raised his hand. “No, you don’t need to apologize. This is his job. You should respect his work, and the courage he was willing to pay with his life for this job.”

“You should thank him for not leaving you at a time like that.”

“If you really want to do something, then give his family a sum of money.”

William nodded. “I will.”

The room was quiet for a while. “Can I know who wanted to deal with me?”

Lance clapped his hands. He leaned forward slightly. “To be honest, they wanted to cause me trouble through you.”

“You were implicated.”

William breathed a sigh of relief when he heard this. It was good that they weren’t specifically targeting him.

“I remember you caught them?”

Lance did not deny it. “Yes, they are being questioned. If there are no accidents, I will be able to solve this matter soon.”

“Emily and Pat are very worried about you. You can call them back later.”

“It’s best to carry a weapon when you go out recently. It may not save your life, but it can definitely take the lives of those who want to harm you.”

“I still have to deal with those people, so I’ll be leaving first. I’ve left new bodyguards for you at the door.”

“Goodbye.”

William looked at him for a few seconds, as if in a daze, and then said goodbye.

After Lance left, he lay down again, lying on the white ceiling, his mind replaying the image of the eyeball falling out.

At this moment, he didn’t feel much fear.. only the relief of having survived by a stroke of luck, and some guilt.

There were many police officers outside the door. The police all greeted Lance when they saw him. Sub-bureau Chief Bruce also came over. “Those suspects…”

“After I get what I want, I will hand them over to you, but I can’t guarantee that they will still be in one piece.”

On this, Sub-bureau Chief Bruce had no reason at all. Even if it was a corpse, it would still count as a “perfect” conclusion to this case.

He didn’t dare to ask for more now, because he could feel that Lance was not in a good mood.

Of course, the ones in a worse mood than him were the few gunmen who had been caught.

Not only were their moods bad, but their throats were not so good either.

(End of chapter)