Urban All-Round Master

Chapter 455: Chapter 450: Contending for the Mountain and River List (Part 1)

After Nangong Bing took action, the misunderstood security guards were all released.

Especially Zheng Liang, the most severely affected victim, who was exonerated thanks to Su Ni’s thorough investigation.

Through this incident, the entire security department’s brothers once again proved their cohesion and solidarity.

It wasn’t until around ten o’clock at night that Long Yunfei called to invite him to a secret meeting at an underground club.

During the day, Long Yunfei had already mentioned this matter to Lin Zifeng over the phone.

However, when Lin Zifeng led Black Hawk and Bu Chen to a deserted area in Zhonghai City, they found that this was no ordinary meeting.

It was set up like a military base, under Long Yunfei’s guidance.

The four of them parked their military jeep at the edge of a deserted area in the suburbs of Zhonghai City.

All around was desolation, looking at the structure resembling a prison about five hundred meters ahead—the sand castle.

Bu Chen, somewhat curious, asked, ”Is this supposed to be the Zhonghai City army base?”

”Base my ass, you really underestimate the military capability of Zhonghai City. Calling this tiny place a military base? You really have no vision,” Long Yunfei laughed.

Pointing towards the brightly lit small sand castle five hundred meters away, he said, ”That’s where the CIA selects its talents.”

”Hmm?”

All three glanced at Long Yunfei with a confused look, somewhat at a loss for words.

”To put it plainly, it’s where the CIA annually refreshes its staff. That is, to ensure the agency is always ahead of the curve, we hold an annual competition for new recruits, selecting the finest talents of the year. To put it even more plainly, it’s essentially about finding some fighters to replace the annual attrition.”

”Replace the annual attrition?” Lin Zifeng and the others were even more puzzled.

”Err, to put it simply, every year the CIA loses a lot of personnel while performing national duties. Take this year, for instance, in the Diaoyu Islands incident, the death rate in our agency reached thirty percent of the total! So, to fill the gaps, the CIA holds these combat contests privately every year, prioritizing talents with higher combat power for national service. And these experts come from all over the country, whether they are well-known or not, as long as they have an invitation card, they can participate.”

”Got it,” Bu Chen nodded.

This guy, after some time of recuperation, now looked and spoke much better than before.

He appeared much improved compared to earlier.

”So, the combat talents you select every year, to put it bluntly, are basically cannon fodder for the CIA?”

Lin Zifeng finally understood that the so-called CIA talent selection was just about finding some free cannon fodder.

Nicely said, it’s about selecting talents.

After being selected, where can they really go? It’s nothing more than letting these rookies toughen up, unwittingly turning into others’ cannon fodder in the process.

A true CIA talent competition would definitely not look like some underground fistfight.

”Uh, it is indeed so,” Long Yunfei said somewhat sheepishly, touching his nose.

”Let’s go, the old man is probably anxiously waiting.”

”The old man is going too?” Lin Zifeng was slightly surprised, as with Long Zaitian’s status, participating in such a trashy selection event was unthinkable.

”I’m not sure, but the old man mentioned that this year’s selection is special, supposedly even the Dragon Team from Yanjing City has shown up.”

”The Dragon Team!”

Bu Chen nearly blurted out!

”You know about Dragon Team?” Lin Zifeng asked with a frown.

Honestly, when Lin Zifeng left home five years ago, he was nothing more than a small-time hooligan who couldn’t even enter the main hall.

It was only later that he slowly started interacting overseas and found out about some things, still quite clueless about these hidden national powers domestically.

How strong a country really is and how many covert forces it has amassed.

These are certainly not things an ordinary person could imagine.

”I know a little,” Bu Chen used to belong to an elite special forces unit and knew a bit about the country’s hidden forces.

”Dragon Team? How come I’ve never heard of such a name before?”

”Actually, Dragon Team and my CIA are both covert departments set up by the state, pretty similar on the whole, both established to safeguard national security. The only difference is that the CIA is responsible for intelligence, while Dragon Team handles assassinations, specifically targeting terrorists in secret operations and overseas turmoil.”

Lin Zifeng had now really opened his eyes, surprised that the country had established so many covert departments. From an outsider’s perspective, it truly was not evident.

”Come on, you’ll understand soon,” Long Yunfei looked at his watch, feeling that it was about time. Leading Lin Zifeng and the others, he drove the jeep towards the sand castle ahead.

From a distance, the sand castle somewhat resembled a castle from a fairy tale.

The architectural style was almost entirely European.

In the desolate wilderness of the suburbs, it indeed looked a bit like a castle from the movies.

As they approached the sand castle, the main gate operated with an intelligent infrared scanner.

And they even needed to issue an invitation card.

Fortunately, with Long Yunfei there, the three of them bypassed the need for an invitation card and simply scanned their fingerprints before following Long Yunfei into the elevator to the interior of Sand Castle.

It wasn’t until the elevator brought everyone down to the basement.

Only then did Lin Zifeng sigh a little. The CIA really knew how to play, building a Sand Castle and even constructing such a deep basement beneath it.

The three followed Long Yunfei inside, and only then did they discover a very large underground boxing ring!

Beneath the boxing ring, hundreds of chairs were arranged at various levels, very similar to the Duel Arena where Black Hawk had been rescued last time.

However, the boxing ring in the middle was somewhat special.

Indeed, as soon as Lin Zifeng appeared, Long Zaitian also popped up from somewhere.

He hurried forward to greet him.

”Kid, you’re here,” Long Zaitian said, looking benevolent and frail.

But others might not know, Lin Zifeng understood very well.

This old bastard’s surface skills were better than anyone’s.

”Greetings to Dragon Head,” Lin Zifeng chuckled.

”Dragon Head my ass! Don’t make it sound so formal, alright?” Long Zaitian pretended to be angry, their relationship seeming as if they were old friends who hadn’t seen each other in centuries; yet Bu Chen, standing behind him, felt tumultuous inside, realizing how highly Lin Zifeng was regarded to be this close to the top leader of the CIA!

”Uh...” Lin Zifeng was at a loss and didn’t even know how to respond.

”Boy, it’s all about your performance today, oh, you better not disappoint me.” The old guy patted the back of Lin Zifeng’s hand, looking quite expectant.

”Performance? What performance?” Lin Zifeng asked.

”Fighting! Isn’t fighting your special skill? Just give it your all on stage later, and I’m placing all my bets on you,” he suggested.

”F-fighting? Dragon Head, you brought me here just to fight for you?” Lin Zifeng was speechless.

This old bastard behaved so disrespectfully; was he really becoming senile, or was his brain just less sharp?

”Yes! Didn’t Yunfei explain it to you?” Long Zaitian asked with his mouth wide open.

Turning around, Lin Zifeng saw that Long Yunfei also had a look of exasperation.

His grandfather hadn’t mentioned anything like this to him; it was entirely the old man’s impromptu idea.

Even Long Yunfei felt embarrassed to have such a grandfather.

”Uh...” Lin Zifeng was silent, speechless.

”Then it’s settled! I’ll be watching your performance later, I’m going up first. Hey, Yunfei, hurry, take Zifeng up to watch the match and drink tea, and when it’s time to call his name, just come down and fight hard for me. Remember, it’s okay to kill others, just don’t let them kill you,” he said, and before Lin Zifeng could react, the old fellow dashed away faster than a rabbit.

Leaving Lin Zifeng and the others completely dumbfounded.

When everyone turned their gaze toward Long Yunfei, he just shrugged his shoulders, speechless as well.

Until the old man, Long Zaitian, appeared in a one-way glass pavilion on the second floor, he was seen sitting with another elderly man who, although also had a full head of white hair, was much larger than Long Zaitian.

However, the aura of supremacy this elderly man emitted was not much inferior to that of Long Zaitian.

”How is it? The kid you keep talking about has arrived?” The old man’s every move exuded a royal and domineering attitude.

Yet he spoke to Long Zaitian with a bit of mockery.

”Haha, scared now? I’ll show you what it means to be young and successful, and open your eyes,” Long Zaitian heartily slapped the old man.

”Well, I’ll be looking forward to it,” the old man also chuckled in response.

...

”Say, Yunfei, are these guys all participating in the competition?” At the railing on the second floor, the four people were watching the crowd of hundreds below.

These people, mostly dressed very unusually, as Lin Zifeng would say.

All sorts of oddities.

Some were flexing and preparing under the boxing ring, and in the Great Thousand World, strange things abound.

There were muscular men, explosive girls, and some even dressed like heroes from TV shows.

Not a normal one among them.

”They are all famous masters from Zhonghai City, mostly invited by the CIA today. But I’m a bit puzzled why there are so many people this time, and just now I even saw Zhang Xiaohua from the Mountain and River List, damn it, an Immortal orb, this is unscientific!”

”Mountain and River List? What’s the Mountain and River List?” Lin Zifeng asked.

”The Mountain and River List is essentially an official competition held every five years in Zhonghai City, ranking various masters. However, the current top ten in the Mountain and River List are still the holders from five years ago. Looking at today’s situation, it seems everyone is here to compete for a spot on the Mountain and River List,” he explained.

”A competition among masters?”