Empire of Shadows

With a bang, the door to the Professor’s office was kicked open. Wolf, his face stern and grim, burst in. He walked straight up to the Profe

With a bang, the door to the Professor’s office was kicked open. Wolf, his face stern and grim, burst in.

He walked straight up to the Professor, who was trying to pretend everything was normal, looked at him, and said loudly, “Your family has been kidnapped by them?”

“Was it Lance and his crew?”

The Professor rubbed his face and put the glasses that were on the desk back on. “How… did you know?”

Wolf’s heart was also in great turmoil. Coming to Golden Port this time was not a “mandatory mission.” You could come, or you could choose not to.

After all, Sidney had completely left Fides, and with the “post-Fides city government’s” purge of remaining political forces, he could no longer influence Fides.

Of course, their days weren’t exactly easy either. The local gangs that existed during Sidney’s time had all been suppressed to varying degrees.

The new politicians supported new gangs to fight against them. If it weren’t for the fact that they were all “locals” and had more or less a relationship with the working class, they might have been locked up long ago.

A purely industrial city fears a strike more, because when a strike happens, it’s a city-wide general strike.When Sidney notified them to come over, Wolf didn’t think for too long before agreeing.

There were many reasons to support his decision.

Golden Port was more prosperous, while Fides was clearly lagging behind.

With Sidney as the mayor here, he called all the shots. In Fides, they still had to fight against those newly supported gangs.

Here, whatever they did could be suppressed, but in Fides, they still had to rack their brains to deal with the police.

There were too many unbalanced comparisons that made him make the choice, so he decided to come here, and that’s what triggered everything.

“We have to rescue them!” Wolf looked at the Professor. “That’s not just your family, that’s our family too!”

The Professor’s eyes were very red, his whole person seemed to have lost the belief that supported him. He was in a difficult position. “Lance and his crew have definitely set up an ambush near the valley. If we go, we’ll fall into their trap.”

He wasn’t trying to convince Wolf; he was trying to convince himself.

He was telling himself, don’t fucking go, if you go, everyone will die.

This was a very rational judgment, and he was indeed thinking this way. If they go, everyone will die.

If they don’t go, they can still continue to fight against the Lance Family.

They had moved the battlefield from the city to outside the city precisely to avoid the Wolf Gang’s home-field advantage.

Wait a little longer, wait a few days, wait for the Mayor’s backup plan to emerge, and everything will be settled.

At that time, all scores could be settled. That’s what he said, what he thought.

But rationality, most of the time, does not have the upper hand.

You tell yourself not to wank anymore, that it’s wrong. The guilt hidden in the emptiness after each session makes you swear this is the last time.

Your reason, your thoughts, your personality, your heart, are all so firm at this moment, making this promise, this oath with unparalleled firmness.

But what happens?

When the time comes, reason will fade, and emotion will rise. You will grab the tissues, find a comfortable place to sit, lick your lips, and indulge yourself with gusto once again.

People are all like this, and the Professor was no exception. His reason desperately told him not to do it. He was even trying to convince himself by convincing Wolf.

But the thought of his wife, his daughter, his family, brought him immense pain.

At the same time, just at this moment, several more senior cadres rushed in, looking at Wolf and the Professor with horror.

“Our families… have been kidnapped by the Lance Family…”

The Professor’s eyes widened as he looked at them. He knew it was over.

This was perhaps the most tragic state for a smart person. You know it’s going to end in disaster, but you still have to walk down that path.

Now he couldn’t even convince himself by convincing Wolf. Even if he succeeded, what about those men?

As a gang leader, how could he tell these people?

“Anyway, if you go, everyone will die. Let’s not go. Let’s just wait for two hours and see if they’re serious.”

Say that?

After saying that, they would rebel and leave with their men.

Wolf looked at them in disbelief, then back at the Professor. “Lance and his crew have connections in Fides!”

His teeth were grinding loudly.

At this moment, the Professor had actually calmed down. He tidied his hair to make it look less messy. “It seems we have no other choice.”

Wolf sat down next to him, a hand on his shoulder. “Tell me, what do we do now?”

The Professor forced himself into a state of thinking. “He arranged the location in the valley, which means they must have people positioned on the mountains.”

“We’ll split into two groups. One part will go by the main road, while the other group will bypass the main road and go up the mountain from the side.”

“This time our mission is not to defeat them, but to rescue our families and bring them back!”

The Professor was indeed a smart man. From the beginning, he hadn’t thought of having a firefight with Lance and his crew from a disadvantaged position.

“Get some panel vans. They can hold more people and are a bit safer.”

Wolf listened to his instructions and immediately began to make arrangements. Soon, they had seven or eight panel vans and some smaller cars.

“The panel vans will go with us to the valley. The others in the small cars, get to a high point on the mountain as quickly as possible.”

If he had more time, or even a more detailed map, he could have made more arrangements, but now there wasn’t that much time for him.

It took about an hour to get from here out of the city to the valley. Getting these vehicles had already taken twenty or thirty minutes. They had no other time to prepare.

The group stood in the open space. The Professor’s lips moved. He didn’t know what to say, or how to say it.

This time, many of those going to the valley might die, but they had a reason they had to go.

He should have said something to boost morale, but he really couldn’t get the words out.

In the end, he said a very short sentence— “Everyone, come back alive…”

The long convoy began to move quickly towards the valley, and Lance’s men were also in position.

An hour or so later, a batch of panel vans entered the valley.

The valley was quiet, with only several groups of hostages tied up separately.

The Professor saw his daughter, saw his wife. They, along with the Professor’s other relatives, were tied in two separate circles.

He hadn’t seen them for a while. He had never been so eager to talk to them, to take them away from here.

But he knew now was not the time to be hasty.

The convoy stopped, because everything was too strange. It was so quiet around that there was not a single other sound.

The quieter it was, the more uneasy the Professor became.

Just as he was about to get up, Wolf pressed down on his shoulder. He couldn’t break free; he was no match for Wolf. “This is my responsibility, it has to be me!”

The two stared at each other, neither willing to back down. After a moment, Wolf released his hand. He said solemnly, “Don’t forget what you said. We have to go back alive!”

The Professor nodded vigorously. He checked his pistol and jumped out of the car.

He walked slowly towards the middle of the valley, observing the surroundings while shouting loudly, “Lance, I’m here. Where are you?”

The valley was silent. He walked forward slowly, but the further he walked, the more uneasy he felt.

He was less than ten meters away from his family, from the others’ families. He stopped, his palms slick with sweat.

“Lance, come out and talk?”

“You asked me to come, I’m here. What about you?”

He looked at the surrounding mountains and forests, as if trying to find Lance’s shadow, but all he could see was dense vegetation. Besides that and the echoes, he saw nothing.

The sun was scorching. Drops of sweat trickled down his forehead and temples.

He didn’t dare to wipe them. He was afraid that the movement of raising his hand would create some kind of signal. He had to find Lance’s men first.

“Are you all okay?” Seeing that no one was answering him, the Professor finally turned his attention to his family.

His daughter whimpered and nodded. Although his ex-wife didn’t speak, he could feel that both of them were very worried about him.

The other relatives also seemed relieved to see him. “Hurry up and untie our ropes!”

Some just cried out his name, as if venting some emotion.

He gritted his teeth and took two more steps forward. Still no movement.

“Do you know where they are?” he asked.

“We don’t know. They blindfolded us and then left.”

He tried to get a little closer, and found that there were no unexpected situations. He was a little at a loss as to what to do.

Someone saw that the Professor had already approached the crowd, but no one had fired. They also eagerly got out of the cars and ran towards their families. The Professor turned his head sharply to look at them, something seeming to flash in his eyes.

At that very moment, the gunshots rang out. The fierce gunfire instantly drowned out all the sounds in the mountain forest and also interrupted the Professor’s train of thought.

The hostages screamed in panic. Someone shouted, “I’ve been shot!” And the women screamed and cried. The scene was extremely chaotic.

Wolf slapped the driver’s shoulder, nearly breaking it. The driver endured the pain and slammed on the accelerator, quickly rushing to a position between the hostages and the direction of the gunfire.

The sparks from the bullets hitting the panel van made people breathe a sigh of relief.

“Quick, quick, untie their ropes!”

The Professor frantically tore at the ropes. They were all tied up back to back, with the ropes passing through their hands behind them.

These were not ordinary ropes. Even with a dagger, they were not so easy to cut.

The external environment made it impossible to concentrate and think. The Professor didn’t know why he had a very strange feeling, as if… Lance’s men were doing this on purpose, deliberately forcing them to move these people into the cars faster.

He was dazed for a moment, wanting to continue thinking, but was soon bumped by someone. He came back to his senses, no longer considering other things, and began to instinctively pull hard on the ropes.

The ropes were torn open. His daughter threw herself into his arms, crying and calling him “Dad.” However, at this moment, there was not a trace of joy on his face from having saved his daughter.

Because he saw it. The moment he tore open the ropes, a round thing, from who knows where, fell to the ground.

He subconsciously looked up. He was surrounded by his family.

Bomb!

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