Stealing the Base
Nie Yu slowly closed his eyes. His double pupils gradually faded away, and when he opened his eyes again, they had reverted to their original state.
"Found them just like that?" Vulture asked in surprise.
"I didn't expect that man in the brown coat would actually be able to fly." Nie Yu spoke in a deep voice. "If it weren't for the others sitting in the car and leaving traces on the road, it really wouldn't have been easy to find him..."
"He can control electronic equipment, change his face, and even fly? What's this guy's background?"
"I don't know."
"Then what do you plan to do next?"
"Chase after him and kill him," Nie Yu said without hesitation.
"What about those hands I found for you?"
Vulture stretched his hand out the car window and flicked his cigarette ash. "No problem, but let's make this clear first, the money must be settled in cash... And just like before, I am only responsible for helping you receive and issue tasks. I won't show my face."
Nie Yu gave him a cold look and didn't say anything more. Carrying his hunting rifle, he walked straight forward.
"Go hide back in your cellar."
...
At the entrance of the Su Estate.
A young man wearing a peaked cap and a hoodie slowly came to a halt in front of the tightly closed gates.
'There are no traces of the door being opened... Either they haven't arrived yet, or they know it's already empty inside.' Chen Ling casually glanced at the crack of the door and thought to himself.
It had been a long time since Nie Yu was arrested. Logically speaking, with this guy's abilities, he should have escaped long ago... So it could only be the latter.
At the time when Chen Ling left with Su Zhiwei and the others, a group of assassins had chased after them. Although Chen Ling killed them all, according to what the last two assassins said, there was a guy codenamed "Vulture" behind them who worked specifically for Nie Yu... It was impossible for Nie Yu not to search the Su Estate without any intelligence, so there was a high probability that he and Vulture had already met up and knew that he and the others had escaped.
'Now both sides are hiding in the dark. It just depends on who finds who first.'
After pondering for a moment, Chen Ling clarified the general situation, while his gaze swept across his surroundings.
There were no tall buildings in downtown Gusu. To monitor the Su Estate, the location couldn't be too far away, and there weren't many places to choose from... Very quickly, Chen Ling locked onto four of them and walked over with his hands in the pockets of his hoodie.
As he walked, Chen Ling opened his flip phone and lightly pressed the call button.
At the same time, all the surveillance cameras he passed by were forcibly called up and popped up on the phone screen one after another.
"Not this road... not this one either... this road is too narrow and impossible to park on... then it must be..."
"Hmm?"
Chen Ling arrived in front of a low building and suddenly stopped in his tracks.
In the footage displayed on the phone screen, a figure hurriedly ran out from the low building and dove into the passenger seat. Seemingly after saying something, the vehicle swiftly drove out of the alleyway... Chen Ling recognized that person. On the highway, the other party hadn't finished speaking before Chen Ling blew him away with a single shot.
"So he was here..." Chen Ling's eyes lit up slightly.
He immediately shifted the surveillance footage to an earlier time. About an hour before Chen Ling and the others arrived at the Su Estate, this car drove into the alleyway. There were a total of three people in the car. Besides the two who were killed by Chen Ling, there was also a figure wearing a black uniform, looking like a bartender.
But when the two assassins drove off to track Chen Ling and the others, the bartender didn't go downstairs. Instead, about forty minutes later, he walked out alone and headed on foot toward an even darker and more complicated alleyway.
Chen Ling was ninety-nine percent sure that this man was "Vulture."
Chen Ling slowly lowered the flip phone in his hand, his gaze looking toward the dark alleyway where Vulture had left, the corners of his mouth turning up slightly.
"It seems... I've taken the first step."
...
Over an hour later.
Chen Ling put away his flip phone, looking at the abandoned path leading underground in front of him, his eyes narrowing.
This place looked like an electric scooter parking lot in some old district, but the several houses around it were all empty. There were even huge "Demolish" characters printed on the walls, clearly having been abandoned for a long time.
Because it was an abandoned area, the electronic surveillance coverage was not comprehensive. After going deep into this place, Chen Ling couldn't rely on surveillance to track Vulture, and when encountering intersections, he could only search them one by one... The good news was that none of the main road surveillance cameras around showed traces of Vulture coming out, so his hiding place was bound to be in this abandoned area.
After searching here for a long time, the only place possible to hide people was this underground space.
Chen Ling walked down the stairs into the underground step by step. The surrounding light rapidly dimmed, and a stench surged out from deep underground, like the musty smell of garbage that had been fermenting for a long time...
In the darkness, his eyes remained bright. Reaching out, he gripped the gun and bone-stripping knife in his pockets, his vigilance already elevated to the maximum.
Soon, a rust-covered door appeared before his eyes...
Chen Ling tentatively reached out and grasped the door handle. With a slight pull, a corner of the door opened; it didn't seem to be locked. As he gradually opened the door wide, an extremely hidden underground tavern appeared before his eyes.
Old floorboards, empty tables and chairs, a dim neon sign... There was no one in sight. Only the cigarette butts and shattered glass fragments all over the floor were telling what had once happened here.
Chen Ling slowly walked into the tavern, his brows involuntarily furrowing.
"No one... Am I already too late?"
Just as Chen Ling's heart sank slightly, a series of footsteps came from outside the door, as if someone was approaching through the underground passage.
Chen Ling immediately pulled the iron door shut again. Looking out through the crack of the door, he found that the person coming was none other than the Vulture he had just seen in the surveillance footage.
Alone?
Chen Ling's brain spun rapidly.
As Vulture walked to the door, a thought surged into Chen Ling's mind. He immediately reached his hand to his chin and tore it forcefully!
Creak—!
The old iron door opened, emitting a harsh sound.
Vulture walked into the tavern. Just as he was about to close the door backhandedly, out of the corner of his eye, he saw a familiar figure sitting in front of the bar counter, looking at him coldly.
Vulture froze on the spot.
"...You... why are you here?"
The black hem of the clothes hung down the edge of the high chair. "Nie Yu" toyed with the goblet in his hand, his gaze as cold as a blade.
"Vulture, your vigilance is getting worse and worse," 'Nie Yu' spoke coldly. "You don't even lock the door when you go out? Are you so afraid this place won't be exposed?"
"No one usually comes here anyway, and there's nothing important..."
Vulture subconsciously began to explain, but he then reacted and immediately asked back, "Weren't you following the clues to track down Su Zhiwei and the others?"
Hearing this sentence, Chen Ling's heart skipped a beat.
Tracking Su Zhiwei? He had already pulled out all the tracking informants, yet Nie Yu still had a way to track them?
"Nie Yu" didn't speak. He slowly placed the wine glass in his hand on the table. After a long time, he finally spoke in a deep voice:
"...I failed."