Empire of Shadows

This wasn't the first time Lance and the others had seen Goldport City at four in the morning. They had seen it before, even when they first arrived in the Federation.

But now, everyone's mood was completely different from when they had first arrived.

When they first arrived, they were bewildered and didn't know what to do or how to survive.

But now, they had found their direction, and a happy life was waving to them in the near future.

Some were smoking and enjoying the breeze, while others were still savoring everything that had happened not long ago.

The wind blowing from the sea already carried a chilling, murderous intent. Lance parked all the cars at the entrance of the Lezhu Company's yard.

After waiting for about a few minutes, the headlights of three cars approached from a distance and stopped not far from them.

Fordis was the first to get out of the car. Under the streetlight, Lance saw the pistol in his hand. He quickly called out, "I'm here."

The vigilance on Fordis's face hadn't completely disappeared. "I can't see you."

Lance led the others to the streetlight, which finally eased Fordis's vigilance, but not completely.

The others got out of the car, and two of them went to open the yard gate. After the others circled around the area to make sure no one was around, Alberto got out of the car.

He acted as if he hadn't questioned anything, smiling and hugging Lance. The close contact allowed him to smell the strong gunpowder scent on Lance's body.

"Don't tell me you caused all those police cars just now," he said, somewhat incredulous but also feeling it made sense, since Lance had just taken a lot of weapons from him.

Lance chuckled twice, "Maybe. If there weren't any other gang shootouts just now, then it was most likely me."

Alberto punched him on the shoulder, "Did you rob a bank or assassinate the president? I had just fallen asleep when I was awakened by a series of phone calls."

"My boss, important figures, and the police department were all asking me if I knew what happened!"

Fordis also came over and hugged Lance, "So?"

"I took out Will from the Karami Gang, on the street."

Alberto whistled, "You chose a good time. Spending some money can suppress this matter," he said, looking at the five cars parked by the roadside.

Many of the car windows were broken, and there were bullet holes in the body. He realized the purpose of Lance's call, and then instructed Fordis and the others to have someone drive a few cars out.

These cars needed to be processed before they could be used again, not only to repair the bullet holes but also to find the bullets inside the car.

If the police believed that Lance was the prime suspect, then they could apply for legal documents such as search warrants to impound these cars.

As long as they could find any bullet in these vehicles that was fired from the weapons at the shootout scene, they would have enough crucial and direct evidence to arrest them all.

There were indeed many bastards in the Federal Police, but you have to admit that some people were indeed doing their jobs, and these people were very good at solving cases.

This was also why Officer Lucar was in a hurry to find Lance. He didn't believe that Lance's convoy hadn't been hit.

As long as it was hit, there would definitely be bullets.

Some bullets might be more conspicuous, such as on the floor of the car, but some bullets were not so obvious, such as shooting into the car door and then hitting a harder part, not penetrating the car door, and getting stuck somewhere in the car's splint.

Such bullets couldn't be removed in a short time without disassembling the car. The entire car had to be disassembled and all the bullets found before it could be considered safe.

Some repair companies that specialize in handling this kind of thing would disassemble the entire car into parts, and according to the number of bullet holes on the car, find each bullet before reassembling the car.

However, this was done either because the cars were very expensive and had some commemorative significance, or because there was no way to change the car, such as the whole world knowing that this was your car, and changing it would cause other unknown possibilities.

This was also why many times those rich gangsters would try to destroy their cars after a shootout, regardless of whether their cars could still be driven.

They were unwilling and couldn't provide direct evidence to the police.

Alberto's men drove the cars Lance had driven over into the garage, and then drove five cars out.

"I'll help you deal with those cars. Two or three hundred dollars per car, there's no need to repair them," The cars would be sent to the scrap yard by Alberto tomorrow morning, then crushed into iron blocks, and then thrown into Angel Lake.

Well, the secret of the rising water level of Angel Lake has been revealed a little, but only a very few people know it.

Lance took the keys and nodded, "Thank you, I'll have someone send the money over tomorrow. There's a high probability I won't be able to come over myself."

Alberto nodded, "Do you need me to provide any other help?"

"A lawyer, or capable people, or anything else?" He knew that Lance wasn't short of money, having just taken more than 400,000 from him, plus the business he had been running.

Lance wouldn't be short of money, but he must be short of other things.

"Lance, you know, I've always thought you could become a big shot, give me a chance."

Lance thought for a while, "I have a few people injured here, and also introduce me to a suitable lawyer."

Alberto looked at the few people standing in the distance, counted them, "Okay, let them go with my car," then went back to the car, fiddled for a while, and took out a business card.

"Specializes in defending gangsters, has very rich defense experience, you can use him."

Lance glanced at the business card, put it in his pocket, and the two hugged again, "See you later."

"See you later!"

Lance had the others get in the car and drove back to the house in the West Suburbs. After a group of people entered the house, they immediately took off their clothes, poured gasoline on them, and burned them to ashes.

They all returned to their rooms, took a shower, and then changed into new clothes.

About a few minutes later, three police cars appeared outside the house with a wail. Officer Lucar strode angrily into the yard. He was just about to knock on the door when he was attracted by a pile of bonfires in the side yard that were still smoking.

At this time, the sky was already slightly bright. He walked to the bonfire. Basically, the flames had been extinguished. Occasionally, when a gust of wind blew, there would be some sparks in the seemingly extinguished bonfire.

He picked up a branch next to him and poked it, but nothing was left.

"Shit!" He put his hands on his hips and turned around twice. At this time, he was 100% sure that Will was killed by Lance!

He walked back to the door and knocked hard on the door, "Open the door, police."

About twenty or thirty seconds later, Lance opened the door, "Officer Lucar, we meet again."

Officer Lucar, who was originally full of anger, calmed down the moment he saw Lance.

He even had a smile on his face!

He held out his hand, "Yes, we meet again."

Lance looked at his hand and, out of courtesy, shook it, but what he didn't expect was that Officer Lucar suddenly grabbed his hand and brought it to his nose.

His movements were very fast, very quick, and also beyond Lance's expectations, after all... many people were watching.

After the faint scent of soap, there was a very special, residual gunpowder smell.

The look in his eyes towards Lance became strange, but he didn't say anything, just looked at Lance like that.

Lance struggled a bit, pulling his hand out of his loosening grip, "Your hobby is very unique, is this some special fetish?"

Officer Lucar was not affected by his words at all, but stared at him with a smile that was not a smile, "Can I go in and take a look?"

Lance shook his head, "Although I would like to cooperate with you, do you have a search warrant?"

Officer Lucar was stunned for a moment, "Who told you that we need this thing to enter your house?"

Lance leaned against the door frame, "The Constitution."

He looked at Officer Lucar, whose expression had changed slightly, and added, "The Constitution also grants me more rights, want to hear them?"

"That's bullshit!" Officer Lucar looked past Lance at the people who came out of the various rooms and stood in the living room. There were a few less people.

"I remember you have a big guy, where is he?"

Lance looked back, "He's sleeping."

"Can you call him out?"

"No." Lance continued to shake his head, "Unless you have a search warrant, or a letter from the court requesting me to cooperate with your investigation or something."

Officer Lucar realized even more that the person in front of him was not the same kind of person as the criminals he had seen before.

He was calmer, had mastered more social rules, and knew how to use these rules.

In fact, a large part of the people at this time did not know that the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution protected them from harassment by illegal searches, arrests, and other acts.

In other words, if you want to search and arrest them, either they are major suspects at the scene of the crime, or there is an arrest warrant or search warrant issued by the judicial department.

But many people don't know this, and don't know how to resist, and can only be led by the nose by these policemen foolishly.

Lance knew this, and protected himself through these, and was so calm, Officer Lucar became somewhat interested in him.

It was like... a fisherman encountering a cunning fish, a game-like confrontation, competition, began at this moment.

Officer Lucar took a step back, "Can you tell me where you were last night?"

Lance asked, "Will these words be recorded in your police report, or used anywhere else?"

"If so, I need to wait for my lawyer before I can say anything."

Officer Lucar smiled and asked, "What if I told you it won't appear on any documents or in court?"

Lance remained the same, "I was sleeping at home last night."

The two continued to stare at each other. Officer Lucar wanted to put some pressure on Lance, but Lance didn't seem to feel it.

He took a step back, "Sorry, I disturbed your rest."

Lance extended his hand again, "Sounds like you're planning to leave."

The two shook hands again, and Officer Lucar said, "We'll meet again soon!"

After letting go, he went directly to a roadside phone booth and made a call to the Assistant Chief.

A late-night shootout isn't enough to wake the Chief, or rather, it's not qualified enough. Moreover, the impact of this shootout wasn't too great, so he wouldn't get up.

"I saw Lance. He had the smell of gunpowder on his hands. It should be him."

The Assistant Chief listened and asked, "Then why didn't you bring him back?"

"He returned to his home before we found him, changed his clothes, and demanded that I show him a search warrant. If I want to take him away, he will definitely ask me for an arrest warrant."

The Assistant Chief didn't react much after listening, "You can only get the relevant legal documents from the Justice Department after dawn."

"So I plan to wait here until dawn. Please have them send the documents over as early as possible."

The Assistant Chief agreed, "No problem, I'll arrange it."

He then asked about the situation at the scene, "How many people died?"

"More than thirty. Will, a senior member of the Karami gang, is also dead, burned to a crisp."

"No useful clues were left at the scene. Lance handled it very quickly. Several people around him are missing, they should be injured."

"If we can find them, extract the bullets from them, and find the doctors who treated them, we can directly send them to court."

The Assistant Chief considered for a while, "Go ahead and do it, I will support you."

After hanging up, he called other detectives from the Criminal Investigation Team and asked them to find out as soon as possible whether major hospitals had admitted patients with gunshot wounds tonight.

If so, find a way to retrieve the bullets.

Then he came out of the phone booth and began to circle around Lance's house.

This is a very ordinary house, with only one garage, and a car parked inside.

The other four cars were parked on the street, so Officer Lucar's first thought was to check these vehicles.

Although he doesn't have a search warrant now, he can take a look through the car.

But he was quickly disappointed. These cars were obviously new cars. In other words, now he is absolutely certain that this case is highly likely to have been done by Lance!

But he just doesn't have evidence, and this is also the most helpless thing for him as a police officer.

You know a person is a criminal, but because you don't have direct and effective evidence to accuse him, you can only watch him get away with it.

After simply checking the vehicles, just as he was about to give up, he suddenly thought of something, picked up a pen and copied down the license plates of these cars, and then made another call.

"Help me check who these cars are registered under."

He reported the license plates, but the other party said that it might take until dawn to get the results.

This finally made him unable to help but punch the phone booth, and the entire phone booth rang.

It was as if the whole world was helping Lance, which made Officer Lucar very unhappy. He didn't like this feeling.

He walked out of the phone booth and accidentally saw Lance looking at him from behind the window on the second floor. The two stared at each other across the street.

Officer Lucar lit a cigarette and made a gesture of shooting at Lance, while Lance just maintained a smile.

An annoying smile!

The sky gradually began to brighten. For the residents of King's Harbor City, the sound of shootouts last night was nothing new.

This is also the police's attitude towards midnight shootouts. Don't let the citizens feel fear, don't have shootouts on the road in broad daylight, then their tolerance will be higher.

During the day, not many people even talk about these things. No one knows who was shooting with whom yesterday, how many people died, and who died.

These things are too far away for ordinary people, they can't touch such distant places.

Rather than caring about this, they care more about what the weather is like today, and things about life and work.

At 7:25 in the morning, the person arranged by the Assistant Chief brought the search warrant. The first thing to do after getting the search warrant was to block Lance's door.

Lance was eating breakfast at this time. He held a ham and egg sandwich and looked at the search warrant in Officer Lucar's hand, signaling that he could come in, "Want something to eat?"

"No, I don't have an appetite!"

He stayed up all night and only slept for a little while after five o'clock. Now he feels terrible.

Lance reminded them, "You better wear gloves. Also, don't make a mess of my house, otherwise I will call and complain about you."

Lucar didn't take this sentence to heart. They began to rummage through the cabinets and check, the goal was weapons.

Many intact bullets were left at the scene yesterday, and these bullets are one of the best pieces of evidence.

If they can find a gun that matches the bullets at the scene, then they can apply for an arrest warrant.

Your weapon participated in a shootout between two gangs in another place in the middle of the night, and also killed people. You say it has nothing to do with you, and you didn't know about it?

Guess if the judge believes it!

But unfortunately, they searched the entire house and couldn't find any weapons. It was so clean that it seemed to have been specially cleaned.

No weapons, no bullets, no dangerous things, Officer Lucar didn't know what to say for a while.

As for those weapons, they must have been left to Alberto. Didn't the big beard say?

Recycle at 60% off.

A weapon worth two thousand two hundred yuan, 60% off is one thousand three hundred and twenty yuan, and it also solves these troubles.

"So, Officer Lucar, did you find what you were looking for?"

Officer Lucar looked back at Lance, the two stared at each other for a while, he walked to Lance's face, looked at him, "I will find what I want one day."

Lance was not affected by his words that carried a similar threat and warning, "I don't know if you can find it, but you will definitely get a complaint today."

Officer Lucar gave him one last look, turned around and walked towards the door, "Let's go."

Watching them leave, Lance spread his hands to his brothers, with a helpless smile on his face, "Federal Police!"

Two seconds later, bursts of laughter broke out in the house, lasting for a long time……