Empire of Shadows

Chapter 234: This is My Territory [Monthly Ticket 666+3]

The middle-aged man was a little absent-minded on the way, preoccupied with other things even though he heard they were arriving soon.

For example, could he take down the Lance family in one fell swoop?

Would the Lance family retaliate?

After taking them down, how much profit could he gain from running this bar?

This book is first published on 𝕥 𝕨 𝕜 𝕒 𝕟 . 𝕔 𝕠 𝕞

He thought about many things, even things that would happen years or decades later.

Unconsciously, the corners of his mouth slowly turned up, revealing a hint of a smile.

He didn't notice that the old men discussing over there also smiled when they saw him like that!

“You have to treat us well this time!” the old man with age spots on his face said with envy.

He only got a five-dollar reward for reporting, while this skinny old man got twenty dollars for cooperating in the act. He could act too, but it wasn't his turn.

Even from a distance, you could feel the unwillingness emanating from him.

The skinny old man laughed and lowered his voice, “Alright, I'll treat you to a big meal later, a five-dollar one!”

The other three old men showed satisfied expressions, and one of them couldn't help but punch him in the chest, “That's more like it.”

The bus quickly stopped at the station, and the driver impatiently patted the iron sheet in the driver's seat, “Those who want to get off, hurry up and get off. I still need to go home and eat.”

“I'm leaving if no one gets off!”

The few passengers on the bus sat numbly, and the old men stood up, with the middle-aged man quickly following.

The driver muttered to himself for a while, clearly dissatisfied with the old men's “slow motion.”

This was an ordinary-looking intersection. After getting off the bus, they led the middle-aged man into a nearby alley.

The trash can at the entrance of the alley was filled with various kinds of household garbage, and sewage flowed everywhere, already emitting a stench.

Several stray dogs were searching for dinner in the garbage pile.

A stray cat was lying on the wall beside them, quietly watching the stray dogs searching for food in the garbage pile, with a hint of disdain in its eyes.

After entering the alley and turning right, there was a shallow backyard, which was no different from the back of most buildings in the neighborhood.

They came to a half-basement, and the old man knocked on the door.

With a click, a gap opened in the window on the door, revealing a pair of eyes.

The person inside opened the door after seeing them, without even asking a question, clearly they were regular customers.

The middle-aged man cursed inwardly, but still followed them in.

At this time, eight cars had already stopped outside the alley.

A large number of people got out of the cars. The stray dogs that were looking for food only glanced at them before leaving with their tails between their legs.

Even the lazy stray cat lying on the wall quickly left the wall like its fur was blown up, disappearing into the darkness.

Several people watched their men enter the alley. At this time, they seemed to be looking for something on the ground, and soon they found something.

Every few feet, there was a small pile of flour on the ground. There was no wind in the alley, so these powders couldn't be blown away, and eventually it led people to a basement entrance.

After getting closer, they could smell the faint scent of alcohol emanating from the air.

“It's here.”

They quickly left, discussed it at the entrance of the alley, and then these people began to look for places to hide themselves, and began to prepare for the upcoming battle.

What they didn't know was that their every move had already been exposed.

“...Later, a few of us will go over and knock on the door. They definitely won't open it.”

“Then we'll argue with them and beat on the door. They'll definitely come out.”

“Find a way to escalate the conflict and get their people to call for help. We can use weapons first if necessary.”

“Everyone else hide and wait for the Lance people to come, then strike directly!”

“Show no mercy, with the goal of killing as many of these people as possible...”

Brinton didn't come today. He was currently the leader here. Although this was an important operation, he wouldn't participate. He had to sit in the rear.

The person in charge of commanding was the strategist who often gave him ideas. Just as he was assigning tasks, suddenly, in the quiet night, people heard the sound of an old-fashioned window being lifted.

It was the sound of the window rubbing against the window frame!

Most of the windows in the Federation open upwards. In order to prevent the windows from falling down at any time, they are made relatively close, so it takes some effort to open or close them.

This also gives the opening and closing of these windows obvious friction sounds, as well as the collision sound when the window is opened or closed to the limit after using too much force.

The group immediately looked in the direction of the sound. They hadn't found anything in the dark yet, and then they heard the sound of more windows being opened to the limit.

The strategist had already realized something was wrong, but before he could say anything, suddenly the sound of submachine guns rang out from the dark windows around him!

There was fire everywhere, and bullets rained down on people and the ground, and the ground was shot so that the soil was churning.

After a brief panic, the Viper Gang also began to fight back, but the surrounding walls were all black, and they didn't know which window had someone behind it and which didn't.

The fire from the shooting made them unable to look directly, and after the fire ended, they forgot the location again.

Randomly shooting also shattered some glass windows, but the entire back alley, even half of the street, was “quiet.”

Only the sound of gunfire.

There were no frightened screams, no complaints or angry curses, and no hysterical voices, as if there were only two groups of them here!

The middle-aged man who had entered the bar also sensed something was wrong, because there were only a few people in the entire bar, and these people were all looking at him at this time.

And the intense gunfire outside made him feel a strong sense of unease, he swallowed, and his arms began to tremble.

He picked up his glass and took a sip, trying to hide his panic and unease. He had a weapon in his arms, but he quickly glanced around. He could kill one person at most, and then he would be shot into a hornet's nest.

This was clearly a trap!

These sons of bitches!

He glared at the old men who were drinking happily, and finally squeezed out a smile, “What does this mean?”

The bartender was still wiping the glass, it seemed that he spent most of his time doing this kind of work every day, either wiping glasses or wiping wine bottles.

He looked up at the middle-aged man, “This is a trap.”

The middle-aged man was covered in sweat, and the soybean-sized beads of sweat were squeezed out of his pores at a speed visible to the naked eye, and then mixed together and flowed down his cheeks.

He didn't even dare to wipe it off, for fear that this action would cause some misunderstanding!

“I don't know what you mean!”

“I'm just here to have a drink with my friends!”

The bartender smiled, put down the square glass in his hand, looked at the middle-aged man, leaned forward slightly, and beckoned to him.

The middle-aged man swallowed, he pressed his hands on the bar, trying to lean forward as much as possible.

His attention was on the bartender's body and face, ignoring the movements in the bartender's hand.

“I don't want to make a mess of this.”, the bartender said in his ear.

Before he could react to what this sentence meant, the bartender inserted a sharp knife into his throat, then immediately pulled it out, and then used the towel he had just used to wipe the glass to press on the wound.

Subconsciously, the middle-aged man hugged his neck tightly with both hands like a drowning person.

But it was meaningless!

He instinctively dodged backwards, retreating to the middle of the bar.

Blood soaked through the towel that couldn't be blocked at all, and the white towel began to turn red, and he began to be unable to breathe.

The backflow of blood gave him a feeling of drowning, and he instinctively began to cough, but when he opened his mouth, he only made a movement similar to coughing or retching.

The blood was not squeezed out by the pressure in his lungs, and he looked at the surrounding people in panic, running towards the door.

But after running a few steps, his body began to twitch more violently. When he was two or three meters away from the door of the bar, he fell to the ground.

Except for a few old men, everyone else calmly looked at the corpse, and the bartender took out a new towel and began to wipe a very clean glass again.

“Clean up the floor and throw him out.”

At this time, the most intense gunfire outside also stopped.

A group of people walked in from the entrance of the alley, with Hiram standing at the front.

“I surrender!”

Next to the trash can, a guy clutching his bullet-ridden abdomen lay with the trash, not at all out of place, as if this was originally his home.

He gasped and looked at Hiram, “I surrender, I know…”

Hiram walked over, picked up his gun and pulled the trigger all the way to the end.

The fire illuminated the entire alley again, and the man looked at Hiram in disbelief, his wide eyes seeming to say—

“Are you fucking crazy?”

When the clicking sound of the empty chamber came, he changed a magazine and continued to move forward.

From behind, some of the younger men were murmuring things like "So cool" or "Awesome." He, who could easily suppress the recoil of a submachine gun firing in bursts, couldn't suppress the upward curve of his lips at this moment.

Soon, they found the second guy, who had already pissed himself in fear, hiding in a corner. Hiram handed the reloaded submachine gun to Ennio, signaling him to do it.

All of them, the first batch to follow Lance, had proven themselves in front of the newly joined members, but only Ennio still lacked something.

This was a good opportunity.

Ennio took a deep breath, holding the submachine gun and standing nervously in front of the man.

His hands kept loosening and tightening around the gun grips.

He couldn't see the man's face in the darkness, but the man's eyes reflected the moonlight, and he could see the fear and pleading within them.

"Please…"

Outside the alley, a police car was parked. Two policemen watched the continuous flashes of light in the alley until the gunfire stopped. They exchanged a look, speechless.

One of them picked up the walkie-talkie and turned on the radio. "We have arrived at the scene of the reported incident and found no problems. It might be…"

Before he could finish speaking, gunshots rang out again, silencing even the person on the radio.

After the gunfire stopped, he continued, "…it might be a false alarm."

"Roger that, false alarm. You can return, repeat, you can return."

As for the gunshots?

What gunshots?!

Who the hell is talking about gunshots?!

There were absolutely no gunshots!