Empire of Shadows

The spacious room was filled with money boxes sent from various bars, and the young people of the family sat together quickly sorting the banknotes in the boxes.

Lance sat on the sofa to the side, with a cigar in his hand. Actually, he didn't really like cigars because he couldn't inhale into his lungs, but recently he seemed to have found a little enjoyment in it.

Taiwan Novel Network → ⓣ ⓦ ⓚ ⓐ ⓝ . ⓒ ⓞ ⓜ

A very powerful cigar, smoking it is like drinking alcohol, there will be a slight feeling of dizziness.

This is because a large amount of nicotine acts on the brain, causing dizziness due to excessive secretion of various hormones.

So take two puffs and then stop for a while.

However, this feeling of dizziness will gradually decrease as he often smokes such cigars.

Humans also have resistance to nicotine. The more you ingest, the stronger the resistance, and you will become dependent on more intake to get pleasure.

But after stopping the intake for a period of time, all of this will reset.

People kept bringing in boxes and then pouring the money onto a special table.

The table was in the shape of a grid, and its gaps were just enough for the coins to fall through.

The coins would rustle and slide down the talc-powdered chute under the entire table for sorting, and finally various coins of one cent, two cents, and five cents would automatically fall into the same box.

The banknotes on the table would be placed in the boxes next to them by these young people according to the different denominations.

Lance didn't often come to check the screening of these incomes, it was just that he was a little interested today.

The air was filled with an unpleasant smell, like fermented, somewhat sour grease.

These smells came from these banknotes and coins.

The oils from people's bodies would stay on the banknotes, and bacteria and the like would cause them to start fermenting, producing this "smell of money".

Some people like these smells very much, but some people don't like them very much.

When the box used to hold banknotes next to someone was almost visibly full, it would be replaced.

Then, a special person would quickly straighten the money in the box and tie it together with rubber bands.

This was a whole operation similar to an assembly line, except that there was no conveyor belt here.

After the money was counted, it would be sorted again. Small denominations would be given to gang members as wages, as well as to those in work clothes.

Large denominations, ten yuan, twenty yuan, would be taken to Lance's underground vault and stacked neatly.

This was also the reason why he wanted Mr. Chobav's bank. His basement was almost full, and he needed a safer and more suitable place to store this money.

He even had a more radical idea, but this required stronger support.

While he was thinking about some follow-up plans, his thoughts were interrupted.

"Lance, phone..."

Deresi, wearing a white shirt and a brown vest, stood at the door and said.

Lance turned his head and glanced at him, supported himself on his knees and got up. He held the ashtray and walked to the office, then closed the door.

"Lisa wants to talk to you, you can call her."

It was Alvin's voice. She directly called the villa, but Lance was not there now.

Lisa rarely contacted him proactively, something must have happened.

He called Lisa back, and the phone was quickly picked up, "They said you wanted to talk to me?"

Lisa gave an "Um" sound, "Ponda looked very aggrieved after he came back. I asked him, and his promotion plan fell through."

Lance frowned. He also put in effort to make Ponda a senior agent. He spent two families to empty one warehouse, just to make Ponda's performance look impeccable.

"What happened to him?"

Lisa didn't know, "He didn't tell me, and I'm very worried."

"I know, I'll talk to him."

After hanging up the phone, Lance sat and thought for a while before returning to the hall. People didn't pay much attention to his return. They were all focused on figuring out the money.

In fact, at the beginning, when they heard that their job was this, everyone thought that this job was not boring. Dealing with money, this was what many people yearned for, right?

But as time went on, they finally couldn't stand it, and even had physical reactions, nausea, and wanting to vomit.

Now each group only works for two days, and then another group replaces them. In the eyes of these people under Deresi, counting money has become a kind of punishment.

"Today's income is at least over 100,000 yuan.", Deresi had a lot of experience. He was also the one delivering the wine, so he knew exactly how much wine these bars sold, and how much was here.

An income of 100,000 yuan, the net profit is about 40%, a net profit of 40,000 yuan, this is the huge profit of alcohol!

Lance nodded slightly, "We need to continue to expand. The port area and the imperial area are places where poor people live. They have to think for a long time before buying a fifteen-cent glass of wine. It's difficult for us to make big money here."

"Only by going to better places can we make more money!"

Deresi had no objection to this. Melo came in from outside with some food and put it on the table, "Eat something."

Lance asked the others to come in. Hiram grabbed a beef rib and stuffed it into his mouth. Lance glanced at him, "You better have washed your hands."

Hiram rolled his eyes, ignored Lance, and continued to gnaw on the beef on the ribs. Deresi laughed aside and said, "I'll tell you something interesting..."

Hiram suddenly froze for a moment. He put down the beef ribs and pounced on Deresi, which made everyone a little... at a loss!

Deresi laughed loudly while quickly saying in Hiram's roaring "Shut up", "He used to eat boogers when he was little, so he doesn't care at all!"

The others couldn't help but laugh when they heard this. Lance also laughed so hard that he couldn't close his mouth, "Some people are like this!"

Hiram took out the rubber band from his pocket. He tied up his hair, "You're dead, Deresi, even if your sister comes, it's useless!"

The two of them were fighting again, and the others started cheering for them!

No one went to break them up. It wasn't that they were really fighting. This was just a way of expressing friendship and affection!

In the end, Deresi rode on Hiram and pressed his head to the ground. In hand-to-hand combat, Hiram's combat power was not as good as Deresi's, but after getting a weapon, the result would definitely be reversed.

"Okay, come and eat something."

Several of them grew up together since they were young, and they also came to the Federation together, so their feelings and relationships were better.

Hiram climbed up and kicked Deresi in the butt when he wasn't paying attention, almost making him fall, and then he breathed a sigh of relief.

Several people sat down at the table, laughing and eating the food.

The young men who were counting money were also eating something. This was not a capitalist's factory, and they would not exploit and oppress their labor so tightly.

They were actually quite excited that Lance was here today.

Although everyone was brothers, it was not easy to see Lance.

They didn't talk about any important things, just some very ordinary things.

A young man asked, "Boss, when will we go and grab a territory again?"

They had just heard Lance say that the imperial area and the port area were places where poor people gathered, and they should go to better places.

As members of the Lance family, they were proud of their family and hoped that it would get better and better.

Someone followed and said, "Everyone is saying that we should have become one of the new five major families, but someone refused our joining, is it true?"

Lance clearly felt surprised when he heard these questions, but not too surprised.

When a person cares very much about something, they will spontaneously collect all the information and clues related to this matter.

This was their expression of love for the family.

Lance put down the ribs in his hand. He thought for a while, "Rather than joining the five major families, I prefer to conquer them!"

The room was silent for a moment, followed by a burst of cheers...

In the evening, a van and Lance's convoy returned to the villa together, and several people took several boxes of money to the basement.

In the basement, many stacks of cash had already been neatly stacked, and now they had increased a bit.

Before going to bed, Lance said it as if casually, "Tomorrow, find something else for the people of the Liji Group to do."

The next morning, Ponda came out of the study. After a night of thinking, helplessness, and acceptance, he was now in a slightly better mood.

Seeing his wife busy in the restaurant, he quickly walked over, "I should be doing these things. We think we should hire a maid, this is not the time for you to be busy."

Lisa nodded. She did feel a little overwhelmed.

Her belly was gradually getting bigger, and various physiological reactions were also starting to appear. Some things were particularly difficult or uncomfortable to do, and she no longer insisted on doing everything herself.

After the two of them worked together to finish and enjoy breakfast, Ponda kissed Lisa goodbye and drove to the office.

His colleagues were now looking at him cautiously, and did not find any negative emotions on his face. They tried to talk to him, and he could now barely face the problem calmly.

"...This was decided by the higher-ups. Don't blame Director Dale. To the higher-ups, he and we are actually the same, and there is no opportunity to speak out."

"I'm fine, don't worry about me. Whether or not I'm a senior agent, we all love our work!"

A very high level of awareness. Sometimes the level of awareness has nothing to do with a person's ideological realm, it's purely forced out.

He had barely sat down when the phone on his desk rang. "Come out for a chat?"

Pangda's expression didn't change, and he said in a low voice, "Okay." Lance gave him an address, and he hung up the phone and walked outside.

"An informant might have some clues."

No one else said anything. He had recently solved several smuggling cases, and some people were interested in his informant, believing that this informant might be a member of those smuggling criminal groups.

They were also curious about how he bought off these informants, but curiosity could only be curiosity. It wasn't convenient for them to ask, and even if they did, Pangda wouldn't tell them.

The meeting place was in a car wash. It was a manual car wash, and although Jinzhou already had so-called automatic car washes, it was still mostly controlled by workers.

It just changed people using tools to wash cars by hand into machines using tools to wash cars. It is said that because of this, the price of car washing doubled!

After the car entered the car wash, the roller shutter door was pulled down, and Lance opened the car door and sat inside.

"I heard you failed to get promoted?"

Pangda frowned, then his tone softened a little, "They parachuted a senior agent in. There aren't any more positions here now, so I can't get promoted."

After all, he had taken a favor from Lance, and he had to give Lance an explanation.

"What's your relationship with your colleagues, and with this parachuted senior agent?"

Pangda was a little unclear about Lance's purpose in asking these questions, but he still told the truth, "It's just so-so. After all, they are all senior agents. If it's not during a mission, we probably won't see each other."

"And...", he paused, glancing at Lance meaningfully, "I've been in the limelight recently!"

Lance immediately nodded knowingly. Being in the limelight meant that some of the senior agents must be unhappy.

A junior agent overshadowing them at work would make them look very incompetent.

Perhaps some people weren't so narrow-minded, but as a super powerful department, there were definitely narrow-minded people!

"As for that parachuted guy, I haven't met him yet."

He looked at Lance, not knowing what Lance was doing asking these things.

Lance smiled and spread his hands apart, making a gesture similar to "丿", "If a senior agent position were to open up now, wouldn't you be the most hopeful?"

Pangda strongly agreed with this, "Yes, but obviously, it's unlikely that there will be a position waiting for me now."

The expression on Lance's face made him feel faintly uneasy, and he also sensed something, "This is a dangerous job, Pangda. You should have received some warnings when you joined."

"They want you to be prepared to sacrifice, after all, you are facing vicious criminal groups, dangerous armed militants."

"If something unexpected happens to someone..."

"Your chance will come!"

Pangda's eyes widened, "Are you crazy?"

"I can't... just because I want to be a senior agent, have you kill my colleague. I'm not that crazy, Lance!"

He repeatedly urged, "Don't interfere in this matter, this is my bottom line!"

Looking at his very serious appearance, Lance shrugged. He didn't want to push Pangda too hard.

So far, he hasn't been able to develop a second mole. The Hazardous Materials Administration is a very special department. Its power is too great.

It is difficult to corrupt this department in the early stages, because these people carefully selected from various departments still harbor some "ideals", and the colleagues don't really understand each other.

The drawbacks of power fermentation have not yet begun to show, just like the current labor unions and labor federations.

Perhaps it will be easier to obtain more moles when these people in power begin to rot.

Before there is a new mole, Lance will not put too much pressure on him, after all, the information he sends back is still very useful.

"I'm just giving you a suggestion, you don't have to accept it."

"Since you can't be promoted to senior agent for a while, then do your job."

Lance said, pushing open the car door and stepping out, "I wish you a pleasant work."

He smiled, shook his head, and left.

Pangda sat in the driver's seat, watching the workers who had surrounded him again start washing his car. He had a very complicated mood at this time.

He was struggling, an internal struggle, a moral struggle. In the end, his reason overcame his desires. He breathed a heavy sigh of relief and lit a cigarette.

The white foam covered his entire windshield, and some of the dust on the windshield was taken away by them, leaving only two bright windows.

Just like his crystal clear heart at this moment, spotless.

These past two days, the general manager has arranged for many people to guard the warehouse at the dock, just in case something similar happens again. Fortunately, no one has come to make trouble in the past two days, which has relieved him a little.

He didn't know if the vice president had resolved the matter, but he secretly guessed that it hadn't been resolved.

If they had resolved it, they would definitely notify him now. The general manager's only idea was to hold on until the commissioner arrived.

The other party should arrive at noon, and there isn't much time left until noon.

There are still some goods to be loaded onto the ship this morning. He heard that the headquarters has placed some of the goods in the northern port instead of transferring them back, and will only come back after coordinating and resolving these issues.

Although this increases some transportation costs, it is better than having stimulating industrial waste mixed in, which would not only cause all of it to be scrapped, but also require them to spend extra money to dispose of it.

Just as he was thinking about these things, a quarrel suddenly came from the warehouse. He frowned and walked towards the warehouse. Some of the dock workers were arguing with their employees.

The two sides were not just arguing verbally, they had already started pushing and shoving. Seeing that the situation was about to escalate, he strode over, "What happened?"

The worker standing at the front turned around and looked at him up and down, "Your people look down on us!"

The general manager's gaze turned to his employees. One of his employees said softly, "These workers are cursing and swearing while working, it's very unpleasant."

"I just told them to shut up..."

Before the general manager could say anything, the leading worker suddenly shouted loudly, "You look down on us workers, we're not doing it anymore!"

"Brothers, let's go!"

In just a minute or two, the thirty or forty workers in the entire warehouse had left cleanly, and the general manager sighed heavily.

He glared at the employee, then walked into the duty room and dialed the service company's number.

"We had a misunderstanding with the workers here, can you send some more workers over?"