Fatal Shot

Seduction Night Bar, 8:00 p.m.

A levitating hovercraft flown from the Television Center building nearby gradually landed. Worthy of mention was that there had been a murder at the 237th floor of the Television Center building 30 minutes before.

A star war reporter—who had risked his life up to 100 times entering the rebel-controlled region to film war images and whose attitude was strongly against the war—had been discovered dead alone in the lounge. He had died in a similar manner as Aoki Kazuo, who had died at the same time last night—sliced in the throat by a special type of army knife in one fatal attack!

Furthermore, a message chip had been left beside the corpse. In it were images of the war reporter communicating in secret with a few higher-ups of the rebel army every time he’d entered the rebel-controlled region. However, this message chip had been claimed by the Dongsang Guard Bureau executives, who had rushed down and ordered nondisclosure of all the information.

******

Feng Luo, disguised as a trendy young NPC, walked with quick and light steps into the retro bar. It was not very prosperous. Compared to the connection process last time, it was much easier this time. He was directly led to Haruko’s tea preparation room by the staff.

“Mister Feng Jian, please sit!”

Pulling open the sliding wooden door and entering after changing into clogs, Feng Luo found an unexpected scene before his eyes.

In the room, Haruko, who was still sitting seiza-style on the floor, had a completely different look than she had worn yesterday. Today, she was not wearing her snow-white sakura kimono but full-black attire with unknown, dark-red flower petals that looked a little similar to that of a ninja but also a little it like that of a samurai.

Also, on the floor in front of her was a belted samurai sword about one meter in length. Her originally let-down, black, waterfall-like hair had been pulled up into a high ponytail. Her face was stern as she nodded slightly at Feng Luo.

If the Haruko of yesterday had been a kettle of clear tea, the one in front of Feng Luo now was a knife. A knife which had not been sheathed but was already radiating viciousness.

Right. Feng Jian. Yes, this was the identity of the NPC whom Feng Luo was disguised as, an average employee of a gun shop.

Haruko sitting seiza-style on the floor said simply, “Mister Feng Jian, please wait for a while. The rest of the people should be here in a moment. Oh, right. This. It is given to you by the investigation team as a reward for your information last night.”

With that, Haruko stretched out a hand and moved the scabbard of the samurai sword in front of her, then lightly pushed the small silver-colored box placed on the floor beside her. Thereafter, the box, seemingly made of some special metal, moved a distance across the floor and stopped perfectly beside Feng Luo.

“Reward?”

Picking up the box, Feng Luo showed enthusiasm in his eyes. Regarding the “report” from yesterday, he had initially not expected much. After all, the game company logically would not really penalize such “consumerist” players, who could easily take out hundreds of millions. He had not expected this today.

His points had risen straight from third to first place after completion of the hidden mission! Now, he had done another three investigation missions. His points had reached more than 1,900—already a whole 800-plus points away from the person at second.

Instinctively, he felt that the points not only influenced the placing but perhaps were also related to the reward at the end of the mission.

For him, earning points had gone much faster than the other players. As he’d expected, the 100 portraits on the screen from before, which he had memorized in five minutes, were indeed the mission targets. Although not all were assassination targets, they were nonetheless important characters or locations of every mission.

It was important to note that even though the system released up to 10 to 20 missions a day, these competitive missions were released to all competitive players—there was absolutely a higher demand than there was supply!

Plus, besides the first emergency mission at the start, the information released in the other missions was not clear-cut. Most of the mission information on the Agent Wristwatch was vague to begin with. Only after some time would the scope of the mission targets be narrowed by subsequent information. This required each player to think of narrowing the scope of the targets themselves, then strive to complete the mission before others found the targets.

In light of this, Feng Luo, who had memorized all the images on the screen, had naturally secured a huge head start.

The war reporter had noticed a match of one portrait in the 100 images in his memory and the staff information from the Television Center much earlier. Hence, he’d claimed 125 points one step ahead of all the competitive players.

Besides the 100 images, the tens of thousands of words implying every player’s hidden mission were similarly of use.

If not for tonight—and if he had a hidden mission—he would have been waiting at the connection point of another hidden mission at this time. That way, it was very likely that he would wait until he became a Hound’s “client.” Because he had already noticed before that, among the players tonight during the hidden mission connection period, there were two people who were players initially placed at first and second! They were also two of the Hounds’ five most important clients!

Feng Luo thought that the Hounds must have known about the existence of hidden missions. Even though he didn’t know why they hadn’t let many people participate, and even though it was understandable for normal players not to do the missions, it was impossible for the players who were keen on obtaining placement to give up on them. Especially in the event of an entire half of their points having been cut.

“What a pity!” Feng Luo shook his head.

Although he had relied on few confrontations during missions and a Scout Beetle to pinpoint the identities of a portion of Hound’s players, there were still some people hiding in the shadows.

Among the five people who had spent a load of money buying the transfer quota, he had only known of the Scout and the Wind Manipulator. The other three originally in the top three positions had remained in the shadows, acting cautiously. After all, even with the possession of disguise potions, it was nonetheless rather difficult to discover other competitive players. Therefore, he had initially wanted to wait for two of the three other people today, but he had received his own hidden mission and thus, could only come over here first.

“But if I must, it’s still more than just a loss!”

Feng Luo looked at the things inside the open box in his hand.

Mini Tracker Bullet ZZ-2 (B-Grade Special Bullet)

Attack power +10%, can be shot with a gun or the Agent Wristwatch, mini tracker inside will enter the body once being shot, can be tracked using the Hummingbird system. Effective Duration: 24 hours (effect instantly lost upon player’s death).

Inside the box which was secured by a fingerprint and DNA lock were five 12.7MM handgun bullets with a complex structure within and with seemingly semi-transparent bullet shells.

B-Grade bullets!

This was the second type of B-Grade bullets which Feng Luo had earned. Compared to that of Impact Bullets, the effect of these five bullets was undoubtedly even more unique.

Feng Luo looked at the detailed introduction – this mini tracker in this bullet would not be able to be detected by Biochips and Agent Wristwatches in typical situations.

Such a unique ability as tracking would definitely be able to add a great surprise effect at right times!