Chapter 1737: Good Night and Sweet Dreams
"Really no useful information?" Xu Huo slightly raised his voice. "Speak up, and you might live."
That player was sweating profusely, trying one prop after another, either they didn't take effect, or they did but showed no results, and even the alarm settings on the Message Collection Terminal were useless!
In a panic, the man shouted toward Xu Huo's direction, "Can you really let me go?"
"Word is bond." Xu Huo's voice seemed to be getting closer. Seeing the leaves rustle, the man suddenly yelled toward the front, "Animal Instinct!"
After shouting this, he intended to run, but as soon as he turned around, he collided with an invisible tangent line—Space Ray Blade might not be able to break through all his defensive items, but the A-rank "All Things Want to Cut Everything" could.
The corpse fell at the foot of the bushes, and Xu Huo turned and left the woods.
Returning to Ship Bay City, he contacted Zhao Yiming and the other two again.
Recent mining accidents weren't hard to investigate, because there were very few of them to begin with. They were mostly small, workshop-style mining companies on the verge of bankruptcy that couldn't afford good enough equipment, leading to occasional accidents. Listing them out, there were only about a dozen cases.
As for work credentials, that was much more difficult. For community services like free clinics, as long as one stayed under machine surveillance, it was fine. But to enter a place like Hiers Group, one needed Hiers Group's approval. Anyone entering or leaving had to at least be a resident of District 019. In other words, to get in, one first had to establish residency in District 019.
Of course, establishing residency wasn't easy either. Their review of Outer Zone Players was very strict, requiring mental assessments seventeen or eighteen times. Going through this entire process would take who knows how long—a month might not be enough to finish.
Xu Huo obtained the mining accident records from recent years, and Zhao Yiming had even specially noted the casualties each time, the mine owners responsible, as well as some interview reports or accidentally leaked records of the accidents.
"Appearance and physical characteristics are all in the holographic records." Zhao Yiming was quite proud of his ability to organize information. "I've found the residences of all these small bosses."
"Brother Xu, is there anything special about these people?" Meng Xiaoman asked. "They have nothing to do with Hiers Group."
"They will soon." Xu Huo told Jiao Hongyuan that he no longer needed to keep watch near Mr. Wei's residence, and also informed them that the "Dwelling of the Departed" should be inside Hiers Group's headquarters, telling them to find it themselves.
Jiao Hongyuan had been to Hiers headquarters. He said incredulously, "Could that believer have been going to see the 'Dwelling of the Departed'? No wonder he wanted to buy a cake—I thought he was giving it to a friend... But why would a believer within the Seventeen-Faced Church know about the 'Dwelling of the Departed'? I thought this must be highly classified information..."
For Clearance Players, this was naturally highly classified. First, because the Seventeen-Faced people wouldn't connect the people Hiers worshipped with the place players were looking for, and players had no concrete concept of the "Dwelling of the Departed," not knowing exactly who it referred to. Amidst a sea of information, they could only bump around like headless flies.
Second, verifying this information was extremely difficult. Even if one guessed that the "Dwelling of the Departed" might be inside Hiers Group, could players actually get in? This was a C-rank Instance.
And whether finding the "Dwelling" would lead to Instance clearance was another matter entirely.
Seeing that he was about to leave, Zhao Yiming quickly said, "Brother Xu, aren't you going?"
"I have other things to take care of." After saying this, Xu Huo directly used a Teleportation Item to leave.
His first target was the owner of a small mining company in a neighboring city.
The security measures for the bosses of such small companies weren't as comprehensive as those for leaders of large corporations like Hiers or Tiantianle. Whether it was finding them or doing something else, the difficulty was much lower.
The company Xu Huo selected after a second screening had a relatively high accident frequency among the dozen or so incidents and had been continuously engaged in mining operations. The boss was also over one hundred fifty years old, which matched the criteria.
He arrived at a rather opportune time. The company's boss was furious because his application for equipment from the government had been rejected. On his way home, he bought several bottles of alcohol and was already half-drunk before getting out of the car. Staggering back to his residence, as soon as he opened the door, he was grabbed by two men wearing Tiantianle uniforms.
"What are you doing..." The boss was about to shout, but was gagged and carried to a chair, where he was tied up. Xu Huo, also wearing a Tiantianle uniform, sat across from him, silently opening the box placed on the table.
All the smart devices in the room had been turned off, doors and windows were tightly sealed, and specialized shielding equipment was used inside to prevent anyone outside from seeing the situation within. However, the faint light seeping through the cracks still allowed the boss to see what was inside the box.
It was a syringe filled with a milky white liquid. The government's public name for it was "Good Night and Sweet Dreams," specifically used for euthanasia or capital punishment, and not commonly seen.
This injection had two uses. One was for euthanasia, allowing a person to leave the world painlessly within a second. The other was for punishing criminals, by adjusting the drug ratio to cause the offender's heart to contract rapidly, enduring three hours of agony before dying—regardless of the method, the final autopsy result would only show cardiac arrest due to improper drug use. This was very common among the elderly in District 019, as they took Evolution Agents throughout their lives.
"What are you going to do! What are you going to do!" The boss stared at Xu Huo in terror, his eyes darting wildly before he shouted, "You're people from Tiantianle! I have no grudge against Tiantianle, why do you want to kill me!"
"Don't you understand what you've done?" Xu Huo said coldly. "People died in your mine. That's not allowed."
"I... I didn't want that either! Who told me I don't have enough money to buy good equipment! I properly compensated the families of the deceased... Even the government doesn't care, so what right do you have to kill me!" the boss shouted wildly.
Xu Huo stared at him expressionlessly, while the boss himself grew increasingly panicked, unable to help but yell, "Even if I mishandled things, the government should punish me! What business is it of Tiantianle! What right do you have to do this! Let me go! If something happens to me, you won't get off easy either!"
"Your family lives out of town. You've been on long-term medication, and today you drank a lot. It's very common for elderly people to have accidents." Xu Huo raised the syringe, gently flicked the liquid inside, stood up and walked over to him, grabbed his head, and aimed the needle at the side of his brain. As the needle pierced the skin, he added, "The dead can keep secrets forever."
The boss's eyes bulged wide. With strength he didn't know he had, he shook Xu Huo off and fled toward the door, chair and all. But he didn't get far before he was pinned down and dragged back. Xu Huo, who had been hit in the face by the boss, rubbed his chin. As he picked up the syringe, his expression turned grim. "You, a man steeped in evil—don't worry, I'll watch you die before I leave."
The sound of footsteps seemed to stomp directly on the boss's heart. Finally, he couldn't hold back and said, "If we're talking about being steeped in evil, you people from Tiantianle are the real deal. I've only killed a few people, but you've killed thousands!"
(End of Chapter)