# Chapter 2973: Hidden Danger, Hostage
"Where are you taking people?" Xu Huo walked up to the few men, looking down at them as he questioned.
The men struggled at first, but when they met his gaze, trembling with fear, they stammered out the truth.
These Special Defense Department players weren't the ones they were supposed to catch. They had obtained a task through an internal channel. The task required them to capture live government players and deliver them to a designated location, where the contact person would pay them a high reward on the spot.
One live captive was worth one million White Notes, and the client didn't restrict the player level of the captives.
"It's not just us—a lot of people are doing this task. Now that the fog has sealed off the city, players can't get out. Earning some extra cash is understandable..."
Before the man could finish his excuse, Xu Huo slit his throat. As blood sprayed out, he turned to another person. "Think carefully before you answer. Where do you make the handover?"
The remaining few couldn't help but swallow hard, scrambling over each other to reveal several handover locations they knew, and even voluntarily exposed the names of other players doing the same task. Just from what they knew, the number reached twenty.
"These scumbags!" The Special Defense Department player who had come to rescue was furious. "Special Defense Department personnel risk their lives to rescue people, yet they're being ambushed and harmed by them!"
This was nothing new in District 014. Some people were lawless, daring to lay hands even on players. In the past two years, the Special Defense Department had investigated and punished no fewer than twenty cases of crimes involving human experimentation on players. The vast majority were committed by ordinary people—whether to become stronger or to cure diseases, some didn't want to take the risk of becoming players, so they chose another dangerous path.
Xu Huo pointed at one of them and said to the Special Defense Department personnel, "Take the others back. I'll go take a look."
Jing City was now trapped in an instance, and anyone could die at any moment. Compared to human experimentation, the more pressing concern should be how to escape. Ordinary people wouldn't have the leisure for this.
Moving swiftly through the thick fog, Xu Huo quickly arrived at the handover location the player had mentioned. He signaled the man to carry the Painting Woman out.
"I'll cooperate fully, big brother. Can you please not kill me?" Tears streamed down the man's face. He knew that if Xu Huo wanted to kill him, he absolutely couldn't escape. "I swear I'll never break the law again. I'll be a good person for the rest of my life to atone for my sins!"
Xu Huo said nothing and kicked him out of the shop.
The man, carrying the feigning-unconscious Painting Woman on his shoulder, obediently walked along the alley. When he reached the spot, he looked around left and right before giving the signal.
Soon, two players appeared in the alley. They looked at the man with some dissatisfaction. "Why are you the only one here? Where are the others?"
The man forced out a twisted, ugly smile. "The others are behind."
"Where?" The two players looked behind him, but just as they withdrew their gaze, the corner of their eyes caught a figure suddenly standing at the entrance of the alley. At such close range, they could clearly see the other person's face!
In an instant, their impatience and disdain turned into terror. They immediately grabbed the man in front of them to use as a hostage, but before they could utter their threat, pieces of paper flying from who knows where plastered themselves over their faces!
"Bang!" The defense barrier forcibly pushed the papers away, but after a sharp whistling sound, even finer shreds of paper surged back, not only wrapping around their limbs but also burrowing into their eyes, ears, noses, and mouths. The moment one person's defense barrier was broken, his face was instantly slashed, covered in blood. Teleportation items didn't work, so the two could only throw out a few bombs and flee in different directions.
Unfortunately, after running only a hundred meters, the two collided face-to-face. Seeing shock and confusion in each other's eyes, they separated again and continued running.
But no matter how they ran, they couldn't escape Xu Huo's spiritual realm. Soon, the Painting Woman dragged them back.
The two knelt on the ground, looking defiant.
Xu Huo didn't waste words with them. He injected each with a dose of medicine.
Under the drug's effect, the two spilled everything they knew. They worked for a local pharmaceutical company. The company's boss was originally from Country X, but after poor management, he was forced to sell the business. Although ownership had changed hands, the two had never seen the real boss. The person managing affairs on their behalf was a local from Jing City.
The two speculated that the company was actually working for a foreign entity. This raid on Special Defense Department players definitely had ulterior motives, but the pay was too generous, so they turned a blind eye.
"Wow, they're so shameless!" the Painting Woman exclaimed.
Xu Huo asked for the address, handed the two over to the Special Defense Department, and rushed to the pharmaceutical company.
But by the time he arrived, the place was empty. The captured Special Defense Department players and everyone inside the company were all gone.
However, since these people had been recruiting players everywhere to work for them, tracking them down wasn't too difficult. The Special Defense Department mobilized and within ten minutes found a group of locals who had evacuated the company building and hidden in a residential area.
Knowing their scheme had been exposed, when they were dragged out, some loudly claimed ignorance, while others cursed the pharmaceutical company boss for burning bridges. From the information they revealed, it became clear that the company's purpose in capturing Special Defense Department members wasn't for human experimentation, but to take advantage of the chaos to hypnotize and lure these people into working for them.
Under the guidance of internal personnel, the Special Defense Department uncovered a large quantity of hypnotic drugs and some specialized brainwashing instruments and equipment.
But how many people they had captured, whether they had succeeded, or how many they had already released remained unclear.
The situation in Jing City was already bad enough. Due to internal changes within the government, both military and Special Defense Department players had become somewhat demoralized. Now this had to happen—did it mean they not only had to guard against suddenly appearing unaffiliated players but also their own comrades?
Team Leader Ming received the news and led a team to investigate their trading platform, while Nie Xuan conducted a headcount of the Special Defense Department's current personnel—this wasn't a simple matter of brainwashing and infiltration. In this special period, any seemingly insignificant player could become a devastating bomb in the right place!
Before a solution to the instance could be found, trouble kept knocking on the door. The batch of poisoned people who had been rescued earlier, after receiving antidotes and being sent to the hospital, suddenly relapsed. Not only did their symptoms recur, but everyone in the hospital who had come into contact with them also suddenly fell ill. It started with elevated body temperature, followed by red patterns appearing on their bodies, spreading from the chest and abdomen toward the head and limbs.
Fortunately, the Special Defense Department had experience dealing with special toxins and pathogens from before. They immediately sealed off the entire hospital along with several nearby streets, preventing further spread.
Just as they were overwhelmed with problems, someone publicly challenged the government, demanding that the government pay sufficient ransom to redeem the hostages.
What hostages?