Shadow Empire

Chapter 570 Prove Your Courage
After Deputy Director Duke left the Kodak family's manor, he immediately called Director Blue and said, "I'm out now. Is that all that's needed?"

"Well, that's all. You may have to run a few more times in the next few days, and soon it will be over."

"Okay, just tell me when the time comes."

"I'm going to do other things."

The Great Purge was coming to an end, but it was not completely over yet, and he still had a lot of work to do.

He was actually very curious, but he also knew that he should ask questions that he could ask and not ask questions that he shouldn't know, as that would only bring trouble to himself.

After Chief Blue hung up the phone, he looked at Lance and said, "I don't quite understand..."

In fact, he was also very confused. What was the point of doing this?

Use these past cases to threaten and intimidate Bandy?
It seems that there is no practical significance in doing this, because Stone is the executor. Even if he says that Bandy instructed him to do these things, he cannot directly blame Bandy.

He will hire a lawyer, who will try every possible way to help him get away with the crime. Besides, the case has happened so long ago that a lot of evidence may have been lost.

It is very difficult to send him to jail through these cases.

Lance shook his head slightly. "I just want to make him panic. Fear and panic will make people lose control and lose the ability to think calmly. Only when he is panicked enough will he keep making mistakes."

"We don't have much time!" Lance said with a stronger tone, "We won't have enough time to just follow the process. We can only force him to make mistakes and then quickly deal with him."

"Shi Dong started to deal with family affairs before he even graduated from high school. He started to take charge of some work when he was in his twenties. It has been more than ten years. How much criminal facts and evidence do you think he has mastered about the Kodak family?"

"They will definitely try every possible means to get rid of Shi Dong."

"The more he knew and the more he spread the news, the more Bandy wanted to get rid of him as soon as possible."

"Shi Dong has not fully cooperated with us. We need him to take another step forward, but this step cannot be pushed by us. It must be pushed by others."

"It only takes one time to push him far enough!"

Director Blue listened carefully, analyzed the situation, and finally agreed with Lance's opinion.

After more than ten years, who knows if he has left any evidence?
And as Stone reveals more and more information, he might end up in jail for a certain case.

They will not keep waiting. The longer they wait, the more passive they will become. They must take the initiative.

"So what should I do?"

In this "big wave", he would feel incomplete if he didn't do something.

Without that profound sense of historical participation, he would not have the feeling that he is also one of the creators of history.

Once people have power and no worries, they will think a lot and start to become a little philosophical.

This is all caused by the comfortable life and work. He never thought about these things before, but now he does.

"Just follow the plan."

That afternoon, some newspapers began to report on these old cases, and the Chao Bao even used a very shocking headline:

"One Hundred Killings in Ten Years: Exposing the Bloody and Cruel Internal Fighting within a Family"

This kind of headline is fully qualified to be put in the Federal Daily News. The report only contains part of the content, introducing the inexplicable disappearance of several important managers of the Kodak family.

Some of these people were their employees, and some also had the last name Kodak and were their family, but they all disappeared eventually.

The report used some vague words to describe the entire speculation process, although none of the endings clearly pointed the finger at anyone.

But anyone who has read the report can taste a special flavor from it, and they are talking about the Kodak family.

Coupled with the recent series of events targeting the Kodak family, the entire Jingang City and even the surrounding areas have begun to discuss these matters hotly.

The more people discuss it, the more bizarre the information they spread.

Even now, Lance has not produced any evidence that they killed a hundred of their own people in ten years, but twisted rumors began to appear overnight.

Like "Bendy is not actually a member of the Kodak family. He is an outsider pretending to be one in order to wipe out the Kodak family's bloodline."

Or something like “They have actually killed tens of thousands of people, but no one ever dares to report it.”

Although they are so outrageous that they are obviously fake, people are obviously more interested in and trust these outrageous news more.

In fact, the pressure from public opinion did not fall directly on Bandy at the beginning. Those lackeys outside had been talking about the Kodak family for many years. Why would he care about what these people said?
But as Director Blue said some people hope the federal government can give them the truth, they hope to restart these investigations.

Director Blue also decided to restart the investigation into these disappearances and called on the entire society to submit anything if anyone knew anything or had any evidence.

They could ensure that those who provided evidence would not be exposed to the Kodak family's sight, and they set up special mailboxes and telephones.

Media reporters reported that "someone called in almost every minute to tell them some information that might be related to the Kodak family's crimes," giving people the feeling that "everyone is working together to tear down the wall of the Kodak family."

Even Bandy himself became very anxious. It was impossible for him to remember every time he silenced someone, nor could he guarantee that every time he silenced someone was clean.

He himself couldn't distinguish all the things that they didn't do but were framed on them by people spreading rumors, and he had never even heard of some of them.

That's why he became more and more uneasy.

You may not care about the malice of one or two people, but when the malice of one hundred thousand or one million people gathers into a sea, no one can withstand it.

In addition to this incident, there was another thing that made him feel bad, that is, Stone was really not dead, and was still with Lance's people.

Someone saw him sitting in a car, and then his family members started looking for information about him everywhere, and they actually found him.

They discovered that Stone was currently living in a villa in the New Bay Area, which was right next to the Empire District and almost next to Lance's territory.

It must have been Lance's arrangement and decision to let him live there. In addition to hiding him, it also made it easier to manage him.

Bandy didn't tell Gao Li about these things. He was afraid that Gao Li would be distracted, so he directly sent someone to deal with Shi Dong.

He has said enough things that he shouldn't have said, he should just shut up!
Stone was controlled in this villa for the past few days, and Lance did not even stop him from contacting the outside world. As long as Lance's people were watching him when he made a phone call, it was fine.

But even so, he did not contact the outside world, because he did not know how to face those people from the past, or his family.

He betrayed a lot of information to Lance, and he felt that it was not his fault, after all, he had died twice.

But it would be wrong to say that I don't feel any guilt or embarrassment at all.

He felt very guilty, and sometimes he hated himself for not having the courage to commit suicide. In fact, if he wanted to commit suicide now, he could do it.

But he just didn't have the courage to do that, he didn't know how to describe how he felt now.

Sometimes he even thought that if everyone who knew him died, perhaps he would be able to find true relief.

But he would soon deny these thoughts himself and feel that he was going crazy.

In just a short moment, he began to daydream, then came to his senses and focused again on the newspaper.

The newspaper mentioned that the federal government held a relatively professional expert discussion meeting. After discussion, the experts believed that the core reason for the current economic depression lies in the irrational allocation of social resources.

A large amount of funds are stored in the accounts of rich people without participating in social mobility, so people have little money in their pockets. In order to improve their ability to resist risks, they can only continue to save money.

This results in the money becoming waste paper in a sense after one or two simple flows.

Without consumption, the store’s efficiency will decrease, the factory will not receive the final payment, and will be unable to pay wages to the workers.

Workers who do not get paid or do not get full paid are even more afraid to spend money recklessly, which creates a terrible vicious cycle.

Experts have always believed that this society is very wealthy, but it is the inability to circulate funds that has caused the current depression.

For example, those rich people and big capitalists.

They are willing to spend money and like to spend money, but they ultimately only account for a very small minority of the entire society.

Their consumption cannot boost the economy of the entire country. Only if all ordinary people consume together can it be achieved.

The solution is very simple. Re-adjust the way resources are distributed, so that capitalists can release some profits and make the people richer. When people have money, they will have the desire to consume. Goods and wealth will begin to circulate in various links. Everyone will get a part of the benefits from the circulation of wealth. This is the healthy way of operation.

However, it is basically impossible to convince capitalists to increase workers' wages by this method.

They would rather go bankrupt together than return the value that originally belonged to the workers' labor to them.

Stone felt bored reading these reports. He didn't understand them. He had never worried about money since he was born.

He flipped through the pages but saw nothing interesting, so he threw the newspaper on the coffee table and walked to the window.

The sun was shining brightly outside the window, and the scene was full of vitality. He suddenly had an urge to go out for a walk, but an impulse was just an impulse after all, because he knew that Lance would not allow it.

He stood by the window, his mind starting to wander again, when suddenly he heard a "tong" sound, followed by a second and a third.

Suddenly, an egg-sized white crack appeared on the floor-to-ceiling window in front of him, followed by a second and a third.

It's the mark left by a bullet!
He reacted and looked at more marks on the glass wall. He cursed and fled into the room.

He began to shake uncontrollably when he realized that if it weren't for the bulletproof glass, he would probably be dead now.

Lance killed him twice, which made him have an indescribable deep fear of death, deep in his bones and soul, trembling!
He sat in his room, locked the door, and picked up the phone, but the line had been cut off.

He could only pray that the people Lance arranged would be of some use.

Outside the house, a rifleman sullenly prepared to put away his weapon. He didn't understand how much the owner of the house feared death, so much so that he used bulletproof glass everywhere, which led to the failure of the plan to silence him.

The people behind him came over and said, "No need to collect, let's force our way in."

The rifleman looked at him sideways, as if to ask "Are you sure?" The other man nodded, "Bendy asked us to deal with Stone as soon as possible. We can't let him talk anymore."

The rifleman re-racked his bolt-action rifle, "I'll provide fire support."

Before he could finish his words, he saw several cars crashing open the gate of the villa on the other side and rushing in.

Close-range firefights began immediately, with gunfire everywhere, and he provided support from time to time.

Fierce gunfire echoed throughout the entire New Bay Area in a very short time. What they could not have imagined was that this was actually a trap.

Soon a large number of police surrounded the area and began to advance layer by layer. All those who resisted were shot dead.

Lance said that it doesn't matter whether these minor characters are alive or dead.

It was too late for the rifleman and the men around him to escape. After a stalemate of several minutes, the two men finally chose to lay down their weapons.

For the stability of the family and the orders from the higher-ups, those lowest-level family members tried desperately to kill Shi Dong.

However, the real beneficiaries of the families behind them laid down their weapons without hesitation.

It has always been like this in this world: those who are not afraid of death are always the soldiers, while the generals are often the ones who sit at the victor's table as prisoners of war and enjoy a sumptuous dinner!

Ten minutes later, there was a knock on the door of the room where Shi Dong was hiding, and his body trembled slightly.

Since the gunfire stopped, he had no idea what was happening outside, and the unknown knock on the door startled his tense nerves.

He looked out the door anxiously.

But then Lance's voice coming from outside the door made him breathe a sigh of relief.

He had never been so... fond of someone he should have hated.

And it wasn't just a good feeling, Lance's voice also brought a sense of security. He just walked to the door and opened the cumbersome door.

Lance was standing just outside the door.

"Are you hurt?"

Shi Dong shook his head. "The bulletproof glass helped me block the bullet."

He now recalled the fear he felt when a few "popular bubbles" suddenly appeared on the glass curtain wall in front of him. They really had no intention of letting him live!

Lance looked him up and down, then asked him to follow him down, "We have already caught these people, maybe you know them?"

"Want to see it?"

After a moment of silence, Shi Dong followed Lance downstairs silently.

As soon as he went downstairs, he saw two people standing in the living room.

There was one person he didn't know, and he probably wasn't a powerful character, but he knew the other person, and he was his cousin.

His cousin also noticed Stone standing behind Lance, who was also the target of his action.

When the two met, one had a look of hatred, while the other had a face so calm that no emotion could be seen.

Stone followed Lance into the living room. Through the floor-to-ceiling glass windows, he saw that there were many police officers outside cleaning up the scene.

There were many corpses in the yard, and someone was wiping the blood off the glass wall with a rag.

It was just a little bit at first, but the more I rubbed it, the more it appeared, but it also became more transparent.

Originally, Stone wanted to ask something like "Why do you want to kill me?", but he quickly gave up.

Why else?
The biggest reason is that he is still alive!

"It looks like you two know each other," Lance said with a smile, sitting on the sofa.

Shi Dong was standing next to the sofa. He looked like Lance's subordinate. He nodded and said, "My cousin."

"Fake!"

"Don't call me cousin, I feel fucking sick!"

His cousin started yelling loudly, and seemed to have some courage. He seemed to hate Stone very much, and said something like "I don't have a cousin like you. The moment you were caught, you should have died immediately..."

Shi Dong's expression kept changing, showing guilt, dissatisfaction, and a hint of indescribable disgust.

In fact, Lance could understand his current mood, which was probably similar to the feeling of "You are not me, do you know how I have been through this period of time?"

In order to allow the cousins ​​to communicate better, Lance glanced at the gang members behind the rifleman.

The young man took out a steel cable made of two deer antlers connected to a steel wire, and when the rifleman was not paying attention, he tightly strangled his neck.

While squeezing it hard, lift it up.

Under the shocked and horrified gaze of his cousin Stone, his face quickly began to turn red.

At first he was able to deal with the situation relatively rationally. He tried to insert his fingers between his neck and the noose to exert force so that he could breathe.

But as he was unable to do this, his rationality began to dissipate under the strong influence of the desire to survive.

He struggled frantically, tearing the noose around his neck with both hands, and his neck was covered in blood.

His flushed face was slightly tilted to the side, and he looked at Shi Dong's cousin with a pair of pleading eyes, expressing his desire to live.

He struggled continuously, in vain, and eventually his face turned purple and his eyeballs bulged outward. He slapped the person behind him hard, but in the end, his movements lost strength.

He died with fear of death, attachment to living, resentment towards his cousin Shi Dong for not saving him, and many other emotions in his eyes.

He was looking at Shi Dong's cousin until his death.

The room was quiet. There were even police officers present, but they turned a blind eye to the murder that was happening right under their noses.

Lance looked at Stone's cousin, "Do you want to prove that you have more courage than your cousin?"

(End of this chapter)