Gao Wu: I inherited the evil organization in the game

Chapter 656 Some Go to Their Deaths, Some Seek to Live

Then, communication was completely cut off; this time, there was truly no sound.

Xiao Jiuzi, however, maintained the highest level of prostration, her forehead pressed firmly against the cold, sticky ground, like a petrified, thin-skinned skeleton.

One second, two seconds, five seconds, ten seconds...

All his strength was drained away with that final call.

He slowly raised his head, the abnormal flush on his face rapidly fading at a visible speed, replaced by a more subdued ashen look.

With his last ounce of strength, he gripped the communicator tightly.

Click!

The precision instrument was crushed by his withered hands, tiny metal and crystal fragments slipping through his loosened fingers and silently mingling with the sewage and mud beneath his feet, leaving no trace.

Having done all this, he once again faced the empty air before him, choking back tears as he uttered his final wish:

"Little Jiu thanks Young Master Xie, wishing you good fortune and peace..."

The words of blessing dissipated in the foul-smelling air.

After saying that, he struggled and stood up unsteadily.

The excruciating pain of his soul being torn apart and burned surged back, more violently than ever before, threatening to shatter even his last vestige of consciousness.

This time, no kind homeless person came to relieve his pain.

He knew his time had truly come.

He staggered along, like a rusty puppet, stepping through the filthy water as he walked deeper and darker into the sewers.

He wanted to leave this place, using the last bit of strength in his body to get as far away as possible from where the parchment scrolls were hidden.

He wanted to discard his useless body in a corner where no one could find it, as far away from what was important to the young master as possible.

The sound of faltering, limping footsteps echoed in the empty, deep pipes, fading into the distance and becoming fainter.

Step by step.

Xiao Jiuzi's figure was eventually swallowed up by the bottomless darkness of the sewer.

It will probably be as he wishes.

Died in a corner no one could find, silently rotting and dissolving, eventually becoming an insignificant part of this sewer, guarding its unwavering loyalty until death.

Soon, the sewer returned to its quiet state.

All that remained was the gurgling sound of the slowly flowing sewage, like a sob.

And the rustling sounds and occasional sharp squeaking of rats, hidden deep in some rusty pipe or garbage heap.

They seemed to be whispering among themselves, discussing the uninvited guest who had been crawling and standing for a while, and all the secrets that could not be brought to light...

In another part of the city, inside the underground sewers of an abandoned chemical plant.

Li Xiang and Chang Erbing were huddled inside, looking like two frightened mice, almost blending into the thick shadows of the pipe.

After racking their brains and considering all the options, they finally decided that the intricate, maze-like underground waterways were the safest and most suitable place to hide people.

Honestly, the pervasive stench in the air is actually more reassuring than fresh air.

However, they did not simply hide; they also had a plan to escape.

Li Xiang and Chang Erbing found a suitable spot in the underground shaft and slammed their phones onto the damp ground.

The force was well controlled; the phone screen was cracked, but it wasn't completely malfunctioning. A faint light still shone through the surface, like the last glimmer of life from a dying firefly.

Then, the two of them swiftly and decisively cut open each other's bodies, letting the blood drip around the phone and along the path extending outwards from it.

In just a few minutes, the scene was disguised as a "crime scene" where someone had been attacked and their phone had been accidentally dropped.

On the ground, a trail of intermittently splattered blood stretched forward, dripping and meandering for several meters, as if someone was wounded and running wildly, desperately fleeing into the darkness deeper into the well.

If you follow the bloodstain all the way down, and go a little further in, you will find another law enforcement recorder in the muddy filth.

Half-hidden in the dim light, its screen shattered, a cold light flickering faintly, it was like a silent witness, silently recounting its owner's panic and unfinished escape.

In reality, it's in the opposite direction, at a position that's neither too close nor too far.

After doing all this, the two quickly retreated, but instead of following the fake bloodstains deeper, they quietly slipped into the darkness on the other side.

The distance is neither too far nor too close, about forty meters.

This was a carefully calculated distance, allowing for a glimpse of the "first crime scene" while remaining dark and concealed enough to be difficult to detect.

They found a sunken pit filled with a layer of murky sewage.

The two men gritted their teeth and lay down, letting the icy sewage almost completely submerge their bodies, leaving only their eyes, mouths, and noses exposed.

Li Xiang and Chang Erbing lay quietly in the sewage, secretly monitoring the "crime scene."

As a detective, faking and returning to the "crime scene" are the simplest and most basic operations.

What truly tests one's character is the silence that follows.

Time seemed to lose its sense of flow in the pitch-black underground shaft.

There was only coldness, only darkness, only an all-pervasive stench, and only the heavy, slow beating of a heart in the chest.

Chang Erbing felt his body gradually losing sensation, and his thoughts began to freeze and become blurred.

He almost wondered if they would freeze to death or drown silently in this sewage.

Just as he was about to fall into a deep sleep.

despair--

A very faint sound, but completely different from the sound of water droplets, came from the darkness.

Li Xiang's fingers suddenly gripped Chang Erbing's arm tightly. The pain instantly snapped the latter back to his senses, and he immediately held his breath and focused his attention, his ears perking up.

It wasn't the sound of water, nor was it the sound of rats scurrying about.

It's... footsteps!

The footsteps gradually became clearer, slightly disordered. Chang Erbing silently counted the number of people in his mind:

"One, two, three, four!!!"

Soon, several beams of flashlight pierced the darkness, sweeping back and forth across their carefully arranged "crime scene" area.

Suddenly, a beam of light froze, landing directly on the phone with its shattered screen.

The exclamations suddenly rose in pitch, echoing through the underground shaft:
"Found it! It's here. Strange, Captain Li's phone was left here..."

The beam of light trembled and slowly moved toward the area around the phone. The dark red bloodstains were nowhere to be hidden under the strong light of the flashlight, having already solidified into a shocking black mottled patch.

Another voice rang out, filled with shock and panic:
"There's blood all around... there's blood all around. Was Captain Li attacked here? Look—the bloodstains are heading that way!"

Several beams of light immediately converged, shooting towards the depths of the well like spotlights, tightly gripping the two trails of blood.

Footsteps sounded again, moving quickly in that direction. Less than half a minute later, a new discovery came from the depths. "Wait! What...what's in the water?...It looks like a recorder?"

"Pull it out and take a look! Be careful!"

"It's the police body camera. Half the screen is broken. Let me try... wait? It seems... it can still be turned on?!"

His voice carried a hint of surprise and uncertainty.

Another voice urged urgently:
"It must have been Captain Li and Er Bing who fell here. Play the recording quickly, maybe they recorded something."

Chang Erbing felt Li Xiang's fingers tighten suddenly around his arm, and both of them felt a chill run down their spines at the same time.

The body camera contained a slightly edited and saved video clip that recorded the scene before the attack. It was 90% real, with only a few minor deletions and modifications.

The tens of seconds of waiting were suffocatingly silent.

Even the people in the distance fell silent, their heads huddled together, all their attention focused on the half-broken screen.

Suddenly, several horrified screams rang out from inside the shaft:
"I can only see half of the screen, and it's too shaky to see anything clearly. Wait a minute, what's that in the corner... [Mask]?!"

"[Masked]?!"

The others gasped in shock almost simultaneously.

The next instant, the air suddenly became quiet, and the echoes all faded away in unison.

"Hurry! Hurry up! Captain Li must have been attacked by [Masked], we can't stay here, we need to get the hell out of here first."

"But weren't we ordered to find Captain Li?"

"What's the point of searching! Captain Li and Er Bing are definitely dead in this well!"

"...Go! Go now! Quickly!!!"

The cacophony of voices and hurried footsteps quickly distorted into a jumbled mess. The group could no longer care about their mission and fled in the direction they had come from—afraid that if they were even a step too slow, they would run into the pale, eerie mask in the video that had no facial features.

The beam of the flashlight darted about erratically like a startled hare, leaping hastily in the darkness before quickly disappearing into the distance.

Chang Erbing abruptly turned his head, dirty water sliding down his face, his voice hushed to the lowest possible level:
"Captain Li, listen carefully, there are four people in total. They're leaving. What do we do?"

Li Xiang's face was hidden in the darkness, his expression shifting between light and shadow. His fist, submerged in sewage, was clenched tightly, his knuckles white. His mind was rapidly replaying every word he had just heard, every rise and fall of tone.

A few seconds later, a ruthless glint flashed in his eyes, and he said in a deep voice:
"Only four people came. They weren't here to arrest us. Looks like our actions haven't gone unnoticed!"

Chang Erbing swallowed hard, the strange smell of sewage making him feel nauseous.

He naturally believed in Li Xiang's reasoning abilities, having held that belief for a long time, albeit in a different way. However, the recent cases had solidified his belief in Li Xiang's abilities.

—Captain Li truly possesses the abilities of a super detective!!!
But this time, it's completely different.

In the past, if Li Xiang's reasoning had been wrong, it would have been the criminals who lost their lives;

This time, if he's wrong, they'll be the ones who die.

Li Xiang sensed Chang Erbing's hesitation and fear. He took a deep breath, the foul, rotten air instantly filling his chest, but his tone became increasingly calm, as if to dispel Erbing's unease, and also to reaffirm his own judgment:
"That's right, only four people came... and they were just calling me 'Captain Li'."

Although I still don't know what happened to the special envoy, Feng Ju, and Ma Bin, or where they are now.

But judging from their conversation, it's highly likely... the police station knows nothing yet, and the situation is actually much better than our worst-case scenario!

As Li Xiang spoke, he slowly got up from the ground and pretended to be weak as he limped out.

Chang Erbing gritted his teeth and got up, wiped the blood off his face, and then helped Li Xiang up, and together they took difficult steps outside.

Each step splashed up heavy sprays of water that carried far through the silent pipes.

Sure enough, the footsteps that had already run quite a distance away suddenly stopped.

One of them exclaimed:

"Wait a minute! Listen... there seem to be footsteps coming from that direction!"

"What are you waiting for, to die? That's definitely [Masked]! Run!!!"

The footsteps, which had paused, resumed, this time with even greater haste.

Hearing the footsteps in the distance, which paused and then suddenly accelerated, clearly indicating a faster escape, Li Xiang glanced helplessly at Chang Erbing beside him, who immediately understood.

He took a deep breath, then with all his might, let out an extremely weak, hoarse yet clearly audible cry, the sound echoing faintly through the tube:

"Old Wang... Old Wang... Is that you? Cough cough—, help! Come and help us, we're over here... we can't hold on much longer..."

The original plan was for Li Xiang and his companion to pretend to be unconscious after confirming the situation, and wait for the police to find them.

However, their brothers who came looking for them were incredibly alert.

They had no other choice but to pull themselves out of it.

In the distance, the sound of running footsteps came to an abrupt halt once again.

A deathly silence fell.

After several seconds, Old Wang's voice, filled with suspicion and uncertainty, rang out, as if he were asking his companion, or perhaps talking to himself:

"Does this voice sound familiar? It sounds... it sounds like Erbing's voice?!"

Another voice replied, "It really does seem to be Chang Erbing?"

"What happened just now...?"

The footsteps began to move back hesitantly, cautiously, step by step.

The footsteps began hesitantly, moving back extremely slowly. The flashlight beam also trembled as it probed towards the source of the sound, sweeping left and right as cautiously as if searching for a way through a minefield.

After a long while, the flashlight beam finally trembled and illuminated the figures of two "bloodied people" supporting each other and staggering forward.

"My God, it really is Captain Li! Captain Li isn't dead, and there's still Er Bing!!!"

Old Wang's exclamation exploded, his previous fear instantly replaced by shock and disbelief.

Several flashlight beams focused on them, illuminating the appalling state of Li Xiang and Chang Erbing—they were soaking wet, covered in black and red grime, and their faces were deathly pale (partly from blood loss and partly from being soaked in dirty water), barely able to stand.

"Quick! Go over and help!"

Old Wang shouted and came over first, followed by the other three, who hurriedly took over the almost "exhausted" Li Xiang and Chang Erbing.

"Captain Li! Er Bing! What...what's going on with you guys?!"

Old Wang's voice trembled, and the hand holding Li Xiang's arm could feel the coldness of the other's body and his uncontrollable trembling.

"Don't...don't ask...let's...let's get out first..."

Li Xiang shook his head "weakly," his eyes half-closed, as if saying even one more word would exhaust his strength.

"Yes! Get out! Get out now!"

Chang Erbing echoed weakly, his entire weight leaning on his companion.

(End of this chapter)