In this world, strange superpowers were constantly emerging. Without seeing it with their own eyes, no one would know just how many strange beings there were in existence.
When night fell, Ren Xiaosu quietly led Zhou Yingxue outside the stronghold. Then Zhou Yingxue “took” out a seed and threw it onto the ground. Without needing to dig any holes or water it, the seed started sprouting immediately and grew rapidly.
Ren Xiaosu could hear the muffled sound of the earth rumbling, but he could not tell that anything was going on underground. The plant that sprouted from the ground did not seem like it had grown very tall and looked at most as large as a coriander plant.
However, when Zhou Yingxue pulled the green plant out of the ground, the ground suddenly opened up into a one-meter-wide tunnel. Zhou Yingxue said, “Just jump right in. I plucked it out early, otherwise, it could have used its roots to create an even larger space underground.”
Ren Xiaosu asked, “What’s the largest size it can create?”
“About the size of a room,” Zhou Yingxue said.
Ren Xiaosu pondered about a room being created at will several dozen meters under the ground. This fucking power would be such an easy way to build a bomb shelter!
“You head down first.” Ren Xiaosu said to Zhou Yingxue, “I’ll follow you.”
Zhou Yingxue pursed her lips at the thought of him not trusting her.
However, she did not make a fuss about it. She just contorted her body and crawled into the tunnel. As she was crawling inside, she caught a glimpse of some light behind her and wondered if Ren Xiaosu was secretly peeking at her from behind. Although Zhou Yingxue was cursing at how shameless he was, she did not dare to protest.
But when they got out of the tunnel, Ren Xiaosu said to Zhou Yingxue, “Head to the rendezvous point first. I still have something I need to attend to.”
After saying that, Ren Xiaosu handed a long case to Zhou Yingxue and told her that there was a sniper rifle inside it. He wanted her to carry it with her.
The main purpose of doing so was to confuse Wu Tong and the others. After all, Zhou Yingxue’s current persona was that of a sniper, so carrying the long case on her back would only make her look more like one.
After he dealt with that, Ren Xiaosu left Zhou Yingxue behind in the stronghold alone. She hurriedly planted some plants to cover the entrance of the tunnel but was left with a sense of helplessness. Didn’t Ren Xiaosu promise to help her with the mission? So why did he leave right after getting into the stronghold?
Fortunately, this wasn’t the Wang Consortium’s stronghold. Otherwise, she wouldn’t be so sure that she could avoid all of the surveillance cameras on her own.
Zhou Yingxue rushed all the way to the rendezvous point. How the Zhou Consortium’s strongholds differed from the Wang Consortium’s strongholds was that even if you were to sneak into one of the Zhou Consortium’s strongholds, no one would care about you even if you openly swaggered down the streets.
If it were the Wang Consortium’s strongholds, the artificial intelligence would probably have already reported the presence of an intruder to the police.
After arriving at the meeting place, Zhou Yingxue knocked on the door and went inside. The other hitmen asked, “Where’s your assistant?”
Zhou Yingxue answered calmly, “I got him to handle some matters.” What else could she say?
The hitmen looked at each other and laughed in their heads. That boy toy really couldn’t get into the stronghold after all!
However, they did not explicitly remark about it. After all, Zhou Yingxue was a superhuman and a sniper at that, too, so of course they could not afford to offend her.
Wu Tong brought out a huge map and said, “I have an informant on my side who helped me find out about Zhou Xilong’s daily routine. Every morning, he sets off from Red Pine Lane and passes by Jianghan North Road, Liberation Avenue, and Sanyang Road before arriving at his office. At night, he attends some social engagements, but the location isn’t permanent. However, he tends to return home to his residence at Red Pine Lane after that.”
Zhou Yingxue quietly observed the reactions of the other hitmen and noticed they looked a little distracted. It was obvious they had already been briefed, but Wu Tong was just repeating it to her.
The four people before her had already formed a clique.
Wu Tong continued, “We have two plans. One is to ambush him on his way to the office, and the other is to ambush him at the entrance of Red Pine Lane when he returns at night. Both plans have their pros and cons. The morning plan is more likely to succeed as he’ll definitely pass through that route every day, but the disadvantage is that it won’t be convenient for us to retreat after taking action in the daylight. The night plan will give us the advantage to retreat safely. Visibility in the night is worse, so it’ll be more difficult for the enemy to pursue us.”
After Wu Tong finished speaking, Zhou Yingxue said, “Have you all planned the retreat route yet?”
“No, but the same rule applies. We’ll leave based on our own capabilities.” Wu Tong smiled.
“Then let’s go with the night plan.” Zhou Yingxue smiled calmly and said, “We can’t throw away our lives over a mission, right?”
“Alright, since the superhuman has said so, we’ll prioritize the night plan and carry out the decapitation strike in the villa at Red Pine Lane,” Wu Tong said and nodded.
“How many people are there escorting him every day? And how many guards are stationed at the villa?” Zhou Yingxue asked with a frown.
Wu Tong said, “They have a total of seven guards spread out between two vehicles. The vehicles are bulletproof, and it’s always the same person sitting by the target’s side. That’s probably his aide or the superhuman that was mentioned in the mission brief. As for what the superhuman’s power is, we aren’t sure either. These people also stay overnight in the villa.”
At this point, a person next to Wu Tong said to Zhou Yingxue, “There’s a tall building in the vicinity of Red Pine Lane. The four of us will attack the villa sometime during the night. At that time, Ms. Zhou, you can choose your preferred sniping spot and provide us with suppressive fire. If anyone uses the windows as cover and tries to stop us, we’ll be depending on Ms. Zhou to help us take care of them. Our proposed time of operation will be tonight.”
In fact, the most difficult part of a decapitation strike was how to get ahold of the target’s schedule and how to identify their location. Once they could find the target, everything could proceed smoothly.
The person they were going to kill this time was not an elusive target. Wu Tong’s informant had even made preparations for them beforehand, so that saved them a lot of trouble.
Therefore, since all the preparations were in order, they might as well strike fast.
Furthermore, the plan the four had come up with was definitely not that simple. They probably did not want to say it because they did not want Zhou Yingxue to know about their plan.
Zhou Yingxue said calmly, “No problem.”
But after saying that, she started panicking on the inside. They were going to take action tonight, but Ren Xiaosu had yet to come back from whatever he had gone to do. How was she supposed to provide suppressive fire for the others?
However, Zhou Yingxue thought that even though she had not been specially trained to handle a sniper rifle, it shouldn’t be a problem for her to hit a nearby target with the help of a scope. After all, she was trained as a soldier in the Yang Consortium’s military, so she had handled a sniper rifle before.
She quietly left the safe house. After locating Red Pine Lane, she scouted for a tall building nearby. It wasn’t easy for her to find an observation spot that was close enough, but when Zhou Yingxue went up to the rooftop and opened the case that Ren Xiaosu had given her…
She discovered it was filled with bricks…
Zhou Yingxue was so angry she nearly wanted to curse out loud. That shameless Ren Xiaosu! Never mind that he had disappeared, but he did not even leave her with a sniper rifle? Was she supposed to rely on these bricks to provide suppressive fire for the rest of the team tonight? Use the bricks to smash the glass windows of the villa?!
