rescue

Steve caught up on sleep on the plane. He had spent the night reviewing the complete background and details of the mission, memorizing the relevant information, and after collecting his equipment from logistics, he boarded the plane bound for the border. The flight would take four hours, and after landing, a vehicle would take him to the border, after which he would have to rely on himself for everything.

While he is within Baya's territory, Te'an's intelligence and logistical support will remain uninterrupted, but there will be no support for actual operations. If he fails, he will simply disappear. Nutag's government will never admit to sending agents into Baya's territory.

This is a rule that everyone who undertakes cross-border missions knows: once they cross the border, they cease to exist.

The border between Baya and Nutag lies in the southwest, covered by dense vegetation. Once infrared-protected forest camouflage is worn and face paint is applied, there's virtually no chance of being detected in the dense forest.

Steve nimbly traversed the primeval jungle and quickly entered the territory of the Kingdom of Baya. Before leaving the dense forest and entering the border village, he changed his clothes, replacing his forest camouflage with the most common clothing style on the Baya border. He also gave himself a simple disguise. He dyed his hair brown and changed his eye color to black using contact lenses, aiming to blend in with the border villagers of Baya so that he wouldn't be distinguished from anyone else.

He entered the village with the flow of people returning from the market, his steps light, as if he had lived in the village for over a decade. He walked to the bus station at the village entrance and skillfully bought a ticket to a nearby city in Baya Mandarin with a local accent.

Two hours later, he appeared in a small border town in the country of Baya.

He changed his clothes again, his eye color changed to brown, he wore a hat, and his clothes were changed to a more fashionable style.

He slipped into the train station unnoticed and boarded a train to Chaohe, a port city in the Kingdom of Baya, without a ticket. There, his intelligence agents would be waiting for him, providing him with the necessary support.

This mission was neither particularly big nor small. In the past, Chen Chao would never have hesitated to accept a mission of this level of risk.

The tasks he undertakes should always be at least this level of difficulty.

But the black market bounty on him was a real headache; he couldn't even imagine how many assassins and mercenaries recognized his face. He was a secret agent; he should never be exposed to the light of day.

If Nutag is the most powerful country on the Eastern Continent, then Baya Kingdom can be ranked second.

But Baya's second place was not earned by himself, but rather supported by Migal.

Migal is currently the most prosperous country in the world and Nutag's biggest rival.

The Patriotic War a century ago was because Nutag missed the wave of modern technological development, which led to it being severely bullied by the emerging Western powers led by Migal.

Although they managed to hold the border at the time, Nutag had to keep a low profile for a long time afterward.

It wasn't until the last twenty years that Nutag finally reclaimed the status of the great Eastern power that had always belonged to him. But before that, Migal's influence had already spread across the globe, and he had planted too many spies around Nutag.

The Kingdom of Baya is a very important thorn in the side.

The Kingdom of Baya is actually quite strong, but after relying on Migal for support for so long, it has gradually abandoned the independent research and development of many advanced equipment.

After all, with Miguel providing a complete solution, why would a politician who only cares about votes in their current term waste time and effort developing their own solution?

Having a rival like Baya on the sidelines is both a bad thing and a good thing for Nutag. The bad thing is having wolves lurking nearby, and these wolves are quite powerful militarily. The good thing is that stealing technology from Baya is much easier than stealing from Migal.

Although Nutag has achieved a leapfrog development in both national strength and technology in recent decades thanks to the management of its six major families and the concentration of resources, there are some fundamental disciplines that cannot be shortcutd and can only be built up over time.

One process involves stirring clockwise at the 32nd minute, which makes the finished product ten times stronger. However, if you don't know the 32nd minute, the clockwise stirring, or even the first stirring, you'll have to try different methods minute by minute until you find the correct solution.

This is something that can only be achieved through time and experience, and it's also the area that Nutag is least able to catch up with.

Nutag's industrial development started too late.

Migal's technology developed earlier, and many basic experiments were completed decades ago. In this respect, they have an unparalleled advantage, and Nutag can only catch up by stealing.

Two years ago, Migal transferred a high-end military production line to Bayan, and Nuttag had long coveted one of the materials technologies involved.

Five T-class agents were planted in the Baya domestic production line as soon as construction began. These five T-class agents were deployed in different processes at various stages of the production line.

One month ago, the data sent back by these five people finally allowed domestic research institutions to reconstruct the process flow, and all parameters of the finished material met expectations.

Logically, their mission should have been completed by then, and they should have withdrawn. However, Migal announced that they would add the production of a component to the production line in Baya, and that component was one of the key structural parts of the sixth-generation fighter jet.

If the relevant procedures and parameters can be successfully obtained, the development progress of domestic fighter jets can be saved by at least ten years.

That's why Chen Chao hesitated at that time.

After considering all the intelligence available at the time and feedback from the agents themselves, Chen Chao finally decided to continue laying this thread.

But now these five agents have encountered an accident.

After a long and winding journey, Steve met with local intelligence agents in Chaohe, got a general understanding of the situation, and, after obtaining fake identification documents, began his independent investigation.

His first step was to figure out why these five people had lost contact.

Steve slept for four hours on the plane, but Chen Chao didn't even have that much free time.

He hadn't slept all night, and after urgently dealing with the affairs of the Kingdom of Baya, he immediately began his daytime work. After all, he had already taken three days of sick leave, and there was a mountain of things to deal with.

"Go through the military research department and see if the news of the successful material development leaked out, which aroused suspicion in Baya Country," Chen Chao instructed the head of the relevant branch after finishing a meeting.

Clearing out or rescuing the five missing agents is only one side of the problem. The other side is to use this opportunity to investigate all internal loopholes and prepare for potential future problems.

Chen Chao ensures that every sacrifice made by his subordinates has corresponding value; this is his requirement for himself.

After two weeks of investigation in Baya, Steve finally roughly confirmed the cause of the whole incident and found the location where the people were being held.

Recently, the production line that Migal is operating in Baya has a new supervisor due to the power struggle and the reshuffling of interests within Migal's upper echelons.

A new broom sweeps clean, and the new director immediately launched a comprehensive audit to prove his predecessor was indeed incompetent. He, on the other hand, would bring a fresh perspective to the production line.

These five T-type agents were simply unlucky. This audit uncovered security vulnerabilities in the process department and confirmed several instances of data leakage with solid evidence over the past two years.

So the Kingdom of Baya locked up all the relevant personnel and placed them under quarantine for investigation, as if they would never see the light of day until the mole was found.

Because no specific individuals have been identified, the interrogation in Baya Country hasn't been too intensive. It mainly involves isolation, exhaustion, and high-pressure interrogation. This level of intensity isn't too difficult for someone like Steve, but for a T-team agent, two weeks is already nearing their limit.

Because the identity of the spy had not yet been definitively determined, the security level of the place where the large-scale detention and interrogation took place was not high. When Steve spent some time sneaking in, he found that four of the five agents being held separately were on the verge of a mental breakdown.

Steve tampered with the surveillance footage and entered the solitary confinement cell wearing a Baya Kingdom uniform.

After entering the cell, his fingers, hanging by his side, trembled slightly as he gave them a secret signal.

The people in the cell noticed the signal, and their eyes lit up.

Steve made a downward pressing motion with his left hand, indicating that he needed to confirm whether anything inappropriate had been said during the interrogation and to clean up any loose ends. The other party waved his finger to confirm that nothing had been said.

Steve stepped forward, met the other person's gaze, and the other person smiled and nodded at him.

Then, in the instant they brushed past each other, the other person quietly sat down in the chair and stopped breathing, as if in a peaceful sleep.

Steve quickly retreated and entered the next cell. He repeated this process in almost identical movements in all four cells. Although this was an expected outcome, Steve could still feel his breathing slowing and his heartbeat decelerating.

The feeling of personally killing a colleague was unpleasant, and his body was trained to remain calm the more emotionally charged he became. Agents with the Z designation were not allowed to lose control during missions.

In the fifth cell, Steve almost thought he would have to do the same thing again. But after seeing his coded message, the other person lowered his voice and said to him, "Take me away. I've seen the blueprints for the structural components. I can recreate them."

Steve needs to quickly determine if this is a trap and whether he can take the other party away.

His tricks can only last for another 5 minutes at most. After 5 minutes, the alarm will sound. They will lose their chance to escape.

Steve reached out and touched the other person's face to confirm that the person was not disguised or had made any facial modifications; it was indeed T13125. He then quickly searched the person to make sure that T13125 did not have anything that shouldn't be there.

"Stay close to me, or I'll kill you first if I'm discovered."

The other person looked at him and nodded emphatically.

With an extra person on his team, the original exit route became unusable, and Steve started killing people.

He eliminated anyone who saw them or questioned their existence. Before anyone could speak, their necks were slashed. People could barely see Steve's movements; in an instant, their mouths and noses were covered, and blood spurted from their necks.

Five minutes later, Steve, along with T13125, a technician known as Driss in the mission, escaped from the facility where he was being held and boarded the evacuation vehicle that had been prepared beforehand.

Five minutes later, alarms blared throughout the facility, and everyone rushed to their posts to check the surveillance footage. But by then, they had already lost track of the intruder's location.