Chapter 45: The Battle of a Trapped Beast
As the rain poured down, a crystal chandelier cast Haji Omar's shadow on the floor-to-ceiling windows of a villa along Bangkok's Chao Phraya River.
The arms dealer, who was a Malay mercenary, stood in front of the window. The bullet holes on his thick neck shone with a hideous luster under the light. The Cuban cigar between his fingers was half burned, and there were three crushed cigarette butts in the ashtray.
"Twenty-seven minutes and thirty-six seconds." Haji's gold teeth revealed a frightening coldness as he spoke. He stared at the surveillance footage on the tablet computer - Ruan Wenxiong's personal bodyguard was secretly entering the back door of the Mo Group.
The adjutant whispered, "Our people also captured a video of Mo Xiaohan's confidant, A'tai, handing him a document."
Haji's knuckles crackled. He knew Nguyen Van Hung too well - that Vietnamese madman never engaged in meaningless social interactions. If he came into contact with the Mohist school, it could only be for one purpose: to join forces to get rid of himself and Zakun.
His military leather boots left deep marks on the carpet. He grabbed the crystal glass on the table and took a big gulp of whiskey. The sound of ice hitting the wall of the glass was particularly harsh in the quiet room.
"Go check it out." Haji crushed his cigar violently, sending sparks flying onto the expensive cashmere carpet. "I want to know the details of that document."
At the same time, on the main channel of the Mekong River, Zakun Wensong's cargo ship "Golden Triangle" was breaking through the waves in the heavy rain.
In the command room, the jade ring on Zakun Wensong's finger shone dangerously in the reflection of the dashboard, and the cuffs of his dark green silk Tang suit were stained with cigar ash.
"President, here's the latest news from the Chiang Mai port." A tattooed subordinate handed over a tablet computer. The surveillance footage showed five burly men in the uniforms of the Haji Mercenary Group secretly swapping cargo box labels.
After zooming in on the image, you can clearly see that the label originally printed with the Mekong Chamber of Commerce logo has been replaced with the logo of an ordinary freight company.
The jade ring tapped out a regular sound on the console, and he suddenly chuckled: "Haji, that old dog, is too lazy to even put on a show."
He knew exactly what this meant—Haji wanted to keep the goods for himself.
Zakun turned to the first mate behind him and said, "Pass the order down. Load the 'seafood' at Pier 3 ahead of time and send it to Haji's arsenal in Chonburi tonight." He paused and pulled out an exquisite seal from the inner pocket of his Tang suit. "Remember to stamp this on the bottom of each box."
The first mate took the seal and, under the light, saw that it was engraved with the Nguyen family's symbol. His pupils shrank slightly, and he immediately understood the president's intention.
At the bottom of the cargo hold, a thin porter filmed the entire process with a miniature camera hidden in his button under the pretext of inspecting the cargo. No one noticed that there was a very small and hidden Dark River Group mark behind his ear.
In the basement of a French-style villa in the Saigon district of Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, Nguyen Van Hung was playing with his Damascus steel dagger, a fresh white chrysanthemum pinned to the lapel of his indigo tailored suit.
The informant, kneeling on the ground, was trembling all over, and the cold sweat on his forehead dripped onto the precious Persian carpet.
"This surveillance record," Ruan Wenxiong slapped the informant's pale face with a dagger, and the deerskin gloves gave off a faint smell of leather. "Where did Haji get it?"
"Yes, it's a Mo family insider..." the informant stammered, "It is said that he spent five million US dollars to bribe him."
Ruan Wenxiong suddenly laughed, and his laughter was so gentle that it was creepy. He knew Haji, the reckless man, too well. The Malay mercenary who only knew how to use brute force could never train an informant who could infiltrate the Mohist School.
Unless... this is a trap carefully laid by someone.
"Prepare the car." He put away his smile, and the dagger spun between his fingers, making a beautiful knife flower. "Go visit our dear arms dealer friend. Remember to bring a 'gift'."
The gifts he was talking about were arms seized from a Haji stronghold last month, all of which were engraved with the unique markings of the Haji Mercenary Group.
In the strategic command room in the basement of the Mo Group headquarters building, cold white light poured onto the huge monitoring console.
Mo Xiaohan stood in front of the main screen. The three-dimensional electronic map of Bangkok city was displayed in high-precision mode. Three eye-catching red spots moved slowly on the map, marking the real-time coordinates of Haji, Zakun and Nguyen Wenxiong respectively. Dozens of flashing blue dots were the control positions of the Dark River Group agents. The distance between them and their movement trajectories were clear at a glance.
Haji mobilized thirty mercenaries to ambush at the teahouse frequented by Nguyen Van Hung;
Zakun's "seafood" is on its way to the Haji arsenal;
Nguyen Van Hung's motorcade took a detour to Haji's private villa...
"It's time to add some catalyst." He said lightly.
Three sets of surveillance videos faked through AI began to quietly flow into the intelligence networks of three parties:
Haji's encrypted terminal received a 4K video of "Zakun and Mo Xiaohan's confidant having a secret conversation at the dock." In the video, one can even clearly see the confidant handing Zakun a USB flash drive.
Zakun's informant "accidentally" intercepted a bounty posted by Nguyen Van Hung on the dark web, the amount of which was as high as 20 million US dollars, and the target was Haji's head;
Suddenly, a secret agreement with Haji's personal seal appeared in Nguyen Van Hung's personal safe. The agreement involved a division of the Vietnamese underworld with the Mekong River Chamber of Commerce...
Torrential rain washed away the neon lights of Bangkok, and motorcades from three factions staged a death chase through the streets. Meanwhile, Mo Xiaohan was casually flipping through Ruan Xingchen's psychological evaluation report for the day.
"Boss, Haji's men have engaged in a firefight with Ruan Wenxiong, and thirteen of them have died."
"Not enough." Without even looking up, he rubbed his fingertips repeatedly over the "Improved Sleep Quality" assessment item. "Let Zakun discover that the Ruan family's mark is hidden in the swapped goods."
When the darkness before dawn was thickest, the three factions finally turned bloodthirsty. Haji blew up Zakun's dock warehouse, Nguyen Van Hung stabbed Haji's deputy's throat with a dagger, and Zakun's sniper was aiming at the fuel tank of Nguyen Van Hung's Mercedes-Benz.
They all forgot that there should be a common enemy in this fight.
Mo Xiaohan walked into the main building of the manor in the rain. As he passed through the carved corridor, he raised his hand to signal the butler waiting in the corner to come forward.
"How is she today?" Raindrops dripped down the ends of her hair, and her eyes were already cast towards the spiral staircase on the second floor.
The housekeeper bowed and replied, "Miss Ruan was reading in the garden this morning, took a three-hour nap, had half a bowl of mango sticky rice for dinner, and tried two pieces of coconut cake that you had someone bring back from Chiang Mai. She didn't show any extreme reactions. But..."
"explain."
"She keeps asking when you'll be back."
Mo Xiaohan's eyes softened slightly, but it disappeared in a flash.
He gently pushed open the bedroom door. Ruan Xingchen was curled up in the middle of the big bed, holding his pillow in her arms, her brows tightly furrowed, and her breathing was slightly rapid. It was obvious that she was not sleeping well. The moonlight shone through the gauze curtains onto her pale little face, reflecting a bit of fragility.
He approached with light steps, and seeing a thin layer of sweat on her forehead, he leaned over and carefully half-held her in his arms, his movements as gentle as if he was holding fragile porcelain.
"Awake?" His voice was low and hoarse, and his palm, which was wet with rain, pressed against the back of her neck. Her eyelashes trembled, but she didn't open her eyes, but shrank into his arms.
"Don't be afraid." He held her tightly in his arms for a moment, until her breathing became completely steady. Then he put her back on the pillow and gently closed the door.
"Continue to monitor." After returning to the study, Mo Xiaohan's voice turned cold again, "Wait until they bleed to the last drop of blood."
The silver ring looked cold under the lamp, like a poisonous snake ready to strike.
Outside the window, Bangkok's neon lights twisted into blood-red in the rain. The chessboard has been set, and the player is waiting for the perfect moment to close the net.
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