Aside from what pertained to her Russian female friend, Li Ang was quite clear on Tang Ranno's thoughts. He knew the Special Affairs Bureau would soon arrive and, having no time for disputes, could only toss the Black Trojan into an alley.
He didn't believe Brother Mu Ma could be so weak. As a member of the Whale Song Organization, he must have one or two powerful pieces of equipment to fall back on. Moreover, judging from the mechanical eye the Black Trojan wore, it could be assumed that after completing the task at Ibaraki Middle School, he had kept the Miniature Life Potion. This way, even if his limbs were broken, he could quickly heal and escape before the Special Affairs Bureau arrived, incidentally drawing some of their pursuit pressure away from Li Ang.
Brother, I'm counting on you.
Li Ang thought to himself, walking through the streets of Yin City disguised as Brother Hu.
Without a doubt, the Special Affairs Bureau would certainly launch an investigation, carefully checking surveillance footage for Brother Hu's appearance. Now, he needed to consider how to escape.
Li Ang made several turns, walked along a riverside path beside a street for some time, and upon reaching the space beneath a bridge and seeing no one around, jumped into the turbid river.
With his modified lungs and the Ripple Breathing Method, Li Ang greatly reduced his oxygen consumption. He put on the Face-Changing Mask to reduce his presence and swam quickly along the river. Using Yin City's water system, he silently slipped through the dense urban surveillance network.
Later, he used the water system to reach the park behind the public restroom where he had disguised himself as Brother Hu. He took out the Origin of Life at the bottom of the lake, transformed himself back into Li Ang, and put his original clothes back on.
Then, using the Phase Boots' special effect of passing through the ground, Miss Chai dragged him quickly over two hundred meters, allowing him to surface in a deserted thicket in the park.
Li Ang crouched in the dense thicket, activated the Ripple Breathing Method, and slowly evaporated the water from his clothes and body using Ripple Energy.
The reason he chose that public restroom for his disguise was precisely because the park behind it had many surveillance blind spots; many young men and women enjoyed strolling there at night, undeterred by the cold.
After his clothes dried, he crawled out of the thicket, dusted himself off, brushed away twigs and leaves, and nonchalantly walked onto the path. After strolling around the park for a while and feeling that enough time had passed, he sent a WeChat message to Wang Congshan, asking if she wanted to play a round of King's Glory.
Li Ang speculated that given Tang Ranno's caution, she would definitely not return to apartment 2084 but would instead vanish completely, adopting an entirely new identity. But to be cautious, he still used mobile games to monitor Wang Congshan's family and had Miss Chai move underground to approach their neighborhood for surveillance.
About an hour later, Miss Chai saw Officer Wang Fengnian and a group of suspicious-looking people, including Wei Linglan, enter the residential area. These people were not in uniform but were in disguise. They kept some distance from each other and appeared like ordinary citizens to a casual observer. Had Wei Linglan not been among the crowd, Miss Chai might not have noticed anything unusual.
She immediately burrowed through the ground to Li Ang's side. Soon after, Li Ang saw Wang Congshan suddenly go offline in the game, AFK and idling in the healing fountain.
He inquired on WeChat why Wang Congshan had disconnected so abruptly but didn't get an immediate response. Ten minutes later, Wang Congshan sent a voice message telling him that her dad had made new progress in a case. According to Wang Fengnian, the young lady living across from them in apartment 2084 was likely an overseas personal shopper involved in smuggling who had now fled and was on the run.
Clearly, Wang Fengnian had not disclosed the full truth. The next day, Li Ang learned from Wang Congshan that her distant cousin, Wei Linglan, had decided to rent the somewhat eerie apartment 2084 and become their neighbor.
Undoubtedly, the Special Affairs Bureau had tracked down Chen Furuo through Xia Junqiang's corpse and the firework. They then used nearby surveillance to lock onto Brother Hu and Tang Ranno. From the Special Affairs Bureau's perspective, Brother Hu and Tang Ranno had both appeared inside the residential complex and were very likely two players acting together. However, Li Ang had already cleared away as many remaining traces of the "Brother Hu" identity as possible, and Tang Ranno had since vanished without a trace, becoming untraceable.
The Special Affairs Bureau was temporarily unclear whether Tang Ranno living across from Wang Fengnian's family was a coincidence or if she had another purpose. Wei Linglan, a member of the Mobile Detachment, decided to move into apartment 2084 for safety considerations.
In a sense, this was actually a good thing. At least with Wei Linglan present, Li Ang didn't have to worry about Wang Congshan's safety.
In the following days, Li Ang once again kept a low profile, remaining hidden until he was sure there was no surveillance from the Special Affairs Bureau. Only then did he return to his player identity.
The reward for this regular team mission was as follows.
[Reward Settlement in Progress]
[Overall Player Performance: S+, Game Coins and Experience Points increased to 160%]
[Mission Reward 1: Excellent Quality Skill Scroll*1]
[Mission Reward 2: Experience Points 100]
[Mission Reward 3: Game Coins 300]
According to the annotations for the second phase of the mission, only an S Rank Completion Evaluation or higher would grant an Excellent Quality Skill Scroll. The S Rank standard necessarily required meeting multiple criteria: Chen Furuo must not have committed any crimes, Chen Furuo himself must not have died, the player must understand the full story behind the Cognitive Bias Curse, and the curse must be lifted.
In the final moments of lifting the curse, Tang Ranno simply ran off, contributing nothing to its removal.
Li Ang lay on the couch, thinking to himself. She probably anticipated that her escape would dramatically lower the overall completion evaluation, meaning we'd only get Rare or even Ordinary quality Skill Scrolls at best. She'd rather forfeit the scroll just to escape... Tsk. Am I that terrifying?
Thinking about it, Tang Ranno was probably not having an easy time now; she would have to change her identity again. In an information society, creating a flawless fake identity is extremely difficult. Short-term living is manageable, but long-term activities would definitely be detected by the Special Affairs Bureau's increasingly stringent information surveillance system.
The survival environment for Lone Wolf Players is getting tougher. Maybe lone wolf players in India or those in South America have it a bit easier, not having to worry about all-encompassing information surveillance.
Li Ang shook his head, deciding not to dwell on it. He opened the wooden box in his inventory and activated the Excellent Quality Skill Scroll.
[Skill Scroll Name: Drown in Misfortune Assassination Method]
[Attributes: Learning Type, disappears after one use]
[Type: Universal]
[Grade: Excellent]
[Special Effect: Causes an endless stream of warm, pure water to surge from the nose, pharynx, throat, trachea, bronchi, and lungs of a target within 200m, causing suffocation or even drowning. The gushing effect lasts for a maximum of 1 minute. Attacking or being attacked will interrupt the spellcasting.]
[Consumption: Consumes 20 Spirit Power Value per second]
[Cooldown Time: 10 minutes]
[Note: If the target unit does not possess the relevant organs, the water source will be redirected to its respiratory system.]
[Note: Drink more hot water, my friend.]