Chapter 30 Paradise Game II: Modern Warfare

At 4:15, a carriage suddenly appeared at the end of the driveway leading to Wangshui Manor.

The gate guards noticed the carriage immediately and prepared to step forward for questioning, but soon they realized something was amiss—the driver's seat was empty, with only two black horses galloping at full speed, apparently with no intention of stopping!

Before a warning could be sounded, the carriage thundered into the iron gates of the manor. The fragile gates fell to the ground upon impact, sending the carriage careening far ahead before finally crashing headlong into the courtyard pond.

"Damn, whose carriage is this?"

"Son of a bitch, don't they know whose territory this is?"

Just as everyone's attention was drawn to the crash, Tyler, who had previously snuck up to the perimeter of the manor's fence, took the initiative to launch an attack!

Crack, crack, crack—

The crisp sound of gunfire tore through the night instantly!

Two to three short bursts of fire at a range of one hundred meters were exceedingly accurate, turning the kerosene lamps hanging on the enemy's hips into perfect targets. Almost in the blink of an eye, four men were struck and fell to the ground!

"It's an ambush!"

"Someone is attacking us!"

Alarm whistles at various posts finally blew, waking the manor's bodyguards from their slumber as they began to return fire. But the darkness concealed Tyler's traces, allowing them to only roughly determine the direction of the attacker's gunfire, without being able to pinpoint Tyler's exact location.

Just as they tried to encircle him, their unguarded flank was met with crossfire from another CQ-B.

Bullets flew across the crowd, leaving them utterly defenseless.

The guards realized that no matter where they ran, they couldn't escape the reaper-like bullets.

"We can't hold this position!"

"How many of them are there, exactly?"

In their hearts, there was a profound sense of absurdity, as if they were still in a dream!

Such an oppressive and suffocating ambush would have required at least forty or fifty people, yet they still could not locate the enemy's main force. And how was it possible, with guards always on watch outside the manor, that such a large group could approach the door completely undetected!?

At 4:20, the courtyard of the manor was breached. Aside from more than a dozen bodies lying on the ground, the few remaining survivors all fled in panic.

...

"This theater... is beyond saving."

Woody looked at the roaring flames before him, his eyes filled with fury. The delegation of the Second Prince had visited just the week before, and now it had been razed clean—an outright slap in the face of the lord of Magnificent Castle! "Damn it, are the people at the North Town Police Station sleepwalking? Not a single officer has been dispatched yet! Sir—"

"Shh." Shandela made a quieting gesture.

Her eyes were slightly closed as she tilted her head back, as if sensing something.

Then she quietly asked, "Do you hear anything?"

The aide-de-camp paused, then calmed down and listened intently, imitating his superior. However, all he could hear was the whooshing of the evening breeze, the crackling of wood burning in the fire, and the murmurs of the onlookers—sounds that would be impossible to ignore even without straining to listen.

"Sir, I don't hear anything..."

"It's gunfire," Shandela suddenly opened her eyes, "Continuous gunfire, at least forty people with guns involved, and they're engaged in fierce combat!"

"Are you sure?" Woody exclaimed in surprise. Firearms were strictly regulated in Magnificent Castle, limited to the city guards and police force. Gangs may have some smuggled weapons, but they were hardly significant. "Could the police be eradicating gang members?"

However, he knew this assumption was shaky, as the police usually alerted the city guards before undertaking large-scale operations to avoid any misunderstandings.

Shandela shook her head, "The sound is coming from the Inner City District, likely inside a residential area."

"Inner City District residential area?" Woody instantly felt his scalp go numb; those who lived there were all prestigious residents of the city, boasting top-tier security levels. How could a gunfight suddenly erupt there? But he didn't dare to dismiss his superior's assertion outright, as a master martial artist's perceptive capabilities were indeed extraordinary.

"Notify Group One, everyone, to head to the Inner City District immediately!"

"Yes!" Woody immediately took the order. "Then... what about the arsonist, are we still going after him?"

"Of course, we are," Shandela said without hesitation. "But I'm afraid he's not here."

The aide-de-camp looked puzzled.

"Let's get over there first, then talk," she didn't explain further, knowing that the more she tried to explain intuition, the more confusing it became— the burning of the Grand Theater and the sudden, intense gunfire in the Inner City District seemed unrelated at first, but they shared one common trait: both were unexpected and abnormally strange.

Just like the diviner who had suddenly disappeared.

She had a vague feeling that answers might be found where the gunfire sounded.

…

"Right! Control your gun well, don't let your eyes stray too far from the sights, and be ready to pull the trigger at any moment!" Zhang Zhiyuan shouted in Zhou Zhi's mind, "Indoor firefighting is not like the outside; you can't overlook any dead angles! It's best to completely annihilate the enemy!"

"Bro, don't get too excited; I can hear you." Zhou Zhi said, amused and exasperated. When he learned that other "fallen" players were still following the game's progress, his spirits lifted, but to his surprise, Zhang Zhiyuan was even more spirited, offering comprehensive and meticulous guidance in a booming voice. "Back at the theater, weren't you totally against this kind of under-the-table justice? How come you've had a change of heart now?"

"Are you stupid? You are the one shooting, not me!" Zhang Zhiyuan replied irritably. "And you saw the mission brief; what right do they have to call themselves police? Cloaking themselves as law enforcers while committing vile deeds worse than beasts, it's no problem if such scum are wiped out."

Towards the end, he practically gritted his teeth.

"Alright, alright, I'll do my best, okay!" Zhou Zhi agreed helplessly. "But speaking of which... I feel like the gun isn't that hard to use, it's almost like playing a shooting game... besides the lack of a bounty reward."

"Nonsense!" Zhang Zhiyuan rolled his eyes silently, "You're not looking at what the others are holding." Though both sides had guns, the vast difference in performance was enough to compensate for the novice's lack of skill. At a distance of one hundred meters, it was hard for the enemy's bullets to guarantee a hit on the first shot, but for the CQ-B, it was wherever you aimed, you hit. While the enemy waited for another chance to fire after a miss, the powerful firepower of the automatic rifle would have turned the target into a sieve.

If this were an even fight, Zhang Zhiyuan reckoned Zhou Zhi wouldn't get away with dying just ten times.

It was precisely because of their absolute superiority in firearms that Tyler and Zhou Zhi chose to assault head-on, the fastest way to resolve the fight.

As it turned out, the strategy was highly effective; in less than five minutes, they had broken into the villa from both sides and engaged in a shootout with the guards inside.

These guards weren't even armed with guns, but still used cold weapons, mainly swords.

Despite their stronger will to fight, they fell faster than the guards outside. Especially when they tried to charge during a lull in the shooting, the relentless gunfire, like a storm, filled their last moments with disbelief.

The two of them rushed up to the second-floor master bedroom without stopping for breath.

This was also where the villa owner spent most of his time.

An imposing figure was sitting in front of a mahogany desk, dressed distinctly differently from the guards and bodyguards, with a golden badge pinned on his shoulder.

Zhou Zhi, without a word, opened fire on this person!

Bullets wreaked a spray of blood mist behind him.

"Is he Kuiqi?"

"Who knows, you should've asked questions before acting."

Seeing the target fall, Tyler moved forward to turn the man's face up, his expression shifting suddenly—the dead man's face was terribly swollen, his eye sockets dark purple, clearly having been dead for a while!

It was a corpse deliberately placed there!

"Be careful, there might be a trick inside the room—" Tyler had only gotten halfway through his sentence when a wardrobe with a mirror suddenly exploded, a figure accompanied by a shower of glass fragments lunged at Zhou Zhi. As Zhou Zhi turned his gun to defend himself, the assailant's speed proved unimaginably fast. Before Zhou Zhi could pull the trigger, the man's fist had already smashed into his face!

A thunderous crash was heard as Zhou Zhi was flung across the bedroom, slamming into the wall at the end, with blood splattering into a spider-web pattern on it!