Chapter 111 Betting
Los Angeles at night is like a huge chessboard, with straight bluestone roads dividing the buildings into twenty-one neat and square rows.

The spies were dressed in black and had their hands on swords.

Like black chess pieces, they follow different paths and are placed where they should go.

If you look down from the sky, the spies connected in silence like a network look like a giant black dragon, hovering on the chessboard.

On the quiet Xinglongzhai Street, Xifeng was walking in front with a newly carved dragon head mask on his face, while Chen Ji and Jin Zhu were walking side by side wearing masks.

Behind them, two secret agents arranged by Jin Zhu followed Chen Ji all the time, blocking his possible escape routes.

As he was walking, Chen Ji suddenly stopped and turned around.

In an instant, the two spies suddenly drew their swords halfway and stared at him with cold eyes.

Chen Ji was puzzled: "Master Jinzhu, are you trying to protect me or detain me? You are treating me like a prisoner now. Should you put me in the inner prison next?"

Golden Pig patted him on the shoulder and sighed, "We are all smart people, why do we have to make things clear?"

Chen Ji's tone was calm without a trace of emotion: "Master Jinzhu, I helped you find a way to hold the Liu family hostage, but now that you are about to succeed, you are going to destroy the bridge! When will you trust me?"

The Golden Pig smiled and said, "I will only trust you when you can explain all the doubts about yourself."

Chen Ji asked in a serious tone: "What are the doubts?"

Jin Zhu thought for a moment and said, "You are an apprentice in the clinic, but you were able to decipher the secret letter of the Jing Dynasty; you were powerless, but you managed to survive the Jing Dynasty spies in the Asakura gambling house; you are not good at investigation, but you were able to get rid of my two subordinates. Do you know that even in my secret service, there are not many people who can do these things, let alone you are just a small apprentice in the clinic?"

The Golden Pig put his hands behind his back and asked with interest: "So, can you help me answer these questions?"

Chen Ji did not answer.

Golden Pig laughed: "It doesn't matter if you don't want to answer. When this matter is over, Mengji will naturally ask for clarification."

Chen Ji suddenly asked, "Sir, aren't you afraid that when you are pretending to be nice to Liu Mingxian later, I will suddenly speak up and ruin your plan? You still need me to cooperate with you in the play, why don't we make a deal?"

The Golden Pig asked slowly, "What's the deal?"

However, at this moment, a secret agent suddenly whispered, "Sir, why do you want to make a deal with him? Every time you meet Liu Mingxian, you wear a mask. Now Liu Mingxian has no idea who is under the mask. It doesn't matter who wears it. Why don't I wear his mask? As long as I don't speak, Liu Mingxian will never notice anything unusual."

Jin Zhu smiled and looked at Chen Ji: "Excuse me, at this gaming table, whoever has the most chips in his hand will have the last laugh. Now you have no chips in your hand, but I still have some."

As soon as he finished speaking, Jin Zhu took off the tiger mask on Chen Ji's face.

He looked at Chen Ji's calm eyes, then at his unconsciously clenched fists, and suddenly said with emotion: "I know you are actually very angry, but you don't have to be angry. I know it must be uncomfortable to be betrayed, but if you really have no problem, I will personally apologize to you and give you a satisfactory answer. Take him away and detain him aside, and tie his mouth, so that he can't make a sound and disrupt the situation."

Two secret agents stepped forward and tightly strangled Chen Ji's mouth with a cloth strip.

Jin Zhu smiled, weighed the wooden tiger mask in his hand, and finally handed it over: "Liu Tiao, put on the mask. From now on, you are the chief of the Military Intelligence Department."

After that, Jinzhu, Xifeng and Liutiao put on their masks and continued to walk towards Mudan Bridge, while another spy took Chen Ji into the alley to meet up with other spies hiding in the dark.

In the alley, Chen Ji slowed down, trying to delay time.

But just as he slowed down, the spy hit him hard on the back with a scabbard: "Walk faster, don't think of any crooked ideas."

Chen Ji felt a burning pain in his back, but his expression became calmer and calmer.

Yin time, the fourth watch of the night.

The so-called first watch is a human, second watch is a fire, third watch is a ghost, fourth watch is a thief, and fifth watch is a rooster.

At four o'clock in the morning, the night is darkest and people are sleeping the deepest, which is the best time to kill and set fire.

Jin Zhu had seen the Mudan Bridge from afar. He slowed down his pace and whispered, "Remember, you must wait for me to confirm whether Liu Mingxian shows up later. If Liu Mingxian does not show up, the operation tonight will be cancelled. We must continue to gain his trust... Now that the court is in chaos, we must catch Liu Mingxian in the act, so as to stop the criticism from the dignitaries."

"understand!"

Jin Zhu confirmed that the three of them had put on their masks and there were no omissions, and then he slowly walked towards the Peony Bridge. In the distance, the night watchman's distant voice came: "All is well, no illness or disaster!"

Jin Zhu shook his head. Everyone said that the job of a night watchman was hard, as he had to get up five times every night to report the shifts and couldn't even get a good night's sleep. But wasn't it the same for him in the Secret Service?
However, when he reached the Mudan Bridge and saw the carriage waiting on the bridge, he suddenly felt that he had missed some details: "I always feel like something is wrong."

"What's wrong?"

"It's so quiet..."

"Sir, our people have already set up surveillance around us. It is right to remain quiet."

"No, no!"

The Golden Pig suddenly looked up at the stars and said, "'Safe and sound, no illness or disaster' is the morning watch's message. It is clearly the fourth watch now. Why did he report the wrong message?"

Xifeng's muscles suddenly tensed up: "If the night watchman or the drummer reports the wrong time, they will be thrown into prison. The time cannot be wrong!"

"The person who just reported the night watch is not the real night watchman!"

"There's an ambush!"

…………

On Anxi Street, an old man wearing a pair of black cloth shoes with white soles and carrying two bags of snacks in his hands walked slowly to Chaiji Grain and Oil Shop.

As he stared into the dark alley, dozens of pairs of green eyes in the alley turned to look at him.

In the silence, the old man smiled and waved his hand: "Nine Heavens Yingyuan Thunder Sound Universal Transformation Heavenly Venerable."

As soon as he finished speaking, a pair of eyes stood out from the crowd, and the other party walked from the shadows to the moonlight, slowly revealing a dark and furry figure.

Wuyun looked up and meowed, "Master, why haven't you rested yet?"

Old Man Yao sighed, "How can I sleep with all the shit that Chen Ji did? I'm afraid the sky will fall when I wake up. Here, I brought you two bags of snacks, share some with the cats behind you."

The dark cloud picked up the hemp rope on the paper bag, turned around and took it away into the darkness.

The next moment, those pairs of eyes became rounder and greener.

Wuyun meowed, but saw that the pairs of eyes in the alley disappeared one after another, and no one knew where the snacks were taken to.

It walked back into the moonlight and lightly jumped into Old Man Yao's arms: "Master, may you live a hundred years!"

Old Man Yao smacked his lips and said, "It sounds like he doesn't have many years left to live."

dark clouds:"……"

It has not been dealing with people for a long time, and it only knows that it should praise people at this time, but it does not know how to praise them most appropriately.

Wu Yun changed the subject and asked, "Master, why are you here?"

Old Man Yao touched Wuyun's head and said, "I read Chen Ji's fortune tonight... but ever since he learned the sword skills, my fortune-telling technique seems to have failed on him. It's vague, sometimes accurate, sometimes not. I can only tell that he's in danger tonight, but I don't know what the result will be."

Wuyun was stunned for a moment: "He said he was not in danger. I wanted to follow him, but he didn't let me go."

Old Man Yao smiled and said, "He probably doesn't want you to be in danger."

Wuyun hurriedly said: "Then you help him!"

Old Man Yao was silent for a few seconds: "Why should I help him? I said before that I don't have any master-disciple relationship with him."

Wuyun was puzzled: "Then why are you going out so late?"

Old Man Yao thought for a moment and said, "I'm just going to see if I need to collect his body."

Wuyun was in awe: "You have a kind heart."

"If you don't know how to praise, you don't have to praise," Old Man Yao said cheerfully, "I don't have a kind heart. If I had a kind heart, I wouldn't have lived to this age. Dark clouds, all the big figures in this world, the higher their position, the colder their blood will be."

Old Man Yao looked down at Wu Yun and asked, "He came to see you before he left. What did he say?"

Wuyun thought for a moment and said, "He asked me to come and tell you at dawn that he might not be back for several days, but he will be fine."

Old Man Yao exclaimed, "Did he guess that he wouldn't be able to come back in the next few days? But now Jin Zhu has begun to suspect Chen Ji and even invited Meng Ji for this purpose. How can he be so sure that he will be fine?"

Wuyun was puzzled: "Jinzhu said before that he wanted to invest in Chenji, why is he doubting Chenji now? Was he lying before?"

Old Man Yao smiled and said, "It's true that he wants to invest, because the way of cultivation of the Golden Pig is to bet heavily on other people. As long as the cultivation of the person he bets on improves, he can share the benefits. After his previous bet on Tianma was successful, Tianma reached the threshold of the Divine Dao Realm in ten years. At the same time, the cultivation realm of the Golden Pig was also brought to a new level."

“After tasting the sweetness, Jinzhu wanted to dig out the next Pegasus every day, but he failed several times in a row, causing his realm to fall instead of rise, and he actually fell back to the Xiantian realm from the Seeking Dao realm…Now that he has seen Chen Ji’s potential, he naturally wants to bet on him again and help Chen Ji get the way and resources for cultivation.”

"I see."

"Let's talk business first," Old Man Yao asked, "Three days ago, after Chen Ji saw you, you disappeared. Where did you go that night?"

The dark clouds hesitated.

Old Man Yao sneered, "Can't you tell me?"

Wu Yun answered honestly: "Chen Ji said that he would only tell you if you asked again and again, and you have only asked twice now."

Old Man Yao was amused: "... Now I'm asking you for the third time, where did you go that night?"

"I went to deliver a note to the Liu family mansion."

"What's on the note?"

"The boss is a fake. You can ask the owner of Bailu Pavilion to confirm it."

Old man Yao narrowed his eyes slightly.

The skinny old man stood on the long street, looking back at the endless bluestone road stretching into the darkness, as if he saw the end of the world at a glance: "He wants to cure Gu Tunlong?"

(End of this chapter)