Although Ren Zhong was shocked, he remained calm and replied, "Yes."
He couldn’t appear as if he’d never seen the world.
"So, actually, we’re really short on money."
Ren Zhong: "Luckily, we’re able to come to this mining district. Though it’s a bit tiring, we earn quite a lot. Captain, you also spent a lot today, but we should be able to earn it back, right?"
Lin Wang nodded, "Yes. The reason we make more in the Chenhui Mine is because repairing equipment here is free. Otherwise, why would I call opening a new mine a lucrative job?"
Ren Zhong quickly followed, "Thank you, Captain, for not disdaining my low strength and for bringing me along."
"It’s good that you know."
Ren Zhong understood Lin Wang’s purpose in saying all this. It was simply a reminder of the favor Lin Wang did for him.
However, Ren Zhong was even more aware that risks and rewards always coexist.
Usually, when hunting around the small town, the death rate of professional teams was very low, and no one would die for as long as a year or more.
But in the Chenhui Mine, five people died in just eight days.
Pan Fenglian, Song Qianlian, and he himself almost died as well.
Now, this "generous and kind" captain thought that Ren Zhong didn’t see through the afternoon’s ploy and didn’t realize it was a complete betrayal, so he was freely employing his method of managing subordinates.
Subsequently, Ren Zhong endured a few more minutes of Lin Wang’s "earnest teachings."
He pointed out that Ren Zhong’s emotions were too exposed and criticized him for not hiding his smile when handing over the mineral source stone to Yu Junren.
"Although finding the source stone and making a fortune is quite nice, everyone was busy for a long time because of you today. You shouldn’t have shown such an overjoyed expression. We are a team, and strictly speaking, everyone else lost money except you. Bei Lihui, Si Mawan, Pan Fenglian, and Song Qianlian would have their thoughts seeing you so self-satisfied since you are a newcomer. You bought this treat, which somewhat appeased their thoughts."
"Okay, Captain. I will pay attention in the future."
"The crystal chip from the Mud Leech in the cave is worth 300,000, and the mud composing its body is worth 150,000. Our team altogether received 60,000 from it. I won’t consider your share in this money. This is to teach you a lesson. Additionally, I won’t include today’s hunting commission in your calculations, and your debt is still 235,000."
"See, you are just too emotional. You really need to change in the future."
Ren Zhong sincerely nodded, indicating he had learned.
Others were hard to say, but he truly didn’t know where Pan Fenglian and Song Qianlian got their opinions from.
At 10:01 PM, in the dormitory bedroom.
Ren Zhong had already honestly laid down and fell into a deep sleep.
His exoskeleton suit was hanging on the wall rack.
Everything was the same as yesterday, the only difference being that the Ruined Beast skin pouch inside the breastplate lining held a thumbnail-sized, crystal-clear, diamond-shaped crystal.
When taking off the equipment, Ren Zhong didn’t even glance at the breastplate, but once entering the hibernation space, he immediately began the next step of his arrangements.
Through these days of close observation, he had deepened his understanding of Lin Wang’s team members.
For instance, over the past two days at a feast, he noticed that the Armored Soldier, Song Qianlian, seemed to have peculiarities in his fusion gene and couldn’t even tolerate the smell of alcohol.
Bei Lihui and Lin Wang were childhood friends, similar to Zheng Tian and Chen Hanyu.
Compared to other members of the squad, Lin Wang cared most about Bei Lihui’s life.
As a gunsmith with high offense and low defense, whose main strength was in frontal confrontation, Bei Lihui’s strongest defensive equipment was on his back.
These were very important details to exploit.
But it wasn’t all good news.
The bad news was that Lin Wang, although not as strong as Ma Xiaoling, was genuinely very strong at his peak state.
Through his Third Level exoskeleton, Ren Zhong analyzed Lin Wang’s combat style, which was about balanced enhancement, with no weaknesses and no exceptional skills.
At the Third Level stage, this was both an advantage and a disadvantage.
But upon reaching the Fourth Level, this absence of weaknesses transformed Lin Wang into a seamless multi-sided warrior.
When facing professionals with lower comprehensive strength, Lin Wang’s steady style would give him overwhelming superiority, effectively making him a crusher of weaker opponents.
Ren Zhong was one such weaker opponent.
After considering all factors in his mind for a long time, Ren Zhong concluded that if Lin Wang’s team maintained its full five-member capacity, even if he earned another million Contribution Points and consumed a Star Origin Injection Liquid to quickly rise to the peak of a Third Level warrior, or even barely step into Fourth Level, he still had no chance of winning.
Unless he could persuade Ma Xiaoling to assist him.
But that was unrealistic, as his relationship with Ma Xiaoling was not at the level of risking life and death together.
Moreover, being the daughter of Mayor Ma Dafu, she had her own concerns.
Ren Zhong chose the ambush site to be inside an abandoned mine pit. Ma Xiaoling, as the Guard Captain, couldn’t just leave Starfire Town during the day without being detected by Yang Bingzhong.
If Yang Bingzhong discovered Ma Xiaoling’s abnormal actions, it would expose Ren Zhong’s premeditated murder and exacerbate the conflict between Starfire Resources and Ma Dafu.
Although Little Ma was a bit naive, Ma Dafu understood the situation.
This matter ultimately depended on himself, so Ren Zhong decided to take a risk and change his plan.
"Brother Wang, I’m taking a day off tomorrow. Could you come to Chenhui Mine tomorrow morning? I want to buy something."
"Eh, that’s not convenient. Usually, when Purple Crystal Mining opens a new mine, outside merchants aren’t allowed to approach."
"Uh, Brother Wang, can you think of something? I want to buy an Information Flow Interference Bomb."
"I’ll check who’s in charge of Chenhui Mine. Sigh, this isn’t easy to investigate. Recently Purple Crystal Mining’s management has become stricter."
"It’s Yu Junren, Brother Wang, you might know him."
"Yu Junren! I do know him. Ren, how do you know this?"
"When we had drinks and chatted before, you mentioned his name to me. You said you were dealing with a procurement manager with an awful demeanor while supplying a new mine. His name was Yu Junren, and you nicknamed him Yu Bastard. I figured it might be the same person."
"Ren, your memory is too good! You could remember even that?"
"That’s because your story was so interesting, Brother Wang."
"Alright, I’ll ask him directly. Hey! It’s really him!"
"That’s great, can you come then?"
"Yes, definitely. Back then, he took a lot of benefits from me. I’ll contact him for a temporary supplier’s permit."
"Okay, I’ll be waiting for your good news. See you tomorrow morning."
Zheng Tian and others thought Ren Zhong had amazing connections, but little did they know that Ren Zhong’s network also contained the real king of connections.
Since confirming that Wang Zhaofu could come, Ren Zhong had a better chance of getting the source stone out.
According to Ren Zhong’s original plan, after obtaining a source stone, he had two options for transport.
The first was to utilize a certain degree of freedom during the mining process to secretly hide the source stone underground and wait to take it away when the excavation work was finished and they were about to leave. This plan had a lot of uncertainty with many unstable factors but had the highest personal safety coefficient.
The second was to hide the pouch in the dormitory and similarly take it away when leaving. But this was also unsafe, as there was no telling if there were surveillance cameras in the bedroom.
Now things were better.
Upon arriving here, he captured new information, namely Yu Junren’s name. Moreover, after obtaining the source stone, he received a day’s leave due to a drilling machine malfunction.
The situation suddenly opened up, so of course, the plan needed to adjust with the change in objective conditions.
In the new plan, Ren Zhong intended to secretly pass the pouch to Wang Zhaofu when they met tomorrow, and then have him take it to Sun Miao.
This certainly carried risks, such as possible betrayal by Wang Zhaofu and Sun Miao.
But Ren Zhong chose to unconditionally trust these two "sworn brothers."
He sincerely hoped they would not disappoint him.
[Recommendation Ticket Voting Slot]