First, he glanced at the three-dimensional map. Li Ming found Tu Zheng’s room, which was built luxuriously, with a large 4x4 bed occupying most of the space.
The surrounding holographic images simulated a vast prairie, vividly lifelike, complete with the rustling sound of wind blowing across the grass.
"This fat man really knows how to enjoy life," Li Ming searched for a moment and found his target, the safe placed by Tu Zheng at the bedside, and quickly opened it.
The safe wasn’t large, but inside was a stack of golden crystals—refined liquid gold, an interstellar precious metal.
Li Ming recognized them at a glance. They were more expensive than the purple crystals he had obtained from Scar-faced Tiger, valued at over ten thousand Star Coins per gram.
"Tsk..." Li Ming grinned.
A rough estimate put this small stack at a value of three million Star Coins, and there were also two pickup cards from Giant Shield Company—their purpose unknown.
Later, he went to the warehouse within the Secret Castle, where various firearms and weapons were neatly arranged, at least two to three hundred of them, among which the most notable was the all-metal combat armor in the glass cabinet.
Black paint, sharply defined edges, and almost entirely cast out of alloy as far as one could see, only the purple-black titanium fiber lining was visible at the joints during movement.
[Tank Guard 211 Close Combat Armor—D grade: built from King Kong alloy, mixed with titanium fiber lining, a heavy single-soldier combat armor.
Control Conditions: Seven thousand points of metal energy
Control Effect: Defense Boost—150%
Control Ability—Tank Guard: an additional 300% defense boost.]
The ability was simple and brutal, adding up to a 450% defense increase. After being controlled, ordinary kinetic bullets couldn’t even break a sweat on his skin.
At least a D suffix energy level was needed to break his defense.
Even without using Control, wearing the Tank Guard on the outside and having array armor inside, he could withstand attacks from a D grade life form for a good while.
"This time it’s a big haul," Li Ming thought cheerfully as he packed the firearms, all of which were sources of metal energy, including heavy weapons of F and E grades.
This windfall was far greater than all his previous gains put together.
He had killed three big fishes, gained three million Star Coins as a bounty, and the miscellaneous items in the Secret Castle were roughly estimated to be worth five or six million.
In total, his haul was worth eight or nine million Star Coins, plus there were two anonymous storage cards from the Giant Shield Company, potentially hiding little surprises.
Even though this place was also made of metal materials, he couldn’t linger here long. He packed up, took his belongings, and swiftly left.
Half a day later, Yang Peng stood here with a blank expression, and Chief Wang quietly reported, "Minister, this place has been cleaned out, and there’s no data in the monitoring terminal."
"Does anyone else know about this place?" Yang Peng couldn’t help looking toward Zeng Hao.
"Those who know about this place are all Tu Zheng’s confidants. Although few, there are still a few," Zeng Hao shook his head helplessly, "I don’t know who got ahead of us."
"Specter!" Yang Peng suddenly spat out these words. Zeng Hao’s expression tightened, and Chief Wang’s expression lifted, "Minister, how do you know it was him?"
"Intuition," Yang Peng frowned, "I don’t know why, but I always feel like he’s always one step ahead of us."
"You mean there’s a mole in the department?" Chief Wang deliberately lowered his voice.
"It’s just my speculation, don’t spread rumors," Yang Peng shook his head, sighing.
"Another USB drive?" Li Ming was speechless, looking at the USB in the box.
After absorbing the refined liquid gold and those firearms and equipment, he had gained nearly sixty thousand points of metal energy. After controlling the Tank Guard, he still had about fifty-five thousand left, an unprecedentedly large number.
He then proceeded to claim goods at the Giant Shield Company, one of the two anonymous storage cards left by Tu Zheng.
He checked it on a smart terminal and found it was also a set of criminal evidence, with many overlaps with the data Qin Xiao had collected.
But there were differences too.
Qin Xiao’s collection focused more on middle and upper management, but Tu Zheng’s included substantial evidence of low-level government officials taking bribes, not just from the city guard but across various departments, totaling four to five hundred people.
However, some of the bribes were just a few thousand Star Coins, for minor favors.
"So now everyone keeps this kind of stuff for protection, huh? If caught, throw it out and blow up a big hole," Li Ming copied it into his smart terminal and destroyed the original USB.
Suddenly, he realized his smart terminal had also become a bomb.
It was a mixed bomb, and it would be amusing if it got lost one day, he thought aimlessly.
Although the USB drive was a disappointment, another item gave him a pleasant surprise—
[D-72 High-Energy Thermobaric Grenade—Consumption: A bomb with massive destructive power.
Control Conditions: Ten thousand points of metal energy
Control Effect—Power Burst: Consumes controlled objects, temporarily raises the host to the standard of a D grade life form, and controls the Flame Element, duration—60s]
"A thermobaric grenade, is it meant for a doomsday scramble?" Li Ming caressed its delicately hollowed-out metal surface.
Though only the size of a fist, its power was enough to reduce several city blocks to ashes, comparable to a small missile.
If such a severe terrorist attack occurred, the entire city guard, if not flayed, would be deeply affected.
Happily controlling another powerful item, he added another ace to his hand. Aces are never too many, and he still had forty-five thousand in metal energy.
When he returned to the city guard headquarters, Yang Peng was also just returning with his team, his face grim, while Lin Yao looked utterly downcast.
Seeing him return leisurely from outside, Yang Peng asked a few suspicious questions but got no clear answers.
In the afternoon, the misery of Lin Yao was the talk of the city guard, with many taking delight in his calamity.