Chapter 303: The Seemingly Honest Driver? Now Truly Honest

They failed to capture Priest alive.

Unable to extract any information about K or the drug trafficking organization from his mouth—this outcome didn’t come as much of a surprise to Su Ming.

Or rather…

From the moment he confirmed Priest’s identity as a mercenary and saw how much K trusted him, Su Ming had already prepared for the possibility that even if they neutralized Priest and left him powerless to resist, they still might not get any useful intel.

After all, judging by Priest’s background and his former profession as a mercenary, he was undoubtedly fiercely loyal to K. He likely had numerous methods of taking his own life to ensure he’d never spill any critical secrets.

Still, once they learned that Priest had infiltrated Jiahe City, they had no choice but to try.

If they could capture Priest alive, it would undoubtedly be a huge breakthrough in unraveling the series of related cases.

Unfortunately, this attempt didn’t succeed. There were no unexpected gains.

But at least the cowardly Ghost was still in Jiahe City. He definitely wouldn’t kill himself for K. As long as they could apprehend him, the investigation could still move forward.

…

At that moment,

In a luxury hotel near Bangkok Airport,

K stared at his laptop screen, watching images and tweets pulled by a web crawler script.

The users posting from the Jiahe City Sanhe Square area were all talking about hearing gunshots. Some had even recorded the sounds.

Online military enthusiasts had already analyzed the audio and concluded that, aside from standard-issue sniper rifles and police handguns, there was also the sound of an illegal foreign heavy sniper rifle.

Just from the weaponry alone, people could already imagine a dramatic shootout.

K, who knew the general situation, grew visibly colder and more furious as he scrolled through the images.

Because in the latest batch pulled by the script, he saw photos of Su Ming, Lin Tian, and the others leaving the scene.

And also… a body being carried away in a black body bag.

There was no doubt.

Judging from the images, it seemed no police officers had been shot, not even lightly injured.

Otherwise, their expressions wouldn’t look so relaxed.

The body in the bag was clearly Priest.

At that thought,

K closed the laptop and stared at the ceiling, his expression complicated as he muttered softly,

“So he’s dead after all… and the police didn’t even pay a price?”

“Priest, the one I trusted most, who had never failed a mission, and this is as far as he could go?”

With a faint sigh of resignation,

K picked up the phone on the table and dialed the number he’d been contacting most frequently lately.

After a few seconds,

When the call connected, K spoke without hesitation in a low voice.

“Priest failed.”

“He failed without making those dogs pay any price.”

On the other end of the line, Q fell silent, clearly unsettled and confused.

In her view, even if Priest’s location had been discovered and he was surrounded, with his extensive mercenary experience, he should’ve at least made the police pay something. It didn’t make sense for him to fail so easily. Her voice turned cold.

“Not even a scratch? Then is Priest still alive?”

“Dead,” K answered the question Q clearly cared about most, then continued.

“After being surrounded by the police,

Priest called me one last time. He said he was switching targets—from Ghost to Su Ming, the leader.”

“If I had to guess, Priest must’ve been taken down when facing Su Ming.”

“Because I remembered—back when The Sculptor was found, Su Ming had already shown incredibly impressive marksmanship.”

“So most likely, Priest lost in that very area he was most confident in—gunfighting. He lost to Su Ming, which is why he couldn’t make those dogs pay even the smallest price.”

When he finished speaking,

Q let out a slight breath, sounding somewhat relieved as she said,

“As long as he’s dead.”

“Compared to the regret of not eliminating Su Ming, I was more worried about Priest being captured alive.”

“Given his importance and how much he knew about our Organization’s internal workings, Priest was no less informed than Ghost—possibly even more.”

“Now that he’s dead, at least we can be sure our side’s secrets won’t be exposed.”

“And with Priest drawing attention, I’m guessing Gray Wolf should already be at Lingling Circus, preparing for the next phase.”

“In any case, K, you should return to the United States for now. Leave the rest to me and Professor.”

“With Gray Wolf’s experience, he definitely won’t fail when it comes to someone like Ghost.”

“Alright, that’s all for now.”

“Before I go, what’s Gray Wolf’s current status? Has he started tracking Ghost yet?”

With that,

Q hung up without hesitation.

Listening to the dial tone in his ear, K looked down at the floor stained with red wine and scattered with broken glass, recalling the string of failures over the past few days.

It seemed that from the very beginning, whenever he went up against Su Ming, he had never come out ahead.

And every time he thought he’d cut off the trail, a new leak would appear.

Failure.

It seemed to be the one constant during this entire period.

No wonder even the Professor, who had always believed in him, ended up saying something as harsh as… “You’ve really disappointed me.”

At that moment,

A strange impulse surged in K’s heart. He wanted to book a flight from Bangkok back to the Dragon Country, to face off against Su Ming once more, and at the very least, win half a move.

But unfortunately… it was nothing more than a fantasy.

In the end, he still booked a flight to the United States, choosing to run away, to retreat, and to accept the disappointment from the Professor.

…

At that time,

On the highway leading from Jiahe City to Lingling Circus,

A taxi was speeding along. The driver, drenched in sweat and genuinely honest for once, had his foot slammed down on the gas pedal, racing forward with all he had.

He had long since abandoned any thoughts of taking a detour to scam money. All he wanted now was to get rid of the terrifying plague god sitting beside him as fast as possible. In his heart, he’d already cursed that black devil countless times.

Gray Wolf was watching the scenery outside the window. Once he noticed that the surroundings and buildings had finally changed, no longer looping like some kind of ghostly maze, he finally relaxed a little.

But the very next second,

A new message popped up on his phone, and his expression shifted instantly, a trace of urgency flashing in his eyes.

Thud—

He suddenly slammed his fist down on the center console in front of him.

Then he shoved the message with “Lingling Circus” written on it in front of the trembling, honest driver, showering him with spit as he barked,

“Go, go, fast!”

“Go!!!”