Chapter 92 (^^)
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Xu Xingran started the car in silence.
“Now we can only hope that Uncle Xu and Uncle Shen will hand over the password, and the people from ‘Eden’ will release Xiao Chen,” Gu Liyu said.
“They probably won’t release Xiao Chen,” Gu Liyu added.
“What do you mean?” Xu Xingran stopped the car by the roadside and turned to look at him.
“Do you already know what can be opened with the passwords of my father and Uncle Xu?”
An Lan nodded, “Uncle Xu told us, it’s the alpha enhancer… but it only works for the Gu family.”
“Eden has such great ambitions; they still want the experimental data from back then,” Gu Liyu said.
With the experimental data, they could manufacture an information enhancer for any alpha family. This enhancer would not only intensify the internal struggles within the alpha family but also become a tool for ‘Eden’ to control the heirs of alpha families.
“You’re tired. Let me send you home to take a shower and wash off the pheromone scent on you. Otherwise… I feel like fighting you,” Xu Xingran said.
“Do you know where Xiao Nan is?” Gu Liyu suddenly asked.
“I don’t know. He’s probably under police protection as a witness now. Why? Do you want to see him?” Xu Xingran asked.
“Yes, I have some questions I want to ask him. Can Captain Hong arrange a meeting?” Gu Liyu asked.
“I’ll arrange it.” Xu Xingran made a call to Captain Hong.
Captain Hong said that Xiao Nan would be transferred elsewhere soon, and before leaving, he could give Gu Liyu and Xu Xingran ten minutes for questioning.
“Let’s go,” Gu Liyu raised his chin.
Xu Xingran sighed, “Do you really see me as a lackey?”
“He only treats people he trusts like this,” An Lan quickly interjected.
Xu Xingran glanced at An Lan through the rearview mirror, with a somewhat helpless smile.
They drove to Xiao Nan’s home. Plainclothes officers and police cars surrounded the house, and a team of officers protected them. The luggage of Xiao Nan and his father was placed in the living room, and an SUV for their departure was parked at the door.
When Xiao Nan saw Xu Xingran for the first time, there was a somewhat embarrassed expression on his face.
Captain Hong sat next to Xu Xingran and waved to Xiao Nan, “Come on, Mr. Xiao, don’t be shy. You should be quite familiar with each other. Let’s chat together.”
This statement was filled with ironic meaning.
Stiffly, Xiao Nan sat across from Xu Xingran, saying coldly, “Haven’t the police already questioned me about everything?”
“But we have new questions,” Xu Xingran squinted and smiled, then looked at Gu Liyu beside him, indicating that he should take over.
Gu Liyu’s expression remained consistently cold, revealing no emotions.
“You got in touch with ‘Eden’ through what channel?” Gu Liyu asked.
“I’ve answered this question many times—I contacted them through email. Although I deleted that email a long time ago, the police have already recovered it, haven’t they?” Xiao Nan said.
Gu Liyu shook his head and said casually, “The email was just a decoy. It wasn’t through email.”
Xiao Nan chuckled coldly, a hint of panic flickering in his eyes, but he quickly regained composure.
“Gu Liyu, then tell me, how did I contact ‘Eden’?” he asked.
“It was because of the shooting competition,” Gu Liyu replied.
“Then Eden should be interested in you, not me,” Xiao Nan said.
There was a mocking tone in Xiao Nan’s voice.
However, An Lan, sitting on the side, noticed that Xiao Nan’s fingertips lightly hooked, as if associating it with the action of pulling the trigger on the shooting range.
“No, people at the core of alpha family power won’t be of interest to ‘Eden.’ Only people like you, dreaming of surpassing high-quality alphas but with insufficient pheromone concentration, are their targets,” Gu Liyu said.
A trace of anger surged in Xiao Nan’s eyes. “What do you mean? Is it so great to be a high-quality alpha?”
“Yes, it is,” Gu Liyu replied.
An Lan was choked by his own saliva. He knew that Gu Liyu was confident in his abilities, and “modesty” wasn’t in Gu Liyu’s daily considerations, but saying “yes, it is great” so bluntly made An Lan suspect if Gu Liyu’s brain had been messed up by the alpha management committee.
…Or maybe, he was deliberately provoking Xiao Nan.
“So what if you’re a high-quality alpha? When Ye Yun’s omega pheromones spread everywhere, you also wanted to pounce, right?” Xiao Nan’s hands rested on the coffee table, moving closer to Gu Liyu, staring into his eyes. “In terms of self-control, you’re not as good as me.”
“So, the accident during the shooting competition in the first half of the year was caused by you,” Gu Liyu remained motionless, his tone without any fluctuations.
In terms of sarcasm, perhaps Xu Xingran was more skilled.
“Oh,” he elongated the sound, with an expression of “I see,” “With me, Gu Liyu, and Ye Yun, the top three in the shooting competition were usually all of us. Without you, what’s the big deal? At most, you would have taken fourth place. But unexpectedly, Xiao Chen showed up.”
Xiao Nan’s fist tightened. “What’s Xiao Chen?”
“Tsk tsk, you got it wrong. It should be, what’s Xiao Yun? He thought you were his supporter, but in fact, you’ve always used Xiao Yun to suppress Xiao Chen. It would be best if Xiao Yun could really cut out Xiao Chen’s heart. Because as high-quality alphas, Xiao Chen’s pheromone concentration in the Xiao family is top-notch. But you didn’t expect Xiao Yun and Han Li to be so useless, right?”
Xu Xingran raised his chin.
That kind of disdain made Xiao Nan unable to endure it any longer. He directly launched a pheromone attack on Xu Xingran.
A strong, stimulating musk directly attacked Xu Xingran, followed by the enveloping scent of amber, as if something instantly suppressed Xiao Nan. His arms propped on the table lost strength, and cold sweat dripped down his forehead.
Captain Hong quickly coughed, “That’s enough. Pheromone suppression… is against the rules.”
Xu Xingran smiled and leaned back.
The oppressive feeling instantly dissipated, and Xiao Nan took a deep breath with force.
“See, this is the difference between you and me. Your heart is full of envy. In the alpha family where pheromones determine status, you know you have no future. If you want to win, you can only cooperate with ‘Eden.’ If you really want to control the Xiao family, you need Xiao Chen. Because his pheromones are the most likely to match successfully. They are now collecting a lot of Xiao Chen’s pheromones… only now you have betrayed ‘Eden.'”
Xiao Nan remained silent, and the more he stayed silent, the more it confirmed Xu Xingran’s guess.
“When you lost in the shooting competition, you must have been angry, right? Did you cry in the bathroom, or did you vent your dissatisfaction to your coach? Then the people from ‘Eden’ noticed you, right? Who was that person?”
Xu Xingran’s last sentence was powerful, and Xiao Nan froze.
An Lan’s heart pounded. Perhaps what Xiao Nan was about to say was the name they saw on the list.
Suddenly, An Lan was pulled over by Gu Liyu. Xu Xingran toppled the nearby Captain Hong.
There was a loud “bang,” and the oil painting hanging in the living room fell with a clatter.
Police officers rushed over, tackling Xiao Nan.
Several bullets hit the coffee table, the sound of cracking porcelain making people shudder.
Gu Liyu’s palm covered An Lan’s left ear, pressing him down towards the coffee table, as a bullet grazed them and embedded itself into the sofa.
They were now lying on the ground, and An Lan couldn’t think about anything. All he could hear was the crackling sound of gunfire, and these were real bullets, not the blanks used in their competition.
There was a bloodstain on the back of Gu Liyu’s hand, bleeding from where the bullet had grazed it just moments ago.
“Go—”
Gu Liyu pulled An Lan quickly behind the sofa.
Meanwhile, Xiao Nan got shot. The officers dragged him, searching for cover and calling for help.
He coughed, blood oozing from his chest, desperately clinging to the officer beside him, silently pleading for help.
However, the gunman controlled the position of the window, and as soon as they moved out of cover, they would be hit.
“Captain Hong, how long will it take for the rescue team to arrive?” Xu Xingran asked.
“Probably five minutes at the fastest.”
“We can’t wait for five minutes; they’ll come in before that,” Gu Liyu said coldly.
“Captain Hong, it’s not good! Xiao Nan has been shot in the chest, and he might not last much longer!”
Captain Hong heard this news and squeezed out a curse from between his teeth.
The audacity of “Eden” had far exceeded their imagination. Sending someone to assassinate a witness protected by the police was daring to the extreme.
A loud bang echoed, and An Lan’s shoulder trembled in response.
“It’s over,” Xu Xingran said.
“What’s over?”
“The SUV prepared for Xiao Nan’s evacuation outside was hit. They will be coming in soon.”
Before Gu Liyu could speak, there was a crash, and the security door of the Xiao family was forcibly smashed open. The steel door flew out, narrowly missing An Lan. Without hesitation, Gu Liyu pressed An Lan against his chest.
The door slammed onto the coffee table, the sound akin to an earthquake.
A modified SUV rushed in, and the door opened. Someone with a gun jumped out.
Captain Hong’s men immediately raised their guns to resist but were quickly shot.
However, Xu Xingran shouted, “Stop—I’m from the Xu family!”
The armed assailant took out a phone, looked at it, and smashed it against Xu Xingran’s head, causing him to collapse.
Captain Hong, wanting to protect Xu Xingran, was shot in the shoulder by a sniper.
“The next shot will be in the head.”
After saying this, the assailant moved towards Gu Liyu. He was about to pull him up, but Gu Liyu hooked his arm and, using the momentum, successfully dislocated the man’s arm. However, Gu Liyu also took another punch, and his head hit the ground.
“Gu Liyu!”
An Lan reached out to hold Gu Liyu’s head, but the force of the blow was too strong. An Lan’s fingers hit the ground, causing excruciating pain.
“Ugh…”
The next moment, An Lan was pulled up by the assailant, and just as Gu Liyu was about to get up, the man pointed his gun at Gu Liyu’s head.
“Tell your old man that if he doesn’t want to give us what we want, he still has to give it.”
After saying that, An Lan was pulled onto the car.
A hail of gunfire followed, forcing Captain Hong’s team to stay back, watching helplessly as An Lan was taken away.
“Kid, behave yourself.” Another man’s voice came from the car.
An Lan, clutching his left hand, suddenly felt a cold calmness in his anxious heart. He seemed to have become a hostage.
Since he was a hostage, he probably wouldn’t be killed for the time being.
Their car sped away and stopped in front of a building. Someone slid down from a higher position, wearing a sun hat and carrying a gun on his back—the sniper who had hit Xiao Nan.
The car door slid open, and the other party briskly entered. The door “thudded” shut, and the other person sat in the back seat.
The entire process took less than 2 seconds, and An Lan was amazed at their coordination and speed.
The sniper behind kept his head down, and An Lan couldn’t see his face, but he speculated about the man’s identity.
He was most likely Liang Hao, the shooting champion recruited by “Eden.”
“Give him an injection.” The person sitting beside An Lan spoke.
An Lan immediately became nervous. What kind of injection?
Would it make him pass out, or was it the “Eden” drug? He hadn’t undergone a recent medical examination and didn’t know the extent of the influence the drug might have on his differentiation. If “Eden” used drugs again to affect his differentiation, he didn’t know what the consequences would be.
“No, at least three days of unconsciousness with one injection.” The man behind An Lan answered.
“Okay.”
A black hood suddenly covered An Lan’s head.
“Kid, behave yourself, or we’ll blow your head off.”
An Lan couldn’t see anything anymore, so he couldn’t determine his location. However, the person behind him was evidently quite authoritative, most likely Liang Hao.
But even though An Lan’s eyes couldn’t see, his sense of smell and hearing remained sharp.
An Lan heard the sound of a large truck passing by, and their car jolted. If An Lan didn’t mishear, they had driven into the cargo compartment of that truck.
“What are you listening to?” a voice with a hint of a laugh came from behind.
An Lan’s back immediately broke into a cold sweat.
“I heard that you continue to differentiate based on the pheromones from the child of the Gu family. Otherwise, you would have become an omega long ago.”
While speaking, the man circled around An Lan’s chair, pinching his neck. It was the place where Gu Liyu had bitten him before. Feeling someone else touching it, a nauseating feeling rushed over him. An Lan instinctively struggled.
“But are you a real alpha? Why don’t I smell any alpha pheromones from you?” Liang Hao’s words were followed by mocking laughter from the others.
They were all alphas and could sense pheromones.
If not for Liang Hao’s reminder, An Lan wouldn’t have remembered that he could actually launch a pheromone attack on them.
But with four of them… unless Gu Liyu or Xu Xingran intervened, there was no way to bring them down. He needed to find an opportunity.
An Lan remained silent.
“Is this kid scared silly?” The person sitting beside An Lan teased.
“Orders from above indicated that they want this kid. I don’t know what they want him for.”
“But you didn’t see how tightly the Gu family’s kid protected him. My arm got dislocated, and they’ll have to pay extra for this trip. It hurts like h*ll.”
“Extra pay? I think you’re asking for a bullet.”
They chatted and laughed, but there was a tacit agreement not to reveal any crucial information.
They stayed in the cargo compartment for an unknown amount of time, making several turns. An Lan couldn’t determine where their car was heading.
When they arrived at a certain place, the cargo compartment of the truck opened, and the person next to An Lan said, “Getting off to relieve myself.” Then he opened the car door and went out.
An Lan whispered, “I also need to use the bathroom.”
“What?” The man behind him smiled, “Is the kid trying to escape?”
“You’ve got a lot of people… I can’t run away,” An Lan replied.
Liang Hao, sitting in the back, burst into laughter. He somehow produced an empty mineral water bottle and handed it to An Lan.
“Little kids can just use this.”
This was Liang Hao mocking him for being small.
An Lan wasn’t provoked; he just spoke in an even softer voice, “Can’t use this to… you know.”
“Then hold it,” Liang Hao said.
An Lan didn’t continue to find excuses and just sat quietly.
The car continued to move.
On the way, there were several inspections, and the truck driver stopped several times.
Every time there was an inspection, the chatter in the truck compartment would stop. An Lan could feel the cold muzzle against the back of his head. Once the compartment was opened, they would use An Lan to threaten the police.
They stumbled out of the city in this manner.
After driving for an unknown period, An Lan felt hungry. The person beside him seemed to be eating something, making a crunchy sound.
An Lan’s stomach made a very disobedient “growl.”
The person beside him chuckled, “The little kid is hungry. Do you want to give him something to eat?”
Liang Hao responded, “No need. When people lack sugar, their brain’s thinking ability decreases. Let him stay hungry; it’s better than his brain working too fast and causing trouble for us.”
“Makes sense.”
If An Lan didn’t have a hood on his head, they would see his eyes rolling to the sky.
Makes sense, my foot!
After driving for several hours, the truck driver was quite tired. At this moment, a car approached from the opposite direction. The truck driver urgently turned the steering wheel, and the truck compartment almost did a 180-degree drift. They also had to urgently avoid another car in the adjacent lane. When turning the steering wheel again, the entire truck flipped!
The SUV in the cargo compartment tumbled along.
An Lan’s face hit the window, and his stomach felt like it was about to vomit through his throat.
A huge impact sound followed, the truck’s wall vibrated, and their eardrums were almost deafened.
“What the… is going on!”
“My head is about to explode!”
“It’s probably an accident,” Liang Hao’s voice sounded. “We must leave here immediately; the police should be coming soon.”
But the back door of the truck was locked, and they called the truck driver multiple times without any response.
“What if he got killed?”
Liang Hao decided immediately, “Drive, crash open the cargo box, we have to leave now!”
The SUV immediately started the engine, moved to the front of the cargo box, accelerated backward abruptly. An Lan was surprised; these guys were really brutal!
“Boom!” They actually crashed open the cargo box. After a huge bump, the car landed, moved backward a few meters. Who knew they were now on the opposite lane, and another car hit them suddenly.
Their SUV crashed back into the cargo compartment of the truck. The steering wheel was turned too hard, and the car flipped.
An Lan, with the hood on, relied solely on hearing and body sensations to perceive what was happening. His neck was almost broken, and his head hit the window several times.
When their SUV flipped back, An Lan instinctively raised his hands to support the roof.
The sharp sound of metal scraping against the ground, they skidded for several meters before stopping.
An Lan’s bones felt like they were falling apart. After a long time, he reacted. He lay down in the car, and the person next to him made a struggling sound.
“My shoulder… my shoulder…”
An Lan took off the hood, feeling something dripping on his face—it was the blood of the person beside him.
The lights on the road were glaring; An Lan raised his hand to shield his eyes.
The person driving the SUV was completely silent, his hand hanging on the side.
An Lan’s heart was beating very fast. Except for the injured person next to him, everyone else in the car was silent. He had to escape!
Just as he was about to kick out the cracked car window, a gun was pressed against the back of his head.
“Little kid, you’re pretty lucky.”
A bucket of cold water poured over An Lan, and his heart cooled down by half. His blood congealed, and he dared not move, afraid that the gun might accidentally go off.
It was Liang Hao.
He sat at the back, and apparently, his luck was even better than An Lan’s!
Liang Hao kicked open the car door, climbed out.
Several onlookers had gathered around, some calling the police, some coming over to help.
An Lan was about to call for help, and Liang Hao’s voice sounded, “I can kill them all.”
The sound of the gun being loaded was particularly loud.
An Lan dared not move; Liang Hao opened the car door on his side, pulled him out.
With such a serious chain of car accidents, honking horns were already audible in the distance.
Liang Hao grabbed An Lan with one hand and brandished a gun with the other, hijacking a car and forcing An Lan into the driver’s seat.
With the gun directly exposed, he commandeered a car, pushed An Lan into the driver’s seat.
“Drive.”
“I… I can’t drive! I don’t have a license!” An Lan was dumbfounded.
Liang Hao chuckled, a chilling coldness in his smile, “Little kid, men have a natural talent for driving. Haven’t eaten pork, have you never seen a pig run?”
After saying that, Liang Hao fired a shot at the owner of the car who was running away. The bullet hit the guy’s shoulder.
An Lan was stunned. Without saying a word, he immediately pulled the handbrake, stepped on the gas pedal, and the car rushed out.
“See, isn’t that driving well?”
Liang Hao’s hand reached out of the window and directly aimed the gun at the gas tank of the SUV.
“Bang!” The SUV exploded, flames soaring into the sky, and the entire road seemed to twist upward.
An Lan could hardly believe his eyes and roared, “What the h*ll are you doing!”
Liang Hao turned his gun towards An Lan’s forehead, knocking on it, “Leaving them for the police?”
An Lan opened his mouth, but for heartless scoundrels like him, saying one more word was a waste of energy.
“That’s right. In this world, there are only useful people and useless people.”
“It seems I’m a useful person,” An Lan said self-deprecatingly.
An Lan, gripping the steering wheel, drove with his body in the front and his soul chasing from behind.
“Of course, you are useful. Think about your little boyfriend; he must be doing everything to find you now.”
“Why did you kidnap me in the first place?” An Lan asked coldly. “If it’s to threaten Xu Zhongshuang or Gu Yunli, you should have taken Xu Xingran and Gu Liyu. What’s the point of taking me?”
“Because you’re not a high-quality alpha, easier to control,” Liang Hao replied with a smile.
“Xu Zhongshuang and Gu Yunli won’t care about my life or death,” An Lan said.
“Tsk… don’t you know that the more high-quality the alpha, the harder it is for them to let go once they are emotionally attached? Your pheromones will be imprinted in Gu Liyu’s mind like a brand. If he can’t find you, he’ll go crazy. Gu Yunli won’t watch his son go mad.”
Talking about this, Liang Hao seemed exceptionally pleased. In his eyes, so-called high-quality alphas were nothing more than trash once they had this weakness.
A car approached, and the driver reacted quickly, avoiding them. The honking echoed through the air.
“Crazy—have you lost your mind?” the other driver shouted.
“Did I… take the wrong lane?” An Lan asked with a trembling voice.
“Yes. Turn the steering wheel, oh, remember to use the indicator lights,” Liang Hao’s voice carried a malicious smirk. “Drive faster. If they catch up, we’ll have to fight.”
An Lan could only continue pressing the gas pedal. He knew that Liang Hao was particularly ruthless, but if he thought An Lan, as a non-high-quality alpha, was not a threat, An Lan decided to make him taste some bitterness.
“I’m a bit hungry… been feeling dizzy from not eating.”
“Stop pretending. I’m not your little boyfriend,” Liang Hao scoffed.
“I’m worried about trouble. This is a highway.”
Liang Hao fumbled in his pocket, found a piece of chocolate, tore open the packaging with one hand, and impatiently stuffed it into An Lan’s mouth. “Don’t cause any trouble for me.”
An Lan remained silent, holding the chocolate.
D*mn it, causing trouble for you? I’m going to make you regret this.
An Lan melted the chocolate in his mouth. Although he still felt hungry, his mind seemed to be clearer than before, not as dizzy.
He took a silent deep breath.
Liang Hao rolled down the car window, and a faint bamboo fragrance wafted through the car, refreshing.
For a moment, Liang Hao thought it was the scent of car perfume, but when that bamboo fragrance suddenly condensed into numerous sharp bamboo shoots, plunging downward with a formidable momentum, piercing his neural network and embedding into his brain, the gun in his hand loosened.
“You have guts—”
Liang Hao was about to open fire, but An Lan, with one hand, pressed the gun down. The bullet pierced Liang Hao’s thigh, and An Lan released the handbrake, twisting it forcefully, grabbing the gun.
The gun barrel turned, pointing at Liang Hao’s forehead.
Liang Hao covered his bleeding wound, looking at An Lan with resentment. “Little kid, do you know how to shoot?”
“Do I or don’t I, do you want to find out?” An Lan asked coldly.
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