Enforcer Manual
Chapter 285: Match-Fixing Suspicions_1

Chapter 285: Chapter 285: Match-Fixing Suspicions_1

Song Lan felt that the skinny man might have learned a few moves from Roger, as his defeat came so simply and swiftly.

His arm had been wedged into the gaps of the iron cage railing, and about a dozen seconds later, the medical team was ready to go up with a stretcher to carry him away, but the skinny man struggled to pull his arm out from the railing. He propped himself up on his hands, gasping heavily for air.

However, the muscular man did not intend to give him time to rest, proving the brutality of the underground boxing match with his actions—before the skinny man could rise from the ground, he threw a heavy punch onto the skinny man’s back, seemingly indifferent to the possibility that the punch might break the opponent’s spine.

That ferocious punch bent the skinny man’s body, and his eyes nearly popped out of their sockets.

With his body twisted grotesquely on the ground, the skinny man nevertheless incited a rousing cheer from the audience.

Only Song Lan in the crowd shuddered, feeling uneasy all over, "Boss, I think I might still not appreciate this kind of sport."

He suspected that after taking that hit just now, the skinny man might have to spend the rest of his life in a hospital bed.

"I remember this type of competition is called the Cage of No Return Match, where the cage isn’t opened until one party has completely lost consciousness."

Lu Xiang said, "If he had pretended to faint earlier, he might have avoided the punch he just took."

This was by no means a regular boxing match; every participant stepped into the arena with the resolve to eliminate the opponent, and in the past month alone, thirteen fighters died in the underground boxing ring of District Seventeen.

In her eyes, the skinny man was nothing special, and before entering the arena, he must have also signed the "Agreement on Life and Death."

While they talked, the skinny man, who had seemed as though his spine was broken, once again gritted his teeth and propped himself up from the ground.

The audience in the stands erupted into another vehement cheer, as if applauding the skinny man’s resilience.

In response, he received another heavy kick from the burly man.

The skinny man was sent flying several meters away and once again crashed into the iron cage.

Having witnessed this scene, Lu Xiang noticed something amiss and whispered, "Your bet man must have had a prosthetic transplant or undergone some kind of physical modification."

If it were a normal person’s physique, they would have likely fainted after the first punch; not even someone with a strong will could surpass the limits of the human body with spirit alone.

She didn’t know whether this was good or bad for the skinny man.

If he had fainted at the first opportunity, he might have avoided life-threatening injuries, but now the situation was increasingly moving toward a fight to the death.

Instead of a boxing match, what unfolded was more like a one-sided beating, with the skinny man like a punching bag. No matter how severe the beating he took, he managed to rise again, and seeing this, the burly man’s blows grew heavier. After the skinny man fell, the burly man continued the assault, his fists raining down like a tempest against the skinny man’s body.

Until, finally, there came a time when the skinny man’s right hand tightly grasped the cage railing, preventing himself from collapsing to the ground under the heavy barrage of the burly man’s fists.

His face was bloodied, his nose collapsed, and his features were barely recognizable.

After enduring the baptism of punches, he finally delivered his first meaningful counterattack of the night—an ineffective punch to the burly man’s chest, which had subcutaneous armor installed. This strike, which seemed to carry all of his conviction, did not move the large figure in the slightest.

The burly man stood in place, his eyes filled with mockery.

Time seemed to stand still at that moment, the seemingly feeble punch bringing a sudden silence over the underground boxing hall.

People held their breath, watching the deadlock on the stage.

About a dozen seconds later, the massive body in front of the skinny man thunderously collapsed, and after the audience was stunned for a good while, they erupted into another round of cursing.

A staged fight!

There was no more blatant a rigged match than this!

RMN, refund the money!

This thought didn’t disappear but simply shifted from Song Lan’s heart to that of all the audience present, and even Lu Xiang turned his face, looking at Song Lan with a skeptical gaze, "Did you cheat?"

In her eyes, the punch from the skinny fighter was probably not even enough to tickle the strong man. The first thought that came to her mind was that Song Lan was remotely using "Spiritual Energy" to control the skinny man, delivering a strike powerful enough to break through the strong man’s defenses.

"How could that be? We made a bet, how could I possibly cheat?"

He admitted that the thought of betting on the skinny fighter and identifying with him gave him goosebumps, but he never entertained the idea of interfering with the boxing match manually.

To maintain a sense of mystery, he had even avoided knowing the future course of the match in advance.

He certainly had the ability to change the course of a match, but it was pointless; even if he helped the skinny man defeat the strong man, with that level of skill, the latter was bound to die at the hands of the next opponent sooner or later.

"That skinny guy knocked out the strong man with his real skill."

Although Song Lan didn’t understand what had just happened on the field, the fact remained unchanged, "Or maybe the strong man was really throwing the match. Odds of 1:32 could make someone a fortune."

Even as the audience vented their dissatisfaction, most of them were gamblers who wished to cash in on the "welfare" but had instead lost money on the upset; still, they couldn’t influence the referee from announcing the skinny man’s victory to everyone.

Medical staff came onto the stage to carry the strong man away.

As the two walked out of the bar, a phone call came through; Roger’s name displayed on the screen of the mobile phone. He seemed to have heard that the match was over.

"Hello? Chief, what did you think of the match?"

The moment he connected, Roger’s voice came through, eager for information.

"Full of twists and turns."

Song Lan could only think of these four words. He didn’t expect that even Lu Xiang could misjudge, and his bet on the skinny man was purely based on superstition, without any factual basis. In fact, once the match started, he didn’t really believe the skinny man could win.

"I heard the skinny guy won?"

"Mmm."

"Do you know what nickname the audience has given him? ’Cheater,’ that’s what people in the circle call him. His last match was somewhat similar; he was beaten up throughout, but in the last strike, he K.O.’d his opponent."

Unlike those classic comeback moments, the skinny man didn’t show any professional technique during the match at all. From any angle, he seemed no different from the average person.

This kind of comeback didn’t earn him any applause but instead made people suspect the match was fixed.

"His last opponent was also formidable, and many suspected that the opponent had thrown the match by betting on himself to lose, but I later dug up some news—the guy died on the way to the prosthetic hospital. However, that could also be just the prosthetic hospital’s side of the story, as they’ve previously been known to claim patients were dead as an excuse to take the prosthetics from their bodies."

A fighter who made a name for himself in underground boxing often had some valuable prosthetics on them.

"This is the real reason you gave us the tickets, isn’t it?"

Song Lan realized Roger’s underlying motive. If Roger had asked him directly to help with the investigation, he would likely have refused and pushed the matter onto the criminal investigation department.

"Hehe, I just wanted to hear what the head of the department, a professional, thinks."

Roger openly admitted his own cunning plan, "So, chief, what do you think? Was it a fixed match, or did the skinny guy actually use some method to kill his opponent?"

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