Enforcer Manual
Chapter 614: One More Friend, One More Path_1

Chapter 614: Chapter 614: One More Friend, One More Path_1

Before leaving the junkyard, Song Lan took a few oranges from the fruit basket in the public lounge. Since he was going to visit Engle, it seemed rather inappropriate to show up empty-handed, and these oranges were air-shipped from the orchards of the core city by Falena, not to be found in the markets of The Seventeenth Region.

Mr. Engle, however, was utterly terrified by the discovery made the day before and had not yet recovered.

Following the address Dr. Bai Zhu had investigated, he arrived at a private villa, where all the curtains were drawn. Song Lan rang the doorbell several times without response until he called Engle’s phone. Engle then, like an underground worker, pulled back the curtains on the second floor. After seeing Song Lan lingering at the door, he remotely opened the security lock of the front yard.

As soon as Song Lan entered the door, Engle pointed a heat energy blade at him.

Medea mocked Engle for being timid as a mouse, but she was the third, after Chai Ke and Mr. Dorago Safron, to dare brandish a weapon in front of Song Lan.

"What’s in the plastic bag?"

Engle asked, pale-faced and wary.

"Oranges."

"Oranges? Open it up and let me see."

Song Lan complied with his request, opening the plastic bag, but this clearly wasn’t enough to ease Engle’s wariness. He then said, "You eat one first."

Seeing Song Lan peel an orange and put half into his mouth, Engle swallowed, tensed for another two or three seconds, then said, "Now throw the oranges and the plastic bag over to me."

Ever since running back to his villa last night, he had not slept a wink, even sending his accompanying chef back overnight. He hadn’t dared to contact anyone, not even his personal assistant, for fear that he might be overpowered by a creature looking exactly like one of his team members.

Although he put away the heat blade, he turned and got a kitchen knife from the kitchen, handing it to Song Lan, "Cut your palm with this. Don’t worry, I have Healing Spray."

Song Lan was rendered somewhat speechless by Engle’s ramblings but it further confirmed that Engle knew quite a lot about the Worms.

For the intelligence that Engle possessed, he forcefully suppressed the thought of stabbing him in the back of the head, and instead drew the knife lightly across his own palm.

Blood ran down from the cut, Engle holding half an orange, his eyes fixated on the wound on Song Lan’s palm. After silently counting to ten and seeing the wound still bleeding, he threw a Healing Spray to Song Lan.

"Okay, you’re fine. Come in."

Just as Song Lan stepped in, Engle locked the door behind him, and only after making sure that Song Lan had come alone, without anyone following, did he finally relax.

The villa’s interior was lavishly decorated, with numerous posters of the Polaris Alliance on the walls, and the glass cabinet in the living room was filled with collector’s edition figurines of popular rescuers.

This place was likely a property of the Polaris Alliance in The Seventeenth Region, specifically for the use of rescuers coming here to film.

"What happened last night? Wasn’t it you who called me there? Why did you run off first?"

"You don’t know?"

"Know what? It’s just a few human skins, right? We’ve seen them before at crime scenes; it’s no big deal."

Song Lan employed a challenging tactic, "Are you, a Five Stars rescuer, really afraid of this?"

"Is it about the human skins? It’s..."

Engle stumbled over his words, awkward for quite some time, before finally saying in a stiff tone, "Just stop your investigation if you want to stay alive."

In fact, from last night, he had been in intense internal conflict. Reason told him he should leave The Seventeenth Region immediately and return to the safety of The First Region, especially since the money he had earned before was more than enough for him to squander for the rest of his life. But another voice kept telling him this was his only chance for redemption; if he did not seize this opportunity, he was doomed to spend the rest of his life amid curses and mockery.

For Engle, who had long been financially secure, social status and recognition were indispensable.

And before he could make his final decision, Song Lan had shown up at his doorstep.

Engle was lost in thought for a while, and when he looked up again, he saw that Song Lan was no longer in the living room. He was standing at the dining table near the kitchen, frowning and with a look of disgust, "What’s this burnt smell? Did you make this?"

The plate held a charred steak, and from the single bite mark, it seemed the taste must have been hard to swallow.

Song Lan remembered Engle instructing him to toss over the oranges first when he entered the door, so he guessed that this rescuer, accustomed to the luxurious life, must be used to the food in the core city. But after driving away the chef, he had no choice but to try his hand at cooking.

As expected, Mr. Engle ended up with a piece of burnt meat.

"Don’t look at it anymore, that thing’s inedible."

Engle sat on the sofa, wrapped the blanket around himself again, leaving only his head outside.

On one hand, a fun fact, and more importantly, when one is under a blanket, a strong sense of security is generated.

For him, a few oranges were nothing more than something to fill the gaps between his teeth, he glanced at the plastic bag now only holding orange peels, feeling a sense of loss.

"I know."

Song Lan entered the kitchen and rummaged through the refrigerator, the fridge was stocked with ingredients that had been recently delivered, he took out a steak, prepared butter, pepper, rosemary, and other seasonings, and then heated up the pan.

The sizzling sound soon caught Engle’s attention; his focus finally shifted to the aroma that wafted over from the kitchen from time to time, he asked in surprise, "You can do this too?"

The scent was comparable to that of the head chef he poached from a high-end restaurant at a steep price.

"The leader likes it, so I definitely have to ponder over it often."

"Are you talking about Lu Xiang?"

"Yes."

"With your current momentum, she will soon no longer be your leader. If nothing goes wrong, the company’s next plan is to transfer you to the core city."

"That won’t do, I’m not going," Song Lan shook his head, "It’s not often you come across such a good leader."

"Are you an idiot?"

Engle, anxious, crawled out of the blanket, his face incredulous, "As long as you follow the company’s directives, fame, power, wealth—you can have whatever you want. Once you go to The First Region, you’ll have all sorts of beauties at your beck and call, and the entire Review Meeting will have your back before the limelight fades!"

Right now, he wished he could install a thought and action control device in Song Lan’s head and operate it with his own rich experience.

"Here, the steak is ready."

Song Lan ignored Engle’s words; he brought the sizzling steak to the table.

As a representative of the PR faction in the department, he hoped to solve problems in as peaceful a manner as possible.

"Okay, I understand."

Starving, Engle immediately sat at the table, gobbling down the steak, "Mmm, not bad, you’re no worse than those head chefs at high-end restaurants, and surprisingly committed too, which is rare in our line of work."

"I’m not in your line of work."

"Whatever you say."

For a while, the only sound in the living room was that of chewing. It was about ten minutes later that Engle leaned back in his chair, having savored the taste of the steak.

His pale complexion had improved, and the way he looked at Song Lan had also subtly changed.

After pondering for a while, he finally let out a sigh and said, "If you have any questions, just ask."