The copy has 0 error tolerance, and the last words on the ground are all wrong for me.

Chapter 368 Undercover
Clang.

A few coins fell on the fortune-telling stall. Before Jian Xing could react, he heard a voice saying:
"Help me calculate good and bad luck."

Wu Chang, whose sword star suddenly appeared in front of him, showed a moment of surprise on his face. As a man with a sword heart, he didn't even notice when Wu Chang came.

However, he quickly returned to his fortune-teller's charlatan look and asked expressionlessly:

"What does this gentleman want to calculate? Career, wealth, marriage, health, or travel."

Wu Chang sat down opposite Jian Xing and said, "Let's go out. I'm going to the newspaper office in front to look for a friend."

Jianxing took out three coins from the ones thrown by Wu Chang, threw the coins on the table, then took out a compass and pretended to calculate based on the heads and tails of the coins.

Wu Chang watched Jian Xing's performance quietly, thinking that this guy was pretending very well.

When Jianxing and Lengshan were invited to drink before, Jianxing had said that he couldn't tell fortunes at all and could only pretend to do so.

The result of divination depends entirely on the conversations with the client during the calculation process, the ability to distinguish the truth from the false, and then telling the client what he wants to know.

If he hadn't known it in advance, he would have been frightened just by looking at Jian Xing's techniques.

After a brief explanation, Jian Xing said:
"The road ahead is not smooth, like riding a boat across a turbulent river. The water is deep and fast, so don't act rashly."

Wu Chang asked: "Master, is there any way to break the deadlock?"

Jian Xing pretended to operate again and said, "The advantage is in the east. At noon, we can find a big ship to cross the river."

"Thank you." Wu Chang nodded and stood up from the fortune-telling stall.

It was no coincidence that Jian Xing appeared at the door of Mingdeng Newspaper. His purpose was also to come to the newspaper.

Although I don't know where Jianxing collected the information, but from his answer, it can be seen that the Mingdeng Newspaper is very deep and there are hidden secrets. It is best to wait and see and not alert the enemy.

Not only the Mingdeng Newspaper, his inspiration told him that Jianxing itself was also under some kind of surveillance.

However, he was temporarily unable to figure out the other party's surveillance method, so he could only cooperate with Jian Xing and pretend not to know him.

He looked to the east and saw a huge John Shipyard on the bank of the Hills River not far away.

For more information, we can only wait until noon to find Jianxing near John's shipyard to find out what he is up to.

Originally, he wanted to take advantage of the opacity of his true identity and pretend to be the real culprit behind the Pine Tree Coal Mine explosion, telling Connor "We found you" to put some pressure on Connor.

See how Connor will act when threatened and find a way out.

But Jian Xing told him to be careful first, so he could only take a gentler approach.

When he arrived at the Mingdeng newspaper office, he got rid of his social phobia and pushed the door open and walked into the newspaper office.

His appearance immediately attracted attention from all sides.

It’s not that he did anything outrageous, it’s just that he was so big.

At this time in Stilan, ordinary people were generally not tall due to lack of nutrition.

Even in big cities like Grimmland, the average height of adult males is only between 165 and 170 cm.

Wu Changzhen is over two meters tall, and with his muscular body, it is no exaggeration to say that the light inside the newspaper office became much dimmer the moment he walked into the office.

A woman who was about 1.5 meters tall came to Wu Chang cautiously, looked up at him, and asked softly:
"What can I do for you, sir?"

Wu Chang looked at the other person and gave him a kind smile, which scared the other person so much that he took two steps back.

"I want to see Mr. Connor, is he here?"

The woman shook her head frantically and said, "Mr. Connor rarely appears in the newspaper office. You should look for him somewhere else."

As she spoke, the woman grabbed Wu Chang's arm and asked him to leave.

Before Wu Chang could continue speaking, the door of the newspaper office was pushed open and a young man in his early twenties rushed in. He looked at the woman and said excitedly:
"Jennifer, I got some big news. There is a rumor that a miracle happened in the Grey Church. Mr. Connor is still in the office. I believe he will be interested after hearing it."

"Eh? Who built the wall in the hall? Oh, sorry, sir, you are so tall, I didn't see you just now."

Jennifer covered her face helplessly. After a moment, she put her hands down, put a fake smile on her face, and said to Wu Chang:

"I'm sorry, Mr. Connor is not feeling well and doesn't want to see anyone for the time being."

The young man asked in confusion: "Wasn't Mr. Connor quite energetic this morning? Who made him angry again?"

Jennifer rolled her eyes and said, "Shut up, Dean, you're an idiot."

Wu Chang looked at Jennifer with a smile and said:

"Miss, don't be too nervous. I'm here to discuss cooperation with Mr. Connor. I have no ill intentions."

He took a wrench from the tool rack and easily folded it twice to form a metal lump.

"If I had any ill intentions, I wouldn't be here the way I am now."

Just as Jennifer was hesitating, the office door at the back of the newspaper opened, and a man stood at the door and said to Wu Chang:
"Jennifer, bring that gentleman over here."

Jennifer said in a worried tone, "Okay, Mr. Connor."

Wu Chang followed Jennifer into Connor's office.

The office was cluttered with documents piled up everywhere. Connor had to move several stacks of documents on the sofa before he could make room for a seat.

As Wu Chang sat down, the sofa below made a sharp sound like a wailing, which scared Wu Chang so much that he dared not sit down and stood up again.

Connor felt a little embarrassed when he saw this, and he shouted to the outside:
"Dean, bring in a stool that's sturdy enough!"

Two minutes later, Wu Chang sat on the metal stool and looked at Connor in front of him.

In Grimland, Connor is considered tall and strong. Coming from a middle-class family, he got enough nutrition during his growth period and his height is over 185cm.

He has thick hair, a dense beard, slightly deep eye sockets, and a bright gaze, which shows an exuberant vitality. No matter what he says, he can easily mobilize the thinking of others.

Some people are born with charisma and personal charm that can attract people around them. Obviously, Connor is such a person.

"Mr. Connor, my name is Peace. It's an honor to meet you. I have heard about your deeds, the founding of the Bright Light newspaper, and the Charter Movement."

"More than one person I know has told me that you are a person of high character, full of ideals and enthusiasm."

Don't hit a smiling person. Faced with Wu Chang's series of flattery, even Connor's vigilance eased a little.

He said, "I just heard vaguely that you came to me to discuss cooperation?"

Wu Chang said: "Yes, cooperation."

Connor stared at Wu Chang and said, "How can we cooperate? Let me make it clear in advance that although we have demands, we will express them in a peaceful and reasonable manner. We will never use violence or extreme means to achieve a certain goal."

"At least in my case, I will never allow this. If your cooperation is to use the workers' movement to stir up trouble, then you have found the wrong person."

Wu Chang shook his head and said, "Of course not. My name is Heping, so I come for peace."

Connor grinned. If your name is Peace, then you come for peace. He also knows the worst villain, whose name is Goodman.

Wu Chang ignored Connor's gaze and said:

"The direction I want to cooperate in is to change the current status quo in Grimland and bring peace to the city."

Connor leaned forward, glanced through the crack in the door, and asked, "What do you mean?"

Wu Chang snapped his fingers, and mystical runes composed of energy flew out from his fingertips, covering the office and forming a soundproof barrier to prevent anyone from eavesdropping from outside.

"You should be more familiar with the current situation in Grimland, especially the survival of the workers, than I am."

“Getting universal suffrage will indeed improve the workers’ situation, but before that, they face even more serious problems.”

"The illegal operation of factories caused toxins to accumulate in the bodies of many workers, who were constantly threatened by occupational diseases that could cause death. The Corn Laws kept food prices high, causing slum residents to prefer to go to the workhouse for a meal. The poor living conditions of the lower classes caused malaria to run rampant."

"If you want to hear about this, I can talk about it for ten minutes without interruption." Connor stretched out his hand to interrupt Wu Chang and said, "That's enough. I know these problems, so what are you going to do?"

Wu Chang stretched out his hand and slowly clenched his fist, which was as big as a clay pot, squeezing the joints to make a crackling sound.

"These chaos are the chronic diseases of Grimland. Mild treatment is no longer enough to deal with the current situation. If we want to make a change, we must strike hard!"

"I am a straightforward person who does not hide anything. I am attracted by your information network, the reach of the Light Newspaper, and your character, Mr. Connor."

"So I want to join hands with you to dig out the masterminds behind these things. If they are easy to deal with, I will deal with them directly. If they have backgrounds, you will expose them and use public opinion as a weapon to bring them to ruin and make them pay the price."

Wu Chang paused, took out the newspaper he bought on the way from his arms, stood up and put it on Connor's desk.

"To show my sincerity and demonstrate our strength, I will try to find a way to release the workers who were arrested by the police during the march about the Songshu coal mine explosion as soon as possible."

Connor fell into a brief silence after hearing this. To be honest, he was moved.

One of the key contents of the Beacon is to let the workers understand their current situation and tell them that only by uniting and combining their strength can they force Stian to change.

By exposing these problems, there is no doubt that workers will realize the urgency of the situation and give up their illusions about factory owners.

More importantly, what Wu Chang said was what they were planning to do, and they would do it even if Wu Chang didn't come.

Connor thought for a while, and finally said:
"From my personal perspective, I am willing to cooperate with you, but whether it is the Charter Movement or the Bright Light, I am just one of the leaders."

"I need to communicate with a few other people. If they agree, we can discuss it in further detail."

Wu Chang nodded and said, "Okay."

Connor lowered his voice and whispered, "Mr. Heping, come to me again at this time tomorrow and I will give you an answer."

"But when the time comes, we have to go to another place to talk. There are so many people in the newspaper office and it's inevitable that we'll be eavesdropped."

Wu Chang said, "Mr. Connor, you don't have to worry about that. Before we talked just now, I had already used a mystical ritual to isolate the space inside the house, so no one outside can hear it."

Connor was surprised and said, "Mystical rituals, do such things really exist? Mr. Peace, who are you?"

Wu Chang shrugged and said, "I'm just an apprentice arcane knight from a foreign country. I'm leaving now. I hope to hear good news from you tomorrow."

He waved his hand to remove the mystical runes placed around the room, then pushed the door open and left the office.

Walking out of the Mingdeng Newspaper Office, Wu Chang narrowed his eyes. He guessed correctly, there was definitely something wrong with Connor.

Judging from Connor's identity, he should not have been exposed to the occult due to his growing up environment. At the same time, judging from the attitude he showed later, he also wanted to pretend that he didn't know the existence of the occult.

But his acting skills are not as good as Raventon's, and there are many flaws in the details.

When he proposed to change the status quo in Grimland and restore peace to the city, Connor subconsciously glanced at the crack in the door, which showed that he was worried about being eavesdropped.

When he was setting up the soundproofing ritual, Connor's eyes did seem not to see the mystical runes, but the problem was that no matter how exaggerated he talked afterwards, no matter how nervous Connor acted, or how much he struggled, he did not subconsciously look at the crack in the door again.

This revealed that he was not unaware of the existence of the soundproofing ritual.

Clearly possessing extraordinary powers, he pretends to be an ordinary person. In addition, his inexplicable connection with the mine thieves gang makes Wu Chang have a strong premonition that the recipient on the other end of the magic communication sent by the mine thieves leader Mick is Connor.

As to why Connor allowed Mick to work for him and why he sent the extraordinary people disguised as mine thieves to enter the Pine Tree Coal Mine, further investigation is needed.

It turns out that none of the big shots who can call the shots in Grimland are easy to deal with.

Realizing that the time was almost up, Wu Chang walked towards John Shipyard. He looked around and easily found Jian Xing dressed as a charlatan in the restaurant where the workers had their meals.

Jianxing ordered lunch for five people in the restaurant, walked around the shipyard twice with the food, and then turned around and entered a house in the workers' area.

Wu Chang followed Jian Xing into the room. When he entered the room, he saw five people crowded in the small room, and they seemed to be waiting for him.

In addition to Jian Xing and Leng Shan who had already met, two of the remaining three people in the Management Bureau were acquaintances.

They were the Negotiation Master and a man named Bai Ma. When they were chasing Lin Jiang, they both entered the Doomed copy. At that time, the Negotiation Master was a senior cadre of Bai Lao K, and Bai Ma was her deputy.

The last woman among the five was a stranger and looked ordinary, but the fact that she was ranked among the Steam Phantoms meant that she must be a top player in the Administration.

The moment Wu Chang entered the room, his social phobia was relieved and he said:

"Your place is too small. I gave you funds for activities. Why don't you rent a bigger house?"

Leng Shan said, "The first bird to stick its head out gets shot. If we behave too abnormally, we will be easily targeted by other players. So we are not moving out of here for the time being. We will leave after the invitation letter incident."

Wu Chang nodded and asked, "Are you the only five people from the Administration who entered the Steam Phantom dungeon?"

Leng Shan said: "Maybe there are others, but right now there are only five of us."

Wu Chang was slightly disappointed. It seemed that Yu Siyi had only been in the Abyss Game for too short a time and her strength was too weak to be ranked into the S-level copy.

If she could come in, taking her to do a hidden side quest would be like repaying the favor she had done when she was in bad luck.

He looked at Jian Xing and asked curiously:
"Why are you around the Bright Light Newspaper Office? You look so sneaky, as if someone is watching you."

Jian Xing said excitedly:
"It's a coincidence that when we parted ways after our meeting that day, didn't you ask us to keep an eye out for the chaos in Grimland..."

As Jian Xing spoke, he told the story of how he and Leng Shan used the invitation letters as bait to collect information on players entering the dungeon, and how they encountered the mysterious man in black.

After listening to Jian Xing's description, Wu Chang showed a look of surprise on his face. He felt that he had been searching for something for a long time but it was finally found without any effort.

He and Ravington were still worrying about how to find the Steam Council, but they didn't expect that on Sword Star, the Steam Council had already come to them.

"You mean, you and Leng Shan were noticed by the Steam Council?!"

Jian Xing nodded and said, "As soon as we saw that guy was sneaky, we felt that he was not a good person. We just said a few words and he took the bait."

"What organization is that guy in the Steam Council? Is he the guy that Sir Sean behind you wants to deal with?"

Wu Chang nodded and said, "Yes, if you can really catch the Steam Council, I can assure you on behalf of Sir Sean that you will definitely be rewarded with great merit!"

He looked at Jianxing and asked, "You appeared at the Light Newspaper Office before, because of the mission assigned to you by the Steam Council?"

Jian Xing said: "Yes, he told me and Leng Shan that day to come to the Ming Deng Newspaper Office to investigate the three core figures of Ming Deng Newspaper, Connor, Nestor and Henry."

"Record all their visitors and actions in the past three days, paying special attention to whether they have come into contact with extraordinary people."

"We did a brief investigation on these three people and found that Connor, the founder of the newspaper, Nestor, the newspaper manager, and Henry, the editor-in-chief, were also the flagship figures of the Charter Movement."

"The Steam Council wants to investigate the three of them. There must be some big conspiracy behind this. We plan to find out what happened as much as possible as a token of our joining the Mystic Knights."

Wu Chang narrowed his eyes slightly. The three people that Jian Xing and his team were investigating were also the leaders of the Charter Movement.

Just as he guessed, the Steam Parliament suspected the Charter Movement based on the identity of the mine thief. In order to completely silence them, they investigated who was on the other end of Mick's communication magic.

The current situation is definitely a great opportunity, if used well, to find out Connor's purpose and lure out the Steam Parliament.

As for how to maximize the results...

As Wu Chang was thinking, his gaze turned to Jian Xing and Leng Shan.

"I heard that your administration is an official agency and often assists ordinary departments in managing public order, right?"

Jian Xing didn't know why Wu Chang asked this, but he nodded anyway.

Wu Chang continued: "In a sense, you are also a kind of police, but you are extraordinary police."

Leng Shan seemed to guess what Wu Chang wanted to do. He said helplessly, "Just say what you want to say."

Wu Chang rubbed his hands and said somewhat embarrassedly:

"Since you two are extraordinary police officers, are you interested in joining the Steam Council and becoming an extraordinary undercover agent?"

"I can assure you on behalf of Sir Sean that being an undercover agent in the Mystic Knights will not be repeated for three years. As long as you sense danger, you can stop being an undercover agent at any time and rejoin the Mystic Knights."

"In the Mystic Knights, there are always two positions reserved for you. Would you like to consider it?"

(End of this chapter)