Chapter 428: World Number One! The Golden Robbers! |
With a thud, he shoved the corpse into a body bag, tossed it into the trash bin in the stairwell, snapped the lid shut, and Qiezi clapped his hands.
Then he exchanged a glance with Liu Di across from him; the two nodded and continued their approach to the second floor.
After the earlier recon, Qiezi had a clear grasp of how complicated the second floor was.
When they were outside, two security teams had already thrown them into a panic.
And this garage’s second floor was not only narrower than before, it was blanketed in cameras—one slip and they’d be spotted.
They had to be extra careful.
They climbed the stairs to the second floor. Qiezi crouched, pried open the second-floor back door.
Rattle—
But the moment he peeked his head out—
A shout escaped Qiezi and he jerked back inside in a panic!
Because in that instant his U-interface flashed a red exclamation mark signaling imminent exposure!
Cameras!
The camera facing the second-floor corridor could clearly watch the entire hall from their back door to the front-door stairwell.
Very tricky.
For a moment, the infiltration seemed to hit a stalemate.
“So… the ECM jammer is for what? Oh—so it blocks cameras? Damn, we haven’t unlocked it yet because no experience…”
Looking up at the steadily rotating camera, Liu Di’s brows tightened.
The ECM jammer was a unique item in this game.
Stick the jammer on a wall or the ground and it blocks all signals for a limited time.
That includes alarm calls from panicked crowds, security reinforcements, and camera feeds.
In short, whether for assault or stealth, it was a godsend.
You unlocked it at tier three.
Too bad they’d targeted this pricey garage before they had that gadget.
Now it was awkward.
Faced with the camera, they were in a bind.
“Or—”
After thinking, Liu Di suggested:
“Why don’t we just shoot the camera?”
That was a method.
They’d done it before in the Mercy Hospital mission.
But there’s a catch!
Different heists had different consequences for destroying cameras.
In the Mercy Hospital level, breaking a camera triggered a call from the police station that had to be answered.
In some levels, like the World Number One Bank, cameras could not be destroyed at all or they’d trigger an immediate alarm.
According to intel, the cameras in this garage heist were allowed to be destroyed.
However—
Once a camera was destroyed, after a short period security would notice the surveillance failure and call the police.
That window wasn’t long.
Meaning!
If they chose to destroy the camera now,
they would have to use that brief time to complete the entire sequence: find the manager → get the meeting room access card → learn the key room administrator’s name → find the admin’s computer → hack the computer to open the key room → plant the bomb to create an escape route → grab the sports car keys → drive off.
Time was extremely tight and margin for error very low.
Still!
At this point, destroying the camera seemed like the only viable option.
“Goddamn it…”
Qiezi muttered, then steeled himself and nodded at Liu Di:
“Do it!”
Right after he spoke—
a suppressed gunshot!
Pfft—
Crack!
The camera shattered, and the background music instantly ramped up in tension!
Their movements sped up with it!
Bang!
Qiezi lunged out the back door in a single step, flicked off the safety on his Glock, and strode toward the manager’s office!
Liu Di rolled up his sleeves and took up a two-handed ready stance with his gun, watching for threats!
The chat barrage erupted—
‘They ramped up the intensity!’
‘Hubby’s so handsome! Hubby scold me!’
‘Damn they really just switched to open robbery tactics?’
‘Go for it!’
‘Stop, Qiezi, the outside is full of GK (dog heads)!’
‘Robber energy on point!’
‘Their strategy is basically: if undecided, rush in recklessly’
...
After that unlucky face-to-face with the poor employee earlier,
their luck this time seemed especially good.
Just as they stepped into the corridor, the security that had been patrolling the second floor had looped to the other side and hadn’t noticed the camera being shot or that masked intruders had burst into the garage.
The entire corridor leading to the manager’s office was empty!
Perfect timing!
Qiezi seized the chance, sprinted forward, and in three giant steps was inside the manager’s office!
But the next second, the sight before him froze him—
The manager’s office was empty!
“Huh? Goddamn? Where the hell’s the manager?!”
Qiezi was in a bad mood:
“This is messed up! Isn’t there supposed to be a manager right here?!”
“I literally saw him getting cozy with a female secretary when I scoped it out!”
“Where is the person?!”
Hearing Qiezi’s panicked shout over team voice comms, the other three sank inward with dread.
This was bad!
From earlier it was clear that in Payday, every NPC—security, staff, or passerby—moved around.
So obviously the manager had stepped out!
Unbelievable.
And then—
as Qiezi turned his head—
he saw the balding manager standing at the doorway!
For an instant, their eyes met—
The bald manager looked at the masked Qiezi: ?
Qiezi stared back at the balding manager and showed a tooth-clenching grin:
“Heh, you—goddamn—“
Pfft!
A shot!
He dropped the bald manager immediately!
But just when Qiezi thought everything was settled and he could move forward to take the manager’s access card—
as the manager went down, another figure appeared behind him.
A security guard.
Qiezi fell silent.
Then, like seeing an alien resurrect, Huang Bo—what the—!!!
An earsplitting alarm blasted out across the garage!
With Qiezi and Liu Di screaming in furious frustration through the garage:
“Shit—! I’m so screwed!!!”
“Forget stealth! I can’t stealth a thing today! Goddamn!!!”
Rat-a-tat-tat!!!
!!!
The two simply couldn’t endure the constant anxiety of stealth any longer!
At this point anger overrode fear—if they were going down, they’d go down fighting.
DNM—rob it!
Liu Di’s light machine gun and Qiezi’s shotgun opened up together!
The garage’s two floors instantly erupted into chaos!
Screams, alarms, and security shouts all rang out at once!
Security rapidly assembled and charged toward the intruders’ position!
Qiezi displayed full robber ferocity, his shotgun cracking—one guard after another dropped!
“Screw this! Today I’m fighting you to the death!!!”
Beside him, Liu Di went even more over the top, shouldering the machine gun and holding the trigger down!
A torrent of bullets shredded the garage into wreckage:
“Ha ha ha ha! Kill! Die for me!!!”
As soon as gunfire broke out inside the garage,
Little Dark and Donggua, who were on lookout outside, knew without being told that the two inside had been exposed!
No point in debating it!
Today was the day!
Open fire!!!
Rat-a-tat—
Clack-clack! Clack-clack—!!
Gunshots thundered!
Employees and customers alike screamed and fled for their lives!
Within moments, the garage was a chaotic uproar!
The chat barrage exploded—
“Di’s gone mad haha”
“Check it out, doesn’t feel staged”
“After the manager went down and a guard popped out, they couldn’t hold it”
“Ha ha ha hard to hold your composure”
Old Thief’s smile
“Qiezi totally lost it?”
“General Di went berserk hahahaha”
“From stealth to armed robbery, mastered?”
“Ha ha ha so real”
“All tactics shifted to open robbery”
It’s all fake; put on a little mask, drop the electronic music and this is the true vibe
“Cars don’t matter anymore, it’s gotta be about the beat”
‘LOL.’
With the viewers laughing in the chat,
two minutes later the four of them were back at the garage entrance, having calmed down.
Reopened.
Yes, they ultimately failed.
Although in that last desperate segment they’d enjoyed the firefight with the responding cops,
when they finally tried to find keys and drive away, the dock pickup had already vanished.
From alarm to getaway took only three minutes and forty seconds.
That short time wasn’t enough for them to do so much.
For a while, Qiezi’s crew seemed stuck.
Stealth was genuinely difficult.
Rob it outright—still not enough time.
How were they supposed to get through this?
Just then, as everyone was at a loss, Little Dark let out a small exclamation—
“Hey? Wait a sec? I think I see something familiar.”
At his words the others turned to look at Little Dark:
“What did you see?”
Little Dark said:
“Open payday.net and search for the garage heist.”
They all did as he said.
“And then?”
“Click the Rankings section.”
Following Little Dark’s lead, they opened the rankings.
The leaderboard displayed global completion records for the current heist.
The next second—
“No—what?!”
“Ah—??”
All three shouted in unison.
On that ranking list,
the team ID holding the global number one record was glaringly—
[GW Team]
GW!
Golden Wind!
They clicked into GW Team’s squad info!
Four familiar, absurd IDs stared back—
Sam, LU, XDJ, Tetsu!
Gu Sheng, Lu Bian, Xu Dajiang, Moriya Tetsuya!
The Golden Wind executive squad!
Just that lineup could make someone’s jaw drop!
Even more outrageous was the miracle time record the Golden Wind robber crew had set—
[2min59s77]
Two minutes, fifty-nine seconds and seventy-seven hundredths!
World number one!
At that moment everyone lost composure!
What—this—what—!
“Ah—???”