New York, No. 26 Federal Square, Manhattan District, Jacob Federal Office Building, 9:00 AM.
Floors 23-26 are the exclusive headquarters of the FBI New York Division.
Inside a small meeting room.
"Who would've thought I'd actually become the legendary FBI?"
Situated in the back row, Luo An sat in the chair, looked at the formal suit on himself then at the gold badge hanging on his chest, his face expressionless.
He remembered that he was only visiting Japan to explore the customs and local uniqueness. How could he close and open his eyes on the plane and suddenly find himself here?
Slam—
The meeting room door was pushed open, a middle-aged white man with a Mediterranean haircut, dressed in a suit, walked in with a folder, scanned the room, saw no one was absent, and went straight to the point without any fluff:
"Pay attention, this case involves a shooting murder in a park."
The Mediterranean man opened the folder and threw a pile of photos onto the conference table as he introduced:
"The victim is named Mike Robert, 43 years old, shot dead at 11:34 PM on April 11, 2005, in a path inside Central Park..."
Upon hearing the case summary, the intern agents on both sides of the conference table started to pick up the photos on the table, but Luo An remained motionless, sorting through the muddled memories in his mind.
In his past life, he was raised by an old assassin clinging to life and naturally learned a set of considerable skills. His professional ability was excellent, his technical level high, and he had never botched a job... though he also never really took orders from anyone else.
The old assassin raised Luo An with the purpose of having him avenge a blood feud. However, when the old assassin passed away and Luo An was finally ready to find their enemy, he learned that the enemy had already been caught by the local law enforcement and sentenced to death by the court.
With the enemy having no relatives and alone, Luo An didn't dare confront the prison head-on. After a few seconds of thought, he turned his head, boarded the plane to Japan, planning to first experience the local culture, then open a bubble tea shop to live out the rest of his life.
Being an assassin was out of the question, impossible in this lifetime — high-risk aside, money came slowly. Running a bubble tea shop in Japan would be much more profitable!
"Chief, there's something I don't understand."
While the Mediterranean was giving a brief of the case, a white young man with brown short hair and thin lips named Fisher, tilted his head and asked:
"Why is this case handed to us?"
A regular murder case wouldn't need to mobilize the FBI; the New York Police Department could handle it themselves.
Before the Mediterranean could respond, a white woman with red short hair, wearing a standard suit, her figure exceptionally streamlined and perfectly aerodynamic, named Mona, looked disdainfully at Fisher and said:
"The victim was a black special correspondent who returned from a war zone, and beside the body, 'pest' was written in blood. It's clear that this is a special hate crime targeting the victim's identity."
Special hate crimes are under the jurisdiction of the FBI.
After listening to Mona's words, the Mediterranean nodded subtly without making any noise, casting a glance out the corner of his eye towards Luo An at the end of the conference table, motionless. His brow furrowed slightly but he didn't address him, clapping his hands to draw everyone's attention as he said:
"This special hate crime case will be the next phase of your evaluation. You twenty new intern agents have three days to solve the case and catch the killer on your own. Senior agents will score your performance accordingly, those with high scores will become official agents first, those with lower scores will continue to strive."
After finishing, the Mediterranean didn't bother tidying the folder and left the meeting room.
The moment the meeting room door closed, there was a loud commotion. The numerous new intern agents quickly leaned forward to grab and inspect the photos and clues.
"Is the 'pest' written by the victim's body aimed at his identity as a black man or as a journalist?"
"It could also be both."
"Perhaps it's more about his identity as a journalist, the victim did come back from a war zone, and that place is full of religious fanatics. It isn't surprising that they would do something like this."
"It's not necessarily that, the victim also reported on a lot of political corruption issues."
"There seem to be enemies everywhere..."
Mona ignored everyone, and as Fisher left the meeting room, Luo An suddenly heard a buzzing sound by his ear. Before he could react, a pale blue page fiercely appeared before his eyes.
[System Loading...]
[System Loading Successful!]
[Today's Treasure Chest is ready, would you like to open it?]
[Newbie Gift Pack is ready, would you like to open it?]
"...."
Luo An's pupils contracted, and only after noticing that the others hadn't detected the anomaly did he breathe a sigh of relief.
"All those years of reading novels weren't in vain, those authors didn't deceive me; traversers indeed have system buffs!"
Luo An took a deep breath and silently chanted in his mind: [Open]
A crude page from a browser-based treasure chest opening animation; the system displayed [Today's Treasure Chest] rewarding a 20 US Dollar bill and a 50 US Dollar bill. [Newbie Gift Pack] included a bottle of hemostatic potion, and a bottle of water breathing potion.
"..."
Seeing the system page quiet after this, Luo An blinked, somewhat confused for a moment.
This system is so rudimentary!
All the intern agents were eager to analyze the clues. Intern Agent Fisher, upon seeing the wound on the victim's chest, suddenly raised his eyebrows and shouted loud:
"Luo An, hurry over to my desk and bring me the third folder from the top right corner."
"..."
No response came as Fisher expected, leaving him puzzled. Turning back, he found Luo An sitting at the corner of the conference table, deep in thought, completely oblivious to his words.
Fisher's face darkened. He picked up his pen and threw it at Luo An.
Snap!
Hearing the sound of the wind through the air, Luo An, who was organizing his memories, subconsciously reached out and caught it.
Holding the pen, Luo An, who had turned off the system page, looked towards Fisher, and instantly, a piece of memory surfaced in his mind.
Some time ago, during a mission with Fisher and another intern agent named Maki, the two made mistakes that allowed the criminal to escape. When reporting to their superior, his predecessor was deducted 100 points, while Fisher and Maki only received a scolding, not losing a single point!
After finding out, his predecessor, infuriated, turned pale, but, with no background and wishing to become full-fledged as soon as possible, he chose to tolerate it for the time being... This led to Fisher becoming increasingly commanding towards his predecessor.
Luo An's eyebrows furrowed. He didn't have the same forbearing nature as his predecessor, and was about to take action when Mona, who had noticed the situation, forcefully threw her pen at Fisher and loudly asked:
"What are you doing? Can't you get your own stuff?"
Mona, with her computer expertise, stunning looks, and great figure, was one of the few among the new intern agents. Fisher, hit by the pen, didn't say much and merely snorted, picking up his notebook to start recording the clues from the photos.
"Don't bother with him; he's just a pampered jerk."
Seeing Luo An's displeased expression, the curvaceous Mona walked over with a few photos and sat down beside him, comforting him:
"The brief from the superior says, catching the killer in this case awards 80 points, which can make up for most of the points you lost before. And there's also a 50,000 US Dollar reward from the New York Journalists Association for this case..."
"50,000 US Dollars?"
The average American worker's salary in 2005 was only around 2,500 US Dollars.
Luo An didn't care about the aforementioned 80 points, but his eyes lit up at the mention of the 50,000 US Dollars, recalling what an old assassin told him in his previous life:
I don't have the patience for those bullshit love stories, when I was young I just wanted to make money! What's the use of merely envying others? We need to take action ourselves! We have to become richer than them!