I Want to Kill Them Body and Soul

"Stage?"

"Yes. This was an ETO Wallbreaker Operation targeting you. They called it the 'Stage Operation.'"

Listening to the report from the CIA on the other end of the phone, Lin Feng raised an eyebrow.

"Forget this stage nonsense for now. Did you catch the person who called me that day?"

"I'm sorry, but no."

"Huh?"

Lin Feng immediately became displeased. He had thought that with the CIA on the job, even if they could not wipe out the ETO, catching one person should have been easy.

He had figured that the CIA was, after all, an intelligence agency directly under the president. No matter how bad they were, they could not possibly be that bad.

To catch the ETO member who had called him as quickly as possible, Lin Feng had even used his authority as a Wallfacer to lobby governments around the world, hoping they would give CIA agents the green light to investigate.

Now that he had put his reputation on the line, this was the answer they gave him?

Could Lin Feng accept that?

No!

The CIA was full of fucking useless idiots!

Damn it!

"Are you really the CIA? Not some other third-rate agency?"

"What about your satellite tracking? Your GPS? Couldn't you trace them through the communications base stations? Are you people even competent? Did too many ETO moles infiltrate your agency, so you can't find them? Your CIA is rotten to the core!"

Lin Feng unleashed a barrage of accusations, making the CIA director on the other end repeatedly wipe away sweat.

It did not matter what Lin Feng had done in the past. He was now a Wallfacer, and a Wallfacer's authority was absurdly vast. In a sense, he was already equivalent to one of the CIA's top superiors.

A Wallfacer's authority might not necessarily exceed that of the president, Congress, or the Supreme Court, but it certainly exceeded that of the CIA. The CIA might not disappear, but restructuring or abolishing it and collectively putting all of them out of work would take only a word.

The United States had sixteen intelligence agencies, with plenty of intelligence personnel! Losing them would not hurt much at all!

"Please don't get worked up. It was difficult. We truly couldn't find him."

Knowing that things would become very serious if he did not explain matters clearly to Lin Feng, the CIA director hurriedly explained.

"By locking onto the phone's actual IP location, we could find the other party even if we could not identify the buyer of the phone. But after locking onto the IP location, we discovered that the person speaking with you was in Antarctica at the time."

"Huh?"

Lin Feng froze for a moment. Did the ETO member specifically go all the way to Antarctica just to make that call?

Worried that Lin Feng had not understood, the CIA director reorganized his words and explained the situation as plainly as possible.

"In other words, the other party called you from Antarctica. He had anticipated that we would use the IP address to locate him, so he deliberately chose the uninhabited Antarctic. That way, we had no way to gather clues about him from nearby residents or things like surveillance cameras."

Lin Feng considered it, then felt something was off and pressed further.

"Can there even be cell phone service in Antarctica?"

Mobile phones needed a signal to make calls, which required communications base stations on the ground. That employee's number was not a satellite phone number. Forget calling from Antarctica—it could not even make international calls!

"Some time ago, AT&T launched a new communications service. Domestic numbers could activate satellite service to make international long-distance calls. It costs several times more than a dedicated satellite phone, but it saves the trouble of changing phones. Even Antarctica has cell phone service," the CIA director explained.

This was a new communications service AT&T had launched a few weeks before Lin Feng became a Wallfacer. He had been busy with Wallfacer matters, and since AT&T's service mainly targeted the wealthy, it had not generated much discussion among ordinary people. That was why Lin Feng had only learned of it now.

"What about the email? You couldn't trace that either?"

If the phone lead was a dead end, why was the email lead also a dead end?

The CIA director explained, "The ETO was very cunning. The email you received was sent through someone else's social media account after the other party stole that person's computer."

Because the computer had been stolen from someone else, there was no way to start with the transaction and trace leads from there. The laptop contained the owner's personal information, and the ETO member had used the owner's social media account to send Lin Feng the email.

"But he still had to connect to the internet, right? Why couldn't you trace him through the network?" Lin Feng asked unwillingly.

No matter whose computer he used, he ultimately had to connect to the internet to use it.

There were only two ways to get online: using wired broadband to connect the computer, or using a wireless signal—that was, Wi-Fi.

Yet either way, there should have been a trail to follow.

Even if he had used public Wi-Fi, he would at least have been in a public place, where there were bound to be witnesses.

"The other party used the private Wi-Fi of a household in rural Canada to send the email. He also appeared to have used equipment that boosted Wi-Fi signal reception. The IP location was three kilometers away from the Wi-Fi source. There, we found a laptop that had been physically destroyed. We don't know how he obtained the homeowner's Wi-Fi password, but he used that stolen laptop to send you the email."

"We tried everything you considered, and we tried everything you did not consider. I'm sorry, but we have already done everything in our power."

The CIA director answered with a touch of helplessness. They had been full of confidence at first; who could have imagined things would turn out like this?

"Fine. I now have a deep understanding of the CIA's capabilities."

Wanting to salvage at least some of the CIA's lost dignity before the Wallfacer, the CIA director proposed a plan to capture ETO members to Lin Feng.

"According to the email, ETO members will appear in Washington Square one month from now. We can seal off the area and arrest every ETO member there."

This time, the ETO had been fully prepared in advance and had caught them off guard, which was why the CIA had suffered a setback.

But that did not mean the CIA lacked the ability to arrest the ETO members who would appear in Washington Square a month later.

"No. That day, your CIA only needs to handle security and ensure that no dangerous individuals, such as snipers, threaten my personal safety."

Lin Feng rejected the CIA director's proposal.

"You mean..." The CIA director was clearly taken aback.

"I'll go as invited."

They had already issued a challenge, blatantly pushing their luck. If he did not go, would that not be an indirect admission that he was a coward, afraid of those anti-humanity bastards?

The other Wallfacers might worry about being seen through by their Wallbreakers, but Lin Feng did not even have a Wallfacer Plan. Why should he fear those anti-humanity bastards?

So Lin Feng had already made up his mind. Not only would he go, he would kill them body and soul, delivering a devastating spiritual blow to the rampant ETO.

He wanted to see what the ETO's Wallbreaker was truly capable of, and how he planned to break a "wall" that did not exist in the first place.

The CIA director on the other end of the phone hesitated as if he wanted to say something, smacked his lips for a long while, and only then replied.

"Understood. We will provide you with the highest level of security."

CIA Meeting

"Is that what he said?"

After hearing his subordinate report Lin Feng's request, the CIA director asked with a headache.

"Yes."

"Why didn't you try to persuade Feng Taylor again? What the ETO plans to reveal is his real Wallfacer Plan." The CIA director reproached him in dissatisfaction.

The previous Wallfacer's failure had already dealt a severe blow to the United States' reputation. If something went wrong with this one too, and the ETO broke him as well, the United States would become an international laughingstock!

After all, in Hollywood movies, the United States was supposed to be the expert at dealing with aliens!

"I don't want to be labeled an ETO member. If you want to persuade him, do it yourself."

The CIA director answered irritably. Forget the bureau director questioning him—even if the president questioned him, his answer would be the same.

He had indeed wanted to persuade Lin Feng at first. But when he thought of the Major General and reporter who had successively been labeled ETO members and sentenced to life imprisonment, the CIA director no longer dared entertain that thought.

If he went to persuade Lin Feng, then he would be the one the Wallfacer labeled an ETO member. Why should it be him instead of these superiors who talked so boldly from the sidelines?

If they were so capable, why didn't they go persuade him themselves?

The CIA chief of staff rubbed his brow with a headache and sighed.

"This is the Wallfacer's decision. We have no right to oppose it. Let's hurry and make the arrangements."