Ethan Hunt

With Zhou Yi's physical abilities and intelligence, in this world of espionage, accomplishing things like obtaining evidence against a drug lord or gang was simply far too easy.

As for why Zhou Yi did those things that seemed so strange and arbitrary to his superior, Chris...

That time he took a drug lord's money and went out to have fun was entirely because Zhou Yi had discovered that gray income came with major restrictions as well. He had been a little annoyed, so he went to blow off some steam.

Naturally, Zhou Yi had never intended to let the drug lord go. While hinting that the drug lord could pay a "life-saving fee," he turned around and arrested him immediately afterward. He switched sides so quickly that even the drug lord had not reacted in time, and had even wondered whether he had paid with counterfeit money.

However, that money had not been counted toward his experience points.

It was infuriating!

So Zhou Yi took it to Dubai for some retaliatory spending.

Zhou Yi later ran several experiments and discovered that although it was gray income, it still seemed to require adhering to a certain degree of principle. He had to do what he promised the other party when taking the money for it to count toward his experience points!

Zhou Yi had a whole pile of complaints about that.

It was already gray income, so why did it still have to be so honorable?

Why should he show any honor to drug lords? Wouldn't it be better to just grab a weapon and charge in together?

When dealing with things that were not even human, wasn't it only natural to take their money and turn on them immediately?

But the system was clearly a heartless idiot, so it was not swayed by Zhou Yi's arguments in the slightest.

Zhou Yi continued experimenting.

During another operation, Zhou Yi deliberately brought along a team member. To avoid exposing his true strength, he intentionally behaved as though he had the physical abilities of an ordinary human. The result was...

After Zhou Yi had "traded" with the drug lord, the team member did absolutely nothing. He merely watched the drug lord run away. In the end, Zhou Yi had no choice but to step in and capture the drug lord himself!

When Zhou Yi asked him about it afterward, the team member spoke with complete confidence. "You're the famous Zhou! I trust you when you do things. You must have had your reasons. All I need to do is follow your ideas and actions!"

Zhou Yi was speechless.

Then he gave up on that method.

After thinking it over carefully, he realized that, first of all, he could not tell a team member that he intended to let the drug lord escape and then have them capture him. Otherwise, it would still be invalidated, because that involved deliberate guidance from him.

Second, the vast majority of team members would be like the previous one and assume that his actions had some "deeper meaning," so they would not try to arrest anyone.

Third... even if a team member wanted to make the arrest, accomplishing it alone without Zhou Yi's help was nearly impossible. But if Zhou Yi got involved, it would constitute a "breach of contract," rendering the gray income invalid.

So Zhou Yi simply gave up on using team members and returned to solo mode.

Since he could not take shortcuts like that, Zhou Yi decided to proceed according to his original plan.

First, he would get involved in major events such as the Nuclear Crisis or the List Leak Incident.

Then he would make deals with the protagonists or villains and rake in massive gray income from them!

Anyway, given the protagonists' abilities, they would always be able to retrieve the items in the end according to the original plot. If he joined in and cooperated as an inside man, wouldn't that make things even easier?

With that in mind, Zhou Yi checked his interface.

The Auto Mechanic interface had only gained ten experience points. Zhou Yi had earned them while posing as an auto mechanic several times for missions. There had not been many opportunities afterward, so it had not changed much.

As for the IRS Employee interface—

IRS Employee · Intermediate (200/1000)

Title bonuses:

1. Physique · 110 (You need powerful physical strength to subdue tax evaders)

2. Intelligence · 110 (You need sufficient wisdom to understand every method of finding tax evasion)

3. Intermediate Tax Law Mastery (To do a good job, one must first sharpen one's tools)

4. Intermediate Agent Skill Mastery (Sometimes, when facing certain special tax evaders, you need this to find sufficient evidence!)

5. Intermediate Weapon Technique Mastery (As an IRS Employee, this is a skill you must master!)

As for Zhou Yi's own interface, aside from both Physique and Intelligence increasing by one hundred points, there had not been any major changes.

Having successfully obtained a vacation, Zhou Yi planned to begin his scheme.

Over the past year, he had successfully expanded his network of connections.

As long as someone was willing to spend money, he would definitely have plenty of "friends."

As for how reliable those "friends" were... as long as the money kept coming, they were very reliable!

Through spending money and a certain degree of physical intimidation, Zhou Yi had made several such "friends." He mainly intended to obtain useful information from them.

For example, right now—

"Found you..." Zhou Yi looked at an email he had received on his computer and smiled. "Ethan Hunt!"

Capital of the Czech Republic—Prague.

Dressed in a suit, Zhou Yi entered the Consulate with impeccable poise and stride.

Of course, Zhou Yi was not using his original face. On the way there, he had attacked a member attending this banquet, then used specialized equipment to make a mask. He also attached a voice-changing device to himself, creating an almost perfect disguise.

As for where the machines used to make masks and voice-changing devices had come from... what was the CIA worth? Audit their accounts once, and wouldn't he have everything he needed?

Of course, the IRS and CIA were not at the point of being utterly irreconcilable. Small devices like these could be acquired through a certain degree of mutual benefit, such as, "You don't audit our accounts, and we'll give you some small machines."

(IRS: "This is absolutely not a threat. It is merely a normal gift from the CIA!")

Besides, the IRS's agent division was not some idle department that coasted through life. In certain respects, they were even more powerful than the CIA!

Some of the equipment on Zhou Yi's person was unavailable even to the CIA, while other pieces were more advanced than the CIA's!

"Senator, what did you think of the opera?" the Deputy Consul General asked.

"Hmm... very boring." After thinking for a moment, a white-haired but vigorous-looking old man replied.

At that moment, Zhou Yi was taking a glass of wine from a waiter's tray. With his hearing deliberately opened up, he overheard the conversation in the distance.

Normally, Zhou Yi would naturally lower his hearing slightly, because hearing that well meant picking up too many useless and chaotic sounds. Although the brainpower enhanced by Zhou Yi's Intelligence allowed him to process all that information instantly, he was too lazy to receive and process it.

Something that could be recycled was not trash. True trash was something that could not even be repurposed, something with absolutely no value—and those useless sounds belonged in that category.