The End

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Doyle stood by the window, his heavy breaths fogging the glass. London, shrouded in rain, was like a watercolor painting submerged in water, its outlines blurred.

This was a duel to the death. Either he would be disgraced and retire like a beaten old dog, or he would let those people know that even a lion with its teeth pulled still had venom on its claws.

His withered fingers traced the window frame.

The distorted neon lights in the rain reminded him of someone: the ghost who moved through the underworld, the assassin codenamed "Beta." It was this person who had first dealt with the female reporter and then taken his son's life.

A flicker of light flashed in Doyle's cloudy eyes.

He would contact this assassin and tell him an interesting fact: his employer had only paid a deposit but had schemed for him to complete two objectives beyond the scope of the agreement. This was against the rules. More importantly, he wanted Beta to know that Doyle was now willing to pay him to find those who had toyed with him and seek justice with bullets.

Rainwater snaked down the glass.

Doyle turned towards the safe, clutching his last trump card: the true identities of those people.

Beta slung his backpack over his shoulder and stepped out of the car, turning to John in the driver's seat. "Are you sure about this arrangement? I suggest I go in and you provide cover, or we go in together."

John shook his head. "I'll handle Iosef. I have to do it myself."

Beta nodded. "Your injury?"

"I won't die," John replied curtly.

Beta grinned. "That's not what I'm worried about. I'm wondering if digging up Helen's ashes and putting you in there would be disrespectful to the deceased?"

John stared at Beta for a long moment before slowly uttering a single word: "Yeah."

Of course, Beta was just joking.

Beta, carrying his heavy backpack, silently climbed the rusted metal fire escape of the abandoned chemical plant. The dilapidated building towered nearly three stories above the mineral screening plant opposite, making it an excellent sniper's nest. His shoe soles landed on the rusty metal stairs without making a sound.

Reaching the top floor, Beta set down his backpack, unzipped it, and took out a desert yellow M110 semi-automatic sniper rifle.

He began his preparations. He screwed the folding bipod into the Picatinny rail beneath the barrel; finally, he attached the silencer to the muzzle, the metal threads making a faint "click" as they engaged.

The backpack was fully opened and laid beneath him. Beta lay on the backpack, gently resting the barrel of the rifle in a gap in the factory's parapet. This angle offered a clear view of the entire screening plant while ensuring the muzzle's silhouette wouldn't be exposed against the building's edge.

He adjusted his breathing rhythm, his right eye looking through the scope. The crosshairs slowly swept across every possible sniper position in the opposite building. His left eye remained open, observing the activity in the building opposite.

In Beta's scope, John's figure appeared.

The man in the distinctive black bulletproof suit was stealthily moving along the outer wall of the screening plant. Beta's crosshairs caught a guard patrolling the wall directly above John, who was just passing by.

Beta's finger gently squeezed the trigger. With a muffled "poof," a faint wisp of smoke emerged from the silencer. The guard on the wall shuddered violently and then pitched forward.

Below, the moment the body fell, John spread his arms and caught the unexpected "gift" steadily. He placed the limp body at his feet, then leaped onto the wall, disappearing from the scope's view.

Beta's scope moved slowly, the crosshairs sweeping across every corner of the screening plant.

The piles of ore left before the screening plant's abandonment and the towering rusty conveyor belts cast intricate shadows in the sunlight. The glass of a few remaining control rooms reflected cold light.

The scope moved along these structures and finally, in an open factory building, spotted three black Saab sedans parked neatly together. On a wooden pallet nearby, a gunman sat lazily, looking down at his phone, likely chatting with someone.

Beta's gaze moved up along the factory's structure.

On the second floor, a window with intact glass was particularly conspicuous. Through the scope, Beta clearly saw the blond target: Iosef was pacing back and forth in the room, his back to the window, occasionally shouting into his phone.

Beta's index finger gently caressed the trigger.

In the center of the crosshairs, Iosef's back of the head was clearly visible. At this moment, pulling the trigger would end everything. But John's insistence still echoed in his ears, and Beta eventually moved the scope away.

The lens moved down, and John's figure reappeared in view.

He was climbing the rusty conveyor belt, the steel frame groaning softly beneath him. Beta noticed a gunman in the shadow of the roof to John's side, moving towards the edge of the roof.

Beta's breathing gradually slowed, his heartbeat clearly audible in his eardrums. The pre-aimed red box steadily covered the target, and as the gun barrel fine-tuned, the red box gradually shrunk into a precise dot.

The muffled sound of the bullet penetrating the skull was exceptionally clear.

The figure on the distant rooftop suddenly leaned back and fell. John glanced sideways but didn't pause, continuing to climb the conveyor belt, leaving behind handprints stained with rust.

Beta's scope slowly moved up along the rusty red incline of the conveyor belt.

In the control room at the top of the conveyor belt, a gunman was lazily lying on the windowsill, his binoculars dangling casually on his chest. Suddenly, the gunman stiffened; he had noticed the disappearance of his comrade on the wall. He raised his binoculars, carefully observing the position of the wall, then looked towards the distant factory building opposite.

The moment he aimed the scope towards Beta's location—

The bullet precisely penetrated the eyepiece of the binoculars, sending glass shards and blood mist flying simultaneously. The gunman fell backward, his head hitting the tin floor with a loud clang.

Almost simultaneously, John's figure flashed into the control room. He knelt on one knee, his eyes scanning the rooftop of the distant factory, and pulled the walkie-talkie from the corpse's waist.

In Beta's scope, John gave his pistol one last check and turned into the darkness deep within the control room, disappearing like a drop of ink.

Beta's muzzle turned towards the target in the open factory building. The gunman sitting on the wooden pallet was still looking down at his phone.

The moment the bullet penetrated his temple, blood bloomed. The gunman's body fell, his phone dropping to the ground, its screen displaying unsent chat messages.

Several gunshots suddenly erupted inside the factory.

Beta quickly adjusted his scope. Through the intact glass window, he saw John had already burst into the room. Several gunmen fell one after another, their shell casings bouncing on the floor.

In the center of the scope's crosshairs was Iosef's face, contorted in fear. His blond hair was plastered to his forehead with sweat, and his trembling lips uttered pleas for mercy.

But John's movements didn't falter.

"Bang! Bang!" Two shots ended everything.

A splash of crimson bloomed on the glass window from the back of Iosef's head. His body fell backward, knocking over a chair behind him, dragging a shocking bloodstain across the white wall.