Chapter 771: Chapter 484: Stealing Ore (Part 2)

"The captain is here! Let the captain judge personally!"

... 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝓮𝒘𝙚𝙗𝒏𝙤𝙫𝓮𝒍.𝓬𝒐𝙢

For a moment, the three quarrelsome miners and the two security team members who came to mediate focused their eyes on Wang Zhifan, who came over to deliver meals, hoping that the head of the mining team could give a judgment.

Wang Zhifan remained very calm. He waved his hand to forcibly silence the three miners’ endless chatter and said:

"It’s mealtime now! All of you, eat quietly, no more arguments! As for the matter of stealing ore, I have my own decision, and someone will notify you of the investigation results later!"

After saying that, he immediately distributed each of the five present their nutritional paste and arranged for the two security team members to each take a miner away, leaving only the one considered to be the thief, Thomson, on the spot.

Once the other two miners left, Wang Zhifan questioned Thomson, who looked furious with his information listed as a thief:

"Thomson, be honest, did you really not steal the ore?"

"No! Captain, sir! I swear to God I didn’t! How could I care for a few worthless stones! This is an insult to my character!"

Seeing that even the captain doubted him, Thomson became more agitated, possibly due to his skills as a habitual thief, or perhaps he genuinely felt his professionalism was being questioned.

"Hmm... I understand, you keep mining. I will personally investigate this matter, and no one will be wronged."

Wang Zhifan made his statement and left in a hurry, without further exploration on the spot.

In fact, such small matters of ore theft didn’t mean much to Wang Zhifan, as the minerals circulated within the team without affecting his performance as the captain. However, Wang Zhifan suspected that things weren’t that simple, and there might be more to it.

"According to the workstation positions of the three miners I just saw, if any of them were stealing ore, it wouldn’t be that easy...

Ore is very heavy; one can’t transfer it without operating a mining mecha, and such a large piece of machinery would make noises even a deaf person would notice. It’s impossible that a few miners with years of experience wouldn’t realize someone was operating a mecha to steal ore...

So the real situation is very clear. Either these three were acting together to create an opportunity to slack off, or someone else used special methods to steal the ore unnoticed by them..."

After a brief analysis, Wang Zhifan significantly narrowed down the range of suspects. He was not most suspicious of Thomson, the former thief, but rather two newcomers on his mining team, specifically those two players!

The reason is simple: only players have various magical means to pass unnoticed by ordinary miners and covertly claim others’ labor achievements as their own.

Moreover, players are motivated to do so to increase their total ore value as much as possible to meet the mining target for clearing the stage.

Of course, it might not necessarily be his mining team’s players doing this; players from other teams, like Team 2 in the northern section of the mine shaft, are very likely to come over and benefit themselves.

Therefore, while Wang Zhifan continued distributing the remaining nutritional paste and water supplies, he discreetly observed the happenings in his mining area.

In fact, he had already deployed two disguised avatars in the mining area for covert protection, but the mining area’s vastness had prevented them from noticing any outsiders before. At that time, his main control focus was protecting a few elite miners to ensure output, not on such aspects.

When he passed by the two white players in his team while operating a combat mecha without attracting attention, he found that they were controlling standard-type mining mecha and working diligently, not even caring for the nutritional paste distributed to them.

Moreover, he had previously sent an avatar to secretly observe, confirming that their working status was the same without any strangers around, clearly a better work attitude than most lazy NPC miners.

"They seem like typical steady-type players trying hard to mine early in the stage to meet clearing requirements... In that case, the thief likely comes from another team..."

After a brief consideration, Wang Zhifan was basically convinced the thief was from outside, which sparked a long-planned idea in his mind.

"Heh... it’s just ore theft, isn’t it? As if I can’t do it... Let me show you how I’ll steal all your ore!

No, stealing it all would be too much. Stealing half or even a small part would be enough. The stage time is still long; it’s better to proceed thoughtfully..."

With his decision made, Wang Zhifan then began the corresponding operations.

He created a Dream Me Avatar identical in appearance to himself to drive the combat mecha while his true form donned the Wind Concealing Conical Hat, entering stealth mode to head towards the northern section of the mine shaft he had explored once.

The captain of the Team 2 responsible for mining the northern section was a stern-looking middle-aged white man whose style was similar to Wang Zhifan. He was used to personally patrolling the mine shaft to investigate and whip those trying to slack off at any time.

In his stealth mode, Wang Zhifan easily avoided this captain’s patrol route and then began siphoning off their resources in a frenzy within his team.

The first to fall victim to his touch was a rookie miner, an NPC teenager whose skills in operating a standard-type mining mecha were not very proficient, as their mining efficiency was visibly low, though their work attitude was still earnest.

Seeing this, Wang Zhifan stepped in to help, jumping onto their mecha’s truck bed in stealth mode and lightening the load for this NPC’s hard-earned ore, taking a tenth of the minerals in the truck bed at once, all stored in his Space Ring, which is the modified Sea God Meditation Ring.

The second batch to suffer his touch were two veteran miners. These two worked close together, chatting while skillfully mining, without noticing the arrival of an invisible thief.

Wang Zhifan courteously took away a fifth of the premium ore in their mecha’s mineral storage, knowing that at their efficiency, they wouldn’t care about such minor losses.

Later, considering the limited capacity of the Space Ring, Wang Zhifan reduced the frequency of his actions, turning his main attention to finding the players in this mining team.

It didn’t take long for him to discover at least three players in this team.

One was a hardworking type, focusing on mastering the standard-type mining mecha and mining diligently.

Another was a bold slacker type, lying in the mecha cockpit sleeping while no one was watching, not knowing how they planned to clear the stage.

The last was a trickster type, with Wang Zhifan sensing that a humanoid puppet was left in the cockpit to slowly control the mining mecha. The player’s true body had run off somewhere unknown.

"This puppet doesn’t seem too smart, so I won’t refuse to accept their labor’s yield."

For the first two players, Wang Zhifan didn’t steal their ore, as players have various means and he might get exposed.

But for Wang Zhifan, who used a humanoid puppet as a stand-in, there was no need for caution. He determined that this puppet was rather rigid, so he discreetly jumped into the back truck bed, intending to fill up the remaining capacity in the Space Ring.

But just at this time, some unnoticeable movements around him activated his perception, prompting him to quietly jump out of the mining mecha’s truck bed.

He saw that beside the humanoid puppet in the mining cockpit, there suddenly appeared a young player of Xia Country appearance, who casually stored the substituting puppet into their portable space, then jumped out of the cockpit to the back truck bed, raising their hand to seemingly pour out various colored ores from thin air.

"Well, well, I encountered a colleague... No, he very likely is the player who stole from my mining team!"

At once, Wang Zhifan judged he had encountered the culprit, and retaliation became inevitable, but he needed to consider how to exact revenge a bit.

"This person is probably from Xia Country; killing him outright wouldn’t be good. If he works at the Administration Bureau, the losses could be considerable. Besides, my enmity with him isn’t deep, so I will repay him using his own methods."

Once his mind was made, Wang Zhifan immediately took action.