It's dark at night, and most of Sanya's urban areas are slowly falling into silence. However, the Portuguese Embassy located at the foot of Phoenix Ridge is still brightly lit.
None of the embassy staff, including Simang and Thomas, had any rest at this time. Although their bodies were very tired, they had no intention of sleeping at this time.
Today is a very difficult day for the Portuguese, because until now, they still have not been able to find their missing persons.
The Portuguese Embassy in Sanya has a total of more than 50 people on staff, but most of them are civilian staff. Their daily work is to handle diplomatic, commercial and cultural affairs.
In fact, there are only a dozen people who are actually responsible for special affairs such as intelligence, field service, and security.
Among the personnel involved in the surveillance operation, only two people who stayed outside the Sing Tao office returned to the embassy. The other people who tracked the target in batches are all gone forever.
In broad daylight, a dozen adult men with sound hands and feet disappeared silently in Sanya city. This is a situation that has never happened since the opening of the Sanya embassy.
Instead of speculating that they were kidnapped and taken away by someone, Simang and Thomas hoped that this was a supernatural incident caused by ghosts.
However, although both of them are devout believers, they also know in their hearts that this matter has nothing to do with ghosts and gods.
The person behind the scenes not only has considerable professional capabilities, but also the personnel and resources mobilized should be superior to those of the embassy, so that it can be done so cleanly and without leaving any traces.
The most important thing is that this is the capital of Haihan. The other party dares to kidnap so many people in the city. It is simply confident. Their identity and background may be extraordinary.
Although neither of them said anything, they had already tacitly agreed that this matter should be the official work of Haihan.
Abducting people in such a brutal way was more than just a matter of halting their operations. It was most likely that they wanted to obtain information from them so as to gain leverage over the embassy.
Whether these people can withstand high-pressure interrogation or even torture to extract confessions, they actually don't have much hope.
In his early years, Ximang had fought with the Haihan Army in many places overseas. He had personally witnessed personnel from the Haihan Military Intelligence Bureau and the Ministry of Security torture prisoners. The harshness of their methods left a deep impression on him.
Whether they are Spaniards, Jurchens, or Japanese, the person being tortured has only two outcomes: either he confesses, or he dies during the execution.
Simang believed in the loyalty of the missing persons, but did not believe that their will could withstand the various forms of torture.
It is very likely that the Haihan people have figured out the whole story and have all the information about the embassy sending people to track and monitor Haihan official institutions and personnel.
Reporting to the police at this time would probably only bring humiliation to oneself, so they decided to look for clues on their own. Even if you are looking for a needle in a haystack, you still have to try your best.
Almost all the staff of the embassy were sent out, and some people were even temporarily seconded to several local Portuguese shops.
However, in order to avoid further disappearances, we had to strictly prohibit individual actions outside and increase the number of people in each team to five or six people. As a result, although there are quite a lot of manpower dispatched, there are actually only a few teams out there looking for the whereabouts of the missing persons.
After dark, various groups returned to the embassy one after another, but the information they brought back was extremely limited, and the missing persons were still not found.
The rickshaw clue that had high hopes did not yield any substantial results. The rickshaw driver who was pulling labor near the Xingdao office this morning was not found at all.
In view of the fact that the other side had the advantage of occupying the home court, they had every reason to suspect that the driver who took away the embassy personnel was also pretending to be someone from the other side. As for the witnesses, it was even harder to find. Because of the lottery, at least half of the local people gathered in the area near Victory Square. There were large sparsely populated areas in the city where you could do it.
"To be honest, if the Haihan people captured them, it is unlikely that we would be able to find them."
Thomas said with some frustration: "The scope of our search is only limited to the places we can go, but there are too many areas in Sanya that prohibit foreigners from entering, so it is impossible to search."
Simang said coldly: "But at least the Haihan people haven't come to ask for guilt yet. Maybe things will turn around."
Thomas said: "Perhaps they have no intention of coming to question the crime, and they have no intention of releasing the person back! They just want our people to disappear forever, as a warning to us not to act rashly again!"
Ximang said: "Based on my understanding of the Haihan people, I don't think they will do things so cruelly. Speaking of Potian, our actions are only at the level of surveillance, and we have no intention of doing anything to anyone. If Haihan Han is just trying to warn us, there is no need to risk so many lives.”
Thomas said: "But we are very passive now. We can't find anyone and can't figure out the other party's intentions. We don't even know who did it!"
Simon said: "Actually, if you want to know the truth, there is another way. Although we don't know who did it, we at least know who was involved in it."
Thomas said: "You mean Tan Tianming and the Sing Tao Office?"
Simang nodded and said: "The person disappeared while following them. They must be insiders. Maybe we should visit the Xingdao office and see what they will say."
Thomas said: "What else can you say? Of course you won't admit it if you kill them, and we don't have any basis to ask the other party to hand over their people. Are you going to ask them to show their favor?"
Ximang said: "If it can exchange for our people's safe return, I wouldn't mind apologizing to the Haihan people in person."
These words made Thomas look at him with admiration. He had always thought that Simang was the kind of absolutely ruthless person who didn't care what price he would pay as long as he could achieve his goal.
This operation was also carried out with Xi Mang's insistence. The disappearance of these people in the embassy was inseparable from him. If he hadn't been busy looking for missing persons today, Thomas would have had a big fight with him.
However, this statement shows that Simang is not completely indifferent to this, at least he is still somewhat responsible.
Thomas was about to speak when there was a sudden noise outside the house, and then someone ran in and reported: "Sir, the missing person is back!"
Thomas jumped up from his chair: "How many people are back?"
The subordinate responded: "There are quite a few, it seems... they are all back!"
Thomas and Simang looked at each other and hurried out of the house together to check the situation outside.
People did come back, but they didn't come back by themselves.
Someone banged the door of the embassy with stones in the distance. When the people inside heard the noise and opened the door to check, they did not see the person who threw the stones. They only found a dozen people tied up with hemp ropes under the wall outside the embassy. personal. After stepping forward and taking off their hoods, they discovered that they were the same group of people who had disappeared this morning.