Outside the emergency room.
Jiang Chen sat silently in the chair with a gloomy expression on his face.
No one dared to approach him other than the soldiers in kinetic skeletons. The fluid-looking armor covered their chest, and the sleek helmet shielded their head. The soldiers with rifles on full alert protected him in the middle. They examined anyone approaching with sharp eyes… If anyone dared to approach in the first place.
An assassination in public.
With an accident like this in broad daylight, Ivan didn’t say anything and handed in his emblem himself, but Jiang Chen tossed it back at him.
Ivan was not to blame. New Moon Island was hundreds of kilometers away from Coro Island. From start to finish, the whole incident took place in ten minutes. The mercenaries entered the border disguised as tourists, and the weapons and equipment they used were all smuggled into Xin with fishing boat marked with Xin’s flag.
Although Jiang Chen was furious, he didn’t blame anyone. Unleashing his anger on his people was the most foolish and useless choice.
The doctors and nurses in the hospital passed him anxiously, fearing to anger the demigod that is clearly fuming.
Then, a soldier with a rifle turned from the corner and stopped in front of Jiang Chen. He leaned forward and whispered.
“Four pedestrians wounded; one person pronounced died in the hospital. Eight police wounded; two pronounced died in the hospital; four police died because of C4 explosion…”
The cold casualty numbers didn’t stir any emotion in Jiang Chen’s heart. After the soldier finished, he only said emotionlessly.
“Who’s the perpetrator?”
“Reliable evidence indicated that the perpetrator is Arrow Military Company. Xin’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs already protested against the Madagascar government to punish the perpetrator…”
But everyone knew that these protests were useless. It was not that Madagascar didn’t want to take care of these problems, but because their military force would not even win against the battle-trained soldiers.
Because of this, the emerging nations maintained the stance of keeping an eye open and an eye closed to the illegal militants’ misdeeds internationally. As long as they didn’t cause trouble domestically, they would not question their legality.
“I’m talking about the actual perpetrator.”
“…Sorry, we didn’t manage to capture anyone alive. But the boat fled in the direction of country F’s territory, and our boats were blocked by F’s coastal guards at the border.” The soldier lowered his head.
The fishing boat that released the helicopter immediately fled to Xin’s border. Although New Moon Island sent out fast boats to chase them, when they escaped into country F’s borders, Celestial had to stop pursuing.
Country F’s coastal guard freely allowed the militants to enter. It was almost certain that country F was the perpetrator behind this kidnap mission. The only problem was the lack of evidence, and it was virtually impossible to find proof hiring mercenaries to do the dirty deeds.
Jiang Chen closed his eyes.
He was reflecting on his mistake.
The army stationed at New Moon Island could protect Xin like a steel fortress, but he ignored the work in intelligence. Willie society’s spy already reminded him, but he didn’t think too much of it. Only till now did he realize the severity of the problem. Xin’s national security was as penetrable as a piece of paper. And the immigration policy would continue to deteriorate the security of the country. He somehow overlooked this problem before.
He must establish an intelligence department fast before the national security worsens.
Ayesha…
The corner of his eye glared at the closed doors. Jiang Chen felt twisting pain in his heart.
[Fool, why were you trying to prove yourself with wounds… so what if a few rats ran away?]
At the corner, Zhang Yapin with flowers walked over.
He looked at Jiang Chen face full of gloom and let out a sigh.
“Tulips. Help me give these to the wounded. Sorry…”
“I’ll form a national security department as soon as possible,” Jiang Chen said expressionlessly.
Zhang Yapin paused, sighed.
“That would be best.”
Zhang Yapin patted Jiang Chen on the shoulder as he didn’t know how to comfort him. He left the flowers on the chair before turning around.
“Execute,” Jiang Chen said apathetically.
Zhang Yapin stopped, turned around, and looked at him in disbelief.
“Died of fire, 41 captives all died.”
“Are you insane!”
“The circuit board is outdated, the fire equipment lacked maintenance, and there were security disturbances at Xin that day. Just release the statement and send your condolences.”
“That’s impossible! It’s too much of a coincidence! I know you are sad, but we don’t have evidence to prove that country F did this. Even if they if they did, we can’t seek revenge by executing the prisoners of war. We are a civil society! The international image we finally managed to create-”
“You do it.” Jiang Chen tilted his head and ordered a soldier.
“Yes.” The soldier nodded and left.
Zhang Yapin blankly stared at the soldier leaving, he opened his mouth wanting to say something, but he knew the soldier would not listen to him.
[This lunatic, what would killing a few prisoners of war do? The international society would all stand with country F. 41 lives! Captives without any weapons! The despicable crimes against humanity! Even if they started a war, people would think it would be with a cause.]
Or rather, if Xin did execute the prisoners, it would be the exact response country F was looking.
“Wait,” Jiang Chen said.
The soldier stopped and turned around.
“Commander?”
After deliberating for a moment, Jiang Chen slowly closed his eyes, “Just wait a bit.”
“Yes, commander.”
Zhang Yapin let out a sigh of relief. He felt as if he was about to collapse.
“Thank god, you finally regained your rationality.”
Jiang Chen glared at him and didn’t say anything.
[Is that so?]
He suddenly felt that it was not only too low to execute the prisoners of war, but it was also too easy of a punishment for them.
A curvature appeared on his lips, and his eyes flashed with coldness and apathy.
Zhang Yapin watched the silent Jiang Chen as he felt a chill down his spine.
…
A video filmed by tourists appeared on Youtube.
The video shook violently, but a helicopter dragging “Ironman” could still be barely made out.” People on the helicopter fired at the “Ironman” with the machine guns, but it didn’t manage to do any damage.
The video stopped after the helicopter dragged the armor away from Coro Island. It didn’t manage to capture the iron armor from being pulled out of the water nor where the helicopter headed. People were speculating about the identity of the “Ironman”, the cause, and the ending.
No one knew the ending, but the cause could be traced.
People connected it to the gunfights at the city of Coro that day. A lot of the media believed the two were connected.
But because of the gunfight, the government of Xin tightly controlled the information. They only revealed it was two groups of criminals attempting to rob a bank to divert the public opinion from the truth. Although there were a lot of skeptical information, people had to accept this as the truth and build off of the facts by using their imagination.
Because the fight between the iron armor and the machine gunner was very Hollywood-esque, the truth behind the story was completely hidden and mysterious. Also, the government’s lack of disclosure to the event caused the view of the video on Youtube to be extremely high, and it became a hot topic on the web. Even the actor of Ironman, Robert Downy Jr. wrote a joking status on Facebook.
Burp, I was drunk last time, who saw my armor?