The four days following the full release of Chen Jue's music video passed across the capital with the quiet, lethal precision of a carefully calibrated chess clock.
While the public entertainment pages and online forums remained thoroughly intoxicated by the sudden, viral emergence of the mysterious new figure, the real shifts were occurring far away from the flashing cameras and public commentary. The true battle lines were being drawn deep beneath the grey, freezing waves of the capital's northern maritime trade sector.
Inside the secure, high-tech command center of the Su Group's primary shipping division, the atmosphere was hushed, and intense. The walls were lined with massive, floor-to-ceiling holographic radar grids that tracked the real-time movement of hundreds of commercial cargo vessels cutting through the international waters.
