Before long, the reliable Thin-Winged Mantis Squad sent back a report:
"Thin-Winged Mantis Squad has located the target. It's... it's... Aah!... Bzzzt."
The communication abruptly cut off.
Jeffries silently stared at the black screen before him displaying "Signal Lost."
Clenching the pearl tightly in his fist, Jeffries let out a long breath.
A strange smile spread across the corners of Jeffries' mouth. The weight on his heart had finally been lifted.
"Having a lead is a good thing."
Before the Thin-Winged Mantis Squad had been completely wiped out, their cameras had transmitted back the footage they had captured.
It showed a strange humanoid creature spewing terrifying black beams of light.
Those "black beams" were powerful enough to distort space. Even light itself could barely escape them.
The entire Thin-Winged Mantis Squad had been annihilated the instant they encountered it.
"The Thin-Winged Mantis Squad is a reconnaissance unit. Although they don't carry heavy weapons, their mobility is second to none."
"Every one of them is equipped with 'Thin Wings,' Heliopolis' latest propulsion system. Even on a sheer cliff ten thousand fathoms high, they can move across it as easily as flat ground, running along walls and leaping over rooftops."
"Yet not a single member of such a perfectly mobile squad managed to escape."
As his thoughts reached this point, delight appeared on his face.
"Tenmon Soji! Is this the ability weapon you've been secretly developing all this time?"
"An ability user with an ultimate-level power! Strength comparable to a nuclear weapon!"
"You actually hid him inside the Ghostfire Syndicate to keep him out of sight."
"If I can control Tenmon Soji, becoming the one who calls the shots in the company will be effortless!"
Jeffries' words brimmed with confidence. It never even occurred to him that if the company itself could not control such an existence, how could he possibly do so?
As for whether his subordinates lived or died, Jeffries cared even less. The only thing on his mind now was how to capture the rampaging Tenmon Soji.
Jeffries waved his hand, scattering the crushed pearl into the air, then ordered the secretary robot:
"All remaining squads except Squad F are to proceed to the target's location immediately and secure the target!"
"Beep—Understood. I'll take care of it right... right away."
The moment Jeffries issued the order, a chill ran down his back and alarm bells screamed in his mind. Ignoring the table directly in front of him, he hurled himself forward, his armored body smashing the wooden table to pieces.
Yet even then, he could feel wind rushing across his back.
What the hell? He was wearing an integrated powered armor system constructed from a thick titanium-alloy frame covered in carbon fiber. How could there possibly be wind getting through?!
Yet when he reached behind himself, he found the armored suit completely intact.
Had the integrated air-conditioning system malfunctioned? Wasn't everything Heliopolis made supposed to be top-quality?
"Considering that you once approved my wife's maternity leave, I have to make sure you repent properly before I send you to meet her."
"Who?!" A familiar voice came from behind him. Jeffries turned around and saw the secretary robot hacked apart on the floor, while a familiar man stood before him with clenched teeth and a hideously furious expression.
"It's you! The task force's frontline command captain! Aren't you supposed to be on the front line? How are you here?"
"Why am I here? Heh. Obviously, I've come to claim your life, my dear Director!"
"The one communicating with you was a 'Taixu Gang actor' I hired. Of course, for someone like you who doesn't care about his subordinates and only cares about their wives, there was no way you'd notice the difference."
The Taixu Gang's members did all kinds of work, almost like a jack-of-all-trades agency. Among the services the Taixu Gang offered were "actors."
Dusk City had countless gangs, and naturally, gang fights were common. When gangs fought, having more people meant looking more imposing.
What the Taixu Gang did was accept money to disguise themselves as members of another gang. When gang bosses traded insults, they stood behind them and shouted support. When fights broke out, they put on an impressive show.
Their fees were generally quite cheap, so many gangs hired Taixu Gang actors.
As a result, scenes often occurred where two people pretending to be gang bosses cursed each other out while everyone standing behind them was actually a Taixu Gang actor. Then, once the fighting started, the whole thing turned into an iconic street-dance spectacle.
After enough such memorable scenes occurred, members of other gangs began regarding this trendy style of fighting as a new form of gang culture. They joined the dance-battle craze and sparked a wave of civilized brawling throughout Dusk City.
Of course, that came later.
In any case, the command captain had heard rumors about this exceptionally cost-effective service offered by the Taixu Gang.
No matter what, he needed Jeffries to believe that he was still on the front line.
So he picked a quick-witted little fellow, gave him an opening line and some basic information, then told him to improvise.
Fortunately, the vague conversation successfully fooled Jeffries.
"I endured the freezing wind the entire time, clinging to the outside of the frontline operations center's Black Box... In other words, it was only because 'they' tacitly allowed it that I had the chance to bypass the security checks, stand here, and finally get my revenge!"
"Did you really think upper management didn't know about all those little schemes of yours? Heliopolis above all!"
Streams of energy lit up across Jeffries' powered combat suit.
"Hmph. You think you're worthy of being my opponent?"
After all, the director of the Mobile Response Division's Strategic Security Department possessed the finest armored equipment in the entire company. Even if a thousand command captains surrounded him and attacked at full force, that integrated powered armor could slice them apart as easily as cutting fruit.
It was just like the armor from the movie Iron-Guts Man, only even more absurd. Heliopolis Life Sciences' technology was simply unreasonably powerful.
But soon, Jeffries' steel combat suit began emitting the bzzzt of malfunctioning circuitry.
Jeffries' eyes widened as a terrible feeling came over him.
The command captain had been exceedingly cunning. From the very beginning, he had deliberately distracted Jeffries, then immediately eliminated the guard robot, the greatest threat present.
Jeffries' own combat ability was third-rate at best. Without the guard-type secretary robot protecting him, he could only rely on this integrated powered armor from Heliopolis Technology to fight ten opponents at once.
If even that support had malfunctioned, then against the command captain, who was proficient in close combat and possessed superior equipment, Jeffries would have absolutely no ability to resist.
He had been thoroughly set up!
"You tampered with my combat suit?!"
The command captain leisurely scraped his dagger along his metallic arm, producing an unpleasant screech.
"What? Is your three-hundred-million-credit powered armor not working?"
Shing!
A sharp, vicious mantis blade sprang from the command captain's arm. He smugly licked the blade and, seeing the terror on Jeffries' face, said with satisfaction, "No need to thank me. Before deploying, I spent a fortune contacting the legendary hacker known throughout the hacking world as 'Haxxor Bunny' and had her make a few minor improvements to your combat suit. That integrated air-conditioning module was one of them."