On the side of the humans, specifically, the leaders who had gathered in the central district of the domed city named after the capital of one of the largest nations of Pre-Great War, Beijing. w.a.n.g Yu Yan stared coldly at the visiting mayors from the other cities.
"Unacceptable! I object to the virus plan!" When she could no longer stand it, the female military officer did not press her clan"s buzzer. Instead, she directly slammed her palm on the metal desk and declared in a frosty tone.
Her voice was loud and clear. She followed it with a simple explanation while sweeping her sharp eyes around. "Pardon my impoliteness, but it is a very flawed plan! It relies heavily on successful infiltration. The moment it failed, the vials would fall in the enemies" hands. Even after removing the war beasts out of the equation, with a great seer by their side, the Pontiff, do you all think any infiltration would escape their notice?"
Such a garbage proposal was actually raised in a serious gathering. w.a.n.g Yu Yan naturally flared up as her brain could no longer endure processing the stupidity of the various plans that were brought up.
Everyone"s eyes went to her. However, since she was somebody with great mental fort.i.tude, the gazes did not make her flinch. She even stared back at some, still holding that same frigid glare. Her actual rank and position in the army did not give her this much courage. Almost everyone in attendance had a higher standing than her. It was simply emotions that drove her to stand her ground.
This was already the second day of the summit meeting.
The first one was wasted on stupid ceremonies, pleasantries, and complaints about the fae that did nothing but consume precious time.
w.a.n.g Yu Yan was somebody from the military. She knew how precarious their actual situation was, so she was truly disappointed that such things still had to be done even though they were tight in time. Even toward this meeting, she had opinions. No matter how advanced and fast modern transportation had become, the trip could have been saved through a holographic one.
It could be seen that unity did not guarantee a rise in smarts.
"That annoying old man, huh?" The one who spoke was the proponent of the virus idea, a great researcher from another city. A glint of intelligence could be seen in the man"s eyes as he retorted. "However, Miss w.a.n.g. The G.o.d-slaying plague virus has already been developed. We have also tested it on some captured fae. Its effect is very potent. Humans won"t be troubled, as we have also already developed the vaccine. Are you saying we should not use such a strategic biological weapon even though we are already driven to a wall? That doesn"t sound like what a great strategist would say."
The sarcastic words reverberated, its speaker earning frigid glances from w.a.n.g Yu Yan and her supporters.
The woman did not even pause for a second to come up with a reb.u.t.tal. She simply said, "With all due respect, Sir. I believe I have already said my reason for not supporting such a plan. The situation won"t allow it. How can you be so sure that everything will go smoothly and that your invention would bring forth the most ideal effect? Mr. Great Scientist. We have seers too, albeit not as strong and freakish than the one leading the fae race. Why don"t we first invite some of them to divine the success rate of your plan?"
The onlookers interchangeably looked at the two. The scientist"s face lost all sign of haughtiness. From the beginning, the other showed no respect for the girl and was even quite nonchalant and impatient with his responses. It was easy to see that he was not taking the so-called genius of the Beijing military unit seriously. Amongst the researchers, which one of them was not a genius? But now, a solemn expression could be seen on his face. There was also annoyance in his heart from receiving the same disrespectful treatment.
The scientist straightened his back to appear more confident and imposing, "Miss w.a.n.g," he began, once again not addressing the woman with her proper t.i.tle.
"Look. I have noticed that we always have to worry whether everything we do will be seen through by that old man. Shouldn"t we have had enough of always being cautious when planning attacks on Fae cities? My team has done our best to develop a weapon that could best help us reverse the tide and deal a huge blow to the fae race. Everything from our side had already been prepared. Now it"s the army"s turn. You must think of strategies and plans that can"t be prevented even if they got seen through! In the ancient world, they called it an open scheme! And I think that"s already the job of strategists and tacticians to come up with one!"
w.a.n.g Yu Yan glanced at the others, and upon seeing that even the Federal President, the elected overall political leader of humanity was silently nodding, her heart sank.
It seemed many had been swayed by the man"s words, most probably because they were still consumed by the anger and heartache caused by the fall of two great cities.
"I sincerely believed that you are focusing too much on the possibility of success and not giving much thought about what would happen once it all failed," she slowly said, her face as serious as usual.
w.a.n.g Yu Yan naturally argued and even brought up her suggestions, which centered on strengthening their military and producing more automated machine corps in conjunction with the other plans. At the same time, they must prepare for large-scale migration to another planet.
Earth was not as good as before anyway and even if they had a hunch something important was on the planet to attract the superior fae race, in her opinion, staying alive and preserving the human civilization was of utmost importance.
But there was a reason why, despite a thousand years pa.s.sing by, the accomplishment of humans in s.p.a.ce exploration was not as progressive.
"There are several suggestions put forward but the resources of our whole race are limited. We have to choose a few that have the greatest chance of success." The people from the western lab seemed to be adamant about going against her.
"I agree. I believe since the virus plan has already had the things prepared, there is no harm in pus.h.i.+ng it forward. Colonel w.a.n.g"s pet.i.tion to upgrade the army"s gear can also be considered."
"However, despite the allied cities losing two more territories, our total population is still over 2 billion, plus not every city has the proper facilities to produce s.p.a.ces.h.i.+ps. The war is already looming above us, the attack on the two cities of the west are naked provocations and signal of an upcoming large-scale war. We can"t wait for too long. Let"s temporarily shelve the interstellar migration."
"I approve of the suggestion to involve the civilians. They must contribute too. We can"t pretend anymore that it"s rare peacetime. The calm before the storm has already ended."
At the latter part of the meeting, the voting sessions finally began and the different leaders started to voice out their opinions.
On the host"s side, near the seat of the city mayor, Luo Deming, w.a.n.g Yu Yan felt anger bubbling within her heart. She watched them vote in favor of the foolish virus plan and threw the planning of the operations to her and the other military leaders.
"d.a.m.n. All of them won"t listen."
"Greedy. Short-sighted!"
"They just want to s.n.a.t.c.h whatever good thing is being eyed by the enemy race without even knowing if they have the ability! They don"t even know what it is! They are all cowards too."
"With this level of ignorance, they dared underestimate the enemy?"
For a while, she closed her eyes, as she was almost tempted to accuse some leaders of being spies or people mind-controlled by the enemies.
However, she had to stop herself. She knew that was impossible as each leader and officer was protected by many experts and had undergone rigorous inspection before being allowed entry.
…
Jiang Li had hitched a ride towards another fae city with Mohan. A day pa.s.sed since then. Because he secretly eavesdropped on the city mayor, he knew that the discussion on the human"s side had been extended and that the plot was still correcting things even though Mohan was by his side.
He was not aware that Nuwa and her team were busy tracking him and Mohan though.
After spending some time sightseeing in the city, which should be located where Saudi Arabia used to be, he brought the fae boy atop one of the tallest building near outer defensive walls.
Now he could see that there were just so many wrong things about the world now. Resources were probably nearly depleted, especially since it was wartime.
He clicked his tongue as he watched the sun set on the miserable sight outside the magnificent and vibrant city of the fae race. "So ugly. Look at how barren and dead the outer fields and mountains are."
Mohan was a step behind him, busy hesitating whether to sneak an attack on Jiang Li. When he heard the sigh, he rudely spoke, "There"s nothing new about it."
Jiang Li looked up and shook his head. "Don"t you think it"s just so miserable? I bet no civilian wants to come close to the walls and peek at the distance, since everything beyond is just so full of an aura of death. The pollution is so terrible that every city is like this, half caged in gla.s.s and with very tall walls."
The orange sky was beautiful yet the land it shone upon to was very unsightly. Such was the result of wars. There were probably many areas in the world like this, a hundred or so large cities owned by both races were nothing noteworthy as they were at most a tenth of the territories before the Great War.
He stared at Mohan again and said, "By the way, this is something that slipped my mind yesterday when I went to your city"s Holy Temple. But when I talked to one of your fellow race members a few hours ago, he said the planet where you guys lived for several million years is flouris.h.i.+ng. To date, it should still be a great habitat full of natural resources. Why the h.e.l.l did your race come back when Earth is like this?"
A grim expression crept up on Mohan"s face. He did not speak. But he was annoyed since the "talk" the other mentioned was just this shameless uncle hypnotizing a fae citizen. And he did it right before his eyes.
Mohan glared at Jiang Li. As the man was asking for a sensitive piece of information, he would not reply naturally.
"Hmmph." Mohan merely snorted.
The other was lost in his thoughts, continuing. "Come to think of it, it"s just so odd. Looking at how scarce resources here are, I bet that in the 200-year protracted war that went on between humans and fae, your side had to use resources from outer s.p.a.ce, or rather, that other planet, to sustain the population here. Such a stupid move. Yet I don"t think your various leaders have straws for a brain. So what is it that made your race go back?"
There was curiosity in Jiang Li"s eyes. Unfortunately, Mohan was somebody with tight lips and an unyielding personality.
The young fae coldly laughed. "Dream on if you think you can pry anything from me."
"Hey, don"t be like that." Jiang Li had long sat down on the floor, still inspecting the land.
He threw a glance at the male lead, wearing a sincere expression. "I am really a close acquaintance of your Pontiff. You see, we even came from the same origin. We"re both from a very, very impressive civilization called Mu. It"s on a legendary continent ruled by actual G.o.ds in the Pacific Ocean. I am one of the G.o.ds there, while he is the king of a fairly large country wors.h.i.+pping me. The one serving as your Pontiff is an incarnation with full memories. Therefore, he remembered me. To summarize, your Pontiff definitely won"t scold you if you tell me."
The words spoken were the truth, but since the other party was from a different timeline and world, it all only sounded ridiculous.
So to this, Mohan only responded by looking at him like he was an idiot, saying, "So you are that awesome."
"Yes!" Came the shameless reply. Who knew when Jiang Li"s face became so thick.
Mohan then nodded, his lips forming a lop-sided grin as he sneered, "Alright. Since you are a G.o.d, you should be more omniscient and awesome than my race"s Pontiff. So my great G.o.d. Why the h.e.l.l are you still asking me"
"…"
Jiang Li tried to think of what to respond, but the ideas that came to him were more like excuses, so he didn"t bother pursuing the matter.
"Whatever. It"s not like investigating that is my mission." The man feigned nonchalance, even though he had subconsciously planned to visit another city mayor for a more pleasant talk.
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