696 Level Four Warning

The boss possessed many secrets.

The longer he followed Jiang Chen, the more Ivan felt that way.

His ability to occupy that position proved he is a smart man. His intelligence wasn't just mere cleverness and knowing a couple tricks but rather, he was skilled and above all, he knew what to do and what not to do.

Really smart people often didn't ask too many questions.

In the bullet-proof glass isolated training grounds, the big giant in steel armor carried out a series of tactical moves as instructed by the experimenter; including launching heat-seeking bombs, performing evasive emergency moves, releasing machine guns at targets... and so on.

The elites of Celestial Trade were qualified as pilots of the Power Armor. Their loyalty and combat effectiveness had to go through rigorous assessment procedures.

When Jiang Chen saw the giant on the training grounds shredding a Hummer with its hands, he nodded with satisfaction.

"It's almost a war machine... no matter how many times I look at it, the T-3's combat power is so astonishing," Ivan exclaimed.

"It's a war machine." Jiang Chen watched the giant withstood the explosion of the RPG with its front-mounted armor. He narrowed his eyes and spoke with a smile.

It has high mobility, high defense, and the ability to cross the nuclear radiation zone...

In infantry warfare, this type of individual armor has almost no opponent.

"How many people in the force have received power armor training?"

"A total of twenty people."

"Not enough." Jiang Chen shook his head. "We need at least a hundred people prepared. Go work on this and select eighty more people to receive the training."

"But there are only five Power Armors on the island, and even training is done in rotations. If we expand our numbers, we won't have the equipment to support it," Ivan said with a troubled look.

"Not to worry. Tomorrow, I'll make someone send a hundred units over," Jiang Chen said casually

"One hundred units! Don't they have an extremely slow production time?!" Ivan said with shock.

When he first started Power Armor training, he made an application to Jiang Chen and hoped to receive a few more Power Armors for the force. It was really troublesome for four people to use one unit for training. However, the application of equipment was rejected by Jiang Chen, stating that the output was too low.

Now, Jiang Chen just promised to bring a hundred units over, so how could Ivan not be shocked?

Don't they have an extremely slow production time?

"The output can be changed, and now the output increased." Jiang Chen laughed.

In the apocalypse, after conquering Hongcheng, NAC's commercial route to the heartland began to open. As the labor force and material input increased, productivity would naturally go up. The original monthly output of Power Armor was only 5-10 units, but it had now been raised to around 30.

As the situation stabilized, the NAC didn't need so many Power Armors, but the orders hadn't stopped. This batch of extra units was naturally moved to the modern world by Jiang Chen.

When Jiang Chen was ready to leave, Ivan suddenly asked.

"Are there plans for military operations again?"

"No, what happened?" Jiang Chen turned around to ask.

"Seeing as you're expanding the force, I thought you are ready to fight again." Ivan laughed.

"They are produced just in case for unexpected times—"

Before he could finish his sentence, an alarm began to ring in the arsenal. Soldiers on duty raced out from the barracks, kinetic skeletons were put on, and they gathered in an open space.

Jiang Chen looked at Ivan.

Looking in the direction of the alarm, Ivan's eyes turned sharp. "Level Four Warning. Let me go see what happened."

He didn't show the slightest complacency even with the lowest level alarm.

"I'll go too."

Since Jiang Chen had nothing to do, he followed behind Ivan to the direction of the open ground.

The alarm didn't disrupt the order of the facility. Aside from the twenty soldiers gathered together, everyone continued with their routines. Only Level One warnings signaling war required the mobilization of all combat units. This Level Four Warning was nothing more than the discovery of smuggling ships on the radar or the discovery of rescue signals within controlled water. Only the on-duty rapid response force would be mobilized.

Following Ivan into the command center, the Chief of Staff briefly described the situation.

"Three hundred nautical miles north of the New Moon Island in public waters, we received a distress signal from a civil vessel, but it was quickly interrupted. The target area has no storms or other meteorological disasters. The target is suspected to have been captured by pirates. Rapid response forces have been prepared. Aurora-20 has taken off for the target waters, and Black Hawk Helicopter will take off in 2 minutes."

"Life signal?"

"Weak," Chief of Staff said solemnly.

…

Luxury and comfort - this was the Royal Caribbean cruise.

For a 10,000 US Dollar ticket from Sri Lanka, they would go across the Bay of Bengal, float across the Strait of Malacca, dock in Kuala Lumpur and Singapore before eventually sailing to Wanghai. Passengers were the rich and famous as well as elites from all walks of life. After all, the people who could afford the cost had to be middle class at least.

In the corner of the cruise ship, two men sat at a beach table.

From the arrogant look on his face, a man in a suit seemed to be powerful. Behind him were two bodyguards standing still wearing sunglasses. The person sitting opposite him was a bit strange not because of the lack of bodyguards, but due to the felt hat on his head.

The hat looked obtrusive no matter the angle.

The male in the suit frowned and thought in his mind.

"Mr. Zhu Tianyou, thank you for your appointment. I'm Tanaka Yoshinobu, this is my business card." Tanaka smiled and handed over the card in his hand.

Zhu Tianyou didn't take his business card. He eyed his bodyguard and the bodyguard took the business card.

"People who know me know that I don't appreciate doing business while on vacation," Zhu Tianyou leaned in his chair and crossed his right leg on his left knee. "...But I'm very interested in your proposal. I, however, am curious. Ten tons of salt - can you really take it all?

The salt he referred to, of course, didn't refer to eating salt.

It was a hallucinogen with a component of methadone known as "bath salts."

"Please rest assured, Mr. Zhu." Tanaka smiled. "We recently received a 'donation' and we have ample money on hand."

Zhu Youtian glanced at him then he habitually swept around his surroundings.

He wasn't interested in the "donation" of Tanaka mentioned nor was not he interested in knowing where he was selling it to.

Of course, if it was shipped to Yoto, he would consider giving him a discount.

"The rule on the streets is money in one hand, goods in the other. You can determine the location of trade, but it must be within Ethiopian borders." Zhu Tianyou leaned in his chair while twisting the ring on his thumb.

The main component of bath salts was MDPV, a chemical mainly found in Arabian tea.

Ethiopia was one of its main producing areas.

"No problem. Ten tons of salt. What is Mr. Zhu's offer?" Tanaka nodded with a grin.

"Three million."

"...Japanese Yen?"

Zhu Tianyou burst out laughing. From Tanaka's embarrassed look, he already knew he couldn't afford it.

"I thought this was going to be a deal, but it turned out to be a poor man."

The buyer had no money, so the deal naturally fell apart. Zhu Tianyou stood up and was prepared to leave. If this was elsewhere, he might've considered chopping two fingers off of the person who wasted his time, but on this cruise ship, he didn't want to cause trouble.

"Can you lower the price?" Tanaka didn't get up and tried to convince him.

"How much money do you have?" Zhu Tianyou stopped and looked at him with a dubious smile.

"5 million Japanese Yen."

"No need to speak further."

"That's really regrettable then." Tanaka shook his head. His smiling expression didn't change. "It seems I have to handle things myself."

The same time he said that he put his finger on his cap.

For some reason, Zhu Tianyou began to feel a strange sense of alertness…