Chapter 126: Field Work

Chapter 126: Field Work

I breathed in deeply as I listened to Flo about how Erza had gone out of contact. I knew how close she was with Flo and remembered how she had helped guide me when I initially came to this world. My first instinct was to shout that I would tag along in her search, but times have changed. I couldn’t just leave on a whim, especially when the case about our malfunctioning products was ongoing.

These incidents would have a high impact on our reputation and the confidence of our customers. The more we expanded, the more the scale of things grew. Every setback had magnified consequences, as it wasn’t so easy to find alternatives when the monetary amount had grown so much.

“...I...Take one of our teams with you.”

“I can’t—”

“Do it for me and go call Andrew. His team should still be on break since he last followed me up to Aegis.”

“...Understood. Thank you.”

As the call finished, I immediately notified our intel department to keep an eye out for Erza while I got back to investigating the source of our faulty products.

There were currently three main plausible theories.

The first one was a natural defect that only occurs in specific environments or conditions unknown to me. We had tested out the Argus in every common condition it would operate in, but we couldn’t confidently we had tested every possibility. We simply didn’t have the capabilities to do so as the big corps did.

The second was that there was a problem somewhere in our production. It could be embezzlement with someone selling our waste products that didn’t meet our standards. Or even be an honest mistake somewhere in our production process. What I didn’t want to think about was the possibility of traitors within our ranks.

I had previously implemented spying measures against all my employees and so far I haven’t gotten any alerts. I would be quite sad to find someone had noticed and gotten around the stealth implant I had installed. With more and more employees now, I had even spent some time integrating it into our other implants like the Shade, where the nanomachines would then reassemble themselves inside my employees.

The last plausible reason was we were being actively sabotaged. It wasn’t surprising if some corporations found us an eyesore and took hostile action against us. Not every corp resorted to brute force as their first resort. In fact, waging economic wars and intrigue behind the scenes was more common. And this kind of sabotage was exactly something I could see them do.

I would have to wait and see if any additional incidents pop up first to gather more information, though. So far, the two cases didn’t have any commonalities in regard to where they were sourced and who they were sold to. It was only how the way they malfunctioned was the same.

All kinds of possibilities were still open.

Drew - Halls Corporation

“Oakley, over here!” Drew placed down his cup of coffee and raised his hands at his coworker to direct his attention to the corner he was seated at.

The man spotted him and waved back before getting into the line to place his order. Living up to their moniker of being a fast-food restaurant, it didn’t even take five minutes until he sat down in front of Drew with a tray full of food.

He silently began eating while Drew watched as he sipped on his milkshake in between bites. Their table was quiet until Oakley was fully done with his burger and moved on to his fried crickets.

“How did your investigation go?” Drew asked, leaning in toward his colleague.

Oakley finished chewing his food first and took a sip of his drink to wash it all down before replying.

“I found nothing. I got all their records, camera footage, everything was in order, and the cyber-doc didn’t seem to be lying either.”

“You sure their clinic or supplier didn’t fiddle with our products?”

“My clinic is around the upper mid tier range. They bring products in the box for the clients to break the seal. The client should’ve noticed if it came with a broken seal.”

“But there’s still the chance they just resealed it. Shouldn’t put it past them, especially when they deal in so much chrome on a regular basis.”

“If that was the case, they would’ve taken out some parts for money. The sample we retrieved wasn’t missing anything. There’s no motive for the doc to randomly fiddle with a product and reseal it.”

“...Corporate sabotage?”

The young man quickly righted himself as he stared impatiently at the elevator doors opening.

Drew could feel his cold sweat dripping down his neck as he thought about how he would’ve been caught if he had just been a few seconds slower.

He didn’t bother to see who arrived and quickly retreated.

Andrew - Halls Corporation

“Are we going back to space so Peng can float around again?”

“No Peng, this is the airport, not the spaceport.” Andrew dryly replied while he looked over his team and the leader of their new mission.

He was going to be the second in command this time, with their former instructor, the tall and muscular woman with a red cyberarm leading them. Her aura had changed since the last time Andrew had seen her, being especially serious right now, but he couldn’t blame her for it either.

They had been briefed about their objective, which was the search and rescue of their instructor’s long-time co.

Andrew could sense the entire team’s hunger for the mission details, but he waited until they boarded their flight to broach the subject.

“Instructor Flo, can you share any intel you may have to help us on our mission?”

The once-always energetic and reliable instructor simply kept her eyes closed as she responded.

“Just her last known locations and who she last associated with. Here, you take a look.”

Andrew received a file with the details and quickly forwarded it to his team members, which was mostly just Brian and Mark, as he knew Peng wouldn’t care either way.

The three quietly discussed among themselves over the flight, all the way up until they got into their rooms in Lion City.

Once they had settled their luggage, they immediately grouped up and prepared to start their search.

“What’s the plan, instructor Flo?” Andrew asked as everyone else’s representative.

“You will all support me in the background. Stay out of sight while I investigate, and just watch for anyone trying to catch me by surprise.”

“...Instructor, it would be much more efficient if we all split off and did our own investigation.”

“No, too much risk for you guys in unfamiliar territory. You’re company loanouts that I don’t plan on damaging.”

“...If you insist...You’re in charge.”

“Yes, I insist. Now tail me from a distance while I go investigate Erza’s hotel room.”

The group then headed for the hotel several streets away. It was business as normal for most of them, as the outer section of Lion City was the only part foreigners had access to and was practically identical to many metropolises around the world.

Andrew could only watch as his team leader charged boldly into the lobby of the mid-tier hotel. He and his team struggled to keep up while in stealth, being mindful not to bump into anyone on the way.

They caught up just in time to see everyone in the lobby of the hotel staring cautiously at the intimidating woman who boldly strode forward toward reception.

I’m so glad we had taken the time to think it out and had the foresight to book a hotel that’s a small distance away because we could foresee what was about to go down...