Chapter 494 Erik's First Time
Public simulation, press briefing room.
The imperial police agency press conference was scheduled for 3PM, and everyone that'd been invited to attend had arrived five minutes early. Considering they had only been given seventeen minutes of lead time-or eight and a half minutes, real time-it was impressive that not a single person was missing from the list. The debut release of this chapter happened at Ñøv€l-B1n.
Precisely as the clock ticked over to three, Erik materialized behind the podium, attracting the attention of the audience, all of whom were curious as to just who he was.
He didn't waste any time, much to the audience's satisfaction, but immediately began speaking. "Good day, ladies and gentlemen of the press and everyone watching from the comfort of their own homes. My name is Erik Schneider, and about two and a half hours ago, Earth time, I was appointed as the head of the imperial police agency." Though he was speaking in his native German, thanks to the magic of imperial technology and virtual reality, everyone listening heard, and saw, him speaking fluently in their own language.
His self-introduction, along with the brief time he had been in office, caused a commotion in the briefing room. Nobody had been informed of the vacant positions in the government agencies being filled yet, as Aron had wanted to wait until the first round of genetic enhancements and implants had been completed before informing the public.
"As I said at the beginning of my prepared remarks, I will not be taking questions on the subject of imperial appointments. The decision lays in the hands of the emperor. Next question... you in the yellow dress."
"What measures have been taken to ensure that supervillains can't escape their prison to inflict further harm on normal civilians?" the second reporter asked.
"Excellent question. Without going into specifics, I can tell you that The Hole has taken appropriate measures to ensure civilian safety. It is in a remote, classified location and out of reach of the majority of people without very specialized transport vessels. Vessels, I might add, that are held securely under imperial control. As far as jailbreaks are concerned, don't worry, this isn't a comic book or movie. Escaping The Hole isn't a simple task and its location alone virtually guarantees that escapes will fail, even if the blessed in the facility use their superpowers to aid in the attempt. Beyond that, there are multiple layers of security both inside and outside The Hole.
"Currently, the empire maintains a monopoly on violence, so anyone that attempts to escape from The Hole will very quickly learn what that means. Next question." He pointed at a man in a dark gray suit with a striped blue and silver tie.
"Will the imperial police agency increase the security level in their jurisdictions to prevent such crimes from happening again?" the man asked.
"Security levels will absolutely be increased. Sadly, we cannot guarantee that we can prevent all crime, but we will ensure an extremely rapid and overwhelming response when crimes are reported. Especially by the blessed...."
Questions continued coming one after the next, until Erik had answered all of them and the questions began repeating themselves with different wording. Once he was sure that all of the relevant questions had been answered, he called an official end to the press conference.
The media interns responsible for monitoring the Akashic Record had long since seen the result of the investigation and the recording of the events during the robbery, as gruesome as it was. The only question that was left unanswered for those who had seen that security camera footage was where the bullet came from. All the video showed was a bullet passing through the walls of the vault and dismembering and disemboweling Kim So Hong before disappearing through the wall on the opposite side. They were also curious about the NETS head bag, but the Akashic Record informed them that any information on that device was classified and not available for their level of security clearance.