92: Overt strategy

Inside a certain military region in America.

A tall, burly middle-aged man in a dark green military uniform sat in an office chair, handling documents with a cigar clamped between his teeth. After a couple of puffs, a knock sounded on his office door.

"Thump! Thump!"

"Enter!"

The man in uniform didn't look up, engrossed in the documents before him.

A young Soldier in a light white-green military uniform entered the office, saluted the middle-aged man, and respectfully said,

"Colonel, we just received news from the communications department. The War God Squad dispatched to China has been completely wiped out."

The middle-aged Colonel looked up, raising an eyebrow, and asked with some curiosity,

"They were a War God Level squad. How long has it been since they left, and they're already completely wiped out?"

"Yes, Colonel!"

The young Soldier stood ramrod straight, his face expressionless, and replied solemnly.

"Heh, how interesting."

"Alright, I understand. You may go now."

The middle-aged man waved his hand. The young officer understood, saluted again, and left directly, closing the door behind him.

The middle-aged man put the cigar back in his mouth, took two more puffs, and slowly exhaled.

After a moment of thought, the middle-aged man picked up the landline phone nearby and dialed a number.

"Hello?"

"Hello, George, this is Colonel Tony. The matter you entrusted to me before has been resolved."

There was a pause on the other end of the line, then George's voice came through.

"Jack's squad has already..."

"Hahaha, that's right!"

The middle-aged man laughed in response.

"It's finally resolved. It's a pity, but who told them to offend that person..."

"We really have to thank China's recruitment policy; otherwise, we wouldn't have known how to resolve this for a while."

The voice on the other end of the phone said,

"China has always prioritized territorial integrity, and remote areas are no exception."

"However, no matter which country they're from, most free Martial Artists prefer to go to big cities to kill monsters because the rewards are higher there. Naturally, no one is willing to go to remote areas to deal with them."

"As for their military's own Martial Artists, each of them is treated like a treasure. How could they bear to send them to remote areas with low returns, slow support, and high mortality rates to deal with monsters?"

The middle-aged man said,

"They want to reclaim lost territory but don't want their own Martial Artists to suffer heavy losses, so they can only turn to the international community and recruit foreign Martial Artists."

"But mainly, it's because their population base is large, and there aren't enough cities for humans to live in. It's impossible for them to have ample living space like us in America."

The voice on the other end chatted idly.

"Sigh, it's just a shame about China's introduction fees. In the end, it didn't generate any profit for us, and we also lost a War God Level squad for nothing."

The middle-aged man sighed and said,

"Who told that Jack to get involved with the son of that big shot? People from the 'Empire where the sun never sets' really like that male-male thing; it's hard to comment."

"However, regarding profit, we should be able to demand compensation from China. After all, they were a War God Level squad from our America. It's simply unacceptable for them to die for nothing."

The voice on the other end pondered and replied,

"How about it? Do you have a good plan? China knows quite a bit about their background and knows they were death row inmates. It won't be easy to demand compensation."

The middle-aged man became interested and asked curiously.

"What's so difficult about that? We'll just use an open conspiracy against them."

"So what if they were death row inmates? We'll just say it was a wrongful conviction, posthumously award them medals of honor, and declare them rare talents of our America. Wouldn't that give us a legitimate reason to demand compensation from them?"

"Haven't I handled fewer matters like this?"

The voice on the other end suggested cheerfully.

"Hey, I almost forgot about that. You really are a talent, you son of a gun."

"Alright, I'll proceed with your method now. Let's quickly extract the compensation from China. A War God Level squad can create immeasurable value, so this compensation cannot be small."

The middle-aged man slapped his thigh, laughing heartily.

"They originally belonged to your unit. When the compensation arrives, don't forget about me."

The voice on the other end also perked up, its tone cunning and sly.

"You certainly won't be forgotten. Happy cooperation."

...China, inside the Capital Military Region.

"Didn't they go to County 0203? How did they still lose their lives?"

Also in an office, the officer frowned after receiving his secretary's report.

"Didn't we thoroughly investigate their backgrounds, fearing extortion for compensation from America, which is why we sent them to the less dangerous County 0203?"

The officer rubbed his forehead, speaking with a headache.

There weren't many Beast General Rank Monsters in County 0203, and Lord Level Monsters didn't exceed three.

Therefore, it was an unpopular area in the Martial Artist circle, with few people going there. Only the military would usually send internal Martial Artists to deliberately control the number of Advanced monsters.

"They were a War God Level squad; how could they be completely wiped out? Isn't this a huge joke? It's like a university graduate doing high school problems; it's simply a dimensionality reduction attack. How could a university graduate not know high school problems?"

The officer tapped his finger on the desk, asking his secretary.

The secretary awkwardly scratched his head. He was a proper military academy university student, and he had indeed forgotten most of his high school knowledge.

"I... I can do them."

The secretary nodded awkwardly, afraid his superior would conduct a pop quiz on his high school knowledge.

"There must be some special reason for this. Have the military regions near County 0203 discovered anything unusual?"

The officer asked, frowning.

"Reporting, sir, according to the backend data records, some time ago, the military region near County 0203 discovered an anomaly and submitted an investigation request to the North Military Region of Jiangnan Base City."

The secretary had anticipated his superior's question and immediately took out the report, flipped to the corresponding page, and replied.

"What does the report say? Is there a follow-up investigation report?"

The officer had only asked casually, but upon hearing the secretary's reply, he immediately became interested and quickly asked.

"Reporting, sir, according to the investigation report provided by the North Military Region of Jiangnan Base City, they discovered a new type of genetically mutated fungus there, and it has already formed a certain scale."

The secretary summarized the contents of the report.

"A new type of genetically mutated fungus? I remember fungus should be mushrooms, right? What's there to investigate about that, and it's formed a scale? How large of a scale could it form?"

The officer clearly wasn't very knowledgeable about fungi and didn't pay much attention.

"According to the investigation report, when they were investigating, they found that the scale of this fungus had even reached the size of a residential building. Based on their judgment, the Mycelium it had spread might even be as large as several football fields."