NOVPUB"Today, I have only one question for you," 𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑝𝘶𝘣.𝑐𝘰𝘮
In the Elder Council's meeting room, several elders who had received the message were waiting early by the round table.
As Bai E entered, the elder seated at the head of the table spoke first.
"Hmm," Bai E nodded his head, signaling that he was listening.
"Starting now, with the full support of the city, how long do you need to eradicate the hive in the Black Rock District?"
Bai E's expression paused, displaying evident surprise.
Faced with such an outrageous message, it was only natural for him to show astonishment.
In fact, he certainly hadn't expected that the reason the Elder Council had called him was precisely for this matter.
Full support from the city?
Are they not planning on living a normal life anymore?
So even if they had to give up a fair amount of the stability of people's lives within the city, they wanted to ensure his ability to wipe out the hive in the Black Rock District?
Had this become the highest priority for Blackwater City right now?
Seemingly unaware of the full implications of "full support," another elder sitting to the left of the senior elder spoke slowly, "For this eradication, we can produce artificial human soldiers to the greatest extent and mobilize for conscription throughout the city on a large scale. Even on the very day of battle against the hive, all mech pilots from the Mechanical Court and high-ranking spiritual energy users from the research center can be at your disposal. We just need one answer from you... At the fastest, how long?"
Bai E's eyes flickered slightly as his brain rapidly processed the information.
To eradicate the hive with all his might... The imperial capital's messenger had requested unity...
Despite the Elder Council not explicitly stating the connection between the two, there was clearly an absolute link.
There are only two goals in war: to obtain resources or to display strength.
Eradicating the hive would undoubtedly secure a vast expanse of free land resources, allowing for significant freedom in the city's future development—but that's in the long run.
If they were to pursue this at all costs right now, then there was only one objective—displaying strength!
Towards whom?
Without a doubt.
The messenger from the imperial capital.
They intended to negotiate with the messenger from the imperial capital using the strength of the city!
If it were a confrontation, there would be nothing to negotiate.
In other words, the upper echelons of Blackwater City already had a rough plan in mind, and there was a high probability... that it involved unification.
But they wanted to obtain more say and initiative in this union.
So, they needed an absolute victory to declare their strength.
In fact, unification was also the direction that Bai E favored.
The strength of one city is always limited, and humanity was once great because it utilized collective power to the utmost.
Now, an opportunity to integrate the strength of all humanity was within reach, and Bai E did not want to let it go.
Thinking this, Bai E made his decision, "Five days."
"Five days?!" Bai E's answer was clearly beyond what the elders had expected.
"Five days?" one of the elders asked with a flicker in his eyes, "Are you sure?"
"Do you understand the significance of this battle? We're demanding a certain victory, an eradication, not a retreat if we can't overcome them as in the past. Do you have the confidence?"
Bai E nodded expressionlessly, "Five days is enough."
His confidence in eradicating the hive had formed after returning from his last mission.
As long as he wished, after he completed the beheading, what was needed were countless soldiers to clean up the aftermath.
In fact, as long as the bugs didn't flee and he had enough time, the current hive... was no longer an insurmountable enemy even if he were alone.
The only reason he had waited until now to act was that he needed time to develop.
After all, with the military's routine cleansing around it, the hive no longer posed the threat to the city it once had.
And once the hive was gone, the city might very well cut back on its support for the military.
At the moment, it wasn't much different from the ideal time Bai E had in mind for action, and he was already prepared to make his move.
Even in the larger context of global change, the city was unlikely to cut back on military resources, and they could take this opportunity to strengthen the existing soldiers. What better opportunity could there be?
Five days was merely the time needed to ensure the latest batch of artificial human soldiers were born and undergone basic training.
His acquaintance with Helen provided Bai E with insight into the production schedule of the newly created artificial human soldiers.
"Good! Five days it is," the senior elder said expressionlessly. "Put it down in a military order. If the hive is not eradicated in five days, you die. Within these five days, all resources of the city are at your unconditional disposal!"
"...Alright!"
Upon returning to the military camp, the first thing Bai E did was to notify Helen to dispatch staff from the Scientific Research Institute to conduct a comprehensive health check-up for all soldiers in the entire camp.
Everyone who qualified for the Gene Optimization Solution, regardless of whether their military achievements met the standard, would be injected!
Since he had been given resources by the higher-ups, he was going to make good use of them.
The production of the Gene Optimization Solution in the city wasn't vast, but it was certainly not meager.
In the past, the city had been reluctant to distribute such precious resources, which were only for the elite, to the cannon fodder who could die at any moment.
A high threshold was set merely to give more soldiers something to look forward to.
Now with resources freed up, Bai E didn't care about who was or wasn't cannon fodder.
In his view, there were no naturals.
The rule that mass casualties must occur in a large battle should be broken starting with him!
"Next..."
It was time for his second dose of the Gene Optimization Solution.
[As a result of feedback from commissions, your physical fitness has increased by +1.7, reflex by +2.3, and insight by +2.0.]
Under the tireless efforts of players who were either reborn or advanced, his own attributes were growing rapidly.
Physical fitness had the smallest increase not because of slow growth in players.
But because physical fitness had reached its limit.
[Physical Fitness]: 24/24
[Insight]: 20.6/24
[Reflex]: 23/24
These were Bai E's current base attributes.
One maxed out and two nearly maxed out, he was already close to the injection standards set by the Scientific Research Institute.
More meticulous physical condition checks, requiring in-depth core examinations, would be needed to make further judgments.
Helen, being far away at the Intelligent Mechanism Base and busy with the production of new weapon systems at a critical time, couldn't afford to waste so much time going back and forth. So she contacted another trusted institute member to both inject Bai E with his second dose of the Gene Optimization Solution and oversee the first genetic optimization of all the soldiers in the camp who met the criteria.
Five days with all resources provided unconditionally.
Requests from Bai E himself were met at the first instance.
Less than half an hour after Bai E made contact, a tall man with golden facial hair wearing a white lab coat arrived at the military camp.
