Chapter 110: Chapter 91: The Unfathomable Human Heart
Across the ocean in Magong Town.
The morning sun painted the clouds red.
Early this morning, during his jog through Nanhu Village, Jiang Miao had his headphones on. He listened to the final, desperate screams of Edward and his men just before their helicopter went down, a cold smirk on his face.
’You really can’t trust airplanes, can you!’
’I hope our dear Mr. David sleeps well tonight!’
After his run, he went home and took a shower.
When he arrived at the employee cafeteria in the research wing, Shuya was already eating. She looked up and asked with concern, "You slept in an hour today. Stop staying up so late; it’s bad for you."
"Yes, ma’am."
"Don’t be a smartass." Shuya rolled her eyes at him and picked up a piece of broccoli.
"I know, I know. A healthy balance of work and rest. I’m planning to take a few days off to relax soon," Jiang Miao said with a smile, then picked up a bottle of sparkling water and took a sip.
BURP...
Shuya nodded. "That’s true. Once I finish my research on the white block fungus, I also plan to take a few days off to unwind."
Jiang Miao, for his part, had a wonderful night’s sleep.
Meanwhile, the hale and hearty David was plagued by nightmares all night.
「At Locke Manor in Orange County, Los Angeles.」
David A. Locke woke to the harsh glare of sunlight from his window. He rubbed his bleary eyes, his gaze slowly focusing on the alarm clock beside him. It was already 10:37 a.m., almost two hours later than he usually woke up.
He had not slept well.
The sudden "accidents" involving both Li Rongyao, the General Manager for the Greater China Region, and Edward, the President of Baisan Investment, had left him terrified. It felt as if some powerful force was now targeting him.
Last night, after much deliberation, he had called a few "old friends" to sound them out, but he hadn’t detected anything unusual.
In truth, among top-tier players like them, the great financial clans had, over centuries of conflict and fusion, established a set of unwritten rules. Direct methods like assassination had been forbidden long ago.
After all, assassination could easily escalate a conflict. Once it started, it was hard to stop. Even if you succeeded in wiping out a rival family, their dying counterattack would be devastating. More often than not, it would end in mutual destruction.
That was hardly a desirable outcome.
Because in the wake of mutual destruction, the other families would surely not pass up the golden opportunity to kick them while they were down.
David had spent half the night pondering this. The only ones who would dare use such tactics, who would ignore the unwritten rules, were either one of the few new upstarts to rise in North America recently, or an external power.
The thought made David furious, but also deeply afraid.
Whether someone was orchestrating this from the shadows or these were just pure accidents, he had to find out the truth. Otherwise, he wouldn’t be able to sleep, and he felt like he was becoming a nervous wreck.
Just then, the phone on the bedside table rang.
He picked it up and saw it was just a reminder he’d set the day before. He swiped the notification away and pressed the call bell on the nightstand.
A moment later, the butler entered with several maids.
"Sir, you’re awake? Breakfast is ready."
"I know. Is the motorcade arranged?"
"It is, sir. The vehicles have all been inspected. I can assure you there will be absolutely no problems," the butler promised emphatically.
The maids helped David get ready, and then he ate a hurried breakfast.
In the ground-floor dining room, two of the three large dogs remained—the third, a golden retriever, had just been delivered the previous night. Seeing David in such a rush, they secretly breathed a sigh of relief. It looked like the morning’s routine feeding was canceled.
「In the parking lot on the manor’s east side.」
Three Maybach S-Classes, four Audi Q8 SUVs, and a security team of more than twenty men.
After David got into his car, the motorcade departed.
Two SUVs took the lead.
The three Maybachs followed in the middle, with a gap of over a hundred meters.
Bringing up the rear were another two SUVs, also maintaining a hundred-meter distance from the cars ahead.
The motorcade moved at a modest pace, maintaining a speed of about 60 kilometers per hour as it traveled along Interstate 5 from Orange County toward Los Angeles County.
Soon, the convoy passed through downtown Los Angeles without stopping. The Baisan Investment headquarters was on Temino Island, which required them to cross the Vincent Thomas Bridge.
After a glance at the ocean outside his window, David closed his eyes to rest.
The convoy reached the entrance to the bridge and proceeded onto it vehicle by vehicle.
As they reached the middle of the bridge, a song suddenly started playing in the quiet car:
Everybody dies
Surprise, surprise
We tell each other lies
Sometimes we try
To make it feel like
We might be right
We might not be alone
Be alone
The Caucasian driver in the front seat broke into a cold sweat. "Sorry," he stammered, "I didn’t turn on the music..."
In the back seat, David’s expression darkened.
The head of security in the passenger seat snapped, "Turn it off!"
’Damn this car,’ the driver cursed internally. ’The music player turned on by itself. This is going to get me killed.’
But the song continued to fill the car, grating on everyone’s nerves.
Everybody dies
That’s what they say
And maybe in a couple hundred years
They’ll find another way
I just wonder why you’d wanna stay
...
Just as David, unable to suppress his fury, was about to order a change of vehicles—
