"David, did you really have nothing to do with the sudden firing of that long-range sniper cannon?" Maron asked David solemnly on the way back, after switching on the autopilot mode of the car.
"Maron, you were standing next to me the whole time. How could you not know if I had done it?" David retorted as he crossed his arms.
"I know that, it's just so coincidental!" Maron exclaimed as he shook his head.
"I also think it's too coincidental!" David chuckled.
"David, you didn't hack the city defense system to activate that long-range sniper cannon, did you?" Maron asked again, suddenly getting the idea.
He knew that David had a good foundation in electronics, and he had also seen the medium-sized server that had been delivered to him by Leeson Security. That was a professional server, one that ordinary people could not play with.
"That's a military city defense system, not the civilian-use security system that I have in my residence, which can be hacked into by a few mercenaries," David said helplessly as he looked at Maron.
At this moment, Maron received a prompt on his identity bracelet. He switched on his identity bracelet, dumbfounded when he saw the information on it.
"David, things have gone out of hand! The long-range sniper cannon seemed to have shot Mr. Strat!" Maron exclaimed, his mouth wide open as he looked at David. Then, he was suddenly reminded of something.
"Maron, how is Mr. Strat?" David asked, pretending to be shocked.
Seeing David's behavior, Maron gave it some thought and concluded that although David's relationship with Mr. Strat was extremely awkward, he would have to be extremely psychologically abnormal to kill Mr. Strat just for that.
After interacting with David, Maron felt that he was not mentally unsound. Instead, David was very easy to get along with, and despite being a genius, he was not arrogant at all.
In the beginning, Maron only started getting close to David because he wanted to be mentored by Galen. However, after spending time with David, he thought that having a friend like David was worth it.
In fact, even his father, Mayor Bernard, thought the same. Investing in a genius was something many people chose to do.
How could they have managed to contact the military and go on a tour around the city walls so smoothly without Mayor Bernard's involvement?
"Mr. Strat is dead!" Maron exclaimed. He had also lost the desire to pursue the matter, instead deciding to go back and ask his father how things were going to develop. At the end of the day, he and David were both present at the scene and it would more or less implicate them both.
The two of them remained silent and Maron left in a hurry after dropping David off at his house.
David watched Maron's car leave apologetically and thought to himself that he should make it up to Myron when he could.
Upon returning home, he headed straight to the security. However, this time, he did not enter the virtual world and instead logged into the optical computer of Strat Hotel.
When he heard the conversation between Mr. Strat and Jeremy long ago, David had already noticed that the company they mentioned during the conversation was being run under an anonymous identity.
He found the small, unassuming company in the security optical computer. It was named Mountain-River Investments Firm, and its corporate entity was a code generated by special authentication software.
Such an anonymous business was unique to the Star Federation. Anonymity was meant to conceal one's actions.
An anonymous corporation could only be anonymous when it was not in business. Once the anonymous corporation began to generate profit, there would definitely have to be a legal owner.
For instance, Mr. Strat had purchased the Central Hotel and West City Hotel under the name of the anonymous company. It was presumed that the owners of the two hotels were caught off guard because they did not expect anyone to acquire their hotels.
A hotel in a small city may be considered large to ordinary people but to those who were truly wealthy, or to large companies, it would be of no benefit to their interests.
The organization had merely invested credit points into Mr. Strat because they wanted to increase his influence. Only then did Mr. Strat have the financial resources to complete the plan.
David transferred the hidden authentication software to his own medium-sized server and the Mountain-River Investments Firm became his private property.
When the dividends were paid by the hotel in July, there would at least be no requirement for Mountain-River Investments Firm to appoint a natural legal entity.
When David was investigating Mountain-River Investments Firm, he discovered that the company still had 40 million credit points and a designated use for them. They also had regular acquisitions of the shares of Central Hotel and West City Hotel.
Of course, David would not use his credit points in that manner. He did not need any control and authority in either hotel. He was planning on selling those 40% of shares from each hotel if it didn't attract too much attention.
He canceled the regular acquisition and the 40 million credit points were transferred to his anonymous account at Arca Bank.
That caused Mountain-River Investments Firm to become an empty shell. He also held a 40% stake in each of the two hotels, Central Hotel and West Side hotels.
By July, he would have finished his college entrance examination and would be able to leave Pelan City for Nam City at any time. By then, he would have no problem with selling his shares casually or becoming a corporate entity in his own name.
Most importantly, as his cultivation progressed, he would need more and more resources.
These days, the Level 1 Strengthened meat that he had been consuming was left behind by Maron, but it would at most support him until he reached a strength of 1,000 kilograms. He wouldn't have any Level 1 strengthened meat to consume in the future after that.
He also wanted to purchase some Level 1 strengthened meat, but it wasn't something that could be purchased with money. It would be no problem at all to purchase some at once, but in order to have a steady supply for a long period of time, he would have to have a regular supply channel.
Level 1 strengthened meat was obtained by killing Class 1 Bugs. The hunting speed of Class 1 Bugs conducted by civilian armorers was not fast enough, and most of the Level 1 strengthened meat would still be transported to their respective channels to be sold to larger cities.
The amount of Level 1 strengthened meat that could remain in Pelan City was extremely limited, so much that there was no way for someone of David's level to purchase it.
He also didn't want to continuously ask Maron for help. If he used too many favors, it would affect their friendship.
David put aside the matter regarding the Level 1 strengthened meat and once again logged into the security optical computer in Strat Hotel, removing all traces of himself from the security optical computer and restoring it to its original state. He removed the account he had used too.
At last, he installed a mini program in the security optical computer and logged out of it.
After he left the optical computer, the mini program began running automatically to erase all traces of him, before destroying itself.
With that done, there was no trace of David's presence at any point in the security optical computer of Strat Hotel, unless someone knew of David's existence and hired a senior expert in that field. If they were to do that, they might be able to find some trace, but that was very unlikely.
——————————
"Galen, what did you teach David?" Hans asked, looking at the figure displayed on his identity bracelet while he was in one of the offices of the Law Department.
"Hans, that son of yours is a genius. Actually, it's not right to call him a genius. He should be a prodigy. You're delaying his future!" Galen complained with extreme dissatisfaction.
"Galen, it doesn't matter if David is a genius or not, something happened over here, and David is involved. So, I just wanted to ask if you had taught David some other abilities," Hans stated calmly. He had heard Galen praise David a long time ago. He did not believe that David was a genius because he knew better than anyone else what his own child was like. Hence, he just wanted to ask about things that he was more concerned about.
Although his relationship with David had been hostile over the years, he did not show David much concern. He managed to find out a lot about David through Emma the robot butler.
"What happened?" Galen frantically asked after hearing that something was wrong.
"Mr. Strat has been killed by a long-range sniper cannon and when it happened, David was on the wall where the long-range sniper cannon was," Hans said in a sullen voice.
"Mr. Strat is Bersha's father. Is he the guy you suspected of going against David?" Galen asked in shock.
Of course, he knew who Mr. Strat was. In fact, Hans was not the only one who had wondered if Mr. Strat had been involved in the operation against David, having received detailed information about David.
The reason was simple. Amos, the head of security at the Strat Hotel, had showed up outside David's residence. According to investigations afterward, the position found in Amos' identity bracelet showed that he had been standing guard outside David's residence for several days.
It would be impossible for Amos to be protecting David. There was no reason for Mr. Strat to protect David. Besides, how could Mr. Strat have known that David was in danger?