"I can't believe you were attacked."
Lily Ling shook her head in disbelief. It was the next day, and after the soldiers arrived in their tonner truck to help William and I move everything from the warehouse to the military base camp, the heiress to the Ling Conglomerate suddenly showed up in our new office.
"I've activated the Ling family's resources to help find out who the culprits are…and right now, all leads point toward the Han Industries." Lily scowled. "Not only that, we find Benjamin Bo's fingerprints all over the place…not the attack, but outright illegal boycotting and other insidious techniques designed to starve you of business."
"Yeah, because of him, we weren't able to find an alternative place to rent." William shook his head angrily. "But I didn't think he would stoop so low as to block electronic suppliers from selling anything to us."
"Fortunately, that's where I come in." Lily pushed a contract toward us. "My Ling Electronics subsidiary will be your exclusive supplier. Even Benjamin Bo and his Bo Corporation will not dare to go against us. We'll offer you protection."
"Thanks. I really appreciate it." I bowed my head gratefully. Lily giggled and waved my thanks away.
"It's only natural. We're helping each other out. The military offers lucrative contracts, and through you, my Ling Conglomerate will also stand to benefit."
"Of course."
I didn't hold it against Lily. Her motive was to make money, after all. We were running multi-million (or multi-billion when it came to the Ling family) businesses, not a charity. Emotions and personal relationships had no place in capitalism. Everyone was to be exploited.
Well, that was a cynical way of looking at it. But the trick was to offer enough benefits to make the exploitation worthwhile. Only then would people be willing to work for you. No one was stupid enough to work for free.
"I know you're protected by the military for now, but you still have to be careful." Lily gave me a stern look. "There are people out there who are so desperate to prevent you from succeeding that they would even resort to murder."
"Yeah…they have a lot of money to waste if they decided to hire a bunch of mercenaries and equip them with top-of-the-line Han Industries weapons and armor." I nodded, my voice dripping with sarcasm. Lily sighed and leaned closer, dropping her voice to a whisper.
"It gets worse. You know those Han Industries weapons and armor that the military confiscated after they helped you wipe out the mercenaries? They are private weapons developed by the Han Industries that have not been released for public sale. In other words, whoever issued them has to be linked with someone high up the Han Industries hierarchy."
"Justin Han," William muttered sourly. Lily nodded.
"There is a strong possibility that he or his family is behind this. But we don't have evidence. And they already issued a statement to cover up, saying that their private arsenal had been broken into and their weapons stolen."
"Funny how they announce that after the raid last night, eh?" I said with a sneer.
"That's why they are the most suspicious right now." Lily sighed and placed her hand on mine. "So you should be careful."
"We will do our best," I promised.
*
The next few weeks flew by without much incidents happening. Thanks to the military providing us an office, garage and security, we could work unimpeded. Lily personally oversaw the shipment of materials and components, and I used them to produce a large number of energy shield generators for the military.
Once I fulfilled that, they gave us even more money and more contracts. As long as I steadily produced a continual number of them, they were more than happy to keep paying us.
Lily was right. Military contracts were lucrative and our profits were in the millions, if not venturing into the billions. The patent, in particular, was helping us rake in even more profits.
"We are going to need more people!" William exclaimed to me upon the third month after we arrived in the military base. "We have more money than we can spend, and you should hire technicians and workers to build the energy shield generators for you, so that you can start working on other products or improving the shield generators!"
"But I have been working on other products too," I told him with a grin. Stepping back, I gestured toward my completed Titan. "The beginning of the Iron Knight program!"
"Excellent!" William beamed as he stared up at the Titan. "You're going to pitch that to the military?"
"Yeah." I nodded. "Right now, the main use of my energy shield generators is to erect a barrier over fixed installations. Such as this building, for example, this army base camp. To protect the general's office and quarters from attacks. Also, to set up base camps in the field, the field HQs protected by these force fields."
I then gestured toward the Titan.
"My Titan represents the next step. A mobile weapons platform that is protected by an energy shield. The army can now take the fight to the enemy, all the while being protected by the energy shield."
"That sounds great." William nodded fervently, buying into my sales pitch. "This might just be better than even Justin Han's Astral Exosuit series!"
"I'm hoping so." I checked my smartphone. "We have a demonstration for the military planned sometime next week?"
"Yeah. You're going to present that Titan in the demonstration?"
"Of course."
I swept my gaze over the nine-meter tall bipedal war walker. Its legs were bent backward, almost like bird legs except that they were made entirely out of metal and had servos. A plane-like fuselage jutted out, forming its torso, where a few medium laser cannons were located. The missile racks were resting on its shoulders, filled with smart missiles whose A.I. programs I purchased from Qi Robotics. Maintaining contact with Arthur Qi had paid off.
The arms, though, were new. I had designed a charged particle cannon on the left arm while fitting a massive plasma railgun on the right. My Titan possessed immense firepower sufficient to an entire squadron of tanks. At the same time, it was a lot more durable because of the shield generator I had installed within the fuselage.
"First, I'll have to apply for the patent, as usual." I was nodding to myself and listing the things I needed to do in my head. "Then, if the military does decide to buy the Titan, we can begin to expand our business and hire the personnel required to manufacture these in large quantities.'
"That's exactly what I was talking about!" William nodded. "You can't build all these by yourself. You need an entire chain of factories! In fact, I'm amazed you somehow found the time to build this in the last three months!"
"Actually, my original Titan was already halfway completed before we moved here. I just put all the parts back together and added new stuff. Thanks to Lily, I was able to procure the parts I needed for the Titan's primary armaments."
I glanced at the charged particle cannon and plasma railgun. Without Lily's help, I would never be able to construct these. The plasma railgun, in particular, was a massive version of the modified plasma torch I used to fend off the mercenaries about three months ago.
As long as I had the parts, I could rig something together.
"Oh, and each Titan can be piloted by a single soldier," I added with a flourish. "So you don't need an entire crew to move the thing."
"Huh. Okay."
"The problem is training the soldiers on how to pilot the Titan." I sighed and scratched my head. "I'll have to write an operating manual soon. It wouldn't make sense to sell it if nobody knows how to pilot it, after all."
"You're right." William shook his head, very impressed by my efforts. "If I hadn't known better, I would swear that you have the mech touch!"
"Wrong genre, wrong story," I told him. "This is supposed to be a CEO romance story, not a mech story."
"So where's all the romance?" William asked, winking at me mischievously. "How's your relationship with Ms. Lily Ling developing so far?"
"Ugh."
I had almost forgotten about that. I had been so busy with work these last few months that I hadn't seen Lily much at all. She would take the initiative to visit me in the military camp, but I realized that I had never bothered to reach out to her.
Well, she wasn't interested in me romantically anyway. We were just using each other for mutual benefits. I relied on her to get my company up and running while she used me as a shield against other CEOs who were trying to pursue her.
"Dude…you shouldn't waste this opportunity. Ms. Ling is such a great girl. If you let her go, you'll definitely regret it!"
William reprimanded me fiercely. I resisted the urge to tell him that he knew nothing of our relationship. I couldn't possibly tell him the truth. As much as I trusted William to keep it a secret for me, I felt as if I would be breaching Lily's faith in me.
So I just nodded sheepishly.
At that moment, my smartphone chose to ring. I frowned, but picked up the call anyway. I swiped the screen and brought it to my ear, seeing that the caller was none other than Lily.
"Trevor, have you forgotten that you're supposed to be my boyfriend?" She sounded annoyed. "I know you're busy, but you should at least make some time for me. I can't be the one doing all the pursuing. You should do your part as well."
"Right." I decided not to remind her that our relationship was sort of fake. Then again, I originally planned on teaching her how to behave in a relationship and get her to understand true love existed. Damn it, I completely failed at that because I was too engrossed in my work. "Sorry. Um, so would you like to go out this weekend?"
"Actually, I'm calling you because of this weekend. Keep your itinerary free. The Tan family is holding a ball at Riverview Hotel, and they've invited me. I'll need you to be my partner."
"Okay. This weekend? Saturday?"
"Saturday evening. Come pick me up at…say, 5pm or so. Don't be late!"
"Okay. I'll see you then." Hanging up, I then turned to a grinning William. "Let's knock off early today. We've worked hard for the last few months, so it's time to take a break."
"Sure. Whatever you say, boss. Whatever you say."
I wanted to wipe the smirk off my secretary's face, but I didn't. Reaching into my pocket, I retrieved the keys to my new car.
"But first, we should pay the patent office a visit so that I can file for a patent for my Titan. Let's go."