In the office, as Sun Jack opened his mouth, the two sides quieted down, glaring at each other with hatred in their eyes.
Sun Jack understood that their willingness to accept his mediation meant neither side wanted to escalate further—after all, they weren't just playing a deadly game with each other.
Now, it was merely a standoff in terms of momentum; they needed an out, and he was that out.
Sun Jack glanced at the information from the Think Tank and began to improvise. "Since everyone is here, how about we show some sincerity? Since we're negotiating, shouldn't we temporarily cease fire?"
Swiftly, under Sun Jack's mediation, both sides agreed not to use nuclear weapons without limit anymore. They would use a maximum of five nuclear weapons per day, each up to 10 million in yield, and any use of weapons that could affect Earth's topography and geological features was prohibited.
As DNA was entered into the virtual document by all three parties, the atmosphere finally eased a bit.
At the very end, after Sun Jack had spoken his last words to both groups, the whole meeting came to a successful close.
"I really hope our next joint meeting will be about re-greening the entire Earth."
As the communication ended, Sun Jack rubbed his aching head. In the past, dealing with the FFP was all that had been necessary, but now, after the victory, there were even more issues to deal with, and he found these trivial matters no easier than dealing with the FFP.
"Is this agreement useful?" Tapai asked. "I feel it can't really restrain them; once they get fired up, it's just a piece of waste paper."
"We'll use it for now; at least with it, we have a reason to enter the fray. It gives them something to fear, considering our current scale. We're not a soft target that can be crushed easily."
However, Sun Jack sincerely hoped this day would never come. If it truly did, it would mean these two groups were playing a bigger game.
"The Think Tank has already planned our entrance strategy and various contingency plans. We either don't make a move, or we solve it completely in one fell swoop."
Just as Sun Jack had lit a cigarette and was about to relax, he suddenly saw the door to his office open. Si Ai walked in from outside.
Seeing that familiar face, Sun Jack was slightly startled, feeling as if worlds apart.
Si Ai smiled as she walked towards Sun Jack. She came up to his desk, opened her mouth to say something, but in the next second, Tapai swiftly raised his hand, transforming it into a smart machine gun and pulling the trigger at Si Ai's head.
The gunfire burst out loudly, and with a forceful motion, Si Ai raised an energy shield in one hand, blocking the bullets.
But in the very next second, with a burst of sparks exploding from her neural socket, and with her nervous system compromised, the energy shield failed, allowing bullets to instantly pierce her body.
"What are you doing!" Sun Jack waved his hand fiercely, throwing Tapai's weapon aside and hurried toward Si Ai, who had fallen injured.
"She's not Si Ai," Tapai's words stopped Sun Jack in his tracks.
The artificial eye immediately began a scanning function. The face mask was fine; this was Si Ai's face, but the DNA was different. This wasn't Si Ai's DNA, but that of a complete stranger.
"Who are you? Who sent you to kill me?" Sun Jack's face turned cold instantly, and many conspiracies flooded his mind.
Then he saw Si Ai lying in a pool of blood, forcefully lifting her face mask, revealing a tear-stained face filled with sorrow and anger. "The man who killed my brother isn't him!"
"Huh?" A question mark popped up in Sun Jack's mind. He didn't recognize the woman in front of him, nor did he know her brother.
"Are you... sure you haven't got the wrong person?" Sun Jack began to suspect that the other party was suffering from cyberpsychosis.
However, the woman shook her head vigorously, her voice trembling as she said, "I'm looking for you! Sun Jack! My brother was godthing! He was killed by your people!! He wasn't killed by a criminal out for revenge!"
Hearing this, Sun Jack's pupils shrank instantly as he recalled the dead body from a while ago.
"Didn't you say they found the person who killed him?" Sun Jack looked at Tapai, puzzled.
"Yeah, that's what BCPD said," Tapai responded, appearing quite calm.
Sun Jack stood there for a while, thinking deeply. After a moment, under his control, medical nanoworms hidden inside the walls slid down, enveloping Nina and quickly healing her body.
"Don't rush; take your time to explain," Sun Jack said while he sent his clone to verify everything she was telling him.
"My brother was a BCPD detective, and he was a fan of yours. He believed every brainwashing word you said! He even thought that Metropolis now is the Utopia you created! Bullshit! It's not true at all!" Nina collapsed on the ground, crying out in despair.
"What exactly happened to your brother?" Sun Jack's eyebrows were tightly furrowed at this point.
"They say dog died a heroic death in the pursuit of a criminal, a hero of Metropolis, but that's impossible. He was wearing Battle Armor he picked up from you, using the Combat Prosthesis from you. How could any criminal kill him with such powerful gear?"
"Even if he was overpowered, couldn't he even call for back-up? Are all those drones flying around just for show?"
Nina sobbed and wiped her tears, continuing, "I want the law enforcement recording video. They won't give it, saying it was damaged during combat, but DOG told me before that the recording software uploads immediately. I knew something was definitely wrong."
"He went to ask dog's colleagues, but they told me to stop looking into it, saying the other party is too powerful and it would get people killed."
"Too powerful? Are they bigger than me?" Sun Jack directly accessed the highest authority of BCPD's main system to find dog's law enforcement recording video, but the result showed it was already canceled.
Seeing this, Sun Jack couldn't help but laugh with anger. "This is fucking interesting."
He logged onto Sun Jack's network and contacted the Clone Sun Jack inside BCPD. "Sort this out, I want the full story!"
Four hours later that afternoon, Sun Jack announced an emergency meeting of the Federation's top officials, specifying that attendees appear in person, no holographic projections allowed.
At the round conference table, Old Six, Abu, King Kong, Linda Linda, AA, the Priest, and others who had accompanied Sun Jack all along were now discussing what all this commotion was about.
Suddenly, drones flew in, placing a bowl of beef noodles in front of everyone, and Sun Jack walked in with them.
Sun Jack sat at the head of the table and swept his gaze over everyone. "I invited everyone here for noodles today."
Saying so, he started eating first. Others, a bit confused, also began to eat once they saw Sun Jack had started.
The noodles were beef noodles, though the beef was rather scarce; clearly, some people were somewhat displeased, and Sun Jack noted each of their expressions.