The First Order

1217 Bargaining chips

Six hours after Luo Lan and company left Stronghold 111, the Qing Consortium suddenly held an extremely high-profile press conference.

Being the center of the Qing Consortium’s authority, a large number of news reporters would naturally be based at Stronghold 111.

Ever since the Wang Consortium unified the Central Plains, the Qing Consortium had not held a press conference in a long time. Everyone really wanted to know the Qing Consortium’s stance on the Wang Consortium, so this press conference was naturally packed.

The invited reporters, photographers, and videographers were allowed to sit in the front row while the uninvited ones were made to wait anxiously outside the door.

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But before the press conference started, the Qing Consortium’s staff admitted the uninvited reporters into the venue as well. This surprised everyone a little.

Under normal circumstances, they would definitely choose reporters they held sway over to attend such an important press conference. But now it seemed the Qing Consortium was more worried there were not enough reporters attending.

Inside the venue, the reporters held their own little notepads and carefully checked whether their recording equipment were working normally. Some photographers and videographers knelt in the foremost row of the venue as they waited for the press conference to begin.

Qing Yi walked up from backstage in his military uniform and looked calmly at the reporters in front of him.

Everyone fell silent immediately.

Qing Yi said in a low voice, “There won’t be a Q&A session scheduled this time. The purpose of holding this press conference is to inform everyone that Mr. Qing Zhen, the current Chairman of the Qing Consortium’s Board, has already headed to the Wang Consortium for a discussion with Mr. Wang Shengzhi.

“The war in the Alliance of Strongholds has been going on for a long time. Mr. Qing Zhen is willing to risk going to the Central Plains to stop the war so that people will no longer have to suffer the hardships of war.

“I hope the Wang Consortium will respect the sincerity of our Qing Consortium and show theirs as well.

“During this period, I, Qing Yi, as the highest-ranking military commander of the Qing Consortium, will temporarily take over all of the Qing Consortium’s affairs.”

Qing Yi’s speech was written by the Qing Consortium’s head speechwriter. There was only one purpose in making such an announcement, and that was to inform everyone about the peace talks.

If the Wang Consortium ended up confining or killing “Qing Zhen” and Luo Lan, the Wang Consortium would have to first face the criticism of the entire world.

The moment this piece of news was released, all the reporters at the press conference went into an uproar. Just as they wanted to ask some questions, Qing Yi left escorted by soldiers.

No one expected Qing Zhen would actually dare to take the initiative to head to the Central Plains to negotiate with Wang Shengzhi.

They could already imagine this would be tomorrow’s headline in all the newspapers.

There was no other more sensational piece of news than this in the entire Alliance of Strongholds.

…

When Qing Zhen regained consciousness, Qing Yi told him about what happened after he passed out. Qing Zhen then immediately called for this press conference.

There was no time to regret that his previous arrangements were not thorough enough, nor did he show any unnecessary emotions. After leaving Stronghold 111, Luo Lan must have departed the Southwest at full speed, and no one would catch up to him.

Therefore, what he could do now was to remedy the situation and add a few more layers of security for Luo Lan.

The coverage in the news media, as well as all of the Alliance of Strongholds’ citizens’ hopes for peace, were the bargaining chips the Qing Consortium currently had.

However, it was still not enough.

After the press conference, Qing Yi was directly escorted back to Ginkgo Manor. The rest of the world started speculating that if “Qing Zhen” got placed under house arrest in the Central Plains, Qing Yi would be the next leader of the Qing Consortium.

No one could have expected that Qing Zhen had actually not left the Qing Consortium at all and was still there.

Qing Yi walked up to Qing Zhen and said softly, “Second Bro, why don’t I take some soldiers to the border and wait there? If Big Bro really gets detained, I’ll attack Stronghold 61 with my men and snatch him back.”

Qing Zhen shook his head. “No, I need you to be the representative to stabilize the situation. You’ve taken over command of the Qing Consortium temporarily. As long as you’re still around, the hope of the Qing Consortium’s people will not collapse for the time being. Moreover, the Wang Consortium is quite unstoppable at this moment. If you leave your home field and head to the Central Plains, you’ll only be making an unnecessary sacrifice.”

Qing Yi could feel that Qing Zhen was extremely calm at this moment.

It was not that Qing Zhen was calm by nature, but that the artificial intelligence was capable of forcing him to be calm.

Qing Zhen sat on the cushion and pondered for very long. It was so long that Qing Yi could seemingly feel the clouds moving across the distant mountain outside the door.

To Qing Zhen, no matter how smart he was, he could never be as flawless in planning as the artificial intelligence. Therefore, all he could do was make up for any imperfections in his plan with time.

He continuously simulated scenarios with all the clues he had but kept getting the feeling that something was missing. It was as though he was facing an insurmountable opponent.

It was not that Qing Zhen was not confident enough, but that the artificial intelligence was simply too powerful.

After a long time, Qing Zhen suddenly sighed and said, “It’s still not safe enough. The other party controls the communication satellites that most newspaper firms use to transmit information. If the AI directly cut off their communications at its source after realizing our purpose, news of our press conference might not get transmitted to the Central Plains and the Northwest, so we still have to do more!”

“How should I handle it then?” Qing Yi asked. Before this, Qing Zhen mentioned the problem with the satellites. Of the nine satellites in the Alliance of Strongholds, the Wang Consortium and the Pyro Company originally controlled one satellite each while the remaining seven belonged to the Qinghe Group.

Now that the Wang Consortium had unified the Central Plains, all the satellites had fallen into their hands. The Qing Consortium had already stopped using all their satellite phones and were even prohibited from switching them on.

This was especially so for the Qing Consortium’s intelligence agents who were planted in the Central Plains.

That was because as long as their satellite phones were on, the Wang Consortium would be able to identify their locations. Intelligence agents who were given satellite phones were usually the higher-ups. If they were completely weeded out, the entire Qing Consortium’s intelligence and field operations would suffer a devastating blow.

“Check with our most trusted newspaper firm to see if they can contact the Central Plains,” Qing Zhen said.

Qing Yi went out to see how things were. Just as Qing Zhen had predicted, the communications channel between the Southwest and the rest of the world had been cut off by the artificial intelligence.

All the satellite phones had lost their signal.

The artificial intelligence’s move was more ruthless and resolute than they had expected. It seemed intent on getting rid of all the bargaining chips held by the Qing Consortium.

By doing so, the people in the Central Plains would not find out that “Qing Zhen” and Luo Lan were headed to the Wang Consortium to negotiate peace, much less those who lived in the Northwest.

“Get ten trustworthy soldiers and send them on different routes to the Northwest’s Stronghold 144 to look for Ren Xiaosu.” Qing Zhen said.

Qing Yi was stunned. “Why are we looking for him?”

Qing Zhen explained, “Other than you, me, and Zhou Qi, there’s only two others in the world willing to risk their life for my brother. One of them is Tang Zhou, my brother’s adjutant, and the other is Ren Xiaosu.”

Qing Yi thought for a moment before asking, “Second Bro, you think that as long as Ren Xiaosu receives the news, he’ll definitely head to the Central Plains?”

“Yes.” Qing Zhen nodded. “Moreover, there aren’t many supernatural beings who can save Luo Lan from the Wang Consortium. With the current strength of the Wang Consortium and the AI, supernatural beings will also have to submit to that war machine. But if anyone can really snatch someone away from the Wang Consortium, Ren Xiaosu is definitely one of them.”

“Will that make the plan safe enough?” Qing Yi asked.

Qing Zhen still shook his head and said with a sigh, “Perhaps Zero will also think of this possibility. Let’s see if the news can be delivered to Ren Xiaosu first.”