161 Bandit's Logic

Everyone but Ace who was busy writing his note to Aida looked towards him curiously.

Light continued, "We already know that the base leader's ability is hypnotism and it's likely that he has hypnotized many people in order to get to where he is. Unfortunately for him, he had to meet me, his antithesis. With me using my empathic abilities, I can reawaken the people who have been controlled."

"No one likes getting controlled so they are sure to be outraged. We can use this to our advantage. If we can just find one person who is particularly vulnerable, I can not only cancel out the hypnotism but also subtly nudge the person's consciousness to be more inclined to work with us."

Lucifer nodded and then frowned, "This is a good idea, but I doubt the leader has all the people on this base hypnotized. Even if we free the other leaders, that wouldn't keep the original believers across this base satisfied."

"That is indeed a problem I have considered. Thankfully, we have Ace on our team. He can help us fabricate information about the leader colluding with the government."

The twins eyes were wide as they listened to this conversation. They never knew their brothers could be so sinister! Their eyes twinkled with unconcealed admiration that made Light want to smack them both on the head. This wasn't exactly a pristine example of good morality, but it would get the job done.

Light noticed the twin's reactions and weakly attempted to justify his actions, "It's already proven that this man is bad, we're just accelerating the timeline a little bit."

Lucifer chuckled and whispered to Ace, who was busy tapping away on the keyboard, "That's bandit's logic."

Light heard him say that and gave him a sharp glare that directly contrasted his usual calm demeanor. Lucifer merely shrugged as they continued to plan their steps.

Soon, night fell and everyone took shifts throughout the evening to make sure they didn't get ambushed again. Without Little White around, Rin didn't dare to sleep in the shadows so he slept with Yukio instead. Nobody was able to get a good night's rest.

***

A few hundred miles away at the Green Base, Aida received notification from Artie that there was a new post on the site. She closed her eyes and read through the content from Ace's message and furrowed her eyebrows. They had agreed to keep the communication limited so as to prevent anyone else from understanding, but Ace ended writing an entire short story on his own. His descriptions were vague and filled with his usual frivolousness including sentences like "I miss you" and "I want to fly back to you now", but she could still sense that they had run into some trouble.

She clenched her fist in anxiety before relaxing it. 'They are as prepared as they possibly could be. Even if they got into trouble, they should be strong enough to break their way out. Everything should be okay.'

Reopening her eyes, a new steely glint had appeared as she looked upon the base. Even if they were fine, she would still try to expedite the process of consolidating her power here at the Green Base so that she could meet up with the rest of them sooner.

Patting the heads of the three tails, she grabbed a jacket and walked out the room with a slight smile on her face that made the people around her shudder. "It's time for the cleansing."

As she reached the center of the base which served as the town hall, the crowd of people extended all the way to the field where she had fought Gambling Gary. She quietly assessed the crowd of people. There were a lot of people living in this base, numbers reaching a few hundred thousand. With the help and organization of the leaders, most of the people from the base managed to squeeze a spot to watch. The base also had a live stream playing on the base's network to allow all the stragglers who couldn't make it onto the base to see what was happening as well.

Aida noticed that most of the people in the crowd were out of it or had a desolate look on their face, some of them were asleep and others. They were most likely forced here by the guards.

Her lackey and the three leaders saw her as she walked out and escorted her and her two tails to the stage. They stood out with their beautiful faces, neat clothes and clean hair. The stage was made up of multiple large shipping containers. Someone had helped to set up a microphone and chairs for her.

Calmly walking onto the stage, she grabbed the microphone and announced. "Hello everyone. I am your new base leader. I'm sure some of you are questioning who I am and why I am qualified to be your leader."

There were scattered mutters across the crowd, but most of them were indifferent or simply didn't hear her.

Aida frowned at this behavior and had Xiao Ai fling out some sparks to wake people up. There were gasps of shock or fear, some people even wanted to run away before realizing that the sparks were harmless. They then turned their attention warily towards Aida. This action woke everyone in the crowd up.

"Great. Now that I have everyone's attention, let's begin again. I am your new base leader," repeated Aida.

One of the leaders on the side smirked as he heard this while thinking, 'We'll see how much longer you remain that way.'

Aida continued speaking, "Many of you have heard that your former leader, Gambling Gary, is now dead. I killed him. As for why I'm qualified, it's because I am stronger than you. If you have doubts, you may challenge me now."

Silence spread across the crowd, no one dared to challenge them. There were a few looks of ambition, but they were quickly quelled by their neighbors who pushed them back down.

The silence persisted for a while longer and Aida figured no one would try to challenge her so she began to speak, "If none of you are interested in challenging me, I assume you submit. Moving on…"

Before she could move on someone called out, "I challenge you! I ain't going to have some woman be my boss."