The Construction Site

The next day, Boss Gaia met Solis and Noir at the entrance of Rosea after seeing CEO Alex off at Nerium. The trucks laden with food were waiting by the side.

"What about your people from Dragon's Breath?" Noir asked Boss Gaia. "Did they meet up with our Chaos Demon folks already?"

Boss Gaia nodded.

"They will head to site directly," Solis said, looking at his phone. He had just received an update from Alpha, who would be heading the team from Chaos Demon today. Delta was sticking with Solis and Noir. Anthem and Melody, too, were accompanying their humans – but in their gun forms, not in their human forms.

Noir rubbed his hands together. "All right," he said. "Let's go, then!"

The group made its way to the construction site in their cars.

There really were thousands of immigrants at the site. Most of them looked to be rather poor condition – after all, the site was simply an empty land at the moment, so they didn't even have a roof over their heads.

The so-called environmentalists and human rights activists, on the other hand, looked rather well-fed and comfortable. They had clearly arrived just now and were chatting happily amongst themselves, without even bothering to check on the immigrants.

There were also several media vans parked at the site, and many reporters were ready with their cameras and mics.

Solis and Noir stepped out of their car and many of the younger people in the environmentalist and human rights crowd immediately clamoured to get to them. The media people were even more aggressive.

Delta and the other members of the security team immediately formed a protective ring around Solis and Noir.

"Who all are in the environmentalist group here?" Solis asked. He didn't shout at all, but his voice penetrated through the crowd.

Before anyone could answer, though, Boss Gaia arrived in her own car. Behind her, another car appeared, and Jovis got out of it. Several police vans came right after him.

"Big Brother! Brother-in-law!" Jovis called and waved at Solis and Noir. "The environmentalists are not real – they were hired by an industrialist to create trouble for your project! The police are here to arrest them!"

Solis and Noir were pleasantly surprised. It was quite helpful for them if Jovis managed to get rid of one set of people causing them trouble, and in such a decisive manner, too, without laying any blame on either Rosea or Nerium! The industrialist Jovis spoke of was probably CEO Alex's cousin.

Boss Gaia smiled and walked leisurely towards Solis and Noir, speaking as she made her way to them. "That was pretty obvious," she said. "Our project is a unique 100% green project with zero carbon footprint and designed to maintain the ecological balance of the area in totality. There are at least six reports from different domestic and international experts. No one has ever conducted as many environmental impact assessments as we did for this project!"

Her voice was loud and clear, and the media reporters recorded everything eagerly.

"Indeed," the highest-ranked police office said. "It is a case of industrial sabotage – only they didn't do their research properly. Your project is so unique and so clean – the environment minister himself called our commissioner two days ago and asked us to investigate thoroughly. He told us that this is the best environmental project in the whole world and every single part of it was examined and re-examined by experts from all over the world!"

Boss Gaia nodded. "It is – we were planning to make the information public once the foundation stone had been laid at the site," she said ruefully. "Perhaps we should have advertised it earlier."

The police and media were all very sympathetic.

"It's a good thing, Ma'am," a young policeman spoke up. "At least one of your enemies was exposed this way!"

Boss Gaia smiled at the young officer in response.

The police had a list of the fake environmentalists at the site, and they quickly and efficiently arrested all of them.

As the policemen were bundling the fake environmentalists into the police vans, another contingent of large vans with tinted, bullet-proof windows appeared, and so did a couple of helicopters which hovered in the air above their heads.

Noir frowned. "What's this now?" he asked aloud.

"Special Forces. They regulate international and cross-border crimes," Solis said. He looked at Jovis. "You called them, too?"

Jovis shrugged. "Not directly. The police found something alarming during their investigation and called them in," he said.

Several officers of the Special Forces approached them, showing their badges.

"Boss Solis, these human rights activists are actually associated with a human trafficking organisation," the chief Special Forces officer said. "They often bring illegal immigrants from poor countries to wealthier nations and sell them off. This time, instead of selling off this set of people, they were hired to make trouble for you and stop your project. We are here to arrest the traffickers and deport the illegal immigrants."

Several criminals had tried to run the moment the Special Forces had appeared, but the joint teams of Chaos Demon and Dragon's Breath wouldn't let them go so easily.

The criminals were arrested and bundled into the vans. These were international criminals, after all.

Many immigrants broke down into loud wails and angry curses, refusing to budge from their place despite the announcement made by the Special Forces.

"We can't go back!" an immigrant woman – clearly malnourished – wailed loudly. "We sold everything and paid the money to those people who brought us here with the promise of a better life!"

Solis turned to the chief officer of the Special Forces. "Perhaps you could take the traffickers back first?" he suggested. "After all, these immigrants were also cheated by them. We can decide what to do once the actual criminals are taken away. Perhaps there's a way to get their money back?"

"In any case, we should at least feed them first. I can see that a number of them look hungry enough to collapse," Noir spoke up. "We've brought meal packets."

No one had a problem with that. The members of Chaos Demon and Dragon's Breath started handing out the boxed meals.

Suddenly, Noir had a terrible feeling of danger. He looked around wildly, but couldn't see anything. Alarmed, he pushed Solis down, covering him with his own body.

Anthem jumped into Solis's hand – but it was too late. A large patch of blood was already blooming on Noir's back.