174 Qing Zhens defection (1/2)

Defection?

The board of directors in the conference room fell silent. That was a grave crime.

There used to be defections from the Qing Consortium, but it had become a much rarer occurrence in recent years. That was because the price to pay for defection was simply too great, and the organization never let any defectors off.

Someone asked the secretary, ”Did Qing Zhen leave any information behind?”

”He left a letter on the table in his villa.” The secretary said, ”He said he was going out to take a break from things.”

Everyone in the conference room was stunned. Did Qing Zhen treat the Board's decision as a game? He was ordered not to take a single step out of his villa, yet he just left the stronghold!

The elder thought for a moment and said, ”He wouldn't go so far as to defect to the Li Consortium. I suspect he must have received news of the disappearing Experimentals from someone. There should be some connection between these two matters. Otherwise, there wouldn't be such a coincidence.”

Someone wondered, ”Are you saying that Qing Zhen left the stronghold because he received news that the Experimentals have disappeared?”

”It seems like it,” the elder said with a sullen face.

When the board of directors in the conference room heard that, they got a little confused. ”But what does the news of the Experimentals disappearing have anything to do with Qing Zhen? Why did he have to escape?”

”It seems that Qing Zhen has concluded that the large number of Experimentals have probably started heading towards Stronghold 109.” The elder said, ”Qing Zhen went to Stronghold 109 because he wants to save his older brother, Luo Lan.”

It was no secret that Luo Lan was at Stronghold 109. The consortium did not order him to return only because they could not be bothered with an illegitimate son of the family.

Everyone knew that Qing Zhen and Luo Lan had a great relationship. However, they did not expect that Qing Zhen would be willing to risk being branded a defector to escape from Stronghold 111 for Luo Lan's sake.

”But what's the use of Qing Zhen going to Stronghold 111 by himself?” someone wondered. ”He no longer has anyone under him.”

Someone asked the secretary, ”Have there been any movements from the soldiers recently assigned to the other troops?”

”No, they're all very obedient. Everyone is still holding at their respective military bases,” the secretary said.

With that, everyone went quiet. Based on Qing Zhen's character, how could he possibly have gone to Stronghold 109 without bringing some people with him?

In that case, there could only be one explanation left. Qing Zhen still had some secret troops under his control that even the Board did not know about.

Actually, wasn't this exactly the reason the Board had seized Qing Zhen's power back from him? The most famous Shadow in the organization was about to get out of control.

…

Ren Xiaosu kept feeling like something was off for the past few days. The entire stronghold seemed to have suddenly become peaceful.

No one was stirring up any trouble, and there were no more fights breaking out. It was as though all the different major powers had tried so hard to get into Stronghold 109 just to enter and sightsee.

Ren Xiaosu did not see Yang Xiaojin at the end-of-the-year ceremony after finals finished. According to tradition, students would have homework assigned to them over break during the ceremony, and the exam results would be announced as well. The teachers would also take the opportunity to go over the tests with the students.

However, Yang Xiaojin seemed to have disappeared.

The only thing Ren Xiaosu was not surprised about was that Yang Xiaojin had scored exactly 140 points for each subject in the final exams.

When Jiang Wu was handing back tests to the students, she asked which set of tests belonged to Monitor Ren Xiaosu and which one belonged to Councilor Ren Xiaosu. As a result, Ren Xiaosu took advantage of Yang Xiaojin's absence and shamelessly claimed the papers with the higher score.

Jiang Wu was a little puzzled as she said to Ren Xiaosu, ”The handwriting on that set of tests is very elegant and doesn't look like yours at all.”