To guard against Vought's various superhumans, Wang Zhaofeng and his team had developed numerous products for Atlas.
For instance, Translucent, who would someday join The Seven but was currently only used by Vought to spy on officials' private lives, could turn his skin into a carbon metamaterial that bent light, achieving Optical Camouflage and invisibility. His skin was also as hard as diamond.
However, Translucent could not truly vanish. At most, he could infiltrate places with ordinary security and surveillance; he posed no threat to prepared facilities.
Yet in the opening of the first episode of The Boys Season 3, that guy who could shrink himself to the size of an ant and enter the eye of a same-sex target possessed one of the best powers for infiltration, reconnaissance, or assassination.
But Atlas had installed dynamic sensors on every floor of important facilities, including domestic factories and overseas bases. Even the sounds made by Roach climbing would trigger a response.
Furthermore, Wang Zhaofeng's team had entered feedback data from nearly ten thousand insects and other animals into the surveillance filtering program, preventing the system from being overloaded.
In other words, unless Vought's superhumans could perfectly disguise themselves as insects or animals before infiltrating important facilities—matching their weight, appearance, behavior, and every other aspect—they would only have a certain chance of getting inside.
And that was merely one part of Atlas's surveillance system.
Coupled with Vought's excessive reliance on so-called superpowers and its neglect of training, most superhumans could not effectively use their own abilities. They were no different from oversized infants.
Soldier Boy, whom Vought had betrayed and handed over to the Soviet Union for research, possessed considerable hand-to-hand combat, firearms, and counter-surveillance capabilities. His only weakness was that he could be anesthetized by the nerve gas known as Novichok.
Fortunately, Vought seemed aware of its superhumans' lack of military competence. Before the 1990s, it had only pressured federal officials and ordinary businesses, never daring to provoke its peers in the arms industry. After all, the United States was a military-industrial complex nation.
But Vought had begun throwing its weight around, forcing many cities in the Midwest and western United States to sign the Superhero Security Act over the past two years. This was also what Seattle Mayor Harleden Bruce was worried about and wanted to discuss with Sui Yang in person.
Still, Vought daring to extend its "black hand" directly into Seattle and test Atlas's bottom line showed that Homelander's impending adulthood had given Vought considerable confidence.
To say that Vought did not know Harleden Bruce was a puppet single-handedly supported by Atlas would be as laughable as saying this world's Homelander had a personality not much different from the Superman played by Henry Cavill.
And Vought certainly had not expected—nor could it possibly know—that, for the sake of caution, Sui Yang had installed a whole series of surveillance systems, including dynamic detection, "without discrimination" in the homes of every puppet.
After all, before superhumans had spread across the United States and Homelander had established an image of "absolute invincibility" among the public, Vought did not have the nerve to completely fall out with both Atlas and every arms-industry peer at once.
Although Vought was merely engaging in "petty theft," secretly spying and trespassing while believing it had gone unnoticed, Sui Yang considered those acts a provocation.
It seemed he could not let Vought get too comfortable.
Sui Yang pondered for a moment as he looked at the holographic screen, then decided that in a couple of days, he would send Arthur and the most elite Hunters to Russia to secretly seize Soldier Boy while he was anesthetized.
Sui Yang was deeply resistant to Compound V.
He had watched every television series of The Boys, including its spinoff, Gen V.
At the very end of the final episode of Gen V, Homelander asked the female lead, "What kind of animal are you? You enjoy attacking your own kind?" Combined with how the entire show constantly revealed that the vast majority of superhuman students thought highly of themselves, believing they were not the same species as humans but a higher form of life, further intensifying conflict and division...
If he were an outsider watching as an audience member, Sui Yang would have thought Antony Starr's portrayal of Homelander was phenomenal. Even as a villain, he was highly charismatic, and Sui Yang could have watched the protagonists and superhumans slaughter one another simply for entertainment.
But he was in this world, where everything was real. In Sui Yang's eyes, superhumans were a group of mutants, a group of "filthy stains," while Compound V was a drug capable of drastically altering the human genetic map.
Still, research had to be done when it was time for research.
Sui Yang had maintained an amicable relationship with Vought for nearly half a century and had never dispatched Hunters to seize samples of Compound V, mainly to avoid drawing unnecessary attention and because his own strength had been insufficient at the time.
Now, with both his physique and Psychic Power having undergone tremendous growth, and with the ability [Reset] in his possession, he believed it was time to act and seize Soldier Boy, who could currently restrain Homelander.
He could also have Alexia and the Bioengineering Department begin refining Compound V for research. Perhaps they would achieve some unexpected results.
Having settled on his plan and deciding to arrange the detailed plunder operation tomorrow, Sui Yang shifted his gaze to another holographic screen.
Shuffling steps,
Blood flowing from the nose and mouth,
A vacant expression—many illnesses fit those three symptoms, such as the Ebola virus. But the strange atmosphere in Lojia Town made him think of "zombies."
However, Leon had not been the first to discover that something was wrong with Lojia Town. He had merely stumbled into the situation by accident.
As for the various images of drugs, experiments, and the like that flashed through his mind, they indicated a connection only to the Kenya base and Congo.
Though he did not yet understand why, there was no need to guess. The ARS company deployed at the Kenya base was already prepared to airdrop into Lojia Town at any time. For now, they only needed to wait calmly for the investigation results.
The rest were minor matters: Titan 3G sales had far exceeded expectations, inventory was running low, and another batch needed to be manufactured and assembled. Or the construction progress of base stations capable of providing 3G service had been obstructed on the East Coast of the United States.
That was because local news outlets there had used exaggerated headlines such as "Excessive 3G Radiation" and "3G Causes Cancer."
But those media outlets did not know that Atlas had already upgraded all its base stations during the five years from 1988 to 1993. Only the new base stations were being obstructed.
Aside from the need to pay special attention to the Space Gate completing its cooldown on July 23, a few days from now, everything was operating normally and according to plan.
"..."
Finally able to pull his thoughts away from work, Sui Yang rose to his feet, unbuttoned his shirt collar and cuffs, and slowly walked to the floor-to-ceiling window facing north.
As he gazed at Seattle's still brightly lit nightscape and sensed the emotional feedback offered by the city through Psychic Power, he always felt a sense of fulfillment.
It was like playing SimCity all night and finally building a city into the initial image he had envisioned.
After admiring the night view for a while, Sui Yang felt much better. He turned and walked out of the office, seemingly intending to head home and see whether those two Primarchs had been behaving themselves.
(End of Chapter)
Before you continue