Siege

Xinbo Gongguan, on the stage.

Martin Stein stood flushed with excitement, brimming with passion. Camera flashes made him look spirited as he spoke endlessly and eloquently about his understanding of Controlled Nuclear Fusion.

"From ancient times to the present, people have always strived for energy. From the moment our ancestors obtained the first flame from a tree struck by lightning, drilled wood to make fire, and brought flame under their control..."

Suddenly.

The excitement on Martin Stein's flushed face froze.

"Sir, based on a comparative analysis of the fabric on Danton Black's body from the surveillance footage, we can confirm that he is wearing real clothing."

The reporter was clever. He did not say it was the original body, only that it was clothing rather than part of the body itself. The order he had received was merely to conduct a comparative analysis of the material on Danton Black's clothing; he had not been asked to do anything else.

Alex was satisfied. Unless Danton Black had deliberately dressed his clone in clothes, this had to be the original.

Click, click, click, click, click...

Xinbo Gongguan fell silent in an instant. Only the camera flashes continued to flicker. Martin Stein's hand, raised during his passionate speech, remained suspended in the air, giving everyone the feeling that time had stopped around this great man.

Many audience members exchanged puzzled looks, their eyes full of questions as they frowned and tried to get an answer from the people seated beside them.

At first, they thought Martin Stein had merely paused for a sip of water. After all, they had all seen how excited he was onstage, and they could hardly blame him. If they themselves had achieved such a monumental accomplishment, they would probably have been even more excited.

But the pause lasted a little too long—long enough for the audience to grow suspicious.

Through the lenses of his reading glasses, Alex had already seen more than a hundred clones of Danton Black carrying various firearms and charging fiercely toward Xinbo Gongguan's entrance.

Fabric-analysis calculations began in his field of vision. Red boxes, like fighter jet targeting reticles, swept continuously over the army of The Multiplicity surging in from outside.

Clothing simulated from skin had a faint stiffness compared to real clothes. The human eye might have struggled to tell the difference, but before computers running preconfigured programs, their walking, the flutter of their hems, the skin clinging to their bodies and trembling with their movements—all of it revealed glaring flaws.

"One hundred and thirty-two clones of The Multiplicity."

In an instant, the conclusion came through his earpiece.

Every one of those coming to Xinbo Gongguan was a clone.

Alex stopped his speech. The hand he had raised in feigned excitement slowly lowered, and his expression calmed. He lifted his chin slightly, looked toward the entrance, and gave an order.

"Activate the sonar brainwave device! Crush them."

Bang!

A clone of The Multiplicity kicked the doors open, raising his M4A1 toward the ceiling. His face was wild and arrogant, wearing a condescending smile as though he stood above everyone else.

The clones streamed inside. By the time the audience turned around and the reporters spun toward the doors, The Multiplicity had formed a wall of bodies around them, surrounding everyone with guns aimed at the crowd.

The original body, sitting in Starbucks, took a leisurely sip of cappuccino and smiled faintly.

"Ah..."

The venue instantly descended into panic. Audience members sprang to their feet. Some shouted fearlessly at the clones of The Multiplicity. Some wisely crouched behind their seats. Others sat frozen in their chairs, their minds still unable to process what was happening.

The reporters' flashes went wild as they risked their lives to capture every second, photographing the many identical, dazzling figures of The Multiplicity.

If the clones of The Multiplicity had not been holding different firearms, everyone present would have thought their vision was blurred or doubled.

How could there possibly be a hundred identical twins?

Bang, bang, bang, bang...

"Hahaha..."

The leading clone of The Multiplicity pointed his gun at the ceiling. Flames burst from the muzzle as bullets tore into the ceiling overhead, disappearing into it and shaking loose a light dusting of debris. The gunfire instantly silenced the panicked crowd, leaving only the fearless reporters still flashing their cameras and illuminating Danton Black's crazed, laughing face.

At a time like this, the elites groveling at his feet made him want to laugh madly. It completely satisfied Danton Black's humble, sensitive, fragile heart.

Danton Black's attitude toward reporters was outrageously good. He allowed them to film his entire body from every angle, to capture every heroic pose. He allowed Central City Television Station to broadcast live, pointing their cameras at him and putting his handsome face on television to make up for the spotlight Martin Stein had stolen from him a few days earlier.

All across Central City, viewers watching Martin Stein's speech were instantly dumbfounded. A lecture that should have marked the debut of a century-defining great man had been hijacked just like that, criminals storming the venue.

At that moment, a man drinking held his glass suspended in midair, staring blankly at the television.

A housewife crossing the living room with clothes to wash stopped in her tracks when she saw the scene on TV and stared dumbly at the live broadcast.

Were television broadcasts this intense now?

A live broadcast of a crime scene?

As for the venue itself.

Anyone who was not a reporter's friend could only obediently crouch in place with their hands over their heads, waiting for The Multiplicity to execute them.

The only person still standing at the scene, aside from the reporters, was Alex on the stage. His straight back and the bow tie around his neck silently declared the unyielding pride of a scientist.

"Professor Martin, before your great work could even begin, I have already destroyed it!"

"Is that so?"

Alex's face remained calm, without the slightest panic at the situation before him. That composed, indifferent gaze made The Multiplicity deeply uncomfortable.

This was not the effect he wanted.

"Get on your knees!"

The Multiplicity darkened his face and aimed the M4A1 in his hand at Martin Stein's legs. Anyone could imagine what would happen if he did not obey: he would fire without hesitation, break Martin Stein's legs by force, and make him kneel.

His expression was so terrifying that no one could mistake it for a joke. Ferocious light burst from his eyes, letting Central City's live viewers see just how cruel, vicious, and sinister a criminal without any moral principles could be.

On Central City Television Station's live broadcast, The Multiplicity's cruel gaze made people jump. His savage expression of frenzied jealousy was more real and brutal than any actor's performance, making viewers clutch their hearts as they watched, unable to exhale the breath they had sucked in.

By comparison, Martin Stein's calm expression earned admiration, yet also made people unable to help worrying for him.

There were more than a hundred armed criminals!

But the unexpected often came faster than Danton Black's cruelty.

The leading Danton Black's vision began to blur. Darkness seemed to close in over him from all sides, his ears began to ring violently, and it felt as though a chainsaw inside his skull had revved to full power and was cutting through his brain, sawing madly, its teeth tearing through his head.

Splash...

In an instant, the clone of The Multiplicity turned into acidic liquid. Wisps of smoke rose from where he had stood, and the M4A1 slipped from his hand and fell onto the soft carpet without making much noise.

Yet the continuous sound of guns falling was still rather spectacular.

"Move."

Not every clone of The Multiplicity immediately turned into acidic liquid. More than sixty clones collapsed to the ground, unable even to keep hold of their guns. They clutched their ears, their bloodshot eyes bulging as they howled in agony, as though chainsaws were cutting through their heads.

Alex gave the order like a cold-blooded executioner.

From among the crouching audience members and the reporters frantically taking pictures, nearly fifty people swiftly stepped out. It was like a calm, crowded street in a movie suddenly revealing police officers hidden within it, so quickly that no one had time to react.

Without the slightest hesitation, the officers who had emerged from the crowd drew pistols from their waists and fired at the clones of The Multiplicity writhing on the carpet in agony.

Gunshots rang out one after another, then stopped in less than ten seconds.

There were no clones of The Multiplicity left at the scene.

Alex's eyes swept across all the acidic liquid on the floor.

"Sir, the Multiplicity at 5433 Xinbo Gong East Street has not disappeared!"

Alex stepped toward the backstage area on the left, slipping behind the side of the stage where neither cameras nor the crowd could see him.

"Surround and eliminate him!"

"Personnel at five o'clock, evacuate the civilians! Shoot Danton Black on sight!"

Alex shouted. His rapid, resolute footsteps carried the unquestionable force of a dictator moving with ruthless efficiency, yet also the unwavering determination of a general as solid as stone, striding ahead with sweeping purpose.

A surveillance feed from Starbucks immediately appeared in his vision. Danton Black was clutching his head and howling in pain.

"Bring out my bike!"

Alex tore off the bow tie around his neck and tossed it casually against the wall. He ripped away the top two buttons of his white shirt, shut off the projected mask, and revealed his true face. With every step, his body grew sharply taller with a series of cracks. The middle-aged paunch shrank away, revealing his original abdominal muscles, while his tailcoat strained as though it was about to split under his height and muscles.

Alex took off the tailcoat and flung it aside. With dyed white hair, he exited Xinbo Gongguan through the back door, where an officer had already positioned his motorcycle.

Expressionless, he swung onto the Lightning Motorcycle. As the nearby officers saluted, he activated the nitrous boost. Scorching blue flames erupted from the exhaust, the wheels spun wildly against the ground and kicked up thick smoke, and he shot forward like a rocket.