War Has Begun!

"What?!"

Anton flew into a rage. "You're saying Eddie was taken away by the Life Foundation?"

Even through the screen, Phil could feel Anton's fury.

But after what he had just experienced, he understood the meaning of courage. He answered seriously, "Before Eddie was taken away, he left behind video footage from the Homeless Home."

"Video footage?"

Anton frowned deeply and said bluntly, "Tell me what happened. Now."

After listening to Phil's explanation, he quickly calmed down.

"Send the footage back."

Anton instructed, "As for you, Phil, stay in San Francisco for now. Keep a close eye on the Life Foundation, and report to me if anything happens."

"Understood."

Phil nodded.

A few minutes later, Anton received the footage Phil had sent back and reviewed it as quickly as possible.

His expression turned extremely grim.

The raw, unfiltered images delivered the most direct impact.

He could even imagine what Eddie must have looked like, mixed in among all those homeless people.

"Homeless Home... Carlton Drake, I thought I'd already given you enough credit. I never expected you to be even more bottomless than I imagined!"

"Eddie, well done! Now, leave the rest to me!"

Anton murmured inwardly.

He immediately booked himself a flight back to New York in the early hours of the morning.

Before leaving, he found the crew's assistant and called together more than a dozen assistant directors and actors, along with other staff members.

He held an all-hands meeting.

At the meeting, Anton made it clear that he had matters to attend to and would be leaving the crew.

Since filming had already entered its final stages, they could finish the remaining work independently even without him.

It was worth mentioning that more than half a month had passed since the day Eddie first went missing.

Over those past half a month, the movie's production had advanced by another huge stretch.

The remaining shooting schedule mostly consisted of minor supplementary scenes.

Even the scenes involving the male lead, Batman Bruce Wayne, had only a very small portion left unfilmed.

Anton had every confidence in becoming a hands-off boss.

When he left the crew, the assistant directors respectfully saw him off, all wearing bright smiles.

In return, they solemnly promised Anton that they would finish all the filming within twenty days.

At the same time, the film's visual effects work continued progressing steadily.

With the design drafts Anton had helped the visual effects artists create, the effects no longer required much of his attention. He only needed to wait for the finished footage and add them in.

After making all the necessary arrangements, he flew straight to New York.

It was not until the next morning that Jim learned Anton had returned to New York and left him to handle everything.

He was furious.

But he still had no way of dealing with Anton, the investor and director.

The only thing he could do was keep an eye on the crew for Anton, lest anyone take advantage of the situation.

Anton arrived in New York in the early hours of the morning.

Betty had been waiting outside the airport for a long time.

When she spotted Anton from afar, her delicate face was frosty, and she gave her boss no pleasant expression.

No one would be happy about being woken up in the middle of the night to pick someone up from the airport.

Especially when that someone was your boss.

"Betty, I'm your boss, after all. Could you at least give me a smile?"

Sitting in the front passenger seat of the BMW, Anton turned to look at Betty and could not help saying, "Don't forget who pays the salary that beats ninety percent of people your age."

Betty snorted. "Strictly speaking, the newspaper belongs to Jonah Jameson, not Anton Jameson."

"We're both Jamesons. Rounding it off, the newspaper is mine. Isn't that only natural?"

A moment later, as the car was about to reach the Daily Bugle's office building, Anton smiled. "A lot of people should be sharing your feelings right now."

"What do you mean?"

Betty looked utterly baffled.

After parking the car, she followed Anton into the newspaper office and suddenly understood what he meant.

The Daily Bugle's office area was brightly lit.

Lights blazed everywhere, as bright as day.

Every employee sat at their workstation. Not even a single intern was missing.

Most of them looked impatient and extremely irritated.

"Anton, what are you doing?"

Betty had an inexplicable premonition that something major was about to happen.

She had never seen such a scene before.

Betty was not the only one confused. The other Daily Bugle employees were equally baffled.

Of course, seeing that every employee had been summoned back to work by Anton in the middle of the night, they suddenly shared Betty's feeling.

Something big was probably happening.

"I called all of you here today because I have something to announce."

Anton's tone was calm, devoid of emotion.

"Tomorrow's front page is canceled."

Then he spoke in an unquestionable tone.

As he spoke, he turned on the communal projector and cast the video footage he had brought onto the wall.

Everyone was shocked.

Someone immediately cursed, "Shit! Anton, do you know what you're saying?"

Realizing that the footage Anton was showing would become the Daily Bugle's new front page tomorrow, they had no time to vent their resentment. Including the man who had cursed, everyone stared at the flickering images without blinking.

"As you can see, this will be tomorrow's front page!"

After saying that, Anton swept his sharp gaze around the room.

No one dared meet his eyes.

A moment later, their expressions shifted uncertainly as they frowned deeply.

Someone opened their mouth but did not know what to say.

"Where is this?"

After a long pause, Betty finally asked.

Then she seemed to understand something and said in realization, "This was Eddie's field assignment!"

"Eddie? Eddie filmed this?"

"That's right. Editor-in-chief Eddie went out on a field assignment not long after joining the Daily Bugle and has been gone for nearly a month. Who else could it have been? Don't tell me it was one of those interns who don't know anything?"

Everyone's reactions were remarkably unanimous.

Eddie had gone on a field assignment just days after arriving at the Daily Bugle. He had not returned for nearly a month, and no one had heard any news from him.

If the newspaper had not issued any notice, they might even have thought Eddie had offended the boss and run away, or angered Anton, the young boss, through his work and been fired outright.

What they found even harder to understand, of course, was that Eddie was the Daily Bugle's editor-in-chief.

Normally, an editor-in-chief sat in an office drinking tea and directing operations. How could he possibly go to the front lines himself?

But when they considered Eddie's original identity, everyone understood.

When it came to field reporting and professional ability, perhaps no one present could truly compare to Eddie.

After working as a reporter for so many years, he had been directly promoted to editor-in-chief by the notoriously picky Jonah Jameson. That alone showed how outstanding Eddie was.

If he had not offended Carlton Drake in San Francisco and been unable to remain there, someone with Eddie's abilities could have found a foothold anywhere and lived well.

"The footage makes everything very clear. I don't need to explain much."

Anton said, "This is a scandal belonging to the Life Foundation in San Francisco—the one that has a grudge against Eddie. They even signed off-the-books volunteer agreements for human experiments and targeted homeless people off the streets. Eddie lost his job and was blacklisted by the industry because he wanted to expose Drake."

"However, Eddie infiltrated the Homeless Home to film this footage, and he has now been taken away by the Life Foundation. To ensure his safety, we must release this material as soon as possible, ignite public opinion, and leave them too busy to dare harm the volunteers again."

"So listen to me. Scrap tomorrow's front page."

He spoke slowly, emphasizing every word. "From this moment on, the Daily Bugle and the Life Foundation... are at war!"