Vought's PR Machine Kicked into Gear

The team had long since grown tired of Soldier Boy's brutality and control. With Vought's tacit approval and help, they joined forces to attack him.

Afterward, the company secretly handed the superhuman who had once embodied American heroism over to the Soviet Union for research.

Given his power, he would not truly die. Instead, he would be imprisoned and experimented on in the Soviet Union.

In the end, he would be treated as a dangerous asset too difficult to dispose of and kept locked away in a cold facility for years.

Naturally, Vought would never admit the truth. They could not tell the public that the company and his teammates had abandoned their number one hero.

Nor could they let anyone know that the man portrayed as nearly invincible in films, news reports, and military propaganda had ended up in a Soviet laboratory.

That would destroy the heroic myth Vought had spent decades building, and it would prompt the government to ask what kind of secret deal the company had made.

Soldier Boy was an outdated Superhero. In Vought's eyes, he had to die. Then Homelander, carefully packaged by Vought, would make his debut as the new leader of The Super Seven.

Vought Corporation would enter its golden age.

Once Lin Mo understood the reason behind the recent events, he slowly walked through the door that had not quite closed.

Only after he turned the corner did he hear the security door shut behind him. The heavy metal cut off the rest of the conversation.

But he had already heard the most important part. The rest did not matter.

His biggest question had been answered.

Even with a female Homelander's appearance, the timeline had not stopped moving forward.

Even his own arrival had not thrown every key event from the original world off course.

Soldier Boy had still been betrayed in Nicaragua in 1984. Vought had still chosen to cover up the truth, and the Homelander project was still being advanced in secret.

That meant what he knew about the future was still useful.

Of course, he could not guarantee that everything would follow its original course. His presence had already changed how Joanna grew up.

But as long as those key people, corporate interests, and historical turning points remained, the future had not become an impenetrable fog.

Lin Mo felt a little more at ease. At the same time, he found himself amused.

What am I doing? Worrying that the future might be beyond my control?

He was a Kryptonian. Once he soaked up enough sunlight, he would be invincible in this world. There was no kryptonite here, so he had no weakness.

Real security came from his own strength. Besides, worrying about trouble before it arrived was not his style.

Having thought it through, Lin Mo smiled from the heart.

He was not yet powerful enough to see the future for himself, so knowing where it was headed was certainly a good thing.

That night, the research center left the lights on in the common areas past their usual hour. People kept passing by the door.

Cart wheels rumbled softly across the floor. Some carts carried sealed archive boxes; others were piled with dismantled terminals and magnetic tapes.

Lin Mo was in the lab next door, leafing through an unfamiliar set of experiment notes. That was one advantage of being a researcher: his freedom here was not restricted much. As for Soldier Boy, Vought had never connected Lin Mo to the matter at all.

Perhaps they assumed he had no idea what had happened.

Then several records staff carried stacks of paper files into a special incineration room in the lab. It looked like the same incineration room used to test Homelander in the original story.

Lin Mo silently watched them finish the job. Firelight flickered behind the translucent safety door as reports, photographs, and operation records turned to black ash in the heat.

There was no way Vought could erase every piece of evidence. The company would always keep a true account accessible only to its highest-ranking executives.

What they were destroying were the versions ordinary staff might see. They were removing the clues that could let different departments piece together the truth.

In fact, the ordinary researchers did not know what had really happened to Soldier Boy. They thought he was dead. They assumed Vought was merely rushing to destroy some research data on him. Most Vought employees, too, would only be told that Soldier Boy had taken part in a secret operation.

The operation had failed, and he had died. The details were classified at the highest level.

Why the members of his team had been questioned separately after their return, and why the company had suddenly sealed its military cooperation files, would become questions no one was allowed to ask.

"Hey, Lin Mo. Time for bed."

A gentle voice came from behind him. A moment later, Lin Mo felt a pair of hands lift him up. He looked up into a delicate face.

It was Barbara. She had found Lin Mo on the monitors and come to take him to bed.

Interestingly, Barbara had always treated him well. That was how it seemed to Lin Mo, at least; who knew what Vought had in mind?

Lin Mo could not be bothered to resist in her arms. He let her carry him away. He was used to it by now, and this body was only four years old. He was still a child, after all.

Back in his little room, he had no choice but to stay in bed as Barbara had told him.

He had not gone back to the Game Room with Joanna. Vought generally did not let the two of them rest together.

He looked at the surveillance device on the ceiling and quietly sorted through what he remembered.

For Vought, Soldier Boy's disappearance meant more than losing a hero. It meant an era was coming to an end. The company needed a new face, a new symbol of America.

It needed a new flagship product to replace Soldier Boy. And among Vought's secret projects, there was already a candidate who seemed almost tailor-made for the role.

Homelander.

Or rather, the young Homelander, whom the company still managed under a project number.

With Soldier Boy gone, the Homelander project would inevitably become even more important. Vought Corporation would pour more resources into it and accelerate his training and public image campaign.

It would also become more desperate to learn how to control a superhuman who might surpass Soldier Boy. Lin Mo and Joanna would be affected as well.

At that thought, Lin Mo closed his eyes.

With Vought's old flagship fallen, the company would need more than ever to prove that the next generation of heroes could be controlled. It needed success stories. It needed experimental data that could convince the board and the military.

Joanna was being placed in the ideal position to become one.

The next day, shortly before dinner, the research center's PA system crackled to life.

This time, the announcement was repeated three times.

"Attention, all staff."

"Per company headquarters, all personnel not assigned to essential duties must watch tomorrow's special news conference about Soldier Boy at nine a.m."

"Department heads are responsible for confirming attendance. All nonessential experiments are to be suspended during the news conference."

"Repeating: all personnel must watch tomorrow's special news conference about Soldier Boy at nine a.m."

When the announcement ended, the corridor fell briefly silent.

A few seconds later, hurried footsteps and murmured conversations resumed in the distance.

Lin Mo was sitting in his room. He paused and looked toward the speaker on the wall.

A special news conference. Vought's PR machine was about to kick into gear.