The Alt District was out of control...
Jonas felt his blood pressure soar at the news.
He leaned back against the sofa and rubbed his temples, trying to ease the shock the news had brought him.
He had expected his subordinates to be useless, but Jonas had never imagined...
That an entire unit of fully armed special forces under his command could be beaten by a ragtag bunch of gang members.
So in the original storyline, Esnie was the only employee actually pulling her weight?
Jonas resisted the urge to curse, took a deep breath, and calmed himself a little.
Stay calm. Stay calm.
A large part of the reason those gang members dared to attack people from the Wetting Conglomerate and stir up such a massive riot was that troublesome original protagonist of the game.
He had cheats on his side. It was only natural that my subordinates couldn't beat him.
Jonas consoled himself with that thought, but the intelligence coming in live from the Alt District still gave him a headache.
As the Wetting Conglomerate's largest production and storage base for pharmaceuticals and medical equipment, losing control of the district would inevitably cause considerable losses.
It might even affect his eventual entry onto the Wetting Conglomerate's board of directors.
At that thought, Jonas's gaze darkened.
He opened the comms again, and a woman's voice came from the other end.
"Mr. Jonas, what are your orders?"
"Assemble a tactical squad of around twenty people. Also, come pick me up at the Ellison Building."
"Yes, sir. I'll carry out your instructions."
Jonas tapped his fingers lightly against the glass tabletop. At some point, the elevator's floor indicator had reached the top floor.
With a soft chime, the elevator doors slowly opened, revealing a poised woman with a neat, short haircut.
She wore a suit that accentuated her tall, slender figure, along with round-framed glasses, and held a stack of documents in her arms.
"Mr. Jonas, I've gathered all the information on the gangs in the Alt District for you."
Her voice was cool, betraying no emotion.
She tucked her ink-black hair behind her ear, revealing an enticingly pale neck.
As Jonas looked at the young woman before him, information about her sprang unbidden to mind.
[Steward] Eiffel Margarita.
Strictly speaking, Eiffel was one of the few employees left behind by Jonas’s father, who had died long ago.
One of the few loyalists, she had displayed an exceptional talent for personnel management by the age of fifteen or sixteen.
Most people thought of her as "a management machine that almost never makes mistakes."
Her cool head and rational thinking allowed her to excel at all manner of tasks.
That had also earned her an exceptional promotion, making her one of the youngest members of the Wetting Conglomerate's management.
However, Miss Eiffel did not think much of the original Jonas...
In the original storyline, she had repeatedly ignored his orders, acting on her own initiative and making decisions without his approval.
It was worth mentioning that although Miss Eiffel did not obey Jonas, the difficulty of romancing her in the game was absolutely nightmare-tier.
Compared with the absurd number of branching storylines available for other characters, Eiffel had only a handful of romance routes.
Even after being romanced, she almost never joined the Resistance Army or betrayed the Wetting Conglomerate, making her one of the few trustworthy employees.
Unfortunately, this [Steward], Miss Eiffel Margarita, hardly had any good endings.
She either fell alongside the Wetting Conglomerate in its struggle against the Resistance Army, or, after being romanced, died of depression when she could no longer reconcile loyalty with doing what was right.
Among employees rife with turncoats, Miss Eiffel could truly be called a model employee.
Yet in most endings, this model employee met her downfall at the hands of Jonas, the very man she served.
Whenever Jonas thought of that, he wanted to give his original self a beating.
-You deserved to get stabbed in the back by those turncoats.
Eiffel placed the documents in front of Jonas, then stepped back twice, calmly watching the very young heir to the conglomerate.
Naturally, she knew the Alt District was out of control, and she also knew exactly why Jonas had summoned her.
That was why she had already gathered all the information on the Alt District beforehand.
He had to admit, dealing with a capable subordinate was easy. He had given only a couple of instructions, and she had taken care of almost everything for him.
Jonas looked up at Eiffel, about to speak, but when he noticed her calm gaze, his delight vanished. He quickly realized the situation he was in...
The young woman before him was not completely loyal. Under certain circumstances, a subordinate's doubts about the person in charge could prove fatal.
His most pressing task now was to dispel those doubts.
After a moment's thought, he said:
"Have a car ready for me. I'm going to the Alt District myself."
Surprise and hesitation flashed through Eiffel's eyes at his words.
After all, in her view, the young man named Jonas standing before her lacked the ability to keep the overall situation under control. Going to the Alt District now would be extremely risky.
But after hesitating for a moment, she still nodded.
If I go with him, the worst that can happen is that we come slinking back.
It wouldn't be a bad thing for Young Master Jonas to gain a clearer sense of his own abilities.
After all... self-awareness is a virtue. That was also one of the tasks the late master entrusted to me.
Before you continue