Chapter 93: Atsuo
Atsuo leaned back in his chair as Carter and the Invokers arrived in his bunker.
"We finally meet, Zeneros Blackburn." Atsuo said.
"Hello, President Nakamura." Carter nodded.
"I saw what you did out there. You cleaned an entire army of Terrors by yourself. How unsettling..." Atsuo said.
The white swordsman raised an eyebrow. The tension between the leader of an entire continent and the strongest man in this world grew.
Piper let out a dry laugh and tried to dissolve the situation.
"The more powerful he is, the better for us. Right?" Piper said.
"Indeed." Atsuo nodded. "May I ask. What took you so long?"
"There are other forces out there. Forces that endanger this world. I was busy dealing with them."
"I thought you were investigating the Gold Stream?" Atsuo tried to poke holes in Carter’s lies.
"I did. But it seems like you are having a problem with me, President Nakamura. Why?"
Protecting a lie with more lies would just lead to total collapse. Carter distracted the President instead.
"Why, you said. Four millions people died, Zeneros. Four millions. If you’re here, they would have survived." Atsuo smirked.
"Or maybe that many more would die." Carter shot back. He squinted his eyes. "We all have our duty and responsibility. I try to help as much as I can. But Terrors aren’t the only evil incarnation. If I was here and those four millions people didn’t die, another threat may have invaded this world.
Would you blame me then?"
"That is an entire different circumstance." Atsuo frowned.
"And yet. You blame me for their deaths. I may not be out there, visible for you to see. But I am protecting mankind.
You just don’t know about it."
"Hell yeah!" An Invoker said.
Atsuo took a deep breath. "Fine. My apology for my ignorant."
"No harm done. We come to notify you about our arrival and also to receive the information about the Terrors." Carter said.
"My secretary will take care of that for you." Atsuo said.
"We’ll take our leave." Carter nodded.
The President was kind enough to prepare housing for Carter and the Invokers. He led them to their temporary home.
"Rest for the night. We’ll begin scouting the Gold Stream tomorrow." Carter said.
"Roger that, sir!" The Invokers scattered to their room.
Carter pulled Neros and Piper back.
"Watch out for the President and the people here." Carter whispered.
"Why? Do you think they would do something to us?" Neros frowned.
"I don’t know. But I know that we are dealing with a politician. Remember. The whole purpose of a politician is to stay in power as long as possible and gather more power. He might not have the best interest of humanity in mind." Carter whispered.
"But... He shouldn’t do that, right? For the greater good?" Piper said.
"Our good might not be his good. And would a President of sound mind provoked me like that?"
Neros and Piper shook their heads. They couldn’t think of any reasons for the President to behave like that.
"He wants to make sure I remember that he is the President. The actual one in power. He is afraid of me. A person like that cannot be trusted. Beside, it’s always a good idea to be extra careful." Carter said.
"I understand. Don’t worry. I will stay on my guard at all times." Neros said.
Carter nodded. They separated.
Inside his room, Carter closed his eyes and focused on his hearing. Sonar Echolocation painted the interior of the room, even the hidden parts that Atsuo may want to hide.
Carter unsheathed the Prisoner and thrust into the wall, destroying all the surveillance within his room.
All the signals were cut and the screens went static. Atsuo frowned.
"He found out." A technician said.
"Of course, he found out. If he didn’t, I would be surprise. Just keep a close watch on the West’s Invokers."
[SYSTEM GHOST EQUIPPED]
Suddenly, all the screens went static, all the surveillance within the place were deactivated.
A few words appeared on the screen.
"Final Warning. Stay away."
A plain message with no signature. But it was clear who sent it.
"Should we try to replant new surveillance, sir?" The technician said.
"No. Leave them alone. Zeneros Blackburn can destroy us, the last remnant of the East Continent. We let him do what he wants for now."
[TERROR BAT EQUIPPED]
Carter destroyed the surveillance so he could sneak out and collected more shards.
Four millions dead bodies were out there. And a lot of them weren’t properly buried either. It’s the perfect spot for Carter to gather even more human shards.
It was the reason why he accepted to go to the East Continent at the first place. He just wanted more power.
The building Atsuo arranged for Carter and the Invokers was within a military compound. It had a Seal similar to the one Carter had within his home, a Seal from the Priest of Manaca. Leaving the compound would trigger the seal and alarm everyone about his existence.
But he already had a solution to bypass that. When the Terror Bat approached the barrier, Carter briefly transform into his human skin.
[CARTER HAYES EQUIPPED]
His body went through the barrier without any problem and he turned back to the bat right after to continue flying
[TERROR BAT EQUIPPED]
’I’m coming, my shards!’
Through hacking the database within the East Continent, Carter knew that the bodies were transported into a burning facility.
The East didn’t have enough land to do this kind of mass burying. They didn’t have time either and letting the corpse above ground would likely cause a pandemic.
So President Atsuo had decided to burn all the corpse.
The Terror Bat flew into one of the vents of the burning facility.
[ELDRITCH SKELETON KNIGHT EQUIPPED]
Carter burst through the vent. The skeleton with the purple cloak landed gently on the ground.
’It would be great if I have a stealth skin for things like this.’
Carter carefully walked through the facility. He noticed a few workers here and easily got passed them without them noticing.
Then he found the room. The room where all the corpses were.
The stench of death filled the air.