Tokyo Area, the Holy Palace.

Powerful members of society gathered as they prepared for another conference.

Seitenshi sat at the head of the table as the leader. She placed her hands on her legs while spotting a poker face.

“Did you guys receive a copy of the brief report on the mysterious tremors and phenomena?”

Seitenshi revealed the topic of this meeting without delay.

An aide not far away stood up and he bowed respectfully towards Seitenshi.

“Seitenshi-sama, the civilian unrest has been resolved for now. However, reporters from all the media companies are already on their way to the source of the event. It is my belief that articles on this will be issued in a few more hours.”

“Good job, keep me up to date.”

Seitenshi praised her subordinate.

“What about the detailed investigative reports?”

“We are still gathering information on it.”

A subordinate hurriedly replied.

“Preliminary findings revealed the source of the mysterious tremors in the Outer Zone. We dispatched personnel to investigate before the reporters took action. We should be able to obtain accurate information in a more timely fashion than the media.”

Seitenshi sighed in relief, this message soothed a bit of the burden she carried.

The mysterious events and the pillar of radiant light left a wake of civilian witnesses.

If she didn’t get to the bottom of that, anxiety would be the least of her worries.

After this series of events, there are people spouting crap like it’s the end of the world or something.

Without appropriate measures, mass panic would set in and cause more chaos within the Tokyo Area.

This is the root of Seitenshi’s unease.

Given the events that transpired, she couldn’t rule out the possibility of it being an omen of worse events to come.

This is why they needed to get to the bottom of this immediately.

If it was a force of nature, they can leak it out without worrying too much about it.

If it’s truly an ominous portent, then, they needed to prepare for whatever that is coming their way. At least, they need to make sure they aren’t taken by surprise.

Firstly, they need to make sure the media didn’t get the scoop before them. That would start a mass panic.

Clack

An intelligent-looking girl with glasses entered after knocking on the door. Everyone took notice of her as she entered.

The secretary took out a vibrating phone as she reported to Seitenshi.

“Seitenshi-sama, it’s a call for you.”

“A call?”

Seitenshi didn’t turn around before she continued.

“After the meeting.”

“But…”

The secretary hesitated.

“It’s a call from Guild master Noah.”

“Guild master Noah?”

She did a 180 as she picked up the phone.

“Hello.”

A soothing voice came from the other side of the phone, it was a very grim and low tone.

“Do you know where Saitake Sougen lives?”

Seitenshi trembled for a second.

That voice, it was like a gust of air coming from the coldest recesses of hell.

It didn’t sound like the usual Noah and that threw Seitenshi off her balance.

“President Sougen should still be in the hotel…”

“Is that so?”

Noah said nonchalantly. Then he ordered Seitenshi.

“Get in the car, we are going for a second meeting.”

Sitting with a very uncomfortable look, Seitenshi looked at Noah who is sitting directly across her.

Noah placed his chin on his palm as he stared at the passing sceneries outside. He looked calm but Seitenshi can tell he is very riled up right now, his presence alone is enough to chill the temperature in the car.

Seitenshi asked with an anxious tone.

“Erm, what happened?”

Normally, Seitenshi wouldn’t be able to oblige by Noah’s order even if she wanted to. However, she broke protocol, called off the meeting in order to arrange a second meeting with Sougen.

Ignoring if the guy even wants to see them, there are still unresolved issues at the meeting, she basically ditched her subordinates to do as Noah says.

Noah told her to ignore the other stuff.

Seitenshi trusted Noah despite the flagrant number of red flags.

She delayed the meeting and she called Sougen up for a second meeting.

Noah appeared soon after that as they got ready for a second meeting. He didn’t even give her the security details he’s working on. Suffice to say, Seitenshi wanted to know what is going on here.

Noah turned towards her.

“What is the New Human Creation Plan?”

“Huh?”

Seitenshi gasped. She waxed thoughtful for a short while before she replied.

“Besides the New Human Creation Plan, America, Germany, and Australia were working on mechanized soldiers during the time of the Great Gastrea War.”

Seitenshi continued.

“NEXT is the American counterpart to the New Human Creation Plan, Ayn Rand is the leader of this research program.”

“Ayn Rand…”

Noah repeated the name as he carved it into his memories. He landed his sights on Seitenshi.

“This project, are cursed children dragged into this too?”

“You mean modifications on cursed children?”

Seitenshi looked genuinely surprised as she shook her head.

“No, only terminally filled or doomed humans are offered to take part in the program, how can cursed children be modified?”

She had a point, the process of conversion to a mechanized human is excruciatingly painful, it would be a travesty to human rights to drag a perfectly healthy and fine human into this.

Plus, cursed children are very resilient to diseases and injuries, barring extraordinary physical harm, it’s impossible to kill them. In other words, there is a 0% chance that a cursed child would be so grievously harmed to be allowed entry to this program.

This meant that someone out there experimented on cursed children to create mechanized cursed children.

They used their surgical knives on perfectly healthy cursed children!

To complete this modification, they most likely used varanium-enhanced alloys to cut and maim cursed children.

“The chances of successfully completing an operation and the subsequent survival of the subject is extremely low. This is even more unlikely if Varanium were used in the process, the survival chance is astronomically low.”

Seitenshi said with a very grave look on her face.

“I shudder to think how many cursed children died on the surgical table in order to complete this task.”

Noah’s eyes flashed with a cold glint, he couldn’t hold back his own hostility from leaking out.

Ding

The elevator door slowly opened as Noah and Seitenshi looked at the person on the couch.

There are four bodyguards in suit around Sougen, he stood at attention, unlike his cocky self during their first meeting. Noah and Seitenshi looked into the dictator’s eyes.