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Or rather, to be more precise, the only smart way. For what else was he supposed to do, now that I\'d escalated what started as one of the city\'s clans corrupting government officials to mess with us into what could be the spark that turns the uneasy political situation between the two extremely different parts of the world into the third iteration of a great, pretty much global war?

"I think I\'m going to call for my supervisor…" the officer finally said after staring at my face for quite a while. "Do I have your word that once he arrives, he will be able to have a conversation with you rather than with the guns of your men?"

Hearing this, I raised my eyebrow while putting an honestly weirded-out grimace on my face.

"I don\'t believe I\'ve given you any reason to believe otherwise, but just for your peace of mind, sure, call him in," I easily agreed with the request, given how it was in my own interest to somehow placate the situation. "For as long as you guys won\'t try to use this opportunity to attack, I see absolutely no reason to escalate."

Once again, there was nothing but silence… For as long as I was willing to ignore all the noise made now not only by the police and anti-terror units assembling and preparing for either a siege or an assault, but also the very guards that Chihiro hired to keep this factory safe from any incursions.

"Understood," the police officer lightly nodded his head. "I\'m going to retreat now. A man with necessary authority will soon arrive at this exact spot. Is that acceptable?"

Now that the stalemate moved from a situation where neither I nor the officer could do anything to a situation where there were actual procedures for him to follow, the man\'s voice grew all the more confident.

"That\'s perfectly acceptable. I\'m even willing to just stay here and wait while fully aware of the risk of one of your corrupt men taking the shot to snuff the case before it can be properly investigated."

I was fully aware Claire wouldn\'t support this action. Heck! I was quite sure Chihiro wouldn\'t do it either!

But between restarting the world war between the modern and spiritual world and putting my life on the line…

"That\'s quite… brave of you," the officer muttered while already taking a step backward.

"No, it\'s not brave. It\'s logical," I replied with a shrug of my shoulder. "It\'s logical because I don\'t think any amount of money would be enough to convince someone to take an action that would inevitably lead to their demise," I smiled lightly, "and that\'s exactly what\'s going to happen to everyone within a several-mile radius if any harm were to come my way."

At this point, the officer didn\'t seem to have any interest in continuing the conversation, opting to just retreat in silence behind the cover.

"Sir, I would advise you to retreat behind some sort of cover," one of the factory\'s guards mouthed off, just loud enough for me to hear. "Even if you are confident in your abilities, cultivator or not, a high-caliber round is as dangerous to you as it would be to any mortal."

I slowly turned my head and gave the guard a short look before heaving a deep sigh.

"You are perfectly right, a bullet to my head will kill me like it would any other person," I admitted before shrugging my shoulders. "But if I were to be perfectly honest…"

For a moment, rather than looking at the physical world, I took a look at the tendrils of spiritual energy rapidly spreading from the factory to the outside, sprawling on the ground and shooting through the air, influencing the trace amounts of spiritual energy in the air to further develop its expansion.

This wasn\'t how spiritual energy would normally behave, for as far as I could tell with the limited experience I had with it.

There was a clear purpose behind this weird expansion… a purpose I could quite assuredly trace back to the golden ball of divinity back at the factory, the hints of which I could sense in the very spiritual energy moving all over the place.

"I do have an inclination I will get a momentary heads-up if anyone tries to pull a trigger on me."

Once again, it was a massive risk to put my life in the invisible hands of the divinity, counting on it to warn me if anyone were to try to take any excessive action.

Then again, this whole thing… was one hell of a massive mess. A chaotic situation that had no legal, cultural, or even common sense reasons to happen.

It was all because of the influence of the rival clan or the personal influence of the two government agents that the clan hired.

And just like I was putting my head on the line in this mess… so were they. And for every escalation that would take place, they were moving further and further away from the realm of what their superiors would be willing to cover up for them before crossing the line, beyond which they would be all on their own.

\'The question is, are they smart enough to figure that out themselves?\' I thought, taking another deep breath as the weight of the situation continued to bear down upon me more and more with each passing second.

It was easy to act cocky and arrogantly put myself in harm\'s way. But actually staying there, knowing that there could be a bullet in my name already prepared in the chamber of some sniper?

\'Calm down, man. Just like in crafting,\' I took a deep breath, \'trust in the logic and in the process.\'

I only had to fight with my own thoughts for the next few moments before a man in full tactical gear suddenly appeared from beyond the deployed cover and approached the gate.

He was armed with the rifle hanging off his neck and a proper, standard-issue pistol dangling on his hip. His vest was thick enough to beg the question of whether it was police or actually military issue, while his tactical helmet left pretty much no room to doubt its military origin.

In the end, however, the officer didn\'t raise his rifle nor did he pull out his pistol as he approached the gate and then stood down, simply staring me down with a tense and slightly pissed-off look on his face.

"I\'m Major Dickins, acting commander of this whole operation. Now then, care to explain what the hell this mess is all about?"

For a moment, I did the man the same favor he\'d just served me and did nothing but stare at his face. Then, while making sure to move slowly enough not to set off anyone\'s nerves, I shrugged my shoulders.

"To the best of my knowledge, the protest, then the government investigation and finally the hit team tasked with cutting the power cables to the factory in the nearby tunnel, were all orchestrated by a clan that rivals my sponsor in their bid to stop whatever it is that we are doing."

I then shrugged my shoulders again.

"As for what\'s happening right now? My best guess is, one of those corrupt government officers pulled in some favors and started this whole mess either because that clan I mentioned has some really strong material on him… or he simply didn\'t know how to deal with people who won\'t give in to him just because he flexed his authority."

"That\'s…" Officer Dickins squinted his eyes. His head then twitched, as if about to move, only for the man to stop it before he could betray his intentions and actually look around. "That\'s quite a lot of rather heavy accusations. And what\'s with the hit team you just brought up?"

I smiled uneasily.

"Honestly speaking, I would love if our men simply rendered them unable to continue, but given the amount of weapons they brought for the operation…" I shrugged my shoulders again.

Even I wasn\'t dumb enough to openly admit to the possibility that people affiliated with Chihiro\'s clan committed the crime of murder, even if the situation actually called for it.

For a moment, Dickins stared at my face, only to then change the topic to another angle.

"Judging by the number of guards you guys put to this factory, I cannot claim to be surprised people would assume you are doing something illegal behind closed…" the officer looked up and over my shoulder, right at where the doorway to the factory remained open, courtesy of me genuinely forgetting to close the doors, "closed doors."

Still, hearing this, I couldn\'t help but smile.

"That is simply impossible," I declared before putting a wide smile on my lips. "And it\'s not because all the paperwork for this place is in order, courtesy of the city\'s governor himself, but because what we are doing in that factory…" I shook my head.

"It can\'t be illegal simply because it\'s something that was never done before in the recorded history of our species."