Gundam 00: Rise of China

The victory celebration on Ceylon Island was ruined by the arrival of the messenger, which dampened the initial excitement.

Ordinary soldiers might not think too deeply about it, but their own border outpost has been attacked.

Having experienced such empathy, how could they, with their simple and genuine emotions, possibly continue to relax?

Upon hearing Anura's confession, Wei Meng and the others felt as if a huge stone had been thrown into a calm lake, and they all fell silent.

Wei Meng frowned, his fingers unconsciously rubbing the pistol at his waist. Vikram lowered his head and kicked away a shard of glass at his feet in frustration.

Somapiris, oblivious to the ways of the world, stood rooted to the spot, his cool golden eyes churning with an unprecedented turmoil.

Clearly, the complexity of the real world is something the super soldier test base can never match.

Only Wang Ye remained calm.

Sitting on the stone bench, he watched the camp lights gradually illuminate the distance, his fingertips lightly tapping the bench.

Anura could see through the truth, which he already knew perfectly well.

From the moment of its inception, the Celestial Beings was not a righteous savior; on the contrary, they were merely the sharpest and most dangerous pawn on the chessboard of great power rivalry.

Who told Aeolia to have such a flawed origin from the start?

Wang Ye felt that instead of hoping that "those" people would do good deeds, it would be better to hope that the sun would rise in the west in the future.

Meanwhile, tens of thousands of kilometers away, in a military base of the People's Revolutionary Alliance, a fierce storm was raging in General Kim's office on the top floor of a building.

"Are you an idiot?!"

He slammed his hand on the table, the heavy solid wood desk vibrating loudly. A vintage enamel teacup on the table jumped up, spilling tea all over the table.

General Jin slammed his fist on the table, his face turning bright red, veins bulging on his forehead. He pointed at Sergei standing in front of him and began to curse.

"Sergei Smirnov!"

"What can I say to you! How many years have you been in the army? You're a veteran officer, how come you don't even understand this simple principle?"

"In the military, you either do nothing, live a quiet and uneventful life, and no one can find fault with you if you do nothing."

"If you reach the required age and have enough experience, you can still move up the ranks."

"Otherwise, we should do things well and achieve results!"

"Even if you mess things up, you need to think beforehand about how to shift the blame!"

"And you? You're completely brainless, aren't you?"

"Look what you've done! That outpost incident had absolutely nothing to do with you!"

"Why did you rush off to join in the fun? And what was the result?"

"They didn't even leave a single hair on the Celestial Being's Gundam Exia, and let it escape unscathed!"

"Now look what's happened, the entire military is laughing at me!"

"So, tell me, who do you think should take the blame for this?"

He could hear General Jin's rapid and torrential scolding, but Sergei stood straight opposite him, his back as upright as a javelin.

His throat tightened slightly, as if he wanted to say something, but he ultimately swallowed his words back.

There was no way around it; Sergei knew General Kim's temperament all too well.

Talking back at this point will only invite more severe scolding.

But if time could be turned back, he could have another chance to choose how the whole thing was handled.

Sergei will still go.

There was no other reason than that it was a People's Revolutionary Alliance outpost, and he himself was a soldier of the People's Revolutionary Alliance.

As a soldier, he couldn't just stand by and watch his comrades be slaughtered by Gundams while he did nothing!

Seeing this, General Jin, who had finished scolding, looked at Sergei, who remained unmoved by reason and still had an upright expression.

Especially the other party, who seemed to think, "I did nothing wrong, but I'll do it again next time."

General Jin, his eyebrows raised in anger, pointed at Sergei's nose, speechless with rage for a long time.

After a long while, he forced himself to suppress his anger and sat heavily back down in his chair.

There's no way, there's really no way.

General Kim still has to rely on Sergei!

You know, right now General Gao has a guy named Wang Ye who has suddenly emerged and is gaining momentum. No one in the entire military can confidently say that they can completely suppress that guy.

Among his own men, only Sergei was capable of challenging Wang Ye.

"Good-for-nothing! A complete good-for-nothing!" General Jin held back for a long time, but finally couldn't help himself. He got up and cursed a couple more times before panting heavily.

"Alright, stop standing here in the way."

"I don't want to hear your Gundam performance evaluations, they're useless! The process doesn't matter, I only care about the result!"

"Let me tell you, General Gao is currently holding the approval from the Supreme Command and is secretly doing something underhanded."

"But there is no doubt that the other side holds the best resources in the entire army and has access to information and permissions that I cannot obtain."

A flicker of jealousy flashed in General Jin's eyes, and his tone lowered.

"General Gao has such high authority because he achieved great merit with Wang Ye's help. If he can do it, so can we!"

"I've already coordinated with Tianzhu and the Ministry of Armaments. Once everything is ready, we're going to make a big move!"

"In that case, you should return to Tianzhu tomorrow to prepare properly."

"This time, no matter what, I can't afford to mess it up again!"

"If we lose to Wang Ye again, neither of us will escape unscathed!"

"Yes, General."

A glint flashed in his eyes, and Sergei gave a standard military salute, his voice still steady.

"Get lost."

Out of sight, out of mind. General Jin waved his hand impatiently, signaling his subordinate to get lost and stop ruining his mood.

Seeing this, Sergei turned around and walked out of the office, gently closing the door behind him.

No sooner had Sergei closed the door than a loud crash came from the office behind him, clearly General Kim was smashing things to vent his anger.

"General Gao, you old fox! Why does he get all the good things?!"

"And that Sergei! His brain's as hard as granite! He's completely inflexible!"

"Sigh... If only Wang Ye were my disciple..."

Intermittent complaints drifted through the heavy wooden door, and Sergei, who didn't want to hear them but couldn't, paused in his tracks.

He then continued walking forward with a blank expression, pretending nothing had happened.

The corridor was empty except for the crisp sound of his leather shoes on the floor.

However, on the surface, Sergei's face remained expressionless, but in his heart, he was already experiencing a mix of emotions.

He disliked General Jin's practice of taking credit for himself and pushing credit onto his subordinates, and he also disapproved of the infighting and factional struggles within the military.

But from the first day he joined the army, he followed General Jin.

Over the decades, they have long been branded with the mark of General Jin's faction, leaving them with no other choice.

Sergei stopped at the corner of the corridor.

He looked up out the window; night had fallen over the entire base, and the lights in the camp flickered on and off.

Suddenly, Wang Ye's face involuntarily flashed through Sergei's mind.

That excessively young major was calm, insightful, and tactically brilliant.

More importantly, he, like himself, had witnessed the terror of Gundam firsthand and knew just how dangerous Celestial Beings could be.

General Kim's so-called "big move" sounded ambitious, but Sergei was filled with unease.

The performance of the Celestial Gundam far exceeds everyone's imagination.

Using conventional tactics to deal with Gundams will only repeat the humiliation suffered by the Sky Pillar Guard, and will only cause more soldiers to die in vain.

Thinking of this, Sergei clenched his fists.

He couldn't let his men fight a battle with too many uncertainties.

After much deliberation, Sergei took a deep breath and took out his personal communicator.

His finger hesitated on the screen for a long time before finally pressing a string of encrypted numbers.