Asura in Arknights

Since the day she put the uniform in the closet, Cintraya has never touched it again.

With each opening and closing of the cabinet door, a thin layer of dust accumulated on the already less-than-new uniform, making it look even more worn.

After hesitating for a moment, Hintelia took out the uniform.

She didn't unfold the uniform, nor did she even brush off the dust. Instead, she simply opened the drawer at the bottom of the wardrobe and stuffed the uniform into the very bottom.

Alongside the uniform in the drawer was an alloy composite bow that didn't reflect any light. The weapon, which should have required careful maintenance, was simply left in the cabinet, with the bowstring still attached.

"That's fine then."

With her eyes lowered, Hinterlea whispered "Goodbye" and closed the drawer without hesitation.

She no longer needs these things.

Perhaps one day, Hintleya will pick up this weapon again for other reasons, but at least for now, she never wants to touch these two things again; even just looking at them annoys her.

Aside from mentally unstable lunatics, who would enjoy killing each other all day long?

Suddenly, Hintleya's hands stopped moving, and she muttered to herself,

"...Why does this feel like a scene from a movie?"

Although she has hardly had any free time lately, before the Unarmored Alliance missions, Hinterlea had basically nothing to do every day.

Watching movies has become a good way to kill time.

Her current situation is indeed similar to that in some Colombian films, where a person with a secret has laid down their weapon because they are tired of fighting, but fate is unpredictable and some unexpected things happen, forcing them to return to their old ways.

As she thought about it, Hinterlaya suddenly found it somewhat amusing.

"We've been living in comfort for too long... I actually have time to think about all this nonsense."

However, Cintraya's idea is not wrong; the first half of her life could be made into a wonderful movie.

As a child, she admired the glory of the knights on TV, but when she stepped onto the field herself, she hated the darkness behind the scenes of the game.

In a moment of madness, he accepted the invitation from the Unarmored Alliance and has been bound by the shadows cast by those city lights ever since.

If she had refused the Unarmored Alliance back then, she might have taken a completely different path.

Of course, things might get even worse.

Because reminiscing about the past had taken up some time, Cintraya changed her clothes much faster.

Just as Hintelia was about to leave, her phone rang again.

I took it out and saw that I had received a new email.

The bad news is that the email was sent by the chairman who doesn't care about anything.

With her fingers trembling slightly, she opened the email, glanced at its contents, and her mood, which had been terrible just a moment ago, instantly brightened.

The email contained surprisingly good news.

[I forgot to tell you earlier, I've recently found another suitable candidate, a Juris Doctor from Walsh University, a top-performing lawyer. She should be able to start working at the company soon. When she does, you can see what tasks are suitable for her.]

"You've been a great help."

Hinterlea let out a slow sigh of relief.

It is foreseeable that with the press conference, the dark past of Pol Pharmaceuticals will be exposed in its entirety, and they will face no shortage of lawsuits. At this time, having a law doctor and a top lawyer join them will definitely help them solve their urgent problems.

Cintraya is well aware of the company's current problem—a shortage of manpower.

To be precise, the problem is a shortage of capable and trustworthy personnel.

After a bankruptcy reorganization, most of the former executives of Pol Pharmaceuticals have been excluded from the company's core power structure, resulting in a large number of vacancies in key positions.

Generally speaking, if there is a shortage of manpower, you can just recruit people from the community. Three-legged toads are hard to find, but aren't there plenty of two-legged people who can do the work on the streets?

Kopol Pharmaceuticals' situation is somewhat special. If they were to conduct open recruitment, it's estimated that eleven out of the ten successful candidates would be spies with ill intentions, just like with Cintraya back then, where even professional headhunting firms were bribed.

Such spies can indeed be let in; after all, they will work harder than ordinary employees and will not complain about the hardship or have any thoughts of resigning.

However, such people cannot be placed in key positions. This is the predicament they are facing now. They can only proceed step by step, first finding a suitable candidate, and then spending time thoroughly investigating the candidate's ancestry. Progress has been extremely slow so far.

Now, one person has to do the work of ten. It's not just Xintleya; many others are just as busy as she is.

However, this is only temporary. Once the company has enough staff, her work will be back to normal.

This is also why Cintraya was able to grit her teeth and persevere; otherwise, she would have protested against the unscrupulous boss's mistreatment of employees long ago.

The news that new people are coming to help share the burden is enough to put a good mood on Cintraya's position all day.

After putting her phone away, Xintelaya drove to the current administrative headquarters of Bol Pharmaceuticals.

It was unusual for Hinterlea to not be able to get to the company before the start time today, but she wasn't too late. Many employees were rushing towards the company building just like her.

On the surface, the towering building seems no different from last year, but in reality, almost all the people inside have been replaced, including Hinterlanda.

Nodding to the employees who greeted her along the way, Cintraya hurried to the company's front desk.

"Has anyone from Rhine Life come by today? Did they have an appointment?" Hinterlea asked the receptionist casually.

Among the things Li Ang entrusted to her was the information that Rhine Life would be visiting again soon.

The receptionist checked the visitor log and replied, "Yes."

“A gentleman named Ferdinand Clooney came an hour ago and should still be waiting in the VIP lounge.”

Rhine Life employees have been registered as VIPs of the company and have access to most parts of the building.

Regardless of what those people are fighting with the chairman behind the scenes, at least on the surface, Xintelaiya needs to do a good job.

To Hinterlea's surprise, they arrived so early.

An hour ago... the company hadn't even started work yet, they were probably just waiting at the door to ambush Xintelaiya.

"I understand, you can continue with your work."

It seems they're really in a hurry... Hinterlea thought thoughtfully.

However, since the chairman had already said that he would be responsible for the follow-up, Hinterlea didn't bother to consider what Rhine Life was plotting.

To be honest, perhaps it's a lingering effect from her time with the Unarmored Alliance, but Hinterlea is quite interested in the project called 'Dream'.

Banishing these distracting thoughts from her mind, Cintraya didn't go anywhere else, but headed straight for the VIP reception room not far from her office.

Through the frosted glass of the reception room, Hinterlea could see a restless figure on the sofa.

Clearly, the time that Hinterlaya was late made the other party wait very long.

"Miss Heartlea, you've finally arrived."

Upon seeing Hinterlea enter, Ferdinand eagerly went to greet her.

"Sorry, I had some work to take care of, so I'm a little late."

Hinterlea moved nimbly, avoiding Ferdinand who was about to pounce on her.

I don't know what this head of the energy department has been through these past two days, but he looks terrible right now.

Although his hairstyle showed signs of being styled, it wasn't as shiny as it had been the last time we met, and even his crisp tie had a few more wrinkles.

Ferdinand's eyes were bloodshot, as if he hadn't rested at all in the past two days.

"Mr. Clooney, you've come so early, there must be something important to discuss, right?"

Hinterlea gently reminded him, and this statement somewhat brought the other person back to their senses.

"So early? Yes, I have something very important to do."

Somewhat dazed, Ferdinand subconsciously repeated Hinterlea's words, then swallowed hard and slowly said,

"Since you have no plans for Plot 21 in the short term, we hope to conduct our own exploration of the abandoned facilities there and recover the relevant experimental data."

“We will hire a third-party exploration team, but we will need your permission to enter Plot 21.”

Sure enough, their goal was the same as what the chairman had said.

After nodding silently to herself, Hinterlea replied without hesitation, "I have received the chairman's approval to allow you to conduct your own exploration of Plot 21. However, we will send some personnel to supervise your actions on Plot 21 throughout the process."

Because it involves the ownership of items in that abandoned plot of land, it would be strange if we didn't send one or two people to keep an eye on it.

Ferdinand's only interest was the experimental data on the 'Dream,' and he had no interest in the other junk in the ruins.

Therefore, he had absolutely no reason to refuse such a reasonable request.

"no problem."

After reaching a consensus on the general direction, the next step is to discuss some details.

Hinterlea tentatively made a few rather demanding requests, but to her surprise, Ferdinand agreed to them all without even trying to bargain.

You could tell he was really anxious, as if something was urging him on from behind.

After receiving the authorization letter, Ferdinand left without even exchanging pleasantries.

Just like when he came.

Shrugging, Cintraya edited a text message about what had just happened and sent it to the chairman.

"Next is the press conference... Oh right, we need to find someone to go and supervise it. Who should we choose?"

Anyway, Hintelia herself would never do such a thing. She doesn't have a hobby of running into ruins for no reason. Let whoever wants to do it do it.

"Let the Knights go instead."

After some thought, Hintelia finally decided to entrust the task to the knight.

Those office workers who spend all day in the office can't stand this suffering, not to mention that the pollution in Plot 21 has not yet subsided, so no one wants to go there.

Therefore, it would be more appropriate to send the infected members of the Knights.

After making the decision, Hinterlea edited an internal email and sent it to the Bloodblade Knights.

As for who to send, that's up to them to decide internally.

Chapter 52 Ferdinand's Resolve

"What exactly is that woman, Christensen, trying to do?"

As soon as he left the Ball Pharmaceuticals building, Ferdinand began to curse loudly without any regard for his image, attracting curious glances from many passersby.

Hinterlea's guess was absolutely right. Ferdinand hadn't had a proper rest these past two days. He was so angry about what had happened recently that he had no desire to sleep.

Ferdinand's purpose in going to Casimir was not simple. The joint experiment being conducted by the Energy Department there was extremely important. It is no exaggeration to say that if the experiment succeeds, the predicament that Rhine Lab has been facing all along will be solved.

To be precise, the Grand Knights' Territory was just one of the testing grounds. No matter how naive Ferdinand was, he couldn't possibly put all the pressure on this place and on a group of outsiders.

Moreover, Ferdinand was not only a scientist but also an excellent businessman, and he basically controlled the finances of the entire Rhine Life.

Although it sounds strange, most of Rhine Life's investments were indeed brought in by Ferdinand.

The true core of Project 'Dream' remains in Trimont City, Rhine Lab's headquarters. The testing ground in the Grand Knight Territory is merely a backup option for conducting experiments that are inconvenient to carry out on their own territory.

It was merely a candidate, not something Ferdinand would have personally gone to make.

However... the plan, which was originally going smoothly, suddenly encountered an unexpected problem - the other core person in charge of the Dream Project, the director of the Originium Arts Application Department, actually resigned and didn't want to do the job anymore!

How can this be allowed?

After his attempts to persuade Ferdinand failed, he was both extremely angry and deeply frustrated.

After all, she was the one in charge of the experiment, and if she didn't want to continue, Ferdinand couldn't force her to.

The problem is, what will happen to the military's orders if the experiment is terminated? Although this was not the original intention of Project 'Dream', the military is quite optimistic about its weaponization prospects, so it placed a large order with Rhine Lab.

If this deal falls through, Rhine Life's cash flow will definitely be in serious trouble.

Moreover... the military is also Rhine Lab's most important partner, and offending them would bring absolutely no benefit.

How is Ferdinand going to explain the failure of Project Dream to those idiots whose brains are full of explosives? The project leader, because of his ridiculous conscience, voluntarily stopped the experiment? Doesn't he even look at what he's done?

At his wits' end, Ferdinand suddenly remembered that there seemed to be a testing ground in Casimir.

Although I haven't paid attention to this place for a long time, based on the experimental results they sent last time, the progress here is quite good, and it can shut the military up.

However, when Ferdinand was about to contact Ball Pharmaceuticals, he learned of a series of bad news, including the death of the president and the company's restructuring, rendering all previous contact methods invalid.

Ferdinand had no choice but to come in person. In fact, apart from his students and a few close confidants, no one in the entire Rhine Life and even Columbia knew that he had quietly left Trimont.

Even the Colombian military, which was closely monitoring his movements, managed to slip away from Ferdinand's watchful eyes with a clever little trick.

However, this situation cannot last long; at most, the Colombian Ministry of Defense will discover that Ferdinand is missing within half a month.

Therefore, his time was actually quite tight. The round trip would take about a week, leaving Ferdinand with only about a week for the actual operation.