Chapter 246: Florence and Liam
"You better be right about this, Liam! Putting out that evacuation warning could cost us millions if the Gate doesn’t appear!"
The person that spoke was a woman wearing a well-fitted black trouser suit. She had a beautiful face and a good figure, but she wore a scowl that was enough to drive anyone away from her. Her name was Florence, and she was the Head of Superhuman Correspondence in New Jersey. She had been in the middle of work when she got the information from one of her subordinates that the Director of the SMD in New Jersey had issued an evacuation announcement, and she couldn’t believe it was true until she came back here to see for herself! Florence was one of those who didn’t believe that Liam was telling the truth at all! Liam was trying to tell them that some newbie superhuman had predicted a Yellow Gate before it would even appear!? Did he think they were stupid!?
Florence knew Liam as a brilliant man, so she didn’t know how he could’ve fallen for something so idiotic!
’All this is going to blow up in his face, and I’ll be right there to laugh at him. This Jason Marc is definitely lying, and this fool just believed everything he said without any question!’
Florence turned to look at Liam’s handsome, chisled face, and she had to fight back a blush as she glared harder at him, but she clicked her tongue in irritation when Liam ignored her and turned away when someone else spoke from the side. The person sitting there was an older man with greying hair and dark blue eyes. He held a walking stick in front of him and his voice carried an air of wisdom in every word. This was the Director of the SMD branch in New Jersey, Tirius Edgar.
"I’m sure young Liam wouldn’t have made such a decision without having sufficient trust in Mr. Jason Marc. Although he is one of the newest additions to the ranks of superhumans, we cannot deny that his abilities have continued to surprise us ever since he emerged. He is a force to be reckoned with, and his words are not to be taken lightly. My only concern now is his apparent absence in the middle of such a crisis. Liam, where did he say he was going?"
Florence frowned in annoyance when she heard Tirius talking about how important Jason was, but the moment he spoke about Jason’s absence, she also turned to Liam with a questioning gaze! It was already bad enough that Jason was asking them to carry out a full evacuation on nothing but his word, but the person who told them about this incident ended up not being present at all! That didn’t exactly inspire any form of confidence!
Liam ran a hand through his hair as he tried to come up with a proper explanation and Florence swallowed as she saw the way his hair fell over his eyes! Florence felt a heat pooling in her stomach, but she killed it with brutality and glared at Liam again while asking him to answer the damn question! Liam glared at her as well before he finally let out a silent sigh! In truth, Liam was also in the dark about what Jason had gone to do! The only thing Jason told him was that the other situation was far more important than this one!
’Jason is willing to leave hundreds of thousands to potentially die at this rate. That means it had to be important.’
Liam shook his head and then looked at the Director with a serious gaze while telling him that he didn’t know where Jason was. Florence scoffed and Liam frowned in irritation as he turned to glare at her! Her attitude wasn’t helping anyone! Florence gave Liam a cocky smirk, and Liam felt like leaping over the table and taking her head off! But the Director suddenly spoke up before things could get too heated.
"That’s enough from both of you. You are both colleagues, so you would do well to work together in this crisis. Florence, how many guilds have you managed to gather?"
Florence had been put in charge of bringing together as many high-level guilds as possible, and she nodded as she slid a document toward him before talking.
"We managed to gather ten A-Rank guilds and fifteen B-Rank guilds. The BloodRaven guild leader is currently under investigation, but we employed the services of many of their branch members and vice captains since this is an emergency—"
"Katarina will help as well."
Florence suddenly stopped talking when Liam spoke over her, and she scowled at him in curiosity! Wasn’t Katarina being taken to prison for her actions against Jason Marc? How would they expect her to cooperate at all!? Liam could sense the question on her tongue before he even asked it, and he steepled his hands together while talking.
"I don’t know how to exactly explain it, but Katarina seemed to fully understand the gravity of her crime during her conversation with Jason Marc. I won’t sit here and say she should be released, but I am certain that we can count on her support when we need it."
Bang!
"Sir! The sky! The sky is changing!"
Someone suddenly burst into the meeting room and shouted in a breathless voice, and Liam shot to his feet at those words! He asked the man what he had seen, and the man said that it was a Gate! A Gate was appearing above Central New Jersey! Liam immediately told the man to mobilize all the guilds that were available and send them to the Gate’s location!
"Make sure to keep the reporters away from the Gate and announce a restriction on the surrounding airspace! Go now!"
The man nodded and ran out of the room, and Liam quickly moved towards the window to take a look outside. The city had been mostly emptied out due to the evacuations, but there were still a few people who were trying to get out of the city, and Liam felt his face squeeze into a frown. Behind Liam, the Director of the SMD branch was already on the phone with one of his associates to try to get more information about the Gate that was appearing, and Florence walked up behind Liam. Florence looked at the dark circles and tired expression on Liam’s face, and she felt a desperate urge to hold him and make him sleep on her lap, but she bit her tongue hard to get rid of those thoughts! She would never show weakness to this bastard! Florence spoke to Liam in a serious voice.
"The higher-ups are thinking of bringing in some Diplomatic Aid from the international Superhuman Union. I don’t like asking for help from those bastards, but at this rate we’re all going to die, so it seems like the best choice at the moment."
Liam also frowned once he heard about this. The International Superhuman Union was a worldwide organization that was responsible for facilitating the movement and supply of superhumans across the entire world. There were times when a certain country just didn’t have the superhuman strength to handle a Gate, or there were superhuman criminals that were too strong for the Enforcers in a certain country to handle alone. If that happened, then the International Superhuman Union would step in and bring some superhumans from other countries in order to help out! Liam didn’t like the thought of doing this because it always became global news, and it would show the rest of the world that your country was not strong enough to handle its problems on its own.
This would not only affect their commercial sector, but it would also make it more difficult for them to maintain their image as one of the strongest countries in the world! There have been many countries that always refused the aid of the ISU, and Liam felt like they had to first exhaust all of their own options before they would even start thinking about reaching out to that organization. Besides, it wasn’t like they were without any help. Even though the SMD and the guilds weren’t able to produce a sufficient number of powerful superhumans to handle the Gate, they still had the Enforcers!