Chapter 284: Missing Persons Cases

Many confidential documents kept by the Southwest Military Department had been opened up to him.

At Barnard’s suggestion, Lugh stayed in the file management office of the Emergency Response Team for half a month.

He had a rough understanding of the situation in the Southwest Region.

Perhaps infighting was human nature.

Even in this dangerous world, humans were still not a monolith.

Although the Southwest Military had an absolute advantage, there were still some forces hidden in the darkness, stirring up trouble.

The Emergency Response Team not only needed to support the major bases and cities in times of crisis, but they also needed to eliminate the Fierce Beasts.

At the same time, they also needed to deal with those forces that were hiding in the dark and doing small things.

From the perspective of the Illumination Empire’s Federation as a whole, the situation in the Southwest was still considered good.

At the very least, they could barely maintain stability.

The other factions didn’t dare to go against the Southwest Military.

However, it wasn’t the same in the other regions.

For example, the Pavilion of Treasures, the Southwest Headquarters of Skylight City, had been shot three times by Lugh, but they still had to pinch their noses and admit defeat.

However, in the Southeast, where the Pavilion of Treasures had made its fortune, they had used their rich resources to recruit countless Beast Masters. Now, they had the strength that even the military in the Southeast was afraid of.

In the Northwest, the Beast God Cult was extremely rampant. Most of the civilians in some of the Northwest’s base cities had become followers of the Beast God Cult.

This put the Northwest Military in an extremely passive position.

Recently, a large number of unstable factors had appeared in the originally stable Southwest.

Some of these secrets were also related to Lugh.

For example, the headquarters of the Pavilion of Treasures had recently sent two King-tier Beast Masters to the Southwest.

The Southwest Army had just severely punished the Pavilion of Treasures, and the other party had sent two King-tier Beast Masters. This was clearly a little different.

Another example was the recent discovery of the whereabouts of the Beast God Cult members in the Southwest.

It was obvious that the failure of the previous plan didn’t stop the Beast God Cult from invading the Southwest and spreading their faith.

Another example was the appearance of the Black Feather Organization, which had always been active in the North, in the Southwest.

The Wolf Slayer Gang’s technique of nurturing the blue jade butterfly originated from the Black Feather Organization.

In the Southwest, the illegal organization, the Heaven’s Awakening Society, which had already been suppressed, showed signs of resurgence.

In the Southwest, there were also some unknown movements that made people uneasy.

In the eyes of the Southwest Military, the people there were the same as the Beast God Cult. The only difference was that they were slightly less dangerous, but they were all targets that needed to be dealt with.

In addition, there would occasionally be a terrifying beast tide, and the sleeping Fierce Beasts that had awoken from their slumber put a lot of pressure on the Southwest Military.

This was also the main reason why Skylight City had recruited new members of the emergency response team on a large scale this time and added the 14th Team.

After reading through these secrets, Lugh’s heart felt heavy

The 14th Emergency Response Team had a full complement of 100 Gold-tier Beast Masters. It was a powerful team that could immediately enter battle.

Among them, 40 were experienced members of the original Emergency Response Teams.

As for the remaining 60, most of them had served in their respective base cities before, fighting Fierce Beasts for many years.

There were also a small number of Gold-tier Beast Masters. Although they had never served before, they all had decent combat experience.

The Southwest Military Department had recruited a large number of new members for the Emergency Response Team, and had even added the 14th Emergency Response Team. Of course, it wasn’t just for show.

The training continued for about half a month, and the Emergency Response Team began to issue a few simple missions to the 14th Emergency Response Team one after another.

These small-scale missions weren’t very dangerous, and tended to be more investigative and auxiliary. Often, it only required an extremely powerful Beast Master to form a team to complete them.

It was very likely that the higher-ups had considered that the 14th Emergency Response Team was a new team.

These matters were handed over to Lucy and Gary to arrange.

The more he understood the situation in the entire Southwest Region and the entire Illumination Empire Federation, the more he felt that he was lacking in strength.

Just as Lugh was about to find an excuse to sneak out and reveal his strength, Lucy knocked on his door.

“Major, you need to personally take a look at this mission.”

“Make the arrangements.”

Lucy emphasized, “This mission was personally signed by Captain Bania. He wants the Major to go there personally.”

“Let me take a look.”

After hearing Lucy’s words, Lugh started to read seriously.

He flipped open the document and finished reading ten lines at a glance. His expression did not look too good.

The matter was related to the Black Feather Organization.

After the boss of the Wolf Slayer Gang was interrogated, he revealed that the Blue Jade Butterfly’s cultivation technique came from the Black Feather Organization.

This immediately attracted the attention of the Southwest Army.

The Southwest Army immediately ordered the Guardians to pay close attention to the traces of the Black Feather Organization. They also told them to pay attention to the proportion of missing people in the city.

In the end, they actually found some traces of the Black Feather Organization.

In the entire Southwest, three outer organizations of the Black Feather Organization had been destroyed, and seven members of the Black Feather Organization had been killed.

However, the hidden forces of the Black Feather Organization in the Southwest did not stop there.

First, they had found out that in the 200 cities in the Southwest, there were five cities where the age distribution of the missing people was roughly the same as the age distribution of the human hosts in the three stages needed to cultivate the Blue Jade Butterflies.

Generally speaking, five to six-year-old children went missing the most.

Then there were young girls.

However, in these five cities, the number of 13 to 15-year-olds who had gone missing in recent years had increased significantly, and the number of 20 to 26-year-olds was basically the same.

The Southwest Military suspected that there were members of the Black Feather Organization hiding in these five cities.

Bania hoped that Lugh would personally lead a team to Blue Star City.

Logically speaking, even if they suspected that Black Feather Organization members were hiding in these five cities, there was no need to send an emergency team over.

As long as they ordered the local city lords to directly lead troops to destroy the Black Feather Organization members, it was more than enough.

However, the problems in Blue Star City did not only appear in the Black Feather Organization.

There were also internal problems in Blue Star City.

When the Southwest Military Headquarters ordered the major cities to report the proportion of missing people, the city lord of Blue Star City checked the reported figures. It was very likely that the figures were fake.

Three days ago, a Beast Master who led the city guards of Blue Star City went to Skylight City and complained to the military headquarters about the inaction of the Guardian of Blue Star City, Scott, and the Deputy Guardian, Rodney.

After detailed questioning, the Southwest Military Headquarters learned that a large number of people had gone missing in recent years in Blue Star City and the surrounding safe zones.

Although the city guards knew about this, they didn’t pay much attention to it.

But the problem was that his son had also gone missing after that.

They couldn’t find him no matter how hard they tried.

In his anger, the city guard obtained the information on the missing people from the city guards’ internal records through improper means and ran to Skylight City.

With thousands of civilians missing, there was a high possibility that there was a Black Feather Organization base near Blue Star City.

At most, the Southwest Military would pay a little attention to it.

To put it bluntly, any random beast wave would cause an unknown number of civilians to be lost.

The city guard of Blue Star City was most likely not lying and had even passed the hypnosis test of the spirit-type pet.

The most important issue of Blue Star City to the Southwest Military Department was that Guardian Scott had concealed the real missing population data.

If the city guard was not deceived and obtained the real data, then the Guardian of Blue Star City would be suspected of defecting.

If the Guardian of Blue Star City defected, then the entire Blue Star City, inside and outside, could be infiltrated by the Black Feather Organization.

That was why Bania had ordered Lugh to lead the remaining members of the 14th Team to Blue Star City to thoroughly investigate the entire Blue Star City.

Bania did not specify how to deal with it. Instead, he asked Lugh to meet Barnard.

After Lugh read the contents of the document, he immediately followed the instructions of the document and rushed to Barnard’s office.

A portion of the military order that Barnard gave to Lugh.

Lugh looked at the military order, the bright red seal of the Southwest Military Department, and Paul’s signature. He could not help but suck in a breath of cold air.

The contents of the military order were transferred to the former Guardian of Blue Star City, Scott. The Deputy Guardian, Rodney, went to the City Guards Military Ministry of Skylight City to meet with the Director and Deputy Director of a certain office.

Barnard said in a low voice, “You lead the team to the normal investigation first. If Scott and Rodney really have a problem, then this appointment order will happen to you. This is to deal with the worst possible outcome.”

“What if they don’t accept it?”

“Then we’ll deal with them according to military law,” Barnard said with narrowed eyes. “Don’t be soft-hearted. Kill them if you have to.”

“I understand.”

“How many members are still in the 14th Team?”

“Including me, the Vice-Captain, and Lucy. There’s a total of 73.”

“That’s enough. Bring that Blue Star City guard with you.”

It was indeed enough. Three Platinum-tier elite Beast Masters and 70 Gold-tier Beast Masters were fully qualified to be enemies with the entire Blue Star City.