Homo Sapiens

In a hall thick with tension.

The dozen or so contemporary leaders of the Xu Clan all sat ramrod straight on their wooden chairs.

Patriarch Xu Qinxue was a man in his fifties with a square face and a receding hairline. He looked at the family members present, a flicker of exhaustion and displeasure in his eyes.

"I’ve heard the chatter among the ranks these past few days. The Aquino Clan and our family are allied through marriage. If we abandon this alliance, we won’t be able to stand alone against the Fernando, Lopez, Marcus, and Ayala clans."

The leader of the eighth branch, Xu Yingming, scoffed. "Heh. And you think not abandoning the alliance means we can fight them? Is this the past? The Aquinos can barely hold their ground in Manila."

"Yingming, I hear your ’cooperation’ with certain people in Bais Port has gotten quite extensive, hasn’t it?" Xu Qinxue retorted, his lips curling into a smile that didn’t reach his eyes.

Facing the Patriarch’s accusation, Xu Yingming replied without a hint of concealment, "So what if it has? At least I’ve brought a substantial new income to the clan. As the old saying goes, a wise man adapts to the times. Third Uncle, you’re old."

"Hmph! Short-sighted fool! I’m not so old and senile that I can’t see the situation clearly!" Xu Qinxue flew into a rage, slamming his hand on the table and shooting to his feet.

But he didn’t notice the icy disdain in Xu Yingming’s eyes.

’How can I save the clan when I’m surrounded by insects?’ The killing intent in Xu Yingming’s heart grew stronger.

He then gave a subtle look to another leader, Xu Yingqi, who was sitting in the back. Their eyes met, and Xu Yingqi pressed a controller in his pocket.

Xu Qinxue, who was in the middle of railing at the others, suddenly grew even more irritated by a mosquito buzzing near his ear.

But soon, Xu Qinxue sensed something was wrong. His vision blurred into multiple images. He saw the others slumping over, one after another, before his world went black.

CLAP CLAP CLAP...

"Yingqi, well done." Xu Yingming said with a smile as he clapped.

Xu Yingqi replied coolly, "I didn’t do it for you. I did it for the clan."

The scene today would not have unfolded so smoothly without the cooperation of Xu Yingqi, a member of the main branch. He was, after all, the one in charge of security for the entire estate.

Xu Yingming merely smiled without comment. After all, flies are only drawn to cracked eggs.

After being secretly recruited by the Homo Sapiens Company as a Spider Web Manager, he had been discreetly scouting for suitable assistants. Xu Yingqi, a young man of his own generation, quickly became a target.

He chose this man not only because Xu Yingqi was from the main branch, but for two other reasons. First, Xu Yingqi was in charge of the clan’s security. Second, Xu Yingqi held a grudge against the Aquino Clan.

After Xu Yingqi’s sister was married into the Aquino Clan, she suddenly committed suicide by jumping into the sea. The matter had haunted him ever since. Faced with the Patriarch’s authority, all he received was a compensation of 5 million Pesos from the Aquino Clan.

For a brother and sister who had relied on each other since childhood, money could never erase the rage and hatred in his heart.

And that was when Xu Yingming appeared.

After witnessing the power of the Homo Sapiens Company, and after they allowed him to personally kill the scumbag who drove his sister to her death, Xu Yingqi lost all reason to resist.

At this moment, Xu Yingqi’s heart was a maelstrom of complex emotions.

’I will put an end to this filthy system of marriage alliances. A tragedy like my sister’s should never happen again.’

For members of a great clan, especially the women, so-called freedom in marriage was virtually nonexistent. This was particularly true for those whose parents had no influence. Once married, even if they were miserable, divorce was not an option, as it would destroy the relationship between the two clans.

His sister couldn’t endure the abuse from her husband’s family. She wanted a divorce but received no support from her own, and in the end, her only way out was to jump into the sea.

From that moment on, Xu Yingqi had changed.

He hated his own powerlessness, and he hated the clan’s heartlessness even more.

Shaking off the gray memories, Xu Yingqi quickly called over the Soldiers he had planted and began the "modification" process on the leaders present.

At the same time, using the Patriarch’s name, he gave an order to Xu Qinxue’s wife, telling her to take her daughter on a trip to the Aquino Clan in Manila to "strengthen their bond."

Xu Qinxue’s wife was a member of the Aquino Clan herself, so naturally, she had no objections.

She took a plane to Manila that very afternoon.

Meanwhile, Xu Qinxue’s eldest son was working on Bohe Island, and his youngest son was studying on Xing Island. As for the other members of the main branch, they held no real power.

Before making their move, Xu Yingqi and Xu Yingming had already used recordings to simulate the voices of all the leaders.

Using a voice simulator and the leaders’ own phones, they quickly placated the various branches of the clan, using the excuse that they would be in a meeting for about a week and shouldn’t be called unless it was an emergency.

With the two of them working in concert, plus support from the Security Department and the Internal Affairs Department, the core members of the Xu Clan were taken down in one fell swoop.

By the time the so-called meeting was over, Xu Qinxue and the others had been turned into emotionless Soldiers.

This marked the moment the Xu Clan fell under the control of Xu Yingming and Xu Yingqi.

...

「Bantun Island.」

Xu Yingming arrived here secretly, via submarine.

That’s right, a submarine.

Luzon is a very peculiar place. The power of the various clans is a tangled web, and it’s only natural that they have their own proxies in the military. It’s just a matter of how much influence each one has.

The Lopez Clan and the Fernando Clan, along with the Duterte Clan and the Tusun Clan, can influence at least two-thirds of Luzon’s military forces. They even have their own loyalist legions that answer only to them.

The Fernando Clan has immense influence over the Luzon Navy. This year, the Fernando Clan joined forces with the Lopez Clan to fund the navy’s purchase of three submarines from the New Luzon Shipbuilding Company via a "special donation."

In reality, the New Luzon Shipbuilding Company is a medium-sized shipyard newly formed by consolidating the shipyards owned by those two clans.

Luzon’s shipbuilding industry is actually decent, mainly because South Korea and East Japan have invested in numerous shipyards there, creating a relatively strong foundation.

Although the New Luzon Shipbuilding Company can’t compare to the shipbuilding enterprises of the Koreans and East Japanese, after the consolidation, it can just barely manage to build 20,000-ton class cargo ships.

As for building submarines, that was forcing them to do something they weren’t ready for. No one expected them to be able to build things like attack submarines or nuclear submarines.

Li Qingye’s mission for them was simply to accumulate experience.

The first submarine model they produced—the Mackerel-class—had a displacement of 550 tons. It used a conventional diesel-electric propulsion system and wasn’t fast, with a speed of 8 knots submerged and 12 knots on the surface, and a maximum diving depth of less than 120 meters.

It was even worse than a World War II-era submarine.

The upsides, however, were its high comfort level, significant redundancy, and relatively good safety.

Its only truly outstanding feature was its low noise profile. The anechoic tiles on its hull were a specialty product from the Homo Sapiens Company, even more advanced than America’s. They could actively absorb active sonar waves.

They were made from a bionic nanomaterial designed using principles of biomimicry.

In Li Qingye’s view, the most crucial elements of a submarine were actually stealth and safety. Attack capability was secondary.

After all, what’s the difference between a submarine that can’t hide and a surface ship?

Therefore, the Mackerel-class was designed to sacrifice other performance aspects to focus on safety and stealth.

The Mackerel-001, which Xu Yingming was aboard, had only been officially put into service just over half a month ago.

In reality, a total of six Mackerel-class submarines had been built in the docks of the New Luzon Shipbuilding Company, split between its two shipyards. However, the company’s management fudged the books of the two shipyards and suppressed information, leading the outside world to believe only three had been built.

The three Mackerel-class subs slated for delivery to the Luzon Navy were the version without the anechoic tiles.

The Mackerel-001, on the other hand, was for the Homo Sapiens Company’s own use.

The reason for using a submarine was to avoid satellites in the sky. If Bantun Island, which had no inhabitants, was frequently visited by ships, it would eventually attract attention.

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