Chapter 927

"You must be Mr. Bell."

After flipping through the documents and personal items on the table and confirming the homeowner's identity, Leon turned his head to look at the disheveled man being held down by Alger, saying in a calm tone:

"Please rest assured, we don't want to hurt you; we just want to borrow your identity as a scholar from District 1 to help us do a few things."

"Hmph!"

Before Leon could even finish stating his request, the man with the messy beard let out an angry snort, then said with an unfriendly expression:

"You must be those fugitives! What? After attacking Administrative District 3, you've set your sights on Scientific Research District 1?"

"Yes."

"I won't take you there, don't even think about it!"

The disheveled man acted very tough, stiffening his neck and glaring angrily at Leon:

"Scientific Research District 1 is the core of the entire Kingdom of Kroke, and everything I have was given to me by the Kingdom. I could never betray the Kingdom!"

"Mm-hmm."

After responding casually, Leon, who hadn't slept all night, didn't continue talking to the disheveled man, but instead said to Alger, who was holding him down:

"Senior Alger, it's up to you now."

"Alright."

Hearing Leon's words, Alger nodded slightly, and his right hand, which was pressing on the disheveled man's shoulder, instantly dispersed, turning into countless threads finer than hair, which hung limply on his shoulder.

"What is this thing? You... what are you doing?"

In the disheveled man's terrified gaze, the strange threads hanging on his shoulder actually broke through the skin on his shoulder like burrowing earthworms, drilling into his body one by one.

Immediately after, before he could even react from the shock and resist, those threads, which were so thin they were almost transparent, "swam" along the gaps between his muscles toward his limbs and bones.

In just a few breaths' time, these eerie threads had traveled throughout his entire body, replacing his own will and completely taking over his body; even places like his eyelids and tongue had at least dozens of fine threads implanted in them, leaving him unable to move in the slightest.

"That's about enough."

After flipping through the disheveled man's earlobes and faintly feeling the protrusion of some threads in the thinnest part of the skin on the back, Alger, whose entire right arm was missing from the shoulder, nodded and said to Leon:

"This Mr. Bell has already been controlled by me. If he exhibits any abnormal behavior, I will discover and stop it immediately, ensuring he has no chance to call for help."

"Thanks for your hard work."

After nodding toward Alger, Leon, in the disheveled man's terrified gaze, flipped through his pockets, took out his personal notebook, glanced at the itinerary written on it, and then said:

"Let's go. It's time for Mr. Bell to go to work, so we should be heading out."

Heading out? You... ah?!

Hearing Leon's words, the disheveled man discovered in terror that it was as if another set of bones and muscles was exerting force inside his own body; he actually raised his hand to unlock the door and walked out.

And that young man with black hair and black eyes, along with the burly man missing his right arm, followed directly behind him, walking straight onto the street without avoiding anyone at all.

Even more bizarrely, facing these two criminals whose appearance and features were exactly the same as those in the broadcast, and who hadn't even changed their clothes, the passersby on the street seemed not to see them at all, showing no reaction whatsoever.

How is that possible? Could they be invisible?

While the disheveled man was completely baffled, Leon had already taken his identification card, inserted it into the wayfinder by the side of the road, issued a request to go to Scientific Research District 1, and then, along with the tall man missing an arm, followed him into the floating car that had come to pick them up.

"Mr. Leon."

Seeming a bit unsure, after the floating car started moving, Alger couldn't help but ask:

"Are we just going over there directly like this? Wouldn't it be safer if we went using Mona's 【Path Ahead】?"

"It's fine, let's just go like this."

Leon, sitting beside the disheveled man, answered without raising his head while flipping through the data he had snatched yesterday:

"I've checked carefully; among the technologies of the Kingdom of Kroke, there is nothing like video surveillance. With the effect of 【Secret Tail】, it's enough for us to sneak past ordinary checkpoints.

And counting the several large experimental areas specially opened up in the surrounding area, the total area of Scientific Research District 1 is nearly sixty square kilometers. It's not a small place; as long as we are careful not to get too close to the core area and don't appear in places that are too open, the possibility of being discovered is not high."

"That's good then..."

Hearing Leon's assurance, Alger felt a bit more at ease, then looked at him as he lowered his head to flip through the data, and asked with some curiosity:

"Mr. Leon, these snatched data are just ordinary figures, right? You've been reading them all night yesterday, haven't you finished yet?"

"No, I've only read about one-tenth of it so far."

"Then... have you discovered anything?"

"A little."

Flipping through the thick "Kroke Mineral Resource Policy" in his hand, as well as the "Annual Schedule of Major Energy and Core Material Revenue and Expenditure" used for comparison, Leon said with a slightly cold expression:

"The area of the Kingdom of Kroke is not large, but its resource consumption is astonishingly high. Just for floating crystals alone, it consumes over 100,000 tons every year, and the consumption of other whale oil, coal, special ores, and various rare metals is calculated in the millions of tons."

"Isn't this quite normal?"

After thinking for a while, Alger said with some confusion:

"I don't understand this very well, but I've also heard people say that although the Kingdom of Kroke is small, it is actually a trade-oriented country like the Thousand Sails Sea Kingdom of Saio, selling massive amounts of products every year. This consumption doesn't seem like much, right?"

"This consumption is nothing; even in terms of the Kingdom of Kroke's trade volume, it could even be considered low. But the real problem lies in where these resources actually come from."

After using his charcoal pencil to circle a few spots on the attached map of the "Mineral Resource Policy," Leon frowned and said:

"Although the 'territory' area of the Kingdom of Kroke is not large, there are very, very many 'mining areas' that are actually controlled by it and exist solely to support the Kingdom of Kroke.

Even if these 'mining areas' are not large individually, and their locations are extremely scattered, the areas that provide resources to the Kingdom of Kroke in the name of short-term development, semi-permanent leasing, or even outright purchase, add up to nearly 400,000 square kilometers."

"What?!"

Hearing Leon's words, Alger couldn't help but be shocked.

"Actually so much? Our Kingdom of Alesund has such a large territory, and it's only a little over a million square kilometers! I thought the Kingdom of Kroke was just a small country with only twenty thousand square kilometers!"