Chapter 3329: Dark Flower

At this very moment, far across the ocean in the United States, Tawana's unusual behavior had indeed attracted the attention of the Victorious One and his staff.

However, since Tawana had long been the most vocal and outspoken critic, the Victorious One did not know whether her Tokyo concert, where she refrained from speaking recklessly, was due to a genuine desire to change course or merely a temporary restraint forced by the earlier release of that video; thus, for them, contacting Tawana now would be premature, and it would be better to observe further, otherwise any contact would inevitably expose their intention to win her over, and if the other side seized upon it to make a big deal, the overall loss would outweigh the gain.

After all, the outcome is now settled, and for the Victorious One, a major star like Tawana holds little strategic significance—having her would merely be the icing on the cake, while lacking her would cause no great harm.

But if, at this juncture, they pursued merely the icing on the cake and ended up giving the opposition ammunition to exploit, it would naturally be like picking up sesame seeds while losing a watermelon; therefore, the safest course is to continue observing, confirm that her stance has genuinely shifted, and only then make contact to complete this final step of adding the icing on the cake—this would be the best choice.

Meanwhile, a private jet took off urgently from a small airport in Washington, flying from here to the distant U. S. Virgin Islands in the Caribbean Sea.

On board, several middle-aged white men in their fifties and sixties sat silently in four facing luxury seats in the cabin.

All four wore grim expressions, especially one man in his sixties with graying hair, who was filled with rage.

Although the plane was still in its ascent, he had already unfastened his seatbelt, strained himself upright in the fuselage tilted upward, and angrily demanded: "What the hell is going on?! Wasn't it said that the person had already been put in the vehicle? Why has everyone vanished, and then Tawana still went back to finish her concert?!"

The three men before him exchanged tense glances, looking at each other, until finally a blond middle-aged man spoke: "Chairman, the assassins we sent had indeed lured Tawana into the vehicle at the time, and even the Mitsui family noticed nothing; the team leader even communicated with the person responsible for disposing of the body and erasing traces, and it was said that they had intended to take only Tawana into the vehicle, but due to the complicated situation, her boyfriend and one of her bodyguards also got in, after which they suddenly lost all contact, we have been unable to reach anyone, and as a result, Tawana appeared on schedule at the dome's performance venue, so we suspect either our people were bribed by Tawana, or they were eliminated."

Another man said: "The possibility of being bribed by Tawana can be disregarded; our people know our own strength best—Tawana could offer them even more money, but they would have no life to spend it, and by then not only would Tawana surely die, but none of them would survive either."

The white-haired man, unable to contain his fury, said: "Eliminating the possibility of bribery leaves only one last option: perhaps your assassins were all eliminated by the opposing side. Were you not sending top-tier assassins this time? And wasn't there also coordination from Japanese ninjas in the middle? With so many people and the advantage of striking first, how could such a major problem still occur?"

"This..." the three men broke out in cold sweat, and the blond man, steeling himself, said: "Chairman, since we do not know the exact circumstances, we can only speculate—perhaps there is an unknown top-tier expert near Tawana, or perhaps the Mitsui family detected something abnormal and left a hidden countermeasure; mainly, our people have all gone missing, we do not know what exactly happened in between, and we can only guess."

The white-haired man shouted angrily: "I don't want to speculate about what actually happened—I only know one thing: Tawana must die! Initially, that bunch of worthless individuals, in order to exploit her influence to win her over, actively told her many secrets and even showed her things that outsiders must not see; now the person they placed high hopes in has completely failed, and once the transfer of authority is completed, they will surely spare no effort to investigate these matters, at which point Tawana will become one of their breakthrough points, and I also believe they are harboring a burning determination, vowing to eradicate Tawana this thorn in their side; Tawana is what kind of person—you know her better than anyone, this young woman from a middle-class background simply cannot possess genuine crisis response capability; once the FBI sits her down for interrogation, she will quickly spill everything she knows."

Saying this, he added: "This woman's influence is truly immense—at least two billion people on Earth know who she is, and the opposing side will certainly treat her as their greatest breakthrough point; once she is breached by them, this will become the biggest news in the world, so before she is overcome by the opposition, those key figures will surely try every means to isolate the risk, and by then, we all may very well be unable to escape death!"

The blond man quickly asked: "Chairman, according to your view, what should we do now?"

The white-haired man replied coldly: "When you go hunting in Africa, the local organizers will provide you with much dedicated equipment, including a pistol, a dagger, and a double-barreled hunting shotgun, which has two triggers and two completely independent firing systems, designed so that if one shot fails to bring down the beast, you can quickly seize the moment to fire the second shot with maximum speed; if both shots fail to resolve the threat, you can still draw the pistol to continue the attack, and if the pistol still fails to remove the danger, you must then use the dagger to engage the beast in close combat—in short, you and your quarry can only have one survivor."

Saying this, he scanned the three men and continued: "Here, Tawana must die, and the sooner the better, so I don't care what methods you use or whom you find—you must launch a second, even third, assassination against Tawana as soon as possible, absolutely not allowing her to return alive to the United States; as long as she does not return to America, we still have a chance to come back, but once she returns to the U. S., we can only die somewhere outside of America."

The blond man frowned: "Chairman, our main personnel in Japan have already gone missing, and what remains are only some auxiliary staff with average combat ability; if I now wish to launch a second round of assassinations against Tawana, we must necessarily find a sufficiently powerful external ally."

The blond man said: "In that case, let us immediately seek suitable external allies—there is a Chinese saying: 'Under generous rewards, brave men will surely appear'; as long as the bounty from the dark flower is high enough, someone will surely risk their life for it! You can contact Japan's largest ninja clan or underworld organization; I know little about ninjas, but as for the underworld, how about the Yamaguchi-gumi? Aren't they quite formidable? Tell them, if they can eliminate Tawana, I will give them one billion U. S. dollars!"