108: Chapter 108 The Five Great Families are shocked and enraged, slamming their fists on the table to demand an explanation.

It could freely pass through any matter without obstruction, cross the limit of the speed of light to traverse dimensional space, and conduct instantaneous quantum state communication between Earth and Zeta Star, thirty-nine light-years away.

It could trace back time, monitor anything that happened at any point in the past, and exert a real influence on the physical constants of the microscopic world.

It was a vanguard intelligence device deployed by Zeta Star to the target planet in advance, gathering all necessary information for the arrival of the million-strong fleet.

Without the slightest hesitation, Zhang Yi pressed purchase.

His balance dropped from 9.2 million to 4.2 million. Combined with the 320,000 spent on the gloves earlier, he had already spent just over six million.

But he did not hesitate at all.

This item was the core prop for the grand show that was about to unfold. Without it, the fear of the million-strong Zeta army bearing down on them would not feel real.

Once the item was delivered, he leaned back against the sofa and began to plan how to use this thing to pull off a massive stunt.

Since it could unfold in two-dimensional space, once unfolded, it could theoretically cover the entire sky of Earth.

In other words, he controlled what was written on Earth's sky. He could write whatever he wanted, and all of humanity would see it just by looking up.

The content had to be oppressive enough, shocking enough to make all of humanity tremble to their core,

but it had to fit the identity of an advanced civilization, rather than sounding like a street thug shouting abuse.

The first line that popped into his head was:

"Lowly human civilization, you are finished!"

It sounded too much like a street thug cornering someone and talking trash. It didn't match the sophistication of an advanced civilization. Rejected.

The second line was: "You are all bugs!"

Not bad. It had the arrogance of an advanced civilization,

but similar content had already been used once in the bloody ultimatum on the sky. Repeating it would lack novelty and weaken the effect. Rejected.

The third line was: "Yoshi! Beautiful girls of Earth, plenty of them!"

This was even worse than a street thug. He shouldn't have even thought of of it. Discarded immediately.

Zhang Yi fell into deep thought, his finger tapping rhythmically on the armrest of the sofa. Various versions of threat declarations cycled through his mind, but none of them satisfied him.

The ones that were too direct lacked sophistication,

the ones that were too subtle might not be understood,

the ones that were too long, no one would bother to finish reading,

and the ones that were too short failed to convey enough dread.

Just then, the pendulum clock on the living room wall suddenly chimed the hour.

The pendulum swung back and forth, its brass face reflecting the afternoon sunlight filtering through the French windows. The second hand ticked second by second, making a steady, crisp clicking sound.

Zhang Yi subconsciously looked up and stared at the circular clock face for a few seconds.

Then, a flash of inspiration struck his mind.

A scene suddenly surfaced from the depths of his memory, one from a science fiction novel he had read in his past life.

The corners of his mouth curled up slightly. He knew what he should write on the sky now.

...

Fifth Avenue, Manhattan, New York. The Astor Family's private club.

This building had no street number.

On Fifth Avenue, thousands of pedestrians passed by it every day, and not a single one would give it a second glance.

In their eyes, it was nothing more than an old-fashioned oak door set into a greyish-white limestone facade, without even a brass plaque on the frame.

Yet, the people behind this door could find out within minutes the laying year of every paving stone, the pruning frequency of every street tree, and the rental range of every storefront window on the entirety of Fifth Avenue.

Because this was a property of the Astor Family,

and the Astor Family was among the first generation of aristocrats after the founding of America.

On this land, the only people who had arrived before them were the Native Americans, and Native Americans did not have private clubs.

At this moment, in the private study on the third floor of the club, five people sat on either side of a twelve-foot-long walnut table.

Floor-to-ceiling bookshelves lined three walls of the study, packed with leather-bound classics handed down since the eighteenth century, but tonight, no one was in the mood to flip through a single book.

The crystal chandelier cast a warm, yellow glow evenly across everyone's faces, illuminating the spread-out intelligence documents, encrypted tablets, and several printouts of the fierce battle over the Hoover Dam captured by high-altitude infrared satellite imaging.

Sitting at the head of the long table was the patriarch of the Astor Family, Samuel Astor.

He was seventy-three years old, his silver hair combed meticulously. A pair of gold-rimmed reading glasses rested on the bridge of his nose. He wore a deep navy custom three-piece suit, with an Astor Family crest passed down from his grandfather's generation pinned to his lapel.

Deviating from his usual slow, composed demeanor of an old-school gentleman, his face was ash-grey as he tapped his fingers on the table, signaling everyone present to focus their attention on him.

His gaze swept across the face of the DuPont Family's matriarch, Isabelle DuPont,

a sixty-one-year-old matriarch—cold, silent, with her hands folded on her lap. On the encrypted tablet screen in front of her, a stream of intelligence summaries intercepted from internal Department of Defense channels was scrolling.

Then, it was Frederick Rockefeller III of the Rockefeller Family,

sixty-eight years old, slightly portly, wearing an emerald ring passed down from his grandfather, the elder Rockefeller.

Next was Jacob Rothschild, the head of the North American branch of the Rothschild Family,

fifty-eight years old, thin, quiet, with his fingertips lightly touching on the table in front of him, looking as if he were in deep thought at all times.

And finally, William Vanderbilt V of the Vanderbilt family,

fifty-five years old, broad-shouldered, with a thick grey beard. The pile of intelligence documents in front of him was no less than that of the DuPont Family, but he had placed a glass of whiskey nearby, its rim already smudged with fingerprints.

The earth-shaking battle that took place last night over the Hoover Dam, between the 200,000-strong Space Fleet and two thousand alien UFOs, had been witnessed by anyone in the world with eyes.

But while ordinary people saw shock, fear, and tipped donations in live streams,

these five people, these five families, saw a massive shift—one they had never anticipated, never controlled, and which none of their subordinates had even reported to them in advance from start to finish.

Their respective intelligence channels had been running all night,

from the Department of Defense to intelligence systems, from military contractors to academic observatories.

Every piece of feedback pointed to the same conclusion:

Within the Lighthouse Country, there existed a power structure that was deeper, more hidden, and more ruthless than theirs!

And that structure, without the five families knowing a single thing about it, had stuffed an alien royal into a grey bag and dragged him into an underground garage.

"Everyone sitting here is a person of status and standing in the Lighthouse Country."

"We are all aristocrats, so let's not play hide-and-seek here."

Samuel Astor spoke, his face gloomy and his cold eyes sweeping across the four faces on either side of the long table one by one.

Then, he raised his right hand, which wore his family crest ring, and slammed his palm down hard onto the stack of intelligence documents in front of him.

A nearby empty coffee cup was jarred half an inch high on its saucer, making a sharp clinking sound, and even the whiskey glass at the end of the table wobbled.

"Speak! Who on earth secretly kidnapped the honorable Fourth Prince of Zeta Star, His Highness Prince Dao Dun?!"