I created the Bureau of Anomaly Control

Chapter 363: 361. Negotiation Members

Inside a Federal building.

After several days of waiting, the Federation, having completed other procedures, had already concluded the first round of formal negotiations, without success. Tang Xueluan, representing the Shu family, had arranged for Ma En to participate in the second round of negotiations, which is why they were here now.

Tang Xueluan led Ma En through the building:

"We are now going to meet the other negotiation members. They consist of members from various factions. First, there's Zhao Guanwu, whom you've already met. He will represent the Federation and lead the entire negotiation. Elder Zhao is a top-tier expert and also understands the Divine Firmament better than most of us.

"This isn't to say that he knows some inside information that we don't, but rather that he can see more from the same information. Understanding the abilities of a Divine Firmament Walker, and even making accurate judgments about them, isn't simple. Elder Zhao, who found a way to counter the prophecy, undoubtedly has a deeper understanding of her abilities than we do.

"Next is Mr. Shadow, whom you're most familiar with. He will participate in this negotiation as an expert in the fields of mind and psychology, and as a representative of the entire Investigation Department. In this capacity, he should actually be at odds with you, because the Investigation Department and the Advisory Department have inherent conflicts. The emergence of the Advisory Department is a challenge to their power, and the Federation clearly wants to use us to restrain them.

"But I don't think we need to worry about Shadow. As far as I know, you seem to have a good personal relationship with him, right?"

Ma En didn't deny it:

"We've had some contact, but I can't say for sure that we don't need to worry about him. After all, our so-called friendship may not be as important as the current conflict between the Investigation Department and the Advisory Department."

If he didn't consider that he had secretly solved "Shu Yun's problem" for Shadow, then perhaps that was indeed the case. But in fact, when Shadow introduced Tang Xueluan and the Reformist faction to him, he had subtly mentioned that the Advisory Department and the Investigation Department were not on the same side.

Moreover, although he said that Ma En could come to the Investigation Department at that time, he wasn't really serious about inviting him. Besides the reason he gave at the time that he couldn't provide enough resources, it was also because it wasn't really appropriate.

Shadow knew that Ma En couldn't trust him deep down, and he couldn't trust Ma En either. Not to mention that the Investigation Department had led the pursuit and slaughter of the Savior Alliance. If Ma En really joined Shadow's command, he might even be suspected and assassinated by his former comrades.

"But you just said we don't need to worry about him," Ma En said with some confusion. "Do I need to worry about someone else?"

Tang Xueluan nodded:

"That's right, but don't worry, it's nothing compared to the problems you faced when you were in the Savior Alliance.

"For example, the representative of the Research Institute. Although Elder Zhao is a member of the Research Institute, his identity is closer to an external member like an employee of the Advisory Department. In fact, there are quite a few V-level members like this in the Federation, and their existence is the origin of the Advisory Department.

"And the one who truly represents the Research Institute is Kania, whom you just met."

Ma En blinked in confusion:

"I thought we got along pretty well."

Tang Xueluan nodded and said:

"That's right, but the problem is that the Research Institute also has conflicts with our Advisory Department. To be precise, the Advisory Department itself was established and led by members of the Rongbang faction, which our Shu family represents, while the Research Institute has been getting closer to members of the New Liberal faction in recent years.

"The New Liberal faction and the Rongbang faction are inherently severely opposed within the Federation, so Kania's situation seems somewhat similar to the situation between Shadow and us, but she is completely different from Shadow in two ways.

"First, she doesn't have the status that Shadow has, and her personal preferences can't be placed before her position. Second, she won't give you any special treatment just because you worked together for a while. To put it this way...

"Even if you worked with Kania for decades, I'm afraid she wouldn't care about your life at all. This woman's indifference and arrogance are ingrained in her bones. I always feel that these researchers are more selfish than politicians and businessmen combined. They are the real bastards who put their own interests above everything else...

"It's just that most of the time, their interests are not as opposed to the interests of most people as those of politicians and businessmen. Sometimes their actually selfish actions are even beneficial to you, so you like these guys, but if you ask me, it's just good luck.

"You just happen to have similar interests, but you won't always be so lucky, especially when you are both inside the behemoth that is the Federation. I think you should have already heard about her teacher's affairs.

"These researchers have no moral bottom line."

Although Tang Xueluan can't be completely considered a true Federal politician yet, having only recently returned to the Federation with the help of her family, it was still a bit strange to hear these words from her mouth. But having met Alice, Ma En had to admit that her words were not entirely unreasonable.

Moreover, these last few words were also Tang Xueluan secretly revealing something to Ma En—that the conversation between him and Kania was not a secret.

Tang Xueluan continued:

"But her potential threat to us is actually not that high among the remaining members. It's not that I think she's not as crazy as her teacher, but simply because she has the least power among these negotiation members.

"You also know the name of the next dangerous person, it's the逍遥道人 (Xiāoyáo dàorén,逍遥 literally means carefree, unfettered; 道人 means Taoist) that I mentioned to you last time."

Ma En said with a strange expression:

"I remember you said at the time that he might be loving me because of my connection to someone else."

Tang Xueluan said:

"But that's just a possibility. In fact, he doesn't have any obvious hostility towards us, and as a member of the Advisory Department, he should theoretically be on the same side as us. But I'm still a little worried about him.

"Because the Advisory Department was actually established for guys like him and Elder Zhao. The逍遥道人 is quite dangerous and powerful, and doesn't want to accept the Federation's restraints at all, not to mention that the Federation actually needs his help.

"You can definitely imagine that the conditions we gave him can be considered the most lenient. It is precisely because of this that the current逍遥道人 has formally joined us on the surface, but in reality, he can still be regarded as a free ability user independent of us.

"And that also means that he doesn't need to abide by our rules, and you have a feud with him. Although Shadow personally went to him and reached what might be a pretty good deal for him, it's hard for us to say whether he's really convinced.

"In fact, his behavior of helping us at the time made me feel even stranger. If he didn't do anything, I might not be nervous, but he suddenly spoke up for us, which made me worry if he had ulterior motives.

"As far as I know, his personality itself is also very abnormal. We all think he's not a good person.

"So although there are no obvious problems, I still hope you remain vigilant against him."