Empire of Shadows

The lights in the screening room gradually brightened. The three senators, a group of congressmen, and some of their entourage all remained silent.

Their attention was all focused on the three senators sitting behind them.

Senator Cleveland looked at the two senators beside him, then slowly stood up, holding the armrests of his chair, and began to applaud.

Soon, everyone began to applaud. The senators were still the most reserved, clapping lightly. When it came to the congressmen, their applause was much louder.

By the time it got to the entourage, they looked like they wanted to clap their hands raw!

It wasn’t because Lance’s movie was so much to their liking, but just because of their position.

“The movie was shot very well, with a very profound meaning. Come to my room later, let’s have a chat,” Senator Cleveland said.

Lance nodded.

Then the three senators left first. As soon as they left, the others began to discuss. This movie was not just telling a story, but also a “possibility,” and a prospect!

Soon, Tom brought tea and pastries for Lance and the senator. There was nothing more comfortable than eating and drinking something after watching a movie.After eating some small pastries, Senator Cleveland directly led the topic to the core of Lance’s story.

“You think the Dantra Republic might send a fleet to attack our port?” This was what the senator had seen in the movie.

Different people, people of different levels, the things they see are also different.

The people at the very bottom of society might only see the exciting plot, the impactful scenes, and the not-so-perfect but definitely heart-striking ending.

But in the senator’s view, Lance was just telling a story that might happen in reality.

Lance adjusted his sitting posture. He appeared very relaxed. The greater his value, the more autonomy he had in front of the senator.

“Why wouldn’t they?”

He started with a very sharp rhetorical question. “We have intervened in a war that actually has not much to do with us, and we are playing an important role in the war. On the northern battlefield, we have already gained the initiative.”

“The constantly retreating Dantra people, is it possible that in order to salvage the current situation, they would create a new battlefield to distract our attention?”

This question was very crucial. Senator Cleveland frowned and thought about it. He looked at the pastries on the desk, as if they were so beautiful.

After a few minutes, he finally nodded and admitted, “I don’t know much about military matters, but I believe that what you said is possible, when they are having a harder and harder time dealing with us.”

He thought and deliberated for a while more. “Are you reminding us?”

This was the question he had thought of. Maybe Lance wanted to use this method to remind the people of the Federation, including the ruling class, that being far from the battlefield did not necessarily mean they were truly safe!

Lance nodded, and then shook his head. “On the one hand, I think that Golden Port, as an important port, is very likely to become the target of the other side’s attack.”

Senator Cleveland couldn’t help but laugh twice. “Because you live here?”

He seemed to have seen through Lance’s little trick. Lance did not refute. “That’s one reason.”

“The other reason is that I feel that the land of Yalan is too important for us.”

“In the movie, I have already stated my point of view. First of all, there is a dense population on this land. They are poor, backward, and living in despair.”

“You just need to give them an opportunity, a direction, and many of them will stand up and run.”

Senator Cleveland, combining it with the images that he had not yet forgotten in his mind, nodded. “To participate in the plunder of war.”

Lance continued his words, “Not far from us, a day’s journey, there are hundreds of millions of people who can fight desperately.”

“The Star Islands and Yalan are crucial to the Federation’s strategic plan. As long as we have these two regions in our hands, they can both be a fortress for us to resist foreign enemies, and also a forward base for us to advance into the world.”

Lance’s description was very direct, but sometimes the more direct the language, the more powerful it is, the more shocking it is.

Just like “I want to fuck you,” whether it’s between a boyfriend and a girlfriend, or between enemies, it can express an extremely strong emotion!

After listening, the senator closed his eyes. The things that Lance had said could indeed happen. If he didn’t know, or rather, if the people of the Federation didn’t know, then they could do nothing.

But now they knew. If they did nothing, this would become a proof of the government’s stupidity!

In other words, this was actually also a kind of “control.” Lance was pushing things to develop in the direction he hoped!

A behind-the-scenes manipulator!

Senator Cleveland immediately thought of this word. It fit the characteristics that Lance was showing at this time too well.

After thinking for a long while, he opened his eyes. “You don’t act at all like a gangster boss, but more like a politician.”

“Have you considered going into politics?”

This was his sincere thought. In the process of getting in touch with Lance, he had found that this young man had a vision that people of this era did not have, and used some bizarre but effective methods to solve problems.

And most of the time, the situation was under his control.

Lance smiled. “If I go into politics, do I have a chance to enter Congress?”

Tom, who was serving them on the side, was stunned. He stared at Lance, unable to believe that Lance would ask such a question.

Senator Cleveland was stunned for a moment, and then he laughed. He knew the answer.

“You are a smart man!” he said.

Although he did not tell Lance whether he could enter Congress, he, Lance, both knew the answer very well.

You can be a doctor, you can be a lawyer, you can be a teacher, a soldier, a firefighter, or even an actor.

But you can’t fucking be a gangster boss!

To go into politics?

This path actually never existed from the very beginning!

Lance had made his position very clear. This gave Senator Cleveland a sense of stability. He knew that Lance’s state was stable.

He thought for a moment. “Are you planning to use this movie to persuade the people of the Federation?”

“But what reason do we have to take over Yalan?”

This was indeed a problem. The official line of the federal government’s participation in the war was “to fight for justice.” If they were to become the invaders now, some people would doubt what the core reason for participating in the war on the Tanfit continent was.

They needed a reason, a reason to make a move on Yalan.

“We can lose a freighter, then we can lose a second one!”

“I have a good relationship with a government official from Rapa. He will soon return to the Federation as the diplomatic ambassador to the Federation.”

“If there is news that several countries in Yalan are in contact with the commissioners of the Dantra Republic, plus this movie, and this ambassador asking the federal government for help,”

“He hopes that we can avoid the destructive war caused by the uncontrolled desires of dictators and ambitious men, thus revealing some of the truth.”

“The Federation has brought the freedom that the local people have longed for, as well as a longer-lasting peace. Isn’t this also a just war?”

What Lance had said was actually still very general, but Senator Cleveland could understand it.

For these top politicians, if you ask them a complicated three-digit multiplication and division problem, they might not be able to calculate in their minds how much this number is in an hour.

But if you talk to them about political matters, with just a small hint, they can immediately know what you are trying to express.

Senator Cleveland nodded. “This is a way, but it’s still not safe enough. We’ll talk about it after your movie is released. We need more social emotional feedback.”

That’s what he said, but Lance already knew that this matter was very secure.

He also mentioned the rich natural resources of Yalan, its minerals, its agriculture and animal husbandry, and also its large population.

When the balance is already unbalanced, every extra chip added can make the disadvantaged side fall into hell faster!

The Federation lacked these things, and the things it lacked were precisely what Yalan had, and in great abundance. This was enough to make them lose control of themselves.

“Wealthy” is not necessarily a good thing.

The next morning, the senators visited the naval base together. Admiral Miles received them and together they watched some of the naval soldiers’ drills, which also included a salvo from the naval target.

In short, it was very lively, very formal, and both sides were very satisfied.

During the small talk, Senator Cleveland also talked about the Federation’s strategic goals and value on the East Ocean.

Admiral Miles directly put the topic on the Yalan issue. As a member of the military at present, Admiral Miles was also a radical. He was also very supportive of the matter of stationing troops, so he would not at all consider saying anything contrary to Lance’s vision.

He mentioned the “unsettling” distance between Yalan and Golden Port City.

A warship could reach the periphery of Golden Port City from Yalan in just two or three days and bombard Golden Port. It would be very difficult for the federal navy to deploy defensive forces along the entire long east and west coastlines.

In other words, once Yalan fell, it would mean that the Federation’s grand strategy would quickly shift from a foreign war to a war of resistance against invasion on its own soil, and it would completely lose its dominance over the East Ocean.

Originally, this should have been a very relaxed visit, but in some of Senator Cleveland’s questions, it had turned into a serious discussion.

They sat together and talked about some of the international situation, about the important role of the federal navy in maintaining the current interests of the Federation and maintaining world peace.

They also talked about a series of combat plans on the Dantra coastline in the near future, for example, bombarding a port of Dantra, causing huge losses to the other side.

At this time, they didn’t talk at all about how many of the “huge losses” were civilians, and how many were enemy soldiers. They only talked about the results they had achieved.

Politics has always been like this, only showing the side that is beneficial to oneself.

When the discussion had reached a little after eleven, Admiral Miles invited the visiting delegation, led by Senator Cleveland, to have lunch with the soldiers in the military district.

This in itself was also a part of the script. They gladly agreed.

Then a large number of reporters followed them into the navy’s dining hall. It could be seen that the navy’s food was indeed not bad. There were eggs, beef, and also vegetables and fruits, and it was also unlimited.

Such a meal could only be found in a middle-class family, but here, anyone could enjoy such a lunch.

Whether they were people of the Federation, illegal immigrant soldiers, or refugee soldiers, they could all be supplied without limit.

The reporters had also specially taken some pictures of the senator eating a large mouthful, putting them and the surrounding soldiers in the same picture, to prove the importance that Congress attached to the soldiers.

These photos would all be published in the media as important propaganda materials, to let people know that as long as you joined the army, not only would your status be raised, but you would also have all kinds of good things to eat until you were full without spending any money!

After lunch, the visiting delegation took a warship together to the sea area outside the base. First, they had a panoramic view of the nearby shore cannons and fortresses, and then they also conducted various test firing performances.

Amidst the applause of a group of reporters and politicians who actually knew nothing, this visit was considered a complete success.

Admiral Miles stated that he would definitely guard this “great gate” for the Federation and would not let any enemy have a chance to enter the Federation from here. He said a lot of things that sounded a little strange.

The political significance of visiting a military base is always greater than the visit itself.

Originally, Senator Cleveland had also planned to stay in Likalai State for a longer period of time, but with Lance having created such a scene, he could only shorten his trip as much as possible.

On the second day after visiting the naval base, the group of people hurried to Manteno by car.

If someone had been driving for twenty-four hours, then its speed was actually faster than a train.

In just one day, they had arrived in Manteno.

After resting for a night, Senator Cleveland had visited the speakers of both houses of the state legislature in Manteno, had visited the governor and the key members of the state government, and had had a private chat with Attorney General Terry for a while. He had stayed for less than five days and had chosen to leave.

Originally, he had planned to stay here for seven to ten days, at least seven days.

No one knew why he had returned to New Golden City a few days earlier, but they were clear that something must have happened during this process.

In early August, the weather became more and more muggy. What was hotter than this summer was the promotion of Lance’s new movie!

Lance, with a promotional technique far surpassing this era, had let people see what a “marketing genius” was!

The thing was like this. On August 5th, a temporary supplement appeared in almost all the newspapers of the entire Federation.

The content of the supplement was actually a string of code, which was said to be a string of code that might involve national security that had been captured by a certain agency. They hoped that someone could decipher it.

This “news” had immediately aroused people’s curiosity.

Under the dual effect of curiosity and patriotism, almost most of the people had participated, and it had also become a very hot topic!

The cracking of the code was actually much simpler than people had imagined. In just four or five days, they had mailed all the various results they had cracked to the newspaper office.

After “decryption,” the newspaper office had added a new supplementary publication, like a magazine-like supplementary publication, which recorded the secret they had cracked—”The Surprise Attack on Golden Port Combat Plan.”

The exquisitely clever promotional method had made this promotion directly selected into the industry textbooks, the news industry, the advertising industry, all fields.

At first, people might have felt a little deceived, but when they had accepted the cognition that this was a promotion, they were not so uncomfortable anymore.

They were even more looking forward to the release of the movie, and couldn’t wait to walk into the movie theater.

However, the media was not all good news.

Some people claimed that it had opened a “Pandora’s box,” and would let the film industry enter an unhealthy state, using more fees to create a pile of expensive shit.

But there were also some who believed that the positive feedback brought by a large investment would give the audience a better viewing experience, which was a good thing for the audience.

But in any case, the movie “Surprise Attack on Golden Port,” at the time when its promotional intensity was at its most explosive, was released.

It was very hot, and it ignited the second half of the summer vacation. Almost everyone was talking about this movie, because it gave people a more real feeling.

The tremor of the camera when the cannon roared gave people the feeling of being on a warship and personally participating in this war!

And also those big scenes of explosions. They could not imagine how these were shot. Such a grand scene. Did they really destroy Golden Port City?

The audience from other places had some similar thoughts. Otherwise, how could they have shot it so realistically?

It has to be said that this movie, with a crushing posture, had obtained more opportunities to face the audience. More audience members had also expressed their more thoughts after entering the movie theater. This was a good cycle.

The fermentation of word-of-mouth had made more people walk into the movie theater, and had also made a small portion of them, the ones with brains, begin to think after watching the movie.

The Federal Post had even reported on this movie. Such a serious news story had used the title “If the Movie Becomes Tomorrow” to summarize the importance of Yalan to the Federation on the issue of security!

It mentioned some of the reasonableness issues about the plot of the movie. For example, would the Dantra people, because of the failure of the main battlefield, launch a naval war to restrain the performance of the federal people on the battlefield?

For another example, the strategic value of Yalan, was it really so important for the Federation?

Although they were all some ambiguous questions without a definite answer, which were thrown to the readers to think about, everyone seemed to have some of their own ideas.

The Federation is never short of people who are worried about the affairs of Congress, the workers on the assembly line, the workers in the steel mills, the workers who clean the sewers.

The heated discussion in society also made more people participate.

And at this very moment, Minister Cassia, who had been back for a period of time, had finally reached an agreement with the president of Rapa. He had been appointed as the diplomatic ambassador of Rapa to the Federation and had returned to the Federation.

This time, he had not come alone, but also with his family, a large family…

(End of a Chapter)