Redeeming The Golden Ticket To Life

[POV General Han]

The man was too brave for his own good.

As I nursed my injured hands and walked inside the campus, I realised that the man we thought to be a rabbit turned out to be a lion. 

'Which idiot reported that he is a simple businessman with a software engineer background?'

As I turned my injured hand a thousand curses would not suffice for the intelligence officer who provided the character profile of CEO Hu.

The pain within my crushed carpal tells me altogether a different character profile of this CEO.

"Salute Sir," the soldier greeted.

"At ease"

"Sir, the Chief wants to meet you right away at his office."

"Okay, lead the way," I said and followed behind the footsoldier.

We crossed across the internal quad and walked up a few flights of stairs and then came across an old aesthetic Scholars building with mostly faux wooden exterior designs. The soldier came to a stop outside the door.

I looked at the door and braced myself for an onslaught.

[Knock Knock]

I knocked on the doors.

"Come in," a voice from inside called out.

I took a deep breath and walked in while taking care of my injured right hand.

***

Inside the Army chief's office-

As I walked in, there were rows after rows of books on stainless steel shelves on the right-hand side of the wall. While the centre of the room is dominated by a large Mahogany dark and polished wood table on which his name and ranks are written clearly.

The room was bare and minimalist.

While the man himself, he is short in stature but his eyes tell you tales unheard. The man had black hairs (most probably dyed), he was standing opposite me in his army uniform.

"You are here," he simply stated.

I kept my silence as it was not a question but a mere statement.

"Did you meet CEO Hu?" he asked.

"Yes Sir, I did," I replied.

"What did you think about him?" he eyed my injured right hand as he asked me.

"I don't know what to think of him!" I replied honestly.

"Come have a seat, while I educate you to CEO Hu of the Hu Corporations".

I sat on the only other chair available in the office.

"Should I get some ice for you?"

"No thank you, sir, it is nothing major," I assured him.

The chief walked behind the table to his chair, sat on it and pulled out a drawer. From inside the drawer, he pulled out a pack of Churchill's Cigar and a cutter.

"Want a smoke?" he offered.

"No thank you, sir," I politely refused his offer.

He didn't mind my rejection. The man opposite me lit up his cigar and took a healthy puff of it.

"This CEO Hu is an enigma," he spoke up as he puffed out a ring of smoke, "he was only twenty-three years old when he took over the Hu corporation. At that time, they mostly dealt in real estates and medical technologies courtesy of Chairman Hu and his Wife.

The young CEO was ambitious but also a good businessman. He has an accurate road map for his company's success as well as future growth planned.

When Chairman Hu handed down the Hu corporations even he never imagined his son's success.

It all started with a damn security code that he wrote."

I simply listened to it. Surely there is some hidden information among whatever the chief is telling me now.

"Are you wondering what's new about it? They are filed in the country's record. So what is there to add?"

"Pardon me sir but I am curious. After interacting with him I do not find him a simple man!" I said.

"You are right! He is not a simple man."

I keep my silence while I let the chief reflect on his thoughts.

The man across me seemed to be amused as well as frustrated, seeing him like this made me more curious about this CEO Hu.

"Well I was arrogant just like you, I wanted to pressurise the young CEO Hu to give me the first code that he wrote for his company at a dirt-cheap price or free of cost as a service to the nation.

That man had his own way of tackling the crisis.

He immediately through some dark web channels auctioned his security code and then raked in money equivalent to a small country's total Gross Domestic Production.

He single-handedly established an international branch of his corporation and started investing in stuff that was beyond one's imagination, at least so in the tech world. While the money made from coding programs, he would invest them in various avenues flaunting his business acumen."

"Then what about the hard method?" I asked out of curiosity.

"We did that too, but he was well prepared. He has his personal standing army that he can deploy anytime anywhere. We tried a very hardcore approach, but he always escaped like a cockroach with extra lives. Finally, we did something unforgivable. We kidnapped his son and lured his wife to go for that double whammy, only to be hit in our face.

His wife saved their son and got captured instead, we had our reasons to capture his wife Shui Bai Chang, as we suspected that she is the brain behind the codes programmed by CEO Hu. 

It was no secret as to how talented Ms Shui was at that time, but after we captured her we realised our mistakes. She was autistic so to communicate with her was next to impossible."

He paused and took a long drag of the cigar. 

"You see, we are not heartless. It's that the Hu family very cleverly hid any medical records related to Ms Shui, CEO Hu's wife.

So when we realised that she is autistic, we were already in deep shit. It was also at that moment the accident occurred. Our intelligence had reports or rather speculations that the Shui family held a key to Project 33,"

I sat up a little straighter as I heard the term 'Project 33'.

"Do not get excited, the officer in charge went above and beyond to get something out of Ms Shui. But we were unsuccessful. As it was a covert operation and we were at a precarious position, the officer handling the matter decided to go all the way. They decided to eliminate her to remove any liability for the 'Project 33'. 

So after severe third-degree torture just when they were about to eliminate her, she fled, i.e. she escaped her captivity and the people who were searching for her found her.

Ms Shui, CEO Hu's wife, was in a coma for the past three years. But she woke up this year and this time she is not autistic but she has amnesia.

Our secret intelligence officers played the old trick to see what would be her reaction but it was too mild."

"But sir, I apologize for interrupting you, what does this all have to do with CEO Hu?" I asked in confusion.

"It has got everything to do with Ms Shui. You see, CEO Hu deeply loves his wife and so does his whole family. They were fuming in rage to have received a broken Ms Shui. Plus there was evidence of brutal torture all over her body. 

After this incident CEO Hu played a big game, he moved most of his assets outside the country and most of his forces underground. But after that accident, no government or international gangs or organization including other foreign intelligence units were able to get hold of his head or tails.

He turned into an enigma because every time someone tried to attack him covertly or overtly had been annihilated. There was no mercy shown by this, ever again. He is as much of a savage as one could imagine. He is the only lone wolf who knows how to survive.

This past year just because his wife Ms Shui regained consciousness, he is going soft at least on the surface. We have to be aware, as this is the calm before the storms. He is going to make us all pay with due interest," the Chief heaved a heavy sigh and puffed out the last of his smoke with a large puff.

"Sir, what gives you the impression of his revenge?" I asked him, perplexed at this man's dropped shoulders.

"Here look at this," he pushed today's newspaper towards me.

I adjusted my injured right hand as I looked at the headlines.

"The Biggest Military Corruption Uncovered"

The people responsible are the elites of the social and power hierarchy. The government in its bid to crackdown on severe internal corruption, today released a press statement -

We were made aware of these heinous crimes for some time now. The government placed them under surveillance to acquire more concrete proofs on their misdeeds. Finally, two days back the investigating team got all the information related to the whole operation. So we moved in to make arrests. In the country's legal detention system, they were interrogated about their deeds and other contracts related to them.

The information provided was strictly scrutinised for any discrepancies. After confirming the validity of the data and the total numbers determined, we made them appear in court and face civil judgments or the crimes they committed against their nation. 

The total amount has been rounded off to approximately three hundred billion U.S. Dollars.

The chief culprit behind this has been identified to be party leader Hao Xuping of the capital province and the Military officer Lt. General-"