Chapter 131 The Public Vote

On the ninth day after Gu Baishun was shot, the stevedore association's public vote was held as scheduled.

Around six o'clock in the morning, the front of the Taida Conference Center in the Longkou District of The Dragon City was already blocked by various vehicles. There were too many people attending the meeting, far exceeding expectations, so the conference's security department had to temporarily negotiate parking spaces in the surrounding commercial buildings for everyone's use.

The vast majority of the stevedore association's core members were dressed appropriately, either chatting around the square or taking pictures in groups of three or five.

Due to the large number of participants, the stevedore association's largest conference room could not accommodate more than 1,600 people, so the association rented the Taida Conference Center and hired a professional security company to maintain order.

Today's public vote truly showed the influence and strength of the stevedore association. Whether it was the quality of the attendees or the coordination ability to hold the public vote, it was not comparable to the current Tongji Association. Just the high-level association members responsible for reception numbered thirty or forty, and any one of them would be a prominent figure in society.

...

Inside the Yu family villa, 6:10 a.m.

After washing up, Su Tianyu took a fried dough stick from the kitchen, ate it, and asked Yu Mingyuan, "What time are you going?"

"We'll go in a bit," Yu Mingyuan replied with a smile, "Just to see what all the commotion is about."

"Then I'll go first." Su Tianyu greeted him.

"Are you going to Lao Li's place?" Kong Zhenghui asked.

"No, the leader's arrangements have all been made." Su Tianyu replied softly as he walked out, "I'm going to be a bargaining chip."

"What do you mean?" Zhou Tonghui didn't quite understand.

"Hehe, you'll know when the meeting starts." Su Tianyu replied vaguely and walked out of the house.

Inside the living room, Yu Mingyuan wiped his mouth and looked up at Zhou Tonghui, saying, "Tell your people to get ready."

"Okay."

Zhou Tonghui and Yu Mingyuan had talked all night until after two o'clock in the morning, and they had reached a consensus on certain matters.

At the villa entrance.

Su Tianyu finished the fried dough stick in a couple of bites, bent over, got into Hou Guoyu's car, and softly instructed, "Go to the Longkou Wharf."

"Okay!" Hou Guoyu drove away.

...

Inside the military garrison headquarters.

Tan Mingchao said to his father, "Don't worry, I've arranged everything here. As soon as the results are out, I'll call you immediately."

Tan Hengqiang ate breakfast and softly instructed, "If it weren't for the pressure from above to support Kang Dinghuang and the stevedore association, I would have withdrawn. But since we've already done it, we have to do it well. Consider emergency situations carefully, don't be impulsive, and let's try to get an ideal result."

"I understand!" Tan Mingchao nodded.

"Go ahead." Tan Hengqiang waved his hand.

"Hehe, then I'm off." Tan Mingchao replied with a smile and left the dining room with his guards.

A few minutes later, in the backyard of the military garrison headquarters, Zhang Ming, Yang Dong, Guizi Wu, and a dozen or so high-level members of the stevedore association who supported them, had all gathered.

Tan Mingchao walked over with a squad of soldiers and waved to Zhang Ming, "Come here."

"Yes, Commander Tan!" Zhang Ming immediately went over.

Tan Mingchao, wearing a well-tailored military uniform and a lieutenant colonel's beret, looked very handsome and extraordinary: "Don't be nervous. Just fight as you should. You must appear confident in front of the members present."

"Yes, yes!" Zhang Ming nodded repeatedly.

"Lao Li wants to hold a public vote and has been forcing you to come forward. His purpose is very simple. He doesn't want to be criticized, so he wants to get the position of the stevedore association's leader through normal rules. To put it bluntly, he has to make the people he supports convincing." Tan Mingchao instructed again, "So we will follow this line of thought to do things, then there will definitely be no problems. Even if the voting results are unfavorable, you don't have to panic. We can also continue to drag them out with the second and third plan. At worst, you will be impeached, and we will continue to campaign and reopen the public vote! If it doesn't work, just mess up the conference... it's fine."

"Understood!" Zhang Ming nodded heavily, "Our troops...?"

"Don't worry, they're all in. We value your safety very much." Tan Mingchao patted Zhang Ming on the shoulder, "You can work with peace of mind in the front, and we'll support you from behind."

"Okay!"

"Alright, I won't say much more," Tan Mingchao waved his hand and greeted, "Let's go!"

As soon as he finished speaking, everyone got into the car and set off. In addition to Zhang Ming and other members of the stevedore association, Tan Mingchao personally arranged for two guard platoons to escort them, not counting the "inspection unit" that had already arrived in the vicinity of the venue.

In the slowly moving military jeep, Zhang Ming looked at the surrounding street scenes, feeling both familiar and strange, because since the Qingyi Bureau was driven out of The Dragon City, he had not stepped out of the headquarters half a step, fully interpreting what it means to be an old dog, what it means to be a telephone chairman.

...

In the morning, around 6:50, a car drove into the parking lot of the No. 2 Trade Port in Longkou District.

Su Tianyu and Hou Guoyu got out of the car, bought some breakfast snacks along the way, and came to the shore with brisk steps, finding the 064 boarding pontoon.

Standing on the pontoon, Su Tianyu took out his mobile phone and dialed a number, yawning as he said, "I'm here."

"Okay, I'll have them go over."

"Okay!"

After hanging up the phone, Su Tianyu waited in place for less than two minutes before seeing a burly man walking over, "Hostage?"

Su Tianyu turned to look at him, "Yes, hostage."

"Raise your hands, let me check your bodies." The strong man replied.

"Check my ass!" Hou Guoyu reached out and pushed the other party away, "There are only two of us, what are you afraid of?!"

"What if you're carrying a bomb?" The strong man frowned and asked.

"Alright, let him check." Su Tianyu replied while eating rice noodle rolls.

As soon as he finished speaking, Hou Guoyu reluctantly raised his arms and let the other party search his body.

The strong man carefully searched the two and found that they only carried pistols and did not carry more lethal weapons, so he softly greeted, "Come on, let's get on the boat."

"Let's go." Su Tianyu greeted Monkey and followed the other party onto a small fishing boat.

There were eight people on the boat in total, all of whom were burly men in their thirties or older.

Su Tianyu nodded to them, took Hou Guoyu to the deck, and turned his head to scan the scenery on both sides of the coast.

"You're really brave." Hou Guoyu gave a thumbs up to Su Tianyu.

Su Tianyu put his arm around the other's neck and grinned, "Didn't you come up with me too?"

"I didn't have a choice, who told me to eat your food!"

"Monkey, do you regret following me?" Su Tianyu asked with a serious expression.

While the two were talking, the fishing boat quickly left the port and headed towards the high seas.