In addition to the few insiders in the venue, their leader—better known as China White, real name Chien Na Wei—wore a fake wig to hide her white hair. Dressed in a high-slit cheongsam, she was working as a greeter at the entrance.
Thea felt genuinely sorry for them. With so many heroes at the scene, robbing the White House would be safer than this place. It was sheer madness.
Each hero present could take them down single-handedly. But with so many heroes around, a new problem emerged: who should handle it?
"Uncle J'onn, can you just mind-control all of them?" Thea asked the Martian Manhunter through their mental link.
As expected, the Martian Manhunter refused without hesitation. "I won't use my abilities on ordinary people. Handle it yourself."
Thea sighed. Fortunately, Superman was helpful and volunteered to deal with Brick's crew.
They had sensed the anomaly with their powers, and among the many political figures' bodyguards and agents, some had also noticed these suspicious individuals.
The title "agent" sounded impressive, but they were really just marginally better than civilians. If they acted first and caused a commotion, it would directly ruin the venue Moira had carefully prepared—something Thea absolutely couldn't allow. Plus, many superheroes' identities couldn't be exposed, which made her hesitate to act.
She quietly told Felicity to create a distraction to draw the agents' attention, then whispered to Oliver.
"China White's people are in the venue."
"How many?" Oliver's vision was already top-tier human, repeatedly enhanced, and now even sharper. At Thea's warning, he immediately surveyed the scene and indeed spotted several suspicious details.
"Five. Don't make a scene. You four and Diana—each take one and handle them nearby. Don't affect Mother's event."
At Thea's signal, Felicity got into a conflict with a server. Years as vice president gave her an imposing presence as she scolded the other person into apologizing repeatedly. Thea directly cast a Slow spell on each of the five targets.
With time tight and unable to make large casting gestures, she reduced the spell's power to the minimum—just enough to daze them briefly. But that was sufficient.
They split up. Four more enemies were in the kitchen, which Thea entrusted to Batman's team. Watching Batman and his crew pretend to go to the restroom while heading toward the kitchen with Nightwing, Barbara, and Catwoman, Thea went after her own target.
Her face almost frozen from smiling, China White—disguised as a greeter—was about to catch her breath when she saw one of tonight's targets, Thea Queen, walk past her. While calculating how much they could ransom from this kidnapping, she noticed Thea casually glance at her.
Fear surged into her heart instantly. Her unfortunate childhood, everyone's contempt, her youth drifting between gangs, constantly pledging loyalty to new bosses, constant betrayals, struggling to reach today—all of it seemed to shift between illusion and reality.
Her past experiences felt like a dream. She walked through her life again, but subtle changes plunged her into despair. She was no longer some Triad leader but a beggar waiting to die on the streets, huddling under a bridge in the biting wind, waiting for charity from kind souls.
"This isn't real! This isn't real!" she whispered, though the sound was too soft even for herself to hear.
Decent willpower, Thea noted. Many ordinary heroes or villains had stronger wills than power users—that was the difference between gaining power suddenly versus gradually. But it was meaningless now. She was currently using super-vision combined with fear emotion in a new application.
The illusion was based on an ancient dream parable, though her version twisted pleasant dreams into nightmares—each worse than the last.
China White quickly entered her third nightmare. Her consciousness remained trapped in fabricated memories while her subconscious was terrified. She could no longer tell if her former glory had ever existed. Incomparable fear grew rapidly in her heart.
Finally, after the sixth nightmare, her will shattered. Her eyes glazed over, her legs gave out, and she collapsed backward.
For her, it felt like a long time. In reality, barely a second had passed. As she fell, Thea, who had just walked past, caught her directly.
"She might be feeling faint. I'll help her rest somewhere," Thea explained to the other greeters' curious looks.
No one suspected anything. This was the Metropolis hero, Nobel Prize winner in medicine, super-billionaire—she had no reason to lie to them. Unaware of the truth, they all thought Thea was compassionate and a truly good person, watching her carry China White away with admiring gazes.
As she made her move, everyone in the banquet hall also acted. No one feared these nameless thugs in actual combat, but avoiding attention required preparation.
"Oops, sorry, stepped on your foot."
"My hand slipped—is your clothing okay?"
Various improvised excuses pulled the enemies—already dazed from the Slow spell with foggy minds—out of the hall, then knocked them out and tied them up.
Batman and Superman were equally swift. To avoid exposing the heroes' identities, everyone chose to simply knock the enemies unconscious.
The banquet was ongoing. They couldn't leave for too long, and forty-plus people tied together would be too easily discovered. Thea directly tied them all together and threw them through a portal—the other side was Oliver's hideout.
Acting like nothing happened, they returned to the banquet to eat and drink. The forty-plus troublemakers were as if they'd never existed.
The Christmas banquet was a huge success. Moira was beaming. There were plenty of smart people—many subtly expressed support for her potential mayoral run. Excited, she drank quite a bit. After the banquet ended, Thea sent her home before heading to Oliver's place to check the interrogation results.
Superman and Batman didn't get involved in Star City affairs. Diana had gone home early. Only Oliver's Green Arrow team remained.
Finding his enemies had inexplicably gift-wrapped themselves for Christmas delivery, Oliver was rather exasperated. With everyone captured, letting them go was impossible, but he wanted to know their objective tonight—had his true identity been exposed, or was it something else?
However, the minions knew nothing. No amount of intimidation worked. The leaders, Brick and China White, were in deep unconsciousness. There was no way to question them.
When Thea arrived, the fully armed and masked Green Arrow team was splashing water on China White's face.
She didn't look at the poor woman experiencing her new Yellow Millet Dream, but instead turned to the muscular Brick.
This powered Triad member apparently wasn't too bright. Thea had watched his battle with Superman from afar.
The guy had actually brazenly asked Superman to punch him once—testing his endurance, supposedly. Faced with such a sincere request, Superman was surprised but didn't refuse, using about ten percent power to lightly tap him. Then the guy became the sorry sight before Thea's eyes.