Book excerpt: COVID-19. For months, the coronavirus has been holding the world in a death grip. By now, it's dawning on people that nothing will ever be the same. It's the liberal societies of the West that are feeling the merciless impact the most. Besides the immense, spiraling costs, they must also cope with the reality that their freedom-orientated societal models are beginning to unravel because of this disaster. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the West is faltering. The West as a colossus with feet of clay- that’s what’s impelling the men around Chinese intelligence agent Yue Fei. Author Klaus Mewes has written a gripping thriller, a sophisticated mixture weaving together geostrategy, the history of the virus pandemic, and the research behind it. Klaus also expertly uses China’s breathtaking development and eventful history over the past thirty years to infuse his story with realism. The author sheds light on the - fictitious, to be sure - events leading up to the outbreak of the pandemic. Meanwhile, a young woman physician, Shenmi, lives through the 1989 events that occurred on Tiananmen Square. Traumatized, she withdraws emotionally. That is, until the death of a boy during the 1997 H5N1 flu epidemic changes her life yet again, and she resolves to dedicate herself to researching viruses - specifically, coronaviruses. Yue Fei, however, the cunning intelligence agent, is playing his own game. Failing in his hunt for dissidents and professionally exiled as a consequence, he contemplates revenge and the opportunity to rehabilitate himself in the eyes of his superiors. One day, by random chance, he stumbles across an old acquaintance - whereupon he hatches a plan that will change the world. Now begins a breathless race against time.