Can Ci Pin - - - Chapter 157

Chapter 157 – Died from Betrayal and Conspiracies

The Night Empress in the gardens were blooming almost a little too outlandishly; their colors were rich and visible under the dim lights as if covered in a thin layer of blood.

The gardening robots automatically adjusted the moisture in the soil and detected that there wasn’t enough water; soon after, a gentle stream of water splashed out. The piano’s soothing rhythm captured the scenery of an almost dream-like world in this corner of the garden.

Suddenly, the watering stopped and the piano fell silent.

A dark shadow the size of a palm flashed by, shaped like a disk and thin as a blade. It flew by so quickly, it was nearly impossible to see with the naked eye. The flying disk passed through the garden and sliced down the tips of a Night Empress soundlessly, releasing a thick aroma from the flower that looked almost as if it were bleeding.

The security system inside Chief Woolf’s mansion was almost like a magical ward in high fantasy novels: from the skies down to the underground chambers, any unauthorized objects or lifeforms that passed through would trigger a reaction from the control center within 1/10th of a second. Aside from patrolling robots, there were three layers of security in the system: the first was an outer layer of nano-cannons and laser guns that could fire long-distance on a locked target. The second was a group of robotic security with an extremely fast reaction time, and the third was a layer made from a special transformable material not unlike Zhanlu’s mech core. This type of material was directly connected to the security system that could show up instantly at any location within the Chief’s mansion, either through the ground or garden, and would remove the invader.

These three layers of security turned this mansion into a powerful citadel not unlike the Silver Fortress, making assassination near impossible.

But this time, when that unknown object flew through the old chief’s most prized garden, the security system was dead silent.

The disk that flew by carefully attached itself onto an open glass window past the flower garden; that room was Chief Woolf’s bedroom.

The old chief was fast asleep, tired in his old age, as if he didn’t notice any noise from the outside.

The disk slowly turned transparent and blended in with the glass, flashing small rows of text on the window—

“Scanning DNA…..”

“Confirmed.”

“Scanning physical state, checking if symptoms match existing records.”

“Scan completed. Target’s symptoms confirmed to match up with existing records up to 98%, confirmed target identity.”

“Concentration of Night Empress within the target’s blood is 56mg/100mL……”

Soon after, a dozen or so ‘disks’ once again flew in from around the mansion and merged in through the window, door, and even walls. An invisible infrared radiation shot out from the center of the disks and pointed at the man on the bed–if anyone could see the scene with an infrared detector, they would see that a complex web surrounded Woofl’s body like prey trapped inside a net.

The door inside the bedroom opened up automatically. A stranger walked in quietly toward the side of Woolf’s bed.

The old chief was finally woken up by the sound of those footsteps, however, his pupils dilated and he couldn’t see who walked in. His muddied eyes looked confused as if his soul had been sucked away from his body, leaving only his flesh behind.

“Chief Commander Woof.” The uninvited guest nodded courteously at him. “Sorry to bother you so late into the night. It isn’t hard to take your life–these cute little disk-shaped nano-assassins could’ve easily done the job, but my master felt that was too pitiful. She doesn’t believe you should die in the hands of a nobody, and even offered to speak to you herself.”

Woolf’s eyes slowly shined a bit, but even with the stranger inside his house in the middle of the night, he didn’t call for help nor show signs of panic. It was difficult to tell whether he was truly at ease or if he’d really lost all cognitive abilities.

The man by his bed cleared his throat and spoke up again, but this time, it was the sound of a gentle woman’s voice: “Grandpa Woolf, I’m Jingshu.”

The corner of Woolf’s eyes twitched slightly.

This uninvited guest was a fifth generation opium carrier, which would make him almost at the top of the food chain in the Freedom Corps hierarchy. It was a considerable honor for him to carry out an assassination job that a robot could easily do, showing that the mastermind gave him a certain level of respect.

But even the big fish in the pond was still a biochip human, meaning that any part of their body could easily be controlled by their master at any time. Lin Jingshu was currently using this body to speak to Woolf.

“My father used to hang a photo inside his study; it was a group shot of my grandfather, you, and Doctor Hardin. The photo later disappeared, and I thought perhaps you were the one that took it. But a photo is still a dead object. How could it compare to a living person beside you?” Lin Jingshu’s gentle voice coming out of the tall man made the scene even more eerie than usual. “So over these last few months, I used the Night Empress to return these people back to your side; do you like my present?”

Woolf’s gaze moved slightly as it turned toward the corner of his bed and outside the window while the disks surrounding him scanned his brain waves at the moment.

The world in Woolf’s eyes right now was an overlap of reality and illusion. He saw Lin Ge’er leaning by the corner of the bed and sharing half of his blanket. The young man’s personal device was left on with an open book still floating by his knee as he quietly fell asleep. Outside the window, Hardin was sitting by the flower garden with his knees together, head looking up at the clear night sky—they were all young, including himself.

They were at the City of Angels at the time. What kind of peaceful life could the revolutionaries possibly have? They had to stay alert at all times against their enemy’s AIs that could appear at any moment. They slept with their guns and swords, wore capes stained by blood and fire, hoping to build a future for this world. Woolf couldn’t remember how many times they were almost completely annihilated, how many times he saw countless seniors before him die as he ran for his life; he couldn’t remember how many times he feared that he would die on the battlefield like them…..

But thinking back now, he was surprised to find that the happiest days of his life were during that age of unrest and uncertainty.

The friends at that time were real friends, the emotions were genuine and earnest; he could still see the sun rise with his own two eyes, his heart still lingered with hope for the future before him.

“It looks like you enjoyed it, I’m relieved.” Lin Jingshu said in a gleeful tone, “Farewell, may you have a good night’s sleep; rest assured that the future will be in my hands.”

She fell completely silent after that line. This fifth generation chip carrier once again regained control of his own body and put gloves on his hands. He stabbed a thin needle into Woolf’s neck: “You won’t feel any pain, is there anything else you’d like to say?”

Woolf certainly didn’t feel any pain; the new type hallucinogen Night Empress numbed his skin enough to the point where he could ignore the stinging pain of the needle. He was like an old addict that had given up on rehab and stayed still, waiting for the guillotine to drop. His eyes relaxed as they curled up soundlessly and he started whistling a simple tune—

The tune was too old, it probably belonged to a rural tribe back in the old Sidereal Era; nobody recognized where it came from.

The night breeze gently sent the aroma of the Night Empress into the bedroom, submerging Woolf inside.

……The whistling stopped.

Chief Commander Hubert Woolf died quietly on a night when the Night Empress bloomed.

He died of betrayal and conspiracy.

There was no will from him, as if foreshadowing that even if his flesh had perished, he still hadn’t stepped off the stage—

When Lin Jingheng’s starship passed the customs check by the supply station, he was putting ice in his drink. At the same moment, the starship suddenly shook violently as a wave of particle cannons crashed into its shield. Zhanlu’s robotic arm caught the glass that slid off the table. The ice dropped to the floor; Lin Jingheng felt his heart jump a little: “What happened?”

“They’re enacting martial law.” Lee and Lu Bixing walked down toward the bar.

Lee continued: “We received a sudden notice that they won’t let any more starships in behind us, and the ones that already passed through are being asked to immediately land on the supply station. Get ready, everyone, we’re connecting to the tracks soon.”

“At least we didn’t get blocked outside,” Bayer said. “The supply stations in the First Galaxy are pretty decent, we can stay a few days if we must…”

As if.

Before Bayer could finish, the starship that was about to connect to the tracks suddenly accelerated and charged forward with a speed that was clearly above the limit of an unarmed starship. The gravity system inside the ship temporarily shut down as Lu Bixing grabbed onto the wheelchair that was about to fly out.

Lin Jingheng grabbed onto Zhanlu’s robotic hand and almost forgot he was supposed to be a ‘weak and terminally ill patient’: “Give me the pilot’s permission.”

The pilot was a veteran soldier from the First Squadron and immediately handed the piloting permissions to him. The transfer was completed within a blink of an eye. To everyone’s surprise, Lin Jingheng didn’t immediately resort to his bad habit of piloting a mech like a rollercoaster and smoothly adjusted the starship onto the supply station’s receiving tracks, swiftly dodging another wave of particle beams.

“Who’s out there opening fire on unarmed starships?”

“Collateral damage,” Lin Jingheng said, “There’s a mech fleet outside the station, from the ID it looks like…”

“The Central Militia from the Third Galaxy,” Lee followed up. The First Galaxy had already collected data within this short time period as he reported, “The central command of the Third Galaxy’s Central Militia was sent off personally by the Marshal himself. They gathered up illegally and left their post towards the First Galaxy; it seems like that wave of particle beams was just a threatening display.”

“Such impudence.” Lin Jingheng frowned as he signaled towards the surrounding starships to follow him and land carefully onto the station’s tracks.

The entire atmosphere around the border supply station was only one spark away from war; a row of military-grade mechs was on standby along with another group of soldiers reorganizing beside them. All of the service robots in the starship receiving deck were switched to security robots; all of the terminals into the station were closed off except for the escalators that seemed as if they led up to the heavens.

Lin Jingheng shot a cold glance at Lee: “You made me sit in a wheelchair.”

The poor captain didn’t dare to argue that it was the Marshal’s own bad lottery luck that gave him this role and could only lower his head in slight defeat.

Lin Jingheng waved his hand in frustration: “Zhanlu, contact the supply station’s telecommunication center, let them…”

Before he could finish, he felt his feet leave the ground; under Bayer and Lee’s absolutely astonished expressions, Lu Bixing picked him up directly from the wheelchair in a princess carry.

Lin Jingheng almost choked on air.

“We came all the way to the First Galaxy to ‘treat your illness,’ not to blow Wolto up.” Lu Bixing snickered mischievously by his ears, “Mister ‘patient,’ there’s a checkpoint in front of us, can you control your expression and lower the hand that’s ready to strangle me?”

Lin Jingheng: “……”

“Relax, close your eyes, lean on my shoulders.” Lu Bixing clearly didn’t let this opportunity go to waste. “Hey, pull your hand back, I can see your veins popping. How could a terminally ill patient who’s been stuck in bed for years have your kind of attitude—didn’t Doctor Hardin say you were a professional liar? Where’s your professionalism, hm?”

Bayer nudged Lee with his elbow and whispered: “Hey bro, do you think I’ll get an order to assassinate the Prime Minister later?”

Lee completely ignored the comment and felt the future of the First Squadron clouding up ahead of him as he followed behind, maintaining a courteous distance with a face as stern and blank as Zhanlu’s.

The guards on the supply station quickly scanned the IDs on their personal devices, their gaze stopped briefly on Lin Jingheng. A part of Lin Jingheng’s fringe that was down covered a good half of his face, exposing only his pale chin and lips as he leaned in Lu Bixing’s arms like a corpse.

The First Galaxy had always placed emphasis on their humanitarian acts and commented courteously with sympathy: “From the Fourth Galaxy? That certainly is a long trip, has the patient been doing well on the journey?”

“He was diagnosed by a specialist in the Fourth Galaxy, we didn’t have a choice so they advised us to try our luck in Wolto—here’s the letter.” Lee gave him a complicated smile that was genuinely from the bottom of his heart, making the whole act seem more believable and earning him extra sympathy from the soldiers.

“Normally we would arrange for priority passage and provide special terminals inside the galaxy to send you to Wolto as soon as possible,” a soldier said with a slightly troubled tone. “But we just received an order that all public terminals to Wolto must be closed off temporarily.”

Lee and Bayer exchanged a quick glance.

At that moment, the musical that was playing on the multimedia screen floating above the center of the station stopped as it was interrupted by urgent news, capturing the attention of everyone on the station.

“…..Breaking news from Wolto. Early this morning, Woltorian standard time 1:15A.M., Chief Woolf’s mansion in the mountain ranges suddenly experienced a blackout. All three backup energy supplies have also simultaneously malfunctioned, the security system dead; it is suspected to be destroyed by outside forces, currently…” the host paused for ten whole seconds before they raised their voice in shock, “What!? Are you sure!?”

The majority of the central continent on Wolto was still in the middle of the night. Sirens, voices, and sounds of robots flying and running around created lively background noise.

Lu Bixing’s grip tightened.

“……Ladies and gentlemen, we have just received official confirmation from the Military Council that Chief Commander Woolf was assassinated in his own residence this morning…”

Lin Jingheng felt a buzzing sound ring inside his ears.

When the three pirate organizations invaded the Union, Chief Woolf had stood up from his half-retired seat and single-handedly turned the tide. After twenty years, he managed to reclaim Wolto; in the hearts of the people, he was almost like a god that protected the Union.

How could a god die?

Immediately after, the news of General Duke’s assassination that had been suppressed by the central government for days was finally released at the same time. All of the Central Militias that had gathered at the border of the First Galaxy demanding an explanation for Duke’s death were stunned.

Wang Ailun summoned an emergency press conference in the middle of the night after countless restless nights of the same thing. Fatigue and exhaustion engulfed his face as he stood before the camera, words almost escaping him as he opened his mouth.

News spread like an explosion; the press conference was already filled with crowds of people while the security scans were completely silent in contrast. Nobody noticed that beneath these same confused and anxious faces, over 50% of the people had already been injected with opium biochips and were simultaneously listening to the next orders from their higher-ups.