Chapter 43

"The father of Ares Von, Prince Cayley, died because of his close guards' rebellion, while his elder brother was killed by his people. During his escape, he was infected by the Rainbow Virus accidentally – it is said that the medical environment was unable to cure the disease at that time, which caused necrosis of most of his body and he had to use artificial organs to replace them."

"But according to the rules of the Anti-Utopia Group, the use and production of alternative organs for human beings is a felony of contempt of nature, hence they can only give him the alloy production, which made him a weird figure with a third-class certificate of disability."

"For decades, the AUG has used Ares Von's image to carry on anti-utopia propaganda, vilifying him as a negative case against the abuse of technology. Because of his early experience, Ares Von doesn't trust anyone and is an extremely self-closed and capricious man – he and the AUG just take advantage of each other.

"Oh," Jingheng Lin answered with a thoughtful voice: "Sounds like a familiar character, a pirate version of myself."

"I have also roughly analyzed his armed forces by the information of his attack on Cayley planet and Beijing planet ..."

"It doesn't matter," Jingheng Lin interrupted him, "All I need is just the list of people who still follow him after his escape from the Eight Galaxy to outer space."

Zhanlu answered: "According to the data I have, there are only three men who have followed him since that time. They are..."

"No need to introduce them, just search all the data of the underground black market from your database, video records, news, sneak shots or whatever. Cross-check the data with those men. Just give me the result of that."

After a silence of about five minutes, Zhanlu said: "Sir, one of the men is known as Primalien — male, two-hundred-and-twenty-year-old, who is some sort of sadist and a faithful follower of Prince Cayley. I have found two video records of him appearing at the underground black market from my database. According to the analysis of lip language, people call him as 'Black Scale', or similar pronunciation. The second video record has caught the merchandise that he bought from the underground black market."

"What is it?"

"A snakemaid." Zhanlu answered with no emotion, "Very inhumane."

"So, sounds like he is utterly 'loyal' to the Prince Cayley." Jingheng Lin squinted purposefully.

Ares Von and snakemaid, the same artificial freak creatures, could give people an unpleasant association. Considering the personality of Prince Cayley, if he'd known his henchman had a finger in this, he would cut this man into pieces.

But why was this Primalien was willing to risk his life to buy freaks like this from the underground black market?

"Snakemaid" always had a meaning of lewdness and voluptuousness, while a sadist always had a repressed desire inside himself.

That was very worth savoring.

"I'm sorry. Sir, what does that mean? I don't understand it." Zhanlu asked innocently.

Jingheng Lin didn't answer him: "So Primalien is very familiar with the underground black market and underground channels."

"I'm afraid so," Zhanlu answered, "Including the locations, construction rules and distribution of transfer points of common underground channels..."

Jingheng Lin continued his unfinished words: "Also including the member constitution of underground channels. He knows exactly what kind of people are living in the underground channels – he dealt with them."

"Yes, Sir. He knows them. Even though he knows that those people were no threat, he still spared none."

"I see," Jingheng Lin said, "Block the mouse hole and keep the snake outside – it looks like I need to act myself as a mouse today. I need some fast muscle-dissolving agent.[note 1]"

The fast muscle dissolving agent destroyed the near-perfect muscle layer of Jingheng Lin – after years of strict life and continuous training, he had a very low body fat ratio, which made him a slender man after the destruction of the muscle layer.

"Consume all the particle cannons, keep one missile," Jingheng Lin buttoned up his loosened shirt, "Blow off the materials stock ... Oh, and the remaining relaxants, drain them all, but keep those boxes and leave them in the disposable waste."

Mech Beijing followed all his commands like a tinker toy.

"Zhanlu, shield my personal terminal."

The robot hand scanned his wrist and the personal terminal went black – unless there was a decipher tool which was more intellectual than the mech core of the first mech of the IU, it just looked like in the damaged state.

"Backup the surveying map, and then destroy this one, include the location system of mech Beijing and all the interstellar channel maps for reference. Then forge an interstellar map according to the map I drew, the vaguer the better. Change the mode of the mech to 'the lowest survival mode'. When you finish all these commands, Zhanlu, shrink your mental network and transfer all the backup energy stocks in Beijing to your place."

The screens of machines in the mech Beijing went black one by one. At last, even the gravitation system stopped working, and the whole cabin went into the zero-g state.

"Now you prepare to sleep," Jingheng Lin said to Zhanlu, "Until I call you from the mental network ... Oh, wait a second. I almost forgot. Give me a combo blocking antibody before sleep. Those poor pirates are wild about making some disgusting biochemicals."

"Yes, Sir," Zhanlu asked, "In what form do I go to sleep?"

Jingheng Lin glanced at the cabin and pointed at the wine cabinet.

Two hours later, the pirates had detected a mech wandering into their alarming field. The mech was like a piece of crap – with one part of its body was missing, the power system completely shut down as it was out of power, sliding at a constant speed, not to mention its barely existing defense system.

A crap like this didn't need a missile indeed. Those pirates sent the vanguard to try to invade the mental network of the mech – to their surprise, the invasion was very easy, for no one was driving this mech and the interface was unoccupied!

The vanguard reported to the superior quickly. After the command was given, the first one in the vanguard who tried to control the mech's mental network carefully picked up this unknown mech. They were shocked again by the find that in this mech, there was a pilot 'in a coma'.

It was unknown how long he had stayed in space, food and water were probably used up. With cracked lips and a withered face, this poor man was gaunt and stringy.

There were eight empty relaxant boxes found in the mech. The pilot must have run out of stock, pulled from the mental network exhaustedly before taking a nutrition injection. If no one found him, he could have become a space mummy after running out of oxygen a few hours later.

However, in this mech that was almost out of stock, there was a very vague navigation channel chart on which a new channel without any record was marked.

The vanguard did not dare delay – after quickly reporting it, they sent the man to where the commander, Primalien, was.

Primalien, the first general of Prince Cayley, looked like a middle-aged man – he had a square face, high enough hairline, wide shoulders, and a fashionable "smiling" lips. At first sight, he was just a nobody, with a little sort of kindness. However, if you were caught by his sight, you would feel the creepiness within a moment – his smile was just like the hypocritical evil god in the ancient stories, staring at mortals and the sacrifices they made greedily

"That's him?" Primalien took a glance at the insensible pilot carelessly, "Identity?"

"Should be the smuggler from underground, there is a vague underground channel chart in his mech, often seen among smugglers." His pirates answered, "He was forced to break the connection with the mental network, that's why he lost his mind. Boss, I think a few milligrams of relaxant is enough to wake him up."

"Okay, just do it." At first, Primalien nodded without care. As he walked away, a light came by and lit up the young man's insensible face, "Wait, hold on."

The pirate leader approached him, using two fingers to catch the man's face, and looked at him carefully: "Doesn't he remind you of someone?"

The pirates looked at each other dumbly.

Fortunately, Primalien didn't expect an answer from them, just kept saying: "Really like the one of the Silver Fortress."

"Boss, do you mean Jingheng Lin?" A chubby pirate asked in a low voice – when he mentioned that name, he was a little bit nervous and licked his lips unconsciously, "This man ..."

Primalien smiled, his hand moved along from the unconscious man's face, thin neck, and emaciated chest: "How could Jingheng Lin be such a feeble man? Besides, what could a dead man do?"

"Take off all radioactive things and metal things from him, including the belt. Check whether there is subcutaneous implantation – if not, wake him up, I want to talk to him, if so, just cut his head down." Primalien stood up before he finished his words, licking the finger he had just used to touch the man, "He will be my best collection."

A few pirates approached, scanning the whole body over and over. There was only an old-model laser gun found on him. Besides that, only the belt and shoelaces eyes gave some response. His body was clearer than his face, the personal terminal on his wrist was already damaged, having no response no matter how they scanned it.

Besides being very poor and very pitiful, and with a face that looked like Jingheng Lin, there was nothing special about this man.

"Prepare ten milligrams relaxant ..."

"Hold on," Primalien interrupted again, standing in the dark, rubbing his chin leisurely, "Before the relaxant, he needs a hello gift."

"Yes, Boss," the chubby man was well-trained, "Bring the Rainbow Virus."

The lethal virus was pushed into the man's body, this unconscious man struggled a little uneasily – with a tightened neck, his hands and feet were pressed, like a bird that was struggling in death.

Primalien was gazing at his miserable face and weak struggle strangely – his eyes became lighter, too excited to calm down.

After 24 hours of incubation, the Rainbow Virus would take root and sprout inside this beautiful body: At first, it would take all his strength; three hours later, he could only blink his eyes, then his limbs and organs would stop functioning, the immune system would collapse – by that time, those necrotic parts would be cut off, and beautiful organs would be transplanted on him, which would only cause a minimum rejection. His body would become the most suitable sample for transplant that could turn to any form at will.

Under the stimulation of the Rainbow Virus, this 'insensible' man opened his eyes before they gave him the relaxant.

"Water..." He said a word in a daze, his scattered eyes were unable to focus. His fingers hooked on the shirt of a pirate, then dropped down, "Give me water..."

Primalien nodded, a glass of water was sent to the man's mouth.

That man must be desperately thirsty, almost drowning himself into the glass. No one knew where he got the strength – he took the glass away by himself ... thought most of the water spilled on his body.

He thanked vaguely: " Can I have one more?"

"Poor man." Primalien shook his head, "Give him one more glass of water. Bring the nutrition injection here."

Mental damage could just be part of the reason that this smuggler-like poor man had lost his mind, the other part was hunger, as there was nothing left in the mech. After two glasses of water and a nutrition injection, he finally came back to life. It seemed like he had just noticed that the room was full of pirates – he smiled fawningly, with his eyes rolling quickly, showing a sense of cunning and nervous.

Primalien, who was sitting right in front of him, looked at him kindly as if he was a new pet, asking gently "May I have your name?"

"Hydrophis."[note 2]

"A strange name, a nickname?"

"No. When the people who raised me up found me, he was watching the live broadcast of Animal World and it was just talking about a Hydrophis."

A classic name of the Eighth Galaxy underground people, Primalien just passed this one: "What do you ..."

Before he finished this word, he found out that the young man stared at his face and interrupted him: "I might have seen you somewhere before ... Are you Mr. Black Scale?"

Primalien's expression shattered suddenly.

The young man who called himself as "Hydrophis" acted as if he didn't catch the expression change, and said delightedly: "I've seen you at the black market once, you bought that one, I prepared the eco-pod for you ... hmph ..."

Primalien covered his mouth quickly – his cold and sticky sight was just like some kind of a cold-blooded animal. Then he waved his hand to his men around, suggesting them to go away – there were only two of them left in this tiny room.

Hydrophis was confused, having a frightened look. Suddenly, Primalien smiled at him and let him go, who turned back to that kind man again – the scary face was just like a temporary illusion.

"Buying a pet furtively at the underground black market is not proper behavior, especially for a leader. You can understand it, right?" Primalien took a glance at Hydrophis – he was obsessed with this face, but not with those eyes. Though the expression was different, the special shade of gray still reminded him of his deadliest enemy, Jingheng Lin. It made him very uncomfortable.

Primalien decided that once the Rainbow Virus attacked, he would gouge those eyes out and change them into dark brown or black.

Such a deeply hidden secret was nearly unveiled during this first meeting, now, Primalien's attention had been drawn to other places – before Hydrophis introduced himself, he was regarded as a gangster from the underground black market.

"Why did you drive such a damaged mech to this place? What happened?"

Hydrophis was confused at once: "My...my navigation was broken. I was tired, hungry and exhausted. My last impression was the compatibility kept dropping down, and then I don't know anything ... where is this place?"

Primalien stared at his face: "Almost near outer space, where did you plan to go?"

Hydrophis paused for a while, then he put his head in his hands, saying a train of obscene words with an accent that was totally from the Eighth Galaxy's underground world – he didn't have to gouge out his eyes to prove that he was not like Jingheng Lin. He was just a villain from the underground.

Primalien tried to figure out what had happened from this "Encyclopedia of obscene words" with patience: "Cow? The missing administrator of the underground channels? You used to work for him? What did you just say about him? Reserve arms, and built up his own base?"

"The son of a bitch also has material stocks, at least two. Only he knows the coordinations." Hydrophis gnashed his teeth and said, "Everyone was afraid of getting in trouble and opposes him to reserve the arms. He didn't give a shit about it. He has arms and materials, so he took all of us into control – he gave us little ration and used us as work animals..."

"To do what?'

"Build the base, some kind of new energy system and defense system, something like that ... I don't know. He just kept commanding us to work. We were starved and those robots were not enough..." Hydrophis said in a messy way, and his body was shaking, "I couldn't stand it anymore. All I thought about was just to kill him, but my friends betrayed me, sold us to Cow ... They ... They all died. There was only me that ran out of the base..."

"There, there –" Primalien acted like a kind elder, patted the young man's shoulder gently, "Calm down, easy, you're safe now. Now tell me, where are they? Maybe I could help you?"

After these words, Hydrophis was thrilled at once – it seemed that he had realized that he was talking to a notorious pirate. After his eyelashes quivered, he tried his best to control his expression and smiled: "Actually, I didn't ..."

Right, though he hated Cow, but there were still some friends he had lived with at the base.

"A faithful man." Primalien thought.

He interrupted Hydrophis and said gently: "There is no need for such a rush. First, I think you'd better get some rest in this place. I'll come to see you tomorrow."

24 hours later, we could see whether faith could fight against the virus.

Primalien closed the door gently, then he walked away.

Hydrophis – Jingheng Lin sat quietly for a while – then he rolled up his shirt and looked at the pinhole on his arm.

He lowered his head, killing intention flashing across his pale face.

The author has something to say:

Note 1: the fast muscle dissolving agent is equivalent to the future space-time high-efficiency version of Botox, but it is generally matched with the soothing agent on the mech, which is used to relieve the muscle spasm that may be caused by the soothing agent — It's not Admiral Lin's regular face slimming needle.

Note 2: Sea serpent: when the Trojan horse invaded, papa Laocoon saw through the Trojan horse and warned the Trojan villagers, but he was killed by a huge serpent floating across the sea. The meaning of "sea serpent" is: whoever sees me, I will kill him. ╮(╯▽╰)╭

(T/N: Hydrophis is a translator's choice of words to replace sea serpent ^^)