Chapter 133
After a series of investigations, the military court indicted Osborne and Cecil on charges of treason and malfeasance, they also announced the dissolution of the two men’s First and Second Army, which were merged into the Imperial Army, led by Joshua.
Because the two were the most powerful in the galaxy, when carrying out the arrest, the Imperial Army sent their most powerful mech units to surround the two’s villa.
Joshua drove his silver-white ultra-mech and turned on the amplifier to command the two men, warning them not to resist, otherwise they would raze the Bernard and Matthew family.
The two most prominent families in the Empire were now synonymous with ‘shame’ and ‘betrayal’. Old Bernard and Old Matthew were very old, and a few younger generations who hated Osborne and Cecil to the bone had personally captured them and delivered them to the courtroom.
Zhou Yun Sheng stood in front of the window, staring out at the towering white mech, and sneered. He’d repeatedly scrutinized Joshua’s abnormalities these past few day, and had almost confirmed his identity beyond a doubt. The strength of spiritual power was destined from birth, to suddenly rise from S-level to 3S, Joshua had to be occupied by a more powerful soul, like himself.
A Zerg Queen could command all the Zerg, the strength of their spiritual power was obvious, and Joshua’s sudden change had happened after the war.
What was the world’s consciousness doing, how could it allow the son of fate to be replaced? But it was not true to say that he was completely replaced, Joshua still completed the tasks he should complete, and he’d obtained more honor than he deserved, even worse, he was better off than in his original fate.
It seemed that fate had not changed much at all. If he doesn’t expose himself, he could continue living as his human identity, quietly holding the human and Zerg race in the palm of his hands, accomplishing the dream of every Zerg Queen – turning the whole galaxy into its nest.
Good calculations. Zhou Yun Sheng raised his glass to the huge silver- white mech, then walked up to the bedside and shouted impatiently, “Get up, we have to go to court!”
“Tch, annoying!” Osborne dragged opened his eyes and got out of bed, naked. He walked to the floor length mirror, turned sideways to look at the scratches on his back, then said in a reminiscing tone, “My love, you were really passionate last night. You almost drove me insane.”
Zhou Yun Sheng threw a coat over his head and gave him a fake smile, “Everyone says that Osborne is noble and solemn, I should really let them see what you’re like in private.”
“That was before, the current Osborne is an incompetent coward who betrayed the Empire and killed his comrades. I no longer need to maintain my image in front of them, thank God. My love, I’ll do whatever I want to do in the future, the Empire was never my responsibility, you are.” He pinched his lover’s chin and kissed his bright red lips.
Zhou Yun Sheng clasped the back of his head and gave him a hot morning wake up kiss.
When the heavily armed forces broke into the room, this was the scene they met. They almost couldn’t maintain a grip on their particles guns, they’d heard that the feelings between the two Marshals were extraordinarily deep, but now they finally had first-hand insight, just look at the circumstances, yet they still had the mood to be intimate.
“Let’s go.” Zhou Yun Sheng patted his lover’s firm buttocks, then stretched out his hands to allow the people to put him in spiritual and physical power suppressing handcuffs.
The handcuffs were fitted with a gravity device, the maximum value reaching 500 times gravity, it was specifically made to deal with 3S level powers, don’t mention the use of force, even walking was difficult. Each of their steps left deep footprints in the ground, and even the stairs were almost flattened, making the soldiers responsible for arresting them unceasingly scared.
Seeing the two people in handcuffs, Joshua opened his cockpit and jumped down, he walked up to Osborne and lowered his voice, “You once said I was ambitious but didn’t have the ability to match it, now look, I’m at the top of the world, and you’re a prisoner. Osborne, I have proved you wrong. I, Joshua, will never become another person’s vassal, I will be the strongest above all.”
He retreated two steps, and gave them a complacent smile.
Zhou Yun Sheng looked back at him in astonishment. Judging by the words just said, Joshua’s sanity had not been completely devoured by the Queen, his will and obsession had not been swallowed up. He was himself, but also the Queen, they had fully integrated.
No wonder the Zerg Queen picked him, his heart had too many hidden desires, and these desires made him easily seducible by the Queen, so he willingly betrayed humanity. If he and Osborne had not trampled on his pride, he might not have embarked on this path.
Thinking of this, Zhou Yun Sheng sneered again. What trampling on his pride? If he truly had self-respect, he wouldn’t have done those things. In the final analysis, he could only blame his own excessively greedy desires. In the original track of fate, he’d never needed to work hard, whatever he wanted, Osborne or Kyle would hand it over to him, so he could afford to remain kind, cheerful, and selfless.
But without these two people’s silent sacrifices and careful assistance, he could only rely on himself. However, he was from an ordinary family, and his strength, although comparable to Alpha, was not outstanding among them, so naturally, every aspect of his life was unsatisfactory. Coupled with the fact that an Omega a hundred times better than him, Cecil, had suddenly appeared, it was natural that he would become unwilling and obsessed.
He wanted to become stronger, wanted to go beyond Cecil, so everything that happened could be the results of a butterfly effect.
As the inciter of all this, Zhou Yun Sheng gave an amused smile. He took two steps towards Joshua, and the soldiers raised their particle guns.
“Don’t be nervous, I just want to say a word to my old classmate.” He waved his hand and smiled, then whispered to Joshua, “Being manipulated like a puppet by desire doesn’t make you strong. In my eyes, you’re weak. Weak and helpless.”
Joshua suddenly let out a murderous arura, he glared back with cold eyes.
“Speak if you want to speak, don’t lean in so close.” Osborne pulled his lover back to his side, then glared at Joshua with the same killing intent.
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They were, after all, Grand Marshals, and they also had first class strength, their living cell was very clean and bright. But Osborne was furious as soon as he’d stepped in, because they’d put him in a separate cell from Cecil. His red eyes and ferocious expression frightened the prison officer, that night, they transferred the two to a double room.
“Don’t you want them to give you a bigger bedroom? Hmm?” Zhou Yun Sheng sat cross-legged on the small one meter wide bed and laughed.
Osborne sat beside him, because of the weighty handcuffs, it was inconvenient to embrace his lover, he could only kiss his cheek and grin, “There’s no need for that. This small bed is just enough to rest on, I lie down first, you lie down on top of me.”
Zhou Yun Sheng Zhang opened his mouth and captured his tongue, kissing him enthusiastically.
The prison guards patrolled every hour and found such scenes- the two were always cuddling on the bed, or kissing, or chatting, how could they be so free, the guard couldn’t but help shake his head and sigh: Showing no guilt after committing such a heinous crime, these two people cannot be saved!
The next day, the lengthy trial began, the prosecution, including treason and malfeasance, laid down dozen of charges, if the verdict was established, the two would be executed. Those who sat in as spectators were all military leaders and royal family members, the most conspicuous was Old Bernard and Old Matthew.
They sat silently in the middle, surrounded by a circle of empty seats. Obviously, no one in the Empire wanted to get involved with them, including the subordinates who used to be loyal to them.
The judge announced the trial’s start, the prosecution staff immediately took out a thick file and began breaking down the two’s war crimes, in order to highlight fairness, the trial process was broadcasted live on the Star Network.
Osborne and Zhou Yun Sheng didn’t hire a lawyer, but even if they wanted to, no lawyer would dare defend them. As a result of their mistakes, millions of soldiers had died on the battlefield, and the families of the soldiers had threatened to tear anyone who dared defend them to pieces.
Every complaint filed by the prosecution would be confronted by just the two people.
Osborne bowed his head and played with his lover’s fingers, his attitude was quite casual. Zhou Yun Sheng raised his eyebrows and stared at the prosecutors with a mocking expression, even laughing out loud at ridiculous extracts.
“I’m not guilty.” He had already repeated this sentence a dozen times.
The prosecutors looked at him coldly, as if saying – even if you don’t confess, the judge will still execute you. The two heroic figures were already ruined, now no one would sympathize with them, even the few people who’d had some hope for them fell silent after seeing their blasé performance in court.
How can they not feel guilty after indirectly killing so many people?
“I plead not guilty, and I ask the alliance commander at that time, Joshua, to step forward.” Zhou Yun Sheng said loudly.
The judge looked at the Prince Consort, who was sitting in the gallery.
Joshua hesitated for a few seconds, but he remembered that both their hands and feet were shackled with 500 times gravity, not to mention attack, they could barely move, so he elegantly stood up and said, “I’m willing to confront the two Marshals.”
The angry masses on the Star Network ridiculed, “Prince Consort is too gracious, they don’t deserve to be called Marshals, they are interstellar criminals! They almost killed us all!”
“Cecil, please say what you please.” Joshua walked closer to the two witnesses.
Zhou Yun Sheng turned on the microphone on the table and slowly opened, “I want to say that the success or failure of this war was not controlled by mankind, but by the Zerg Queen. We were just the scapegoats it pushed out. And currently, it’s among us.”
The amount of implication contained in this sentence was too large, everyone heard it but didn’t understand it, they couldn’t help but look at each other, puzzled. Only Joshua’s face changed dramatically. He stood up and turned to leave, but the silent until now Osborne suddenly shattered the gravity rings on his wrists and ankles, then pounced on him with lightning speed, grabbing his fragile neck.
The soldiers pulled out their particle guns but didn’t dare shoot, worried about injuring the Prince Consort.
Zhou Yun Sheng slowly shattered his gravity rings, walked up to Joshua, and lifted his chin to give him a careful once over. The sharp spirit of the Zerg Queen frantically attacked him like a needle, but he blocked all the attacks.
“Kill him.” Zhou Yun Sheng lightly said.
Then, in full view of witnesses, Osborne shoved a fist through Joshua’s chest, puncturing his heart. His bright eyes dimmed, and his limbs fell limp.
“No!” On the sidelines, Kyle issued a distressed roar. All the star citizens were intimidated by the demented behavior of the two men.
But it was not over yet, Cecil walked closer and split open Joshua’s skull. They were simply not human, they were demons! They should be thrown into a black hole and twisted into pieces!
The netizens lashed out in anger, stood up and pounded their tables, then suddenly slumped back, their legs going soft. A translucent, spherical object that resembled a human brain drilled out of Joshua’s cracked skull, flying into the face of an Alpha soldier.
It stretched out a sharp mouth, cut a hole in the soldier’s forehead, and twisted its soft, boneless body into it, quickly occupying the soldier’s skull.
The soldier, whose forehead had a bloody hole, began shooting at Osborne and Cecil without regard to the death of the prosecutors and judges behind them. Zhou Yun Sheng escaped the dense spray of bullets and quickly spun around to appear behind the soldier, neatly breaking his neck. Once again, he pried open the skull, forcing out the ball-like object, but this time he caged it with spiritual power.
Osborne immediately laid out his spiritual power around the cage, no matter how high the spiritual strength of the Zerg Queen, it couldn’t break through the two 3S-level’s imprisonments.
It lashed its spiritual force at the air, its mouth issuing a whining sound, its appearance was exactly like a human brain, but its skin was transparent, and it contained numerous yellow eggs. There was no doubt that it was a Zerg.
“Did you take a close look? The human army is commanded by such a monster, if it wants us to fail, we will fail, if it wants us to win, we will win. It controls four-fifths of the Empire’s troops, the lives of all the soldiers are in the palm of its hands. You, however, waste precious time prosecuting two innocent people, so we won’t ever plead guilty!” Zhou Yun Sheng sneered and opened.
Without waiting for him to finish, Kyle, who was standing in the gallery, suddenly leapt through the air, his body rapidly expanding, tearing open his magnificent attire, he fell in front of two and turned into a ferocious looking Zerg. It sprayed venom, its tail sweeping at the two people, trying to save the Queen. The army commanders sitting around him also suddenly became high level Zerg and quickly attacked the two.
However, after years of training, the two’s strength had already reached heights unimaginable by ordinary people, they just usually didn’t show it, which had led to Joshua seriously underestimating them, thinking that the gravity rings would be enough to trap them.
Zhou Yun Sheng punched a hole through a Zerg’s head, turned, then kicked an encroaching Zerg dozens of meters away, smashing it into residue on the wall. Next to him, Osborne had also brutally maimed a few Zerg, using the rags hanging on their bodies to wipe the palm of his hands clean.
Zhou Yun Sheng walked up to the pile of Zerg corpses and sneered, “The King, the Supreme Marshal of the Empire, the Third Army Marshal, the Fourth Army Marshal, the Fifth Army Marshal, the captain of the Royal Guards, and the mecha Generals, these are the best talents in the Empire, but they have long been turned into Zerg. Is this the Lennon Empire or the Zerg Empire?”
Everyone was still blanking out from the previous scene, they looked at him with dull eyes.
“I declare that, from now on, the Lennon Empire will enter a wartime state, and all those who have come into contact with Joshua Lennon have to undergo a comprehensive physical examination to confirm their human identity.”
“If the Free Federation or the Ballou Republic try to probe into our empire at this time, then according to the intergalactic convention signed in 6789, we have the right to utilize our ultimate weapons on both countries.” Zhou Yun Sheng slowly opened to the camera, then pointed to a soldier and ordered, “Find a transparent energy shield, then inform the Empire’s Supreme Laboratory to prepare to receive the Zerg Queen as an experimental body.”
The soldiers immediately returned to reality, saluted, and ran out. The remaining soldiers looked at the two men in awe.
Death was not the most terrible outcome, it was more terrible to live as the dead. The Zerg Queen apparently knew what awaited it in the laboratory, so it let out sharp hisses, violently striking out with its spiritual force, giving everyone on the scene a severe headache.
Zhou Yun Sheng and Osborne immediately released their spirits to suppress it, under such vast cosmic coercion, the Zerg Queen quieted down, shivering.
Things were moving too quickly, leaving everyone unable to respond, it wasn’t until the two men led the soldiers to rectify the site did the audience on the Star Network take an awakening breath.
How did those Zerg get mixed up with human beings? They had control of the Lennon Empire, in order to exterminate humanity, they just needed to provoke the three forces into war. If Marshal Osborne and Cecil hadn’t discovered their plot in time, humanity would’ve perished.
Terrible! As long as they thought of the human-disguised Zerg, they involuntarily shuddered. Those who hated Osborne and Cecil felt ashamed, saying that they would publish a letter of apology on the Star Network, and that they would now unconditionally support the two.
They knew that the Empire was now caught in a catastrophe, and only the two could quell the disaster.
The prestige of the royal family fell to the bottom, they were the first to accept the physical examinations, then the military people followed. Zhou Yun Sheng and Osborne took control of the military with the fastest speed, while killing a few Zerg who tried to take revenge for the Queen.
Zhou Yun Sheng had to lament the Queen’s ambition. It could produce eggs in human bodies, allowing the larvae to slowly hatch and replace the host. It selected all the important players, controlling the Empire by controlling them, if they had continued down that course, humanity and the Zerg would be under its rule in just a few years.
Zhou Yun Sheng stood in front of the detector, watching the military people undergo inspection one by one. Zerg could cover their appearance in human skin and bones, but as long as they stood under an X-ray, their hidden body would be exposed. The soldiers who had passed the examination pointed guns at the men, mercilessly shooting down anyone discovered.
Of course, there were Zerg who tried to flee, but as long as a military personnel went unaccounted-for for more than four hours, they would be wanted by the whole galaxy. The Ballou Republic and the Free Federation were actively cooperating with the Lennon Empire, they were also afraid of the Zerg that could become human beings entering their territories.
Fortunately, the Queen was not interested in ordinary soldiers, which averted a greater disaster. Currently, the Generals of several armies had been killed, and the remainders naturally obeyed the orders of Marshal Osborne and Cecil.
The two men accepted an inspection under the detector to prove their identity as humans for the whole galaxy. When asked how they found the true identity of the Queen, they simply replied, “As long as your spiritual power is higher than the Queen’s, you can sense it.”
Everyone knew that the spiritual power of the Zerg Queen was ridiculously high, so high that human beings could never go beyond it, but now, that was already old history. The anxious citizens of the Empire calmed down, they highly respected the two Marshals. Then they vigorously attacked the royal family on the Star Network, because 50% of the royal family had turned out to be Zerg.
This was not their fault, but the image of the royal family had been irreversibly destroyed, their intention to pick a new king was rejected by the people, who proposed abolishing the monarchy and changing the regime to a democratic republic, a presidential system.
There was no doubt that the people wanted the first president to be elected between Osborne and Cecil.
“You don’t want to be president?” Osborne hugged his lover from behind, feeling up his strong abdominal muscles with his palms.
“Don’t want, too much work.” Zhou Yun Sheng slowly tasted his wine, then asked, “Do you want to do it?”
“I want to be a Star Pirate, like we agreed earlier.” Osborne pinched his lover’s jaw, stressing his words.
“Well, we’ll go be Star Pirates.” Zhou Yun Sheng drank his glass of red wine and gave Osborne a peck on the lips.
Old Matthew and Old Bernard were furious to discover that the two brats had ran away from home, not even leaving a note. They had to announce the news to the outside world, and the public suddenly howled in misery, thinking that the previous trial had hurt the two people’s hearts, making them run away, extremely disappointed in the Empire.
They’d paid everything for the Empire, but Empire had paid them back with the death penalty, no sane person could stand this kind of humiliation. Some people felt distressed for them, some people accused them of being irresponsible, but no matter what the outside world said, they didn’t care.
Finally, the royal family managed to keep their noble status, but lost their authority. The Lennon Empire was changed from an absolute monarchy into a constitutional monarchy, and the rights were handed over to the people.
At the same time, a group of Star Pirates called ‘DOOM’ turned up, in just a few years, they became a powerful group equivalent to the Lennon Empire, the Ballou Republic, and the Freedom Federation.
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T/N:
DOOM- 毀滅 – Huimie – to perish / to ruin / to destroy
Chap 12 is the hardest and most annoying to translate yet, I hate xianxia(when I’m the one translating it). Oh well, see you next time.