Chapter 46
Chapter 46
4.7 – A damned old man who had lived for seven hundred years
Russell finished the last part of the mecha and finally completed all the work that had to be done today.
He breathed a sigh of relief, said goodbye to the uncle at the factory, then trotted all the way outside to buy two bags of bread from a roadside shop before rushing home in a hurry.
Just after he entered the door, he was choked by a pair of big hands around his throat. Russell was still young; his entire body was directly lifted up, both feet dangling in mid-air. His face began to turn red from the interrupted blood flow, and he fluttered in a panic, shaking the bag in his hand as he spoke, “I am not an enemy! Hurry and put me down!”
Due to years of frugality and saving up money to buy inhibitors, Russell’s body was very small, and even though he was close to eighteen years old, he still looked like a teenager who had not yet grown up.
At this moment, Russell’s eyes were red from the man’s actions, his life hung on the balance and struggled in his hands. It was both fresh and beautiful.
Luther had such a moment of hesitation before he let Russell down, though he still watched him vigilantly.
As an alpha, Luther’s instincts remained unchanged even though he woke up badly injured and had none of his original memories. He remained alert.
Russell gasped for breath, rubbing his chest and feeling his heart still thumping wildly, but there was no resentment or blame towards the young man who had grabbed him.
Three days ago, he had picked him up from the recycling station. He had exerted a lot of effort in order to bring the seriously injured man back, dragging and tugging the whole way home. He then cleaned and medicated his wounds.
“You finally woke up.” He seemed to have finally recovered from the danger just now, placing the bread on the only table in his home before sitting down in a chair beside it. He opened the bag of bread. “Are you feeling better? You were badly injured. Although I studied the process in school, I can’t guarantee that I can deal with your wounds properly.”
It was not easy for Russell to be able to find medicine to heal Luther’s wounds on this remote planet that was unknown light years away from the capital star. It could be said that this was a fateful encounter.
If Luther had not married Ashley in the first place, no matter how they fell in love, it would not have affected Xue Ling’s affairs. However, Luther was ‘a husband who was taken’. It could be excused that he had lost his memories, but the most disgusting thing was that even after recovering his memories, he still continued with his resolution to mark Russell.
Xue Ling felt that this was adultery within a marriage, and had nothing to do with true or false love.
Luther right now had no memories, and the actions he had just made were all from his subconscious. After confirming that his life was not threatened, Luther relaxed a little and began to look at Russell.
He could not understand what Russell was asking him, so he frowned and said, “Who are you?”
Russell took a bite out of the bread. It didn’t have much taste, but it did fill the stomach. “My name is Russell Johnson. I’m a mecha pilot, and also an apprentice learning some mecha design and production.” Such a harsh environment did not stand a chance at wearing away at the protagonist’s spirit. They were always like this; even if they were in the slums, the halo on their head would still be shining.
“Mecha pilot?” Something seemed to flash through his mind, Luther pressed a hand against his head and asked the next question: “Then… Who am I?”
“Eh?” Russell incredulously raised his head and gave the man a confused look.
At this time, Russell’s somewhat joyful mood from before disappeared completely.
When encountering an unidentified person on planet 7-818, there were two possibilities. The first, was a person thrown down from the battlefield. After all, the planet was very close to the front lines. Although most of the soldiers that were found were common soldiers, Russel was very willing to rescue an elite soldier of the Emperor. Perhaps he would even receive some compensation, which would allow him to buy more inhibitors before he left the planet.
Other than soldiers, the only people who would come here were those who have been exiled. They could be nobles, or civilians, but in any case, they had committed crimes, and then on the way to their exile, they had gotten kicked down and accidentally landed here.
Russell felt that Luther was still more like a soldier, although he had no proof of identity or anything on his body. When Russell had found him, he had been black all over and his face could not be clearly seen; he had obviously been burnt. But Russell just thought that this man should be a soldier, and a very good soldier at that. If that was the case, then he would be able to get more money.
But now?
This man was asking him who he was?
Heavens, if you ask me, then who should I ask?
While the protagonists were meeting for the first time and did not know what to do with each other, Xue Ling’s fleet had already set out for the front lines and started the first interstellar transfer.
His main starship, together with the starships behind him, were all composed of mecha pilots that combined together were larger than the forces that the Prince had brought with him when he left. But these people were not like the Prince’s guards, who had developed feelings with the Prince from childhood. They were roughly divided into three parts, and were not completely under Xue Ling’s control.
The army that was directly under Xue Ling’s control and closest to him was the Rhine family’s legion. They were the guards trained by the Rhine Family for Xue Ling, and were intended to become Xue Ling’s military strength after he became Queen, and represented the Empire’s Queen. They had been under Warren’s command previously, and should have been handed over to Xue Ling on his eighteenth birthday when he became an adult, but the situation had changed too quickly, and Warren could not manage so much, so Xue Ling was very happy to take over their command.
At least he could rest assured that these people were brought up to be his private soldiers, and they were loyal to the point where if he said that he wanted to kill the Prince, they would not even blink as they directly went follow his orders.
Another legion was sent by the military headquarters. They were always neutral and loyal to the Empire. Their relations with the royal family were not very strong, but Xue Ling had observed them for a few days, and found that they did not resent him too much. To be exact… they did not dislike this face of his.
The remaining legion was the army appointed by the old King, which seemed to be his private soldiers. The old King had said that he had given full command to Xue Ling, but in fact, these people did not seem to value the Princess very highly. They did not have a good attitude when they saw Xue Ling, and they seemed to think that he was going to the front lines just to make a mess.
After observing these armies and their officers for several days, Xue Ling had an approximate grasp on their strength and tempers. So, His Highness the Princess rubbed his hands together, got ready for a fight, and issued a challenge to all the members of the three legions.
Yes, everyone. As long as they dared to come and fight, he would accompany them to play until they were genuinely convinced and kneeled down to call him ‘daddy’.
Faced with such lofty words, at first the officers and soldiers on the starships either scoffed at Xue Ling or tried to dissuade him with mild words. Everyone knew that the Princess was an omega, and that omegas could not win against alphas in mecha piloting. It was impossible even in dreams.
But Xue Ling was extremely insistent, and was very willing to fight according to his own words. It was just that no one wanted to fight with him.
They were deadlocked for two days before the first person came up to give it a try. He was sent flying after three moves.
For the next half month, everyone watched stupefied as their Princess used his own strength to fight against all three legions, and take down a complete victory.
By this time, no one dared to laugh at him. After all, they all came up to fight and lost. It was like the words His Highness the Princess had said, he would beat them all down until they were on their knees calling ‘daddy’…
All the alphas on the starship fleet felt that they had no face left, but at the same time they all felt extremely proud.
This was the Empire’s Princess! Their leader, who as an omega, could give all the alphas on the starships pressure, and they did not have the ability to fight back! With such a leader, the worries they had when they started out disappeared completely.
His Royal Highness was mighty and magnificent. Even without the Prince, the Princess could lead them to sweep through the front lines.
Xue Ling felt that his plan to gain their acceptance had gone smoothly, and when he reached the front lines, he was in an unprecedented good mood. But he did not know that someone had been observing him along the way, watching as he slowly studied the three armies, and then fought against the fleet all by himself. That charm and flair made it so that the more he looked, the more he wanted to catch him and bring him back from the front lines.
Xue Ling could take over an entire starship fleet in half a month. Augustine could also take over the entire capital star in the same timeframe.
Xue Ling maintained contact with the capital star every day, but news about Augustine was not allowed to spread, so he had no idea that the capital star was now being controlled by a group of people from more than 700 years ago. As soon as he returned, he would be like the sheep entering the tiger’s mouth – the possibility of coming out again was very low.
Xue Ling had been worried about leaving Warren at the palace, but unexpectedly, everything was being handled in an orderly way. The number of things that he needed to deal with gradually decreased from the initial pile up towards a successful transition at the end. Xue Ling became increasingly satisfied, and thus put most of his efforts on the front lines to cope with the situation there.
In fact, the number of things that needed to be dealt with had not decreased, but rather had become more and more. The reason Xue Ling thought that everything in the capital star was fine, was because someone had already solved everything, leaving him very little to deal with.
Far away in the capital star, Warren ended his daily conversation with his brother and sighed weakly.
This kind of feeling where there were words that could not be said to the other party and had to be bottled up was extremely horrible. But as soon as he said anything, the signal would be directly intercepted; his nano-computer was the most monitored one and the focus of the Star Net’s main consciousness.
Although he seemed to be free now, he had already been deprived of his military power. He also did not know what intentions His Majesty had, or why he insisted on deceiving his younger brother this way.
To tell the truth, Warren had rejected him when he met Augustine for the first time. After all, he was a person who previously only existed in history. Suddenly, he became a false corpse that stood up to scare others to death. It had to be said that the Rhine family’s original ancestors had been his subordinates. Back then, it had seemed as though the two of them had been the only ones remaining from those who had fought alongside him, while the rest of the officials disappeared along with him.
Now…
They all came out.
This was a group of people who had collectively come back from the dead.
These people were clearly individuals from seven hundred years ago, but they were very familiar with everything regarding this era. After they emerged from the underground city and took control over the palace, they slowly began to take over everything in the capital star.
It was also then that Warren officially gained insight into the existence that was labelled the Emperor of all interstellar space.
Yes, the current title of the strongest attacker in interstellar space, could not be considered anything.
Compared to him, His Highness the Prince who claimed to be the leading alpha of the Empire, was nothing but scum.
At first, Warren still felt a bit of worship towards Augustine’s strength, but later on this worship was destroyed by Augustine’s actions.
Forcing him not to tell his younger brother about what had happened in the capital star, and bringing his parents back were both fine, but Augustine seemed to be trying to encircle the Rhine family. Warren almost thought that he was going to attack them…
But soon he realized what was wrong. Because Augustine did nothing other than to prevent them from leaving the capital star, Warren endured for some time before finally asking the people that Augustine had sent to his side a question. “May I know what Your Majesty wants to do with the Rhine family?”
The answer he was given was very simple, simple to the point where Warren wanted to kill that man and bite him to death.
“Huh? Your Majesty does not intend to do anything to you. It’s only that he was worried that the Empress would not cooperate with his decision when he comes back, so he wanted to have you and your family in his hands as a bargaining chip beforehand.”
“Empress…?” Warren had a crazy guess in his head.
“Yes, the young master of the Rhine family.” His trusted deputy looked at him with a happy smile. “He is the Empire’s Empress.” His emphasis was on the word ‘Empress’ and his smile was practically asking for a beating.
Warren clenched his fists and lowered his gaze. A storm was brewing in his eyes.
What does a damned old man who has lived for more than seven hundred years want to do with his brother?
Old cows like to eat tender grass??? Rob the cradle?
That’s going too far!
editors: almerysl & BlueBug
thanks to ‘somebody’ for their coffee on ko-fi~