ABST Chapter 37

That evening, on the eve of Lan Xia’s funeral, countless condemnation posts suddenly appeared on StarNet:

 

[Judge Elansno!]

 

[Let Dog Ai’s death become the blood that christens the new alliance!]

 

[Honor the heroic spirits who died before!]

 

[Heard Elansno is at Dawn—Dawn, come forward and execute Elansno!]

 

The posts enumerated countless atrocities Elansno committed while commanding the Federation’s First Army—one after another, too numerous to list.

 

Especially now that the Northwest Sector held power, they hated Elansno far more than ordinary Federation citizens.

 

Elansno’s banners and photos were printed out and pasted on streets. With the current situation unstable and streets empty, wherever Elansno’s photos appeared, they were all splashed with red paint and torn to shreds.

 

Now the Federation was overthrown. Elansno’s master was gone. A dog without a master—who couldn’t step on it?!

 

The accumulated anger and hatred were completely detonated by online public opinion.

 

Countless people cursed, even wanting to livestream the execution. They wanted to see how the once lofty, cold, powerful Admiral would be judged, tortured, have his spine shattered as he moaned in pain, be forever nailed to the pillar of shame, never to rise again.

 

The ugly side of human nature made some people inevitably derive dark, secret pleasure from these fantasies.

 

Look—such a powerful person once, now trampled by them at will.

 

The most popular item was an audio recording:

 

[“Why did you issue the order to bombard Star District B6?! Do you know how many innocent people died in vain because of you?!”]

 

[“You kill indiscriminately—aren’t you afraid of nightmares at night?”]

 

[“All for His Majesty. They died, but shouldn’t they feel honored by it?”]

 

Someone dug up that the first two questions came from former Second Army Lieutenant General Wright, while that cold final answer was Elansno’s voice.

 

Three months of continuous war had piled up all the public’s panic in one place, and now ‘Judging Elansno’ undoubtedly gave them a frenzied emotional outlet.

 

They only saw what was right in front of them, cursing at this outlet, using the most vicious words to leave hateful comments.

 

This audio was confirmed to have no signs of synthesis, undoubtedly pushing the already agitated public emotions to an extremely high peak.

 

Dawn.

 

Conference Room.

 

Algiers looked at his comm device: “Have we found out who leaked that audio?”

 

“Almost.” Lian Yao typed the last line of code, following StarNet to find the source. “Got it.”

 

A small window popped up on his device, showing a middle-aged man huddled in a corner with a sinister smile. His righteous-looking face had long been destroyed by malice.

 

This person was still monitoring StarNet comments, unaware he was being surveilled, fingers flying as he sent out lines of inflammatory messages stirring up public anger.

 

He seemed to feel relief and excitement watching people curse Elansno.

 

Shou Bing looked at this face for a while, surprised: “Wright?”

 

Jin Daike: “Wasn’t he missing?”

 

“Missing, but the Federation never reported his death at the time,” Algiers said. “Lian Yao, arrest him and temporarily control StarNet public opinion. Now isn’t the time to clarify.”

 

The fact that Elansno helped the Northwest Sector overthrow the Federation was only known by a few leading faction heads in the Northwest Sector.

 

After all, Elansno was a Federation Admiral. If news of him helping the Northwest Sector spread initially, the Northwest Sector’s reaction definitely wouldn’t be relief and happiness, but strong rejection, believing he had ulterior motives.

 

Later, after what happened to Teacher Lan Xia, they never had a chance to explain clearly.

 

Algiers found it somewhat thorny.

 

After all, people in the Northwest Sector and original Federation citizens still had conflicts difficult to reconcile. Elansno helping the Northwest Sector pleased neither side.

 

Once made public, Northwest Sector people might not all appreciate it, while original Federation people would react even more strongly to Elansno’s ‘betrayal,’ and plans to establish the new alliance would face deeper obstacles.

 

After all, even if it was due to brainwashing that he was loyal to the Federation, Elansno still, while conscious, had spilled too much blood.

 

[Judge Elansno]—the title glared red.

 

Algiers had a headache: “Tomorrow is Teacher’s funeral. Notify the other faction leaders—say Dawn doesn’t wish to see bloodshed for the next three months. Elansno’s matter will be discussed later.”

 

Shou Bing: “I’ll handle it.”

 

No matter what, he was the former young master of Suto and current commander of Dawn’s external campaigns. Plus he already knew quite a few uncles from other factions. Even if just casual acquaintances, they’d give him some face.

 

——

 

Lan Xia’s funeral was viewed as a pivotal moment in overthrowing the Federation. It would be held in the Imperial Capital—crystal coffin displayed for three months, mourning for a hundred days, with highest honors.

 

Three months later, Lan Xia’s remains would be cremated to ash, the ashes sent to Dawn City to rest.

 

The day of the funeral was a gloomy, drizzling morning.

 

Misty rain draped everything in a layer of sorrowful gray veil.

 

Still Algiers’s group of four at the front. They hadn’t prepared white flowers. Before the ice coffin lay dreamlike, melancholy wisteria and all the purple flowers they could find.

 

Light, delicate fragrance lingered in the rain. The man sleeping in the crystal coffin could never open his eyes again, brows still holding irretrievable sorrow.

 

Tens of thousands gathered here, softly singing the requiem.

 

The pure, innocent nursery rhyme, wrapped in damp mist, drifted through the iron window into Gong Du’s ears.

 

He still lay on the iron bed, performing for the surveillance cameras to ensure the protagonist group could see it later, then slowly sat up and walked out barefoot.

 

Today was a special day. They hadn’t locked the door on him, probably considering he might go out to see the funeral.

 

Long-term depletion had made Elansno weak—even pushing open a door seemed beyond his strength.

 

He didn’t take an umbrella. His thin, pale ankles stepped directly into water pooled on the ground. Cold rain seeped into unhealed wounds on his body—the pain and chill seemed to revive his spirits somewhat.

 

Elansno breathed out lightly, said something in a low voice, then smiled and walked out of Dawn’s temporary residence.

 

The people secretly watching him in the shadows were extremely anxious, but with the funeral currently underway, they couldn’t report it and could only follow secretly.

 

Elansno didn’t head toward the funeral, but mechanically walked further and further away, entering a sparsely populated shopping street.

 

He’d removed his mask. White hair disheveled and wretched, making his features appear blurred. Wide, thin clothing clung to his lean body, covered in wounds—showing no trace of a Federation Admiral’s bearing, yet unable to conceal his handsome contours.

 

The black iron ring worn around his neck, combined with blood marks on his throat—no one thought it was a suppression ring, but rather some toy with erotic implications.

 

He seemed to know Dawn’s people were secretly following behind him. Ignoring the shop owner’s gaze, he picked out several items on his own.

 

The owner had originally stared at his white hair and purple eyes for several moments, somewhat suspicious, but after seeing what he bought, that suspicion turned to understanding.

 

So it was kinky play, plus cosplay.

 

On a distant wall hung a photo of Elansno wearing his mask.

 

Knife blades stuck in it, slashed to ribbons. On the ground, red paint washed down, diffusing in rainwater.

 

The white-haired man walked away barefoot.

 

——

 

By the time the funeral ended, it was already evening.

 

Algiers’s group didn’t rest but instead gathered in the conference room.

 

The atmosphere was somewhat heavy, and Jin Daike wasn’t present.

 

Algiers: “Lian Yao, are you certain the information you received is accurate?”

 

Lian Yao nodded: “Definitely accurate. Blue R is one of Grey River’s subsidiary intelligence networks—they only care about money, but this time they’d rather not charge and still insist I look at the data they stole from the research institute.”

 

It was this afternoon, halfway through the funeral, when Lan Zhouhe’s emergency communication broke through to Lian Yao’s comm device.

 

Only a few top subsidiary networks had the Grey River leader’s emergency contact method. Lian Yao hadn’t received one in many years. Once this emergency communication connected, it meant there was extremely significant information, even impossible to handle.

 

Only Dawn’s most core members were in the conference room.

 

Shou Bing’s brows were tightly furrowed as he projected the data Lian Yao provided.

 

It showed images of frozen humans, like ice sculptures, yet swollen with bulging lumps that looked like… eggs.

 

The atmosphere was extremely oppressive.

 

Algiers: “Daike already went to investigate the research institute. We overlooked the underground when we first searched it. The Zerg have been gone for hundreds of years, but if…”

 

If it were true, when did Rosh and the research institute’s connection to the Zerg begin?

 

Was Rosh’s disappearance also related to this matter?

 

Before disappearing, Rosh had schemed against them, leading to Teacher’s death and Elansno suffering a major blow. Both were S-level evolvers, tremendous combat power—was this coincidence or…

 

Jin Daike’s communication came through.

 

The background behind her was the research institute’s underground. Dawn’s warriors surrounded her protectively, their expressions extremely serious: “Brother, that data should be real. In the research institute’s underground, I discovered large amounts of ice and small amounts of unknown residual components.”

 

“After simple analysis, it appears to be some creature’s membrane. It matches the extremely limited Zerg data the Federation preserved. Confirmed—it’s insect egg components.”

 

At these words, both sides of the call fell silent.

 

Everyone clearly understood that these things in the research institute’s underground absolutely couldn’t have appeared suddenly. They might have existed far longer than imagined.

 

During the Zerg’s first invasion, the Federation had accumulated much data about them, but later that data kept disappearing.

 

Including the formula for the beast repellent specifically developed to counter the Zerg—it was accidentally destroyed, leaving only the inferior substitute repellent, downgraded by more than one level.

 

If from that time, the Zerg had already imperceptibly infiltrated the Federation’s upper echelons…

 

Chilling.

 

Jin Daike: “Data recordings about the Zerg are truly too scarce. I haven’t carefully studied the data we just obtained, but from what I understand, among the Zerg, only brain-worms and king-worms possess high intelligence.”

 

“Only one king-worm can be born at a time. Once dead, rebirth often requires a very long time. I suspect Rosh has some connection to brain-worms. Also, Brother—” Jin Daike took a deep breath, eyes darkening. “We may very soon face a second war with the Zerg.”

 

A species they’d never understood.

 

A species viewed as impossible to reappear.

 

A species humanity once paid an enormous price to destroy.

 

Algiers made an immediate decision: “Summon the other faction leaders immediately. Daike, hurry back and organize the data. This matter can’t be delayed at all!”

 

Lian Yao nodded, face cold and solemn, and strode out quickly.

 

Jin Daike: “Alright, coming back now.”

 

They had no time for grief. This was perhaps the greatest crisis humanity would face in hundreds of years. All personal emotions could be temporarily set aside before this crisis.

 

Political regime change was humanity’s internal affair, but the Zerg were external enemies, invaders. This wasn’t just Dawn’s matter—it was all of humanity’s.

 

Algiers: “Shou Bing, stay here. I’ll go find Elansno. He spent the most time by Emperor Rosh’s side—he might know something.”

 

Shou Bing glanced at the time: “Go and come back quickly. When people arrive, you’ll still need to take charge of the situation.”

 

“I know.”

 

Algiers nodded, expression grave, and strode out of the conference room.

 

Night fell deep. Wind and rain continued relentlessly, never ceasing.

 

**

 

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