Star Rank Hunter

Chapter 352: Impersonator

Flanders set his course exactly as Shi Huajing’s navigation map plotted because they were heading to Sector A, the place where the political power of the entire galaxy was concentrated. GAL was pretty unstable right now, so the political organizations residing there made sure to dial up their personal protection to eleven. It wasn’t weak in the first place, but now it was as airtight as it could be.

It was the same reason why Shi Huajing had sent his men to receive them. Without an escort, the group wouldn’t be able to take a step in Sector A without being watched, hailed, scanned, and ID-ed by the patrols again, and again, and again. As if that wasn’t bad enough, one misstep was all it took to be labeled a terrorist because the sector was practicing a policy that was best described as, “kill a hundred innocents if it meant catching one who is guilty.”

Long story short, they might have been able to loiter around certain places in Flander’s spaceplane before the chaos, but to do that now was just asking for trouble. That was why they boarded their escort’s starship upon reaching their initial destination.

Jiu Xun attracted most of the escorts’ attention because the old man stood out, and because they thought that Cillin, Czedow and Shusag were Flanders’ “bodyguards”. A while after they boarded the starship, someone contacted Cillin and passed him Shi Huajing’s message.

“The fourth young master said that he’s about done with the preparation,” the man said. What it meant was that Shi Huajing had found a way into Sector C for Cillin, so Cillin could save the energy for something else. Indirectly, it also confirmed that Shi Huajing had laid his hands on the military.

In hindsight, it wasn’t surprising that Shi Huajing would have the courage and skill to pull off such a feat at all. He could not have become the respected “fourth young master” in just a couple of years otherwise.

The reason Shi Huajing hadn’t just called Cillin’s communicator directly was because it was unsafe, and because the signal was bad. The electromagnetic interference at this particular section of space was stronger than normal due to stellar activity, so Shi Huajing had a messenger carry his message and a video regarding a certain person instead.

Sward was a lieutenant colonel serving under the Fifth Army. There were a lot of ranked officers in the army as a matter of course, but Sward wasn’t an ordinary man. More specifically, he used to be imprisoned in Sector S for the killing of innocent civilians and even his own comrade-in-arms.

Normally, the repercussions for the killing of civilians weren’t too bad if they were caused by the military. The higher-ups certainly couldn’t be bothered to even look at them most of the time. However, it was a different story when the death toll reached a certain level, and the murderer himself didn’t even bother to hide them. Sward was one such person.

Sward was described to be aloof, arrogant, cold-blooded, tyrannical, and bloodthirsty and more. He was a mass murderer with a string of massacres—not kills, but massacres—under his belt, and his last massacre had a death toll of over ten thousand. They were all civilians, and he didn’t stop until he was fully satisfied even after the local government had stepped out to stop him.

The lieutenant colonel was eventually thrown into a jail cell for his crimes, but the chaos happened, and the GAL army splintered into eight great armies just a couple of years after his imprisonment. As a result, Sector S was dismantled, and many of its prisoners including Sward were absorbed into various forces. For a time, he was able to return to his killing ways and fought many battles for the army.

Sward was now dead, however. Cillin didn’t know how Shi Huajing had managed to kill the lieutenant colonel, only that Sward must be connected to the place he was going. He also guessed that Shi Huajing hadn’t killed Sward out of altruistic reasons. Most likely the lieutenant colonel had crossed the young master in some way, so he had the former quietly removed from this plane of existence. If Cillin didn’t happen to be heading to Sector C at this time, no one—at least no one who wasn’t involved from the start—would even know that he had died. In the unlikely case where someone discovered the Sward’s assassination, Shi Huajing already made sure that it couldn’t be linked to him no matter what. After all, he was the current representative of the Shi Family, and it wasn’t wise to butt heads with the military right now. Of course, the fact he threw this caution to the wind before Cillin showed how much he trusted him.

It was clear that Shi Huajing had made many plans to infiltrate the military long before Cillin had made the request. Sward was but the tip of the iceberg.

Back to the present. The video was a compilation of Sward’s behavior. He was a silent man who exuded a chilling aura. It was so dominant that it seemed to seep out of the recording itself and into reality. His eyes were pits of little emotions, and they remained mostly the same even when he was butchering some poor sap. The act of murder barely left any impression in him at all.

“So? Do you think you can do it?” Cillin looked at Shusag after the video was over.

Cillin understood why Shi Huajing had shown them this video. He wanted one of them to impersonate Sward, and in Cillion’s opinion Shusag was the best suited of them all. Shusag was a former soldier, so he possessed that unique aura that seemed to surround every person who ever served in the military before, especially when he dons a military outfit. Not only that, his stature was almost identical to Sward’s, and he had enough control over his body that he could contort himself a bit to smoothen the last bits of discrepancies. Even if that wasn’t the case, Cillin had a million ways to make him look like Sward. It was that unique aura that was the main problem.

Shusag stared at the icy blade of a human being on the display for a bit before removing his hand from his chin. Then, he let out a chuckle and said, “Of course!”

The second he said the words, his presence abruptly underwent a drastic change. His normal flippancy transformed into cruelty, and a cold, invisible barrier that seemed to reject everything caused the messenger’s mouth to fall open in shock.

To be honest, there were a ton of people who possessed the skill to act out Sward’s cruelty, loftliness, and that grim expression that seemed to prelude a snowstorm. Not everyone could emulate that aura that only a serviceman possessed, however.

It felt like staring at a straight javelin. His stance was exactly identical, his eyes spoke of indifference and gloominess, a cold shadow seemed to loom over his person, and when he slowly swept his gaze across the room—it so happened that the Sward in the video was doing the same thing—their eyes, movement, and aura felt perfectly identical.

For an instant, the messenger forgot that Shusag’s face and outfit were nothing like the lieutenant colonel’s. He felt as if the monster who threw all notions of rules and discipline out of his head when he became sank in bloodlust, and would attack even his teammates was standing right in front of him. His eyes twitched, and his back felt as cold as ice. It was only when the cold sensation of metal pricked against his skin that the messenger realized that he was about to draw his gun.

Obviously, the real Sward was dead some time ago. In fact, the messenger himself had taken part in the assassination. It was why he remembered the man all too well, and why he doubted that the fourth young master’s plan when he heard about it the first time. Was there really anyone in this galaxy who could emulate the man’s qualities? Now, he knew the answer. He couldn’t say exactly how successful Shusag was in impersonating Sward, but for an instant, he certainly felt like the latter had returned to life.

Speaking of which, Sward became even gloomier than he normally was after he was plucked out of prison, so Shusag definitely had his job cut out for him. Also, he seemed to have a natural talent for acting. At any rate, Cillin was very satisfied with the results.

The messenger let out a cough to cover up his earlier overreaction. Only then he continued going over the finer details with Cillin. Meanwhile, Shusag had turned back into an unreliable middle-aged man, grabbed an apple, and lay back down on a chair. It was almost enough to convince those who were present that he wasn’t the guy who caused the room temperature to drop sharply a minute ago. Almost.

After they entered a less disruptive space, Cillin finally managed to get in contact with Shi Huajing.

“So? Can it work?” Shi Huajing asked. He needed to know if Cillin had someone who could impersonate Sward. The closer the resemblance, the less chance they would be exposed during the operation, and the higher their success rate would become.

The messenger described to him what had happened earlier, and Shusag put on a show again just for Shi Huajing. It was so good that the fourth young master couldn’t stop clicking his tongue in wonder. “Where on earth did you find such a talent, Cillin?”

Cillin simply smiled and refrained from answering. It wasn’t that he didn’t trust Shi Huajing, but Shusag’s origin absolutely had to remain hidden for now. Catching on the hint, Shi Huajing moved on to discuss the next steps of the plan. Originally, he had planned for Cillin to act as Sward. Since Shusag proved himself to be the better impersonator though, he would have to alter the plan slightly.

“It’s not actually hard to infiltrate Sector C. There’s a recent intel I received that may be of use to you.” Shi Huajing explained, “Some time ago, there was a clash between the Fifth Army and the First Army. The First Army unfortunately suffered some casualties in that battle, but it also gave me the opportunity to assassinate Sward. Anyway, the target location has a strict inspection policy. Only captives and escorts are allowed to enter.”

“Sward is one of the escorts?” Cillin confirmed.

“That’s right. Sward has done this twice already, and I’m pretty sure his service will be required again. Not everyone can witness what was done to those captive soldiers and not bat an eye after all.”

Cillin nodded. He now had a good grasp of Shi Huajing’s plan.

“There is another problem though.” Shi Huajing continued, “Shusag is an excellent impersonator, and I have some of his ID documents in my hands. However, the base you’re infiltrating has even stricter inspection policies than the ones outside. They’ll scan his RNA, DNA, gene activity, antibodies and more to verify his identity. Obviously, even if Sward himself undergoes the scan, the results are going to be slightly different each time. A human’s body is everchanging after all.”

In fact, if the scan showed the exact same results as the previous scan, the person would be detained on the spot because it could only mean that someone had stolen the scan records. It was the biggest problem Shi Huajing was facing right now.

Cillin mulled over the possibilities for a moment before looking at Czedow. After Czedow gave him a nod, he looked back at Shi Huajing and answered, “It’s okay. We can deal with it.”