Chapter 5: 5

 

Chapter 5: Shen Lu, Who Wasn’t Breathing, Sat Motionless and Dormant, With a Stiff Expression That Felt Strange and Cold.


“Captain——? Captain Yan? Have you returned from your morning run?”

The sound of knocking on the door of the room next door woke Yan Chenli up. When he opened his eyes, it was just dawn, and bright rays of light filled the room. Yan Chenli only just noticed the handmade wooden frames by the side of the window, which had a few green plants in them. The bright emerald green made the small room seem even warmer than it was during the night.

The flip-clock on the headboard flipped to 7:00AM with a clatter. Yan Chenli crawled out from the brown bedsheets, tidied up the chest buttons of his shirt, and opened the door, then leaned on the doorframe with a groggy expression, “I’m here.”

“Oh.” Qin Ke turned to look at him, then looked back at the number of the door in front of him, confirming again that he hadn’t gotten the wrong door, “That’s… Shen Lu’s room?”

“I was going to help tidy up things so we can return them to his family when we contact them.” Yan Chenli lifted a hand to his collar, which had been turned upside down while he was asleep, “What’s the matter?”

“…that’s right. Oh.” Qin Ke sighed, then walked over to him, “Mr. Chuan wants you to go over.”

Yan Chenli turned his head to look at him, “Is it urgent?”

“No. Mr. Chuan said you could go when you had time.” Qin Ke had already walked next to Yan Chenli, and when he saw how the inside of the room was arranged from outside the door, he let out a slightly surprised gasp, “He even had a desk? And he kept flowers? Wow… I would’ve never been able to tell he was such a homebody.” After that, Qin Ke couldn’t help but sigh sadly, “It’s such a shame.”

Yan Chenli slightly lowered his eyes, “Yeah.”

“If only he could have stayed.” Qin Ke spoke again.

Yan Chenli nodded lightly: “I think so, too.”


There was still some time left before the usual morning meeting, so Yan Chenli sent Qin Ke away and returned to his own room to freshen up and change clothes. A few minutes later, he carried a large box and went to the first-floor office with the ‘Administration’ sign on the door.

A man wearing a black suit sat inside the bright and spacious office. He was a middle-aged man with an imposing look and a grave expression. He was surrounded by screens with densely-packed data and tables, and was just clattering away on the keyboard as he typed. His gaze was very oppressive, making people involuntarily want to run when he stared at them, but Yan Chenli had long since gotten used to it, so he put the large box in his hands down on the low table in front of the sofa:

“Jin Sen, help me send this back to the Technical Department of the Yinjiang Criminal Investigation Bureau to make a ballistic curve analysis. And this one.” He pulled out a small plastic bag from the inner pocket of his suit, which contained a lump of metal which had been completely deformed by impact. There was a handwritten serial number and label on the plastic bag, indicating that it was a bullet.

Jin Sen put down his work and got up to open the box, there was a pile of almost ten sniper rifles sealed in bags inside it. He looked at Yan Chenli, “Is this the kind of thing you need to come here in person for?”

Yan Chenli paused a little, and spoke in a low voice, “I’m worried about handing it over to someone in yesterday’s operation team.”

Jin Sen’s originally stern gaze became even gloomier, “You don’t suspect it was someone in the operation team?”

Yan Chenli forced a smile and shook his head, “Let’s wait until the results come out to talk about it. If there’s no progress at all, then maybe it really was bad luck.”

Jin Sen swept his gaze over the bullet and frowned, “It’s so badly damaged, I reckon it won’t be easy to determine. What about the bullet inside Shen Lu’s body?”

“Good question, but we don’t have any forensic doctors right now. Once they heard it was in Augustus, all the volunteers ran off and vanished.” Yan Chenli laughed helplessly, “In short, I first had Rest freeze Shen Lu’s body in the hopes that we can get a forensic doctor to take over the autopsy soon. Oh, right, there’s also this,” He once again took out another evidence bag, “Send it to the trace inspection as well.”

In contrast, the contents of this bag were somewhat puzzling to Jin Sen. Inside were a few pieces of torn scraps, which seemed to be made of a black cardboard material. The places where the paper was split revealed a snow-white inner layer, but most of it was dirtied with dust. There were also some fingernail-sized pieces of what looked like red plastic.

When Jin Sen heard that Yan Chenli had stayed alone at the scene until very late, he was worried it might have been because the operation he commanded lead to an Adjudicator’s sacrifice, so he was blaming himself too much and hiding his depression. But now it seemed that he was searching through the scene by himself.

Jin Sen raised his head and looked at him curiously, “Why this?”

“There’s no why, it’s just intuition.” Yan Chenli downplayed his answer, then took the two evidence bags and put them into the box, closing it.

“You always say relying on intuition to handle a case is a big no-no.” Jin Sen lowered his voice, and fixedly stared at him, “You don’t look too well, have you rested these days?”

“All in all, I haven’t slept for three days, and yesterday I just slept for a few hours. Ah, I really am Superman. Doesn’t matter, I can handle it.” Yan Chenli smiled and waved his hand, then went out the door.


When he left the administration, Yan Chenli went to the large building to look for Chuan Beixiang. Chuan Beixiang was the nominal President of the Tribunal, and the person in charge of this peacekeeping operation in Augustus, but he was only in charge of the technical aspects of the job, and would not participate in the planning or implementation of the operation itself. Chuan Beixiang’s work area was in another building shared by the Technical Department and the Logistics Department. The inside was dark and heavy, completely sealed off with no windows, and one could hear the humming and rumbling of various servers and other instruments as soon as they came in, and the air conditioning blew so strongly it made people shiver.

Yan Chenli found Chuan Beixiang inside the lab. It was also dark inside, with impressively huge and imposing instruments lined up in rows, cables of different thicknesses crawling over the floor and climbing the walls like vines, and screens with scrolling values emitting a faint blue light. The room was filled with all sorts of chemicals and disinfectants, whose pungent smell assailed the nose, and there was a giant, can-like apparatus inside of which could be seen the faint silhouette of a human body.

From time to time, a deep and low roar could be heard in the dark abyss, along with the heavy clang of metal.


Yan Chenli looked for the sound and found it’s source. It was a well-built, tall man with ash-grey hair and a metal muzzle on his mouth like the ones used on animals. The man was firmly tied to a mechanical chair by countless unyielding metal bindings, madly yelling and trying to break free, his strength so astonishing faint cracks had already emerged in the solid metal joints. He seemed to be about to break free.

The thin figure of Chuan Beixiang, who was wearing a thin white gown, stood indifferently in front of the instrument panel next to the mechanical chair.

The screen showed the voltage had already reached 2400 volts. Chuan Beixiang pressed a switch, the electric current in the machine crackled, and the man immediately let out a wretched howl. The man’s head drooped in exhaustion, and he twitched for a while, momentarily losing consciousness for a short time before coming to again and beginning to struggle once more.

Chuan Beixiang made a note in his notebook, and raised the current to 3000 volts.


Yan Chenli knocked lightly on the table, producing a faint thumping sound, “Beixiang, were you looking for me?”

Chuan Beixiang raised his head and slowly turned his face, “Yes, good morning, Mr. Yan.” He was a very young and very thin man, with fine, silky black hair hanging over the side of his shoulders and a teardrop mole on the corner of his left eye. His thin build and indifferent expression gave him an air somewhere between gloomy and refined, and his face looked so young it didn’t fit his status.

Different from Yan Chenli’s intimate form of address, Chuan Beixiang’s tone was estranged, without any emotional fluctuation, even seeming a little mechanical. He stopped the experiment and put the Executioner in front of him back in the hibernation cabin. Chuan Beixiang turned around, and seeing Yan Chenli looking down at the voltmeter, explained: “I’m adding a new security device in order to prevent Executioners from losing control. It’s not easy to hold them down and inject tranquillisers when they start going crazy.”

Yan Chenli didn’t make any comments, nodding and asking, “What did you want with me?”

“Is Rest still easy to use?” Chuan Beixiang asked.


Rest was Yan Chenli’s current main Executioner, and aside from the very first test machines, Rest was the first finished product of the Executioner Project, serial number 002. Yan Chenli’s highest record was commanding twenty Executioners at the same time, but normally only three were on duty, and Rest was basically always there.

Yan Chenli nodded, “He’s very good. He follows orders better than I expected, and his mental state is also pretty good, plus, he has far better fighting skills than the average Executioner.” When he got to this point, Yan Chenli shook his head and laughed, “It’s not surprising, after all, during his life he was a fanatical criminal that killed 86 people in one night with a fruit knife.”

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Chuan Beixiang asked again: “Mr. Yan, do you plan on changing Executioner?”

“Didn’t you say so? That changing who you wake up too frequently will increase the mental pressure and raise the risk.” Yan Chenli turned his head and looked at him.

“It’s like this. There’s a donor who expressed a wish to be under your command when signing the donation agreement.” Chuan Beixiang turned around and waked away, and Yan Chenli followed behind him, “Although the wishes of those captured are not important, since this was a donor’s last wish, I will try my best to take it into account. This might be beneficial in stabilising the body’s mental state.”

Chuan Beixiang identified the number and stopped in front of an instrument filled with orange liquid.

The huge hibernation cabin was almost as tall as he was when standing, filled with dashboards and metal tubes, with a heavy metal mechanical chair in the centre. A man sat dormant with his eyes closed on the mechanical chair, with metal straps firmly binding his limbs and body. Pure black, gel-like clothes wrapped snugly around the curves of his strong muscles, and some cold metal bones were exposed on his neck and wrists. He had short brown hair, the outline of his face was cold and straight, and the mental pressure numbers on his collar flashed steadily.

Yan Chenli recognised the person inside at a glance, he felt his breath hitch, and his pupils shrink.


It was Shen Lu.

Shen Lu, who wasn’t breathing, sat motionless and dormant, with a stiff expression that felt strange and cold.


“Mr. Shen was one of the first people to sign a donation agreement, so I prepared his body in advance. The harvesting of his consciousness also went very smoothly, so it was accomplished very quickly.” Chen Beixiang continued speaking.

Yan Chenli stood a little closer, lifting his hand and pressing it against the glass wall of the hibernation cabin, but he only felt a chill under his palm that was so cold it hurt. His voice was hoarse as he asked, “How long ago?”

Chuan Beixiang’s calm voice came from behind him, “His first day on Augustus.”

“………”

Yan Chenli took a deep breath and closed his eyes as he rubbed the space between his eyebrows. After that, he shifted his gaze to the place on the hibernation cabin that displayed the body’s attributes, where there were flashing lines of glowing text:

[Executioner: 101 - Unnamed.

Current Pressure: 17.

Current State: Absolutely Stable.]


Chuan Beixiang spoke again: “101’s simulation tests were in good condition, so it can be started up straight away. If Mr. Yan is interested, give it a name so we can officially wake it up.”

Executioners were human-shaped weapons, and their external appearance was very similar to that of humans. In order to differentiate them as much as possible, and to avoid Adjudicator’s from treating them as similar and any unnecessary psychological burdens, Executioner’s names were generally neutral nouns with a bit of an industrial character. For example, Level, Vernier, or Wrench. Names like Rest were already considered as the artistic ones1 among their peers.

But Yan Chenli thought about it, and he really didn’t want to use names like “Ratchet” or “Screwdriver” to call Shen Lu.


“Can I use his original name?” Yan Chenli asked.

“……” Chuan Beixiang turned his head to look at him, and calmly said, “Shen Lu is already dead, Mr. Yan. Although they look very similar on the outside, Mr. Shen and 101 are not the same person. I don’t think I need to emphasise this point for you.”

Yan Chenli didn’t reply, he just asked again, “Can I?”

“I suggest you had better not.” Chuan Beixiang’s tone was cold, “The original name will activate the memories of the Executioner’s life and remind them about their death, it will likely wear down the body’s computational power and cause unnecessary mental strain. There’s never been a precedent for this in the Executioner Project.”

“That would also depend on his state during life and the degree of the death stress disorder, right? If his death doesn’t create too much strain…”

Yan Chenli’s words paused.


He thought about Shen Lu’s death, he had been abandoned, sacrificed, Shen Lu’s thoughts would forever be frozen on that day when he was killed by Yan Chenli’s own hands.

From now onwards, in the endless future, Executioner Shen Lu would ceaselessly repeat the process of his death during hibernation.

What reason would he have to not resent me?


“Let’s try it.” Yan Chenli spoke quietly, “Ask for his own opinion.”


Yan Chenli lifted his hand to the activation area on the transparent glass cover, and a circle of flashing lights and lettered code immediately lit up around his palm.

[Chief Adjudicator - Yan Chenli, Approved.]

As the system’s announcement began to play, the orange solution quickly drained, and the two glass doors of the cabin opened up to the sides. A blast of icy-cold air shot outwards, and the icy air evenly condensed into a cold fog, sinking down into the air, rolling past Yan Chenli’s knees and ankles.

Once the cabin doors were completely opened, next came the real wake-up segment. Yan Chenli lifted his hand and pressed down on the Executioner’s collar, using force to tighten it against that familiar ice-cold temperature in an action that looked like he was trying to choke him to death.

A halo of green light flashed around the collar like a sound wave, and 101 opened his eyes with a ticking sound. His amber eyes looked like a liquid crystal screen as a serial number and the system name and status ID flashed past them, after that, the figure of the person who woke him up, Yan Chenli, appeared before his eyes.


[Executioner: 101 - Unnamed. Current Pressure: 17. Current Status: Absolutely Stable. Latching onto awakener… Latching successful. Initiating duties.]


101 frowned slightly, seeming like he was coming to, and his machine-like, stiff expression turned gentle. He changed to a look Yan Chenli was familiar with, and opened his mouth, “Captain.”


As soon as he uttered that title, Yan Chenli felt like he was about to fall.

 

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1 The Executioner’s name is specifically a musical notation rest, 休止符 xiūzhǐfú, which sounds a lot nicer than any of the examples given. Top.


TN: The next chapter is a slight timeskip + change in protagonist POV (who we haven’t met yet). Don’t worry, Lulu and Captain Yan will be back, but they’ll be taking a little bit of a back seat for now.

TN2: SZQ just dropped a bunch of gorgeous art on their weibo for lots of the characters (and even some we haven’t met in the raws, gasp). There are also individual posts for most of them, so I’ll be linking to those when the character is introduced in the story in case anyone wants to avoid spoilers. Relevant character images below:
 

Here’s Shen Lu + Yan Chenli, then and now.

 

Shen Lu looking very handsome

 

And Smiling Yan Chenli

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