IMAO Chapter 136

After leaving the control room, they gathered the captured people found in the rooms in the lower cabin of the spaceship.

Besides Qiu Jingming and Aries, there were six others held captive on this ship. Like the others, these six had their memories wiped. As the only one whose memories remained intact, Aries acted like a guardian to a group of children, taking care of them.

Jiang Yuan glanced at these people and let out an almost inaudible sigh. He quickly stepped forward to examine everyone’s physical condition. The situation wasn’t bad. Apart from the memory loss, most people were in good health.

Just as Jiang Yuan opened the cabin door, a black object flew toward the ship’s entrance!

A bomb.

Jiang Yuan instinctively dodged to the side.

“BOOM!”

With a violent explosion, a huge hole was blasted in the ship, accompanied by billowing smoke!

Fortunately, the others were positioned further back and weren’t caught in the blast.

It’s Berkeley’s people!

Their reinforcements had arrived!

While they were fighting on the ship, more people had reached the private port.

Jiang Yuan peered through a gap and saw that the people outside brought armored vehicles with huge armor-piercing missile launchers mounted on top. These people intended to blast the entire ship to pieces, to blow them all to bits!

“BOOM—”

“BOOM—”

Continuous bombardment!

The whole ship shook violently under the bomb strikes!

…

Amidst the rolling black smoke and massive explosions, Merlin curled his toes nervously in front of the TV.

Damn the Berkeley family! How lawless could they be! Using heavy weapons to directly bombard the ship! It was obvious they were trying to destroy all evidence!

Although YUAN and RONG were powerful, even they couldn’t possibly withstand attacks from heavy weapons!

The screen shook violently, making it impossible to see what was happening. All that could be heard were thunderous booms and the enormous crashes of colliding metal.

…

Ken watched the nearly-destroyed ship through narrowed eyes, cold and detached. Even though this ship was his personal property, he felt no pain at its destruction. Right now, he only wanted those two livestreamers dead!

He would kill them by any means necessary!

He was suddenly berated by the main family in the middle of the night, which was how he learned something had happened at his private port. He rushed here to handle it, and the main family even threatened that if he couldn’t kill these two, they wouldn’t care what happened to him.

Ridiculous, it wasn’t even his decision to cooperate with those people.

Whatever, none of that matters now. As long as everyone here dies, leaving no witnesses, the family would certainly be able to suppress this incident. After some time passes, everything would be fine.

With a force of five hundred men and heavy artillery, they should be able to take these people down.

Ken Berkeley’s thoughts were interrupted when he froze.

Out of nowhere, a mecha appeared. Its speed was unbelievable. As it charged forward at high speed, it drew a mechanical blade from its back, thrusting it forward like a sharp sword!

“BOOM—”
“BOOM—”
“BOOM—”

Staring at the rolling black smoke, Ken stood rigid, unable to believe his eyes as he watched the mecha that suddenly appeared and destroyed all their heavy weapons. A question rose in his mind: where did this mecha come from?

But in the next second, his confusion vanished, replaced by terror!

Because the mecha suddenly turned to look at him—

Run!

Without thinking, he turned to flee, but he stopped in his tracks a moment later when he saw a blonde man standing in the distance. Ken stared at him in disbelief.

“Basil?!”

“Basil, quick! Quick! Use your mecha to fight it!”

Watching the panicked man running toward him, Basil’s lips curved into a contemptuous smile. He waved his hand, and men on both sides quickly seized the man.

“Basil, what is the meaning of this?”

Basil looked at Ken with cold eyes and said, “Arresting criminals, of course.”

“Do you know what you’re saying?!” Ken couldn’t believe his ears. Even though the Ripper Basil was backed by the great noble house of Gallop like himself, even the Gallops wouldn’t dare to directly arrest someone from House Berkeley!

“Of course I do, you filthy human trafficker.” Basil sneered.

“How dare you treat me like this?!”

Basil stepped forward and landed a solid punch to Ken’s stomach. As Ken’s body doubled over, Basil lowered his voice and whispered in Ken’s ear, “Why wouldn’t I dare? Starting today, House Berkeley will be removed from Rick’s nobility.”

Ken forgot about the pain and stared at Basil in horror, but Basil didn’t spare him another glance.

No, impossible. They were one of Rick’s great noble houses. They couldn’t be stripped of their status!

This guy must be lying!

Basil looked at the towering mecha before him, his feelings complicated.

He had been patrolling the border between Rick and the Federation with the Shadow Hunter Legion when he suddenly received orders to rush to Longluo Star and ensure the Iron-Blooded Emperor’s son remained unharmed.

Even though he was an abdicated emperor who had abolished the imperial system, His Majesty was still as domineering as ever. He actually threatened them, saying he would blow up Rick’s capital star if anything happened to his son!

Now the three great families had agreed that no matter the cost, House Berkeley must be stripped of their status. From now on, the four great houses would become three.

It wasn’t just because of Horace’s threat. They also had to answer to Rick’s citizens about this matter. If they didn’t deal with House Berkeley, they would be abandoned by the people just like the former Rick royal family!

After seeing Basil had the situation under control, Ji Rong opened the mecha cockpit and climbed down. Jiang Yuan and the others also descended from the spaceship.

Seeing Ji Rong and Jiang Yuan gave Basil a headache. He realized nothing good ever happened when he met these two kids!

As Ji Rong left the cockpit, the livestream view switched from inside the mecha to normal.

…

The audience watching the stream let out a collective sigh of relief seeing everyone safe.

Those who were confused at first went online and finally understood what was going on with the sudden appearance of the mecha.

This year’s Interstellar Mecha Competition prize was a space key, and clearly Ji Rong had a mecha stored in his!

But that wasn’t the main point. The focus was that Rick’s military had arrived. What would their stance be on this matter?

Just as everyone was speculating, a handsome blonde man appeared on screen.

“Thank you very much for helping Rick catch this trash!”

After expressing his gratitude, Basil carefully examined everyone, privately pondering which of these trembling rabbits could be Horace’s son. None of them looked like it. He couldn’t help but ask, “Are these all the kidnapped children?”

Jiang Yuan glanced at Basil and nodded, “Yes.”

“Only these?” Basil inquired.

“We only found this many people on the ship,” Jiang Yuan replied calmly.

Basil was silent for a few seconds before asking Jiang Yuan, “Your livestream is still running, right? May I appear on camera?”

Jiang Yuan nodded, “Of course.”

With permission granted, Basil took a deep breath and addressed the livestream, “Greetings, citizens of all interstellar nations. The Rick Empire deeply apologizes for failing to discover this human trafficking organization. We promise to severely punish everyone involved! Even nobles cannot escape legal punishment! We promise to give a satisfactory resolution to the victims, Rick’s citizens, and everyone across the galaxy who lost family members because of this!”

After speaking, Basil turned to Jiang Yuan and Ji Rong, “You can turn this off now. Rick will make things right.”

…

Then he quickly walked to Qiu Jingming and the others. After giving them a noble’s greeting, he apologetically said, “I’m very sorry we didn’t discover these guys’ actions sooner, causing you such fear and worry. Rest assured, we will definitely punish everyone involved! We promise to give you a satisfactory resolution!”

Basil’s attitude could be described as extremely friendly, forming a huge contrast with his notorious reputation for brutality.

Aries, the only one who hadn’t had their memories erased, naturally knew who Basil was. After all, there weren’t many handsome and famous Alphas in the galaxy. Faced with Basil’s spring breeze-like smile, only four words could describe their feelings – overwhelmed by such favor[mfn]受宠若惊 (shòu chǒng ruò jīng) – overwhelmed by favor from superior (humble expr.)[/mfn].

Jiang Yuan looked at Basil in confusion. Although he knew Basil’s arrest of their attackers must be related to Horace, why was this guy being so… kind to the rescued people? Everyone knew he was no saint, otherwise he wouldn’t have earned the nickname “the Ripper” from all interstellar nations after the five-year war between Rick and the Federation.

After talking with Aries and learning that seven people had their memories erased, one being Jiang Yuan’s brother, Basil finally understood why Jiang Yuan and Ji Rong were here. But he still couldn’t help trying to figure out which of the remaining six was Horace’s son.

With no other choice, Basil had to take everyone with him and treat them all like precious ancestors.

…

Dawn was just breaking.

A small jump ship landed at the Longluo Spaceport.

By now the livestream had ended, but the entire galaxy was in an uproar.

[Let’s discuss human trafficking in light of this livestream-]

OP: Everyone must have watched the livestream, and those who haven’t have caught up by now!

OP: I’m a reporter who has been following missing persons cases for years. Actually, with advanced technology, missing person cases have become very rare since blood type, fingerprints, and retinal scans can identify someone. But why are there still so many people who vanish without a trace? This brings us to certain small nations in the galaxy. These countries facilitate human trafficking by forging legal IDs for trafficked people, so they won’t be flagged as missing persons when scanned by machines!

…

“Holy crap, reading OP’s post is terrifying. Can’t believe there are countries helping behind the scenes…”

“With enough money, anything’s possible. Most of those small countries are controlled by capital with no moral bottom line. Why else do you think North Mali had a revolutionary war?”

“You can’t imagine how dark this industry is. They’re truly ruthless. I had a friend who went looking for their missing relative and ended up disappearing too!”

“This is horrifying! But how did Yuan and Rong know about this trafficking operation? And why did they raid it to rescue people?”

——

In the Longluo Government Hall.

A man around forty was scolding two young people, who kept their heads down obediently as they were reprimanded.

Basil couldn’t help but find the scene amusing. Every time he met Jiang Yuan and Ji Rong, it was unlucky for him. The first time was their failed ship hijacking, when their attempt to threaten Xu Yue backfired and they had to flee in embarrassment. The second time was at the Interstellar Mecha Competition, where these two made his team break a record… for losing a match in record time. And the third time was today.

Watching these two troublemakers getting scolded finally improved his mood a bit.

“You two are too reckless! While I was trying to contact home to resolve this officially, you went ahead and stormed in?!” Jiang Tianze pointed at Jiang Yuan’s face, trembling with anger.

“We didn’t storm in… we didn’t kill anyone,” Ji Rong said in a tiny voice.

“What did you say?!” Jiang Tianze glared at Ji Rong, who immediately shut up and acted docile!

Only when Ji Rong fell silent did Jiang Tianze continue scolding Jiang Yuan with satisfaction. As he was speaking, someone suddenly tapped him. Jiang Tianze turned around ready to flare up, but upon seeing who it was, he immediately suppressed his anger and said gently instead, “What’s wrong, Jingming? Are you feeling unwell?”

“Dad… don’t scold brother…”

Jiang Tianze looked back at Jiang Yuan, then at Qiu Jingming, hesitated for two seconds, and patted Qiu Jingming’s head. “Alright, alright, Dad won’t scold your brother anymore! How are you feeling? Tell me if anything’s wrong!”

“I’m not feeling uncomfortable,” the boy shook his head.

Basil felt a bit disappointed when Jiang Tianze stopped scolding the two, but just then his communicator pinged.

“General, he’s here!”

Basil stood up and adjusted his uniform. He was finally going to meet the legendary Emperor.

As footsteps approached, a man with unbelievably handsome features appeared at the entrance.

As the man strode into the hall, Basil was about to go greet him and lead him to the six amnesiac victims, but the man walked right past him toward the people behind him.

Horace had been watching the livestream on his way here. Although he already knew both children were safe and sound, he couldn’t fully relax until he saw them in person.

Upon seeing them, Horace patted both their shoulders before speaking to them.

Basil, who had been preparing to greet him, was stunned. He turned to the Rick soldiers who came with Horace and asked, “Where’s the Emperor of Hoyt?”

“Isn’t he right there?” The soldier was confused by Basil’s question but still pointed at Horace, who was talking with Jiang Tianze.

Basil: ???

Basil stepped forward to join the conversation and said to Horace, “Sir, hello…”

Basil knew Horace had abdicated, so after some consideration, he chose to address him as “Sir.”

“Hm?” Horace was slightly displeased that someone interrupted his conversation with his in-law, but still gave Basil a brief response, “Is there something, General?”

“Aren’t you here to find your son?” Basil asked, not forgetting to glance at the group of six with amnesia.

“Isn’t he right here?” Horace pointed at Ji Rong.

Basil: ???

Basil wasn’t feeling quite right. Confused but still maintaining a relatively friendly tone, he asked, “This child… I remember he’s from the Federation… He represented the Federation in this year’s mecha competition.”

Horace: “Is being from the Federation and being my son mutually exclusive?”

Basil: “No… not at all…”

Not exclusive.

Not exclusive my foot!

This doesn’t make any scientific sense at all!!!

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