novelDark General
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Translator: Sean88888 Editor: Elkassar1
Because this huge base was basically a city which had very valuable real estate, the buildings were densely packed. Even the air space was packed with various structures and aerial platforms. The spacecraft looked exceptionally nimble as it navigated through the aerial structures.
The spacecraft was like a combination of a frog and a dragonfly. Sometimes, it stretched out two long legs from underneath the fuselage to perch on the edges of those aerial structures, then bounced around like a frog to avoid the obstacles in its path. Other times, when there was more open space, it would fly with the help of propellers. It had a very creative design.
With a final jump, the spacecraft landed directly over the connecting passage Sheyan was about to enter. The sealed door on top of the passage opened. First, six fully-armed military policemen jumped down and pointed their guns, which had very futuristic designs, at Sheyan to prevent him from causing any trouble.
Then, a person in a set of black uniform embroidered with the rank of Major General stepped in front of the crowd.
Major Ryckley's trembled violently all over when he saw the figure. He stared at the Major General in front of him like he had seen a ghost. He desperately spoke into the communicator in a trembling voice.
"Anbar, didn't you say the one who's coming is the Colonel on duty? How did it turn out to be the Dark General?
There was no reply. Evidently, Anbar, who was originally at the other end, had cut off the communication, as if the Dark General was a ghost or a deadly plague. The Dark General actually looked pretty young. He had a fair face and brilliant blonde hair. He looked a little like Leonardo DiCaprio in Titanic, exuding enthusiasm and positivity.
He first asked the military policemen to put down the guns pointing at Sheyan, then asked in a serious tone, "What happened here?"
Sheyan shrugged. Using a regretful tone of voice, he answered, "I'm a contestant from the past, General, and I was sent here to perform a certain mission. I arrived in this space base less than 30 minutes ago. When the Major inspected me, he asked me to take off my pants, spread my legs and stick my butt out."
"I'm pretty sure this isn't the mission I was asked to come here for. As far as I know, my mission has nothing to do with turning gay. Therefore, I rejected his request, and we had some unpleasant disagreement afterwards. That was pretty much what happened."
The Dark General nodded."Sounds like you've been treated unfairly, but that's just your side of the story."
Sheyan smiled and said, "I don't mind finding a lawyer to defend my innocence, nor do I mind if I have to swear upon the Bible. In order to maintain the dignity of the law, I can even wait for a court session. But if I do that, I'll miss the deadline stated in the conscription order. For us contestants, that'll cause a great deal of trouble; it may even be a matter of life and death."
"The court's not the only way to find out the truth. As for being late, you can rest assured that won't happen... Because that investigation and sampling mission of yours this time is a bit complicated. You guys will need some detailed briefing sessions and some simple training in advance. I'm actually a part of the team that's responsible for training you lot. In fact, I'm the one responsible for checking if any of you are late."
At that moment, a group of fully armed soldiers rushed out of the corridor on the other side, but when they saw the Dark General there, they stopped in obvious hesitation. A Colonel came forward to take a closer look. After confirming that the person there was indeed the Dark General, the group of soldiers turned around and simply left....
Sheyan stopped talking. He folded his arms in front of his chest and waited for the Dark General to make his next move. He was eager to see how the General would turn into Sherlock Holmes and find out the truth.
Soon, he realised how foolish that thought was. A military police officer turned on his communicator and shouted, "Calling the Logistics Department, calling the Logistics Department! Show us the holographic recording of exit A-18 for the last half an hour immediately. You have 30 seconds. Authorized by: C51! OVER."
Not even five seconds later, several probes fell down from the ceiling. They pointed right at the entrance and showed a holographic projection depicting the incident between Sheyan and Major Ryckley, as well as his two underlings.
It was not just a simple holographic projection. The scene was replayed by complete holographic 3D human models that vividly mimicked their expression and every little movement in their body at the time. As for the sound, it was probably recorded beforehand; it was now being played in tandem.
The Dark General looked at everything with a deadpan expression, right until the moment Sheyan punched the Major and the glow of the nightmare imprint on his chest turned into the form of a fist. That made the General raise his eyebrows.
"Strength specialty? You're pretty strong. It's quite rare for one with this specialty to become an official Lieutenant Colonel of the Empire in the Growth Hunter stage."
A thought hit Sheyan. He pretended to be surprised as he asked, "Isn't our data given to you by the Nightmare Realm?"
The Dark General gave Sheyan a look and replied, "I don't know. Maybe my rank is not high enough to get this kind of information."
While the two were having the conversation, the holographic projection came to an end.
The Dark General turned to Major Ryckley, who was half dead on the ground, and asked flatly, "Do you have anything to say for yourself, Major?"
Major Ryckley trembled violently. He did not say a single word. Two of the military police officers that arrived with the Dark General went up to him and dragged him away like a sack. At this time, the Dark General smiled at Sheyan and extended his hand. His smile exuded the feeling of a warm spring.
"You have not violated any laws of the Empire, and personally, I think what you did was the right thing. Please put aside these unpleasant things, Lieutenant Colonel, and welcome to Alps Base 7. I'm Major General Fiji."
Sheyan grabbed the hand the Major General offered.
"Nice to meet you, sir."
***
Inside the private spacecraft of Major General Fiji, Sheyan started to get to know this gigantic base.
Generally speaking, the style of the construction here was not very different from that of his era. It was similar to the scene in the central district of a big city — dense high-rise buildings, platforms which strived to develop the space in the air, and the building layout which only tried to be as compact as possible while completely ignoring the problem of getting enough sunlight. In addition, through the transparent glass walls of the giant passageways, he could see that the streets were so crowded that the people looked like ants. It was probably a bustling city that never slept.
The biggest difference it had with the modern cities in his era was that, because the base was directly in contact with outer space, the high-rise buildings were all attached to the base surface with a very advanced curtain wall, and were also coated with a layer of substance which had a metallic lustre which looked like stainless steel. It exuded dignity and a sense of oppression.
The roads were not coated with concrete nor tar, and no cars could be seen on them. Besides the 10-meter wide pedestrian sidewalks on either side of a road, the whole road was covered with metal conveyor belts. The width of each metal conveyor belt was about 3 meters, and their speed was clearly marked on them.
The metal conveyor belt closest to the sidewalk had a speed of two kilometers per hour, which could be considered to be quite slow, but the conveyor belt next to it had a speed of twenty kilometers per hour. The central conveyor belt was moving at a speed of sixty kilometers per hour.
The humans could easily step onto the two-kilometers-per-hour conveyor belt from the sidewalk. There were multiple dents shaped like pairs of footprints on the conveyor belts for the people to step into. After stepping into the footprint-shaped dent, if they needed to go back to the sidewalk, they only needed to stamp hard on the footprint closer to the sidewalk, and they would be sent back to the sidewalk.
If they needed to move to a faster conveyor belt, ie. the one with a speed of 20 kilometers per hour, they only needed to stamp hard on the footprint closer to the fast lane. The machinery under their feet would smoothly deliver them to the conveyor belt they wanted to go to. Sheyan could only sigh in admiration at the ingenious idea and the exquisite technology on display.
It's was hard to believe that any traffic jam would occur with this design, but what Sheyan saw when he entered the base - mainly at the first and second ring roads around the base - fully illustrated the fact that large-scale traffic jams still occurred here, and very often at that. From this, he could tell that the population in this base must have reached a number which was beyond his imagination.
***
While he was admiring the scene from the future world, the spacecraft approached the center of the base. This zone was in stark contrast to the surrounding areas where high-rise buildings competed to occupy as much space as possible.
A magnificent pyramid stood in the center of the base. Its length and width were both about three kilometers. The pyramid was surrounded by transparent glass walls. At its foot were forests, gardens, flowing water and other recreational places.
'It seems like the social hierarchy of humans in the future has actually become more stringent, ' thought Sheyan silently, 'This must be the residence of the upper class. '
Major General FiJi misunderstood Sheyan's fascination. He smiled and told Sheyan, "Does this pyramid feel strange? Most of the contestants who come here show pretty much the same reaction. Contestants from the Middle East of Old Earth will get excited and say that it's pretty cool, while the rest of the contestants simply believe that the upper regimes of the Empire must be controlled by the descendants of the ancient Egyptians. However, that's not the case."
(TL: This is bonus chapter #7 for January. )
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