Star Rank Hunter
chapter-128

Chapter 128: The Man Who Sits On The Cross

When the first ray of light sprinkled onto this ruined land, the dust dancing in the air had already settled down. The only thing that continued to drift above the ruins was the lingering smell of gunpowder, flesh and blood.

Inside the great hall, the four energy shields slowly thinned and faded away.

It was time. According to Cillin, they could now walk out of the building and need not reload a new power source after the energy shields had faded away. Moreover, before they knew it, there was no longer a single Poison Fang member to be seen in the entire great hall.

It was one thing to think, and another to act. Neither Emmus nor Wa Qing were unable to take the first step.

They were both veterans. The lingering smell in the air had grown even more distinct after the energy shields had died down, seemingly narrating a story about a distant fear and despair hidden within a dark night.

Emmus and Wa Qing watched their surroundings warily. Emmus was primed to toss out an energy shield at any moment.

One minute passed.

Two minutes passed.

...

Five minutes later, Wa Qing inhaled deeply and took the first step.

Seeing that Wa Qing had made the first move, Emmus followed suit as well.

Both men walked with careful steps. Every monitoring equipment in the area had stopped working, and Emmus could not acquire any images from them. A couple of long dead corpses belonging to Poison Fang lay scattered across the great hall, although their numbers did not extend over ten people.

If he were to trust on his hearing alone, Emmus could confirm that there was no one around them. The man activated his scanners, and it also indicated that there was no other living person nearby except for the two of them.

Emmus knew very well how many Poison Fang members were stationed on this planet. That was why he was afraid to believe the reality before him.

No matter how you looked at it, the great hall was a part of the heart of the base, right? Even if thirty or fifty thousand people was a little stretching it, there should still be at least ten thousand people here, right? But in reality, the scanner did not pick up even a single living body. At best, there were only the occasional worms hopping past them.

Both Emmus and Wa Qing held an indescribable fear towards the worms. Perhaps it was because the ‘surprise’ Cillin left them earlier was too great, but when they saw some worms hopping by they instinctively tried to escape from them. However, the worms seemed to be uninterested in them, which was why the duo finally relaxed after the realisation.

The relief did not last long before a hole suddenly burst out of a dead man’s chest. The clear sound of breaking bones caused Emmus and Wa Qing to adjust their sights towards that direction immediately. They did not even bother wiping off the cold sweat pouring down from their foreheads as they stared straight at the spot where the sound had come from.

It was then the duo saw a worm slightly bigger than the one they saw earlier jumping out of the corpse’s open chest. After glancing at them once, the worm swiftly hopped out of their line of sight.

Neither Emmus nor Wa Qing missed the instant the worm had gathered itself to attack them. However, it stopped itself at the last second and glanced at them once before finally leaving.

It was only then the duo was able to connect this occurrence with the events that had happened earlier.

Fear, was not instantaneous destruction. It was to take step after step towards a death that was akin to torture. It was to know what horrors awaited you at the front, but could not avoid it.

Cillin had carried with him these roots of fear to this planet, and Poison Fang was neither able to escape fear, nor death itself.

The duo was silent for a few minutes. Finally, Emmus said, “Let’s go to the cross field to take a look. There was a large scale battle there earlier.”

They had heard of the commotion even when they were hiding inside the great hall. Wa Qing wasn’t able to contact Cillin, so he did not object to Emmus’ suggestion.

They might have mentally prepared themselves on the inside, but it was still difficult to calm down when they saw the actual scene.

It was like an offering; an offering that was padded with flesh and blood and supported with the fire of war. Broken limbs and wreckages were everywhere. There was not a single even place to be found even though the cross field was massive.

Once, this was the bloody execution ground where Poison Fang punished the sinners and made amusement for themselves. Now, it was just a land of ruins. Fifty thousand people were buried at this place, but they were unable to find a single intact corpse at all. In fact, some of the corpses were eaten so cleanly that only the bones were left.

What happened here?! This was Poison Fang! Sector V’s infamous organisation of lunatics!

The duo stood at the edge of the cross field and watched the man at the center of the ruins. Their eyes were tangled with mixed emotions.

A lens popped out of Emmus’ left eye mod. Through this lens, he was able to see clear the situation inside the cross field and record it at the same time.

There was a vertical cross about five meters tall at the center of the cross fields, and the bottom of the cross were piled with many Poison Fang emblems. Emmus did not know exactly how many emblems there were, but if they were here, then it meant that every one of its owners were dead.

A skeleton lay on top of the pile of emblems. It did not like like the skeleton of an average human, and it even had two rows of enhanced bones at its torso area.

Above the cross, Cillin sat there leisurely, holding a book in his hand and reading it at a slow pace. A gray cat was crouching on top of his shoulders with narrowed eyes looking very comfortable.

Cillin’s voice was neither quick nor slow, but it felt like a pleasant, clear wind that swept through the ruins and the scarlet desert, causing one’s fretful heart to calm down for some mysterious reason.

Emmus did not understand the language he was using, but the translator had translated the text directly for him.

It was the standard Sector language of Sector X.

“...

Criminals at their deathbeds listening to the honest cries of their heart

Nestling down in the universe

Amidst the ridiculously beautiful stars

Wind and rain usher in a new era

Of Birds from paradise

Passing through the human world...

”

Cillin took no notice of Emmus and Wa Qing, and continued to read at his leisure. Light slowly rose from behind his back, drawing long shadows of a man, a cat, an emblem pile and a cross.

There was a saying in GAL that fifty years makes up the achievements of an entire generation. It was now almost fifty years since the glory brought about by the previous generation. Was it time for the next generation to rise already?

Emmus smiled. His undercover mission in Poison Fang had come to an end, and if there were no further surprises, then the prime of his life would soon arrive after he returned to the army. Therefore, in this coming dawn, just how many would become the pioneers of this new age?

Regardless, Emmus was thankful that he would live in this new age at his prime. Even if he could not become a pioneer himself, he would still be able to witness this new age’s glory.

In comparison to the Six B Squadron’s commander Shawton, and the other B Squadron commanders of Vanguard, Emmus believed that Vanguard Sixth B Squadron’s Cillin was the one who was qualified to be listed in the Hunters’ List!

The Hunters’ List was a list created specifically aiming at Hunters, and only senior level personnel within the army were qualified to learn about the names listed on it.

Every person listed in the Hunters’ List would be given special treatment by the military, even more so than how they treated the Skull King Carranio. Exactly how this preferential treatment would be, Emmus wasn’t sure. But he thought that he might find out very soon.

By now, Cillin had finished reading the poem, and closed the book. However, he did not jump down from the cross.

“You’ve arrived.”

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Translator’s Notes:

Since this is going to be long, I’m putting it at the bottom of the chapter.

First of all, we would like to thank all of you for your continued support. Now we have a couple of announcement we would like to make.

The first bit of good is that we are dropping the novel going to do 5 regular chapters a week instead of 3 starting this June. We have been planning this for quite a while, but every time we try to execute the plan, real life hits us with a bat and we delay. Therefore, we decided to make the announcement now so that we no longer have a chance to run away, after all nothing fights better than a cornered beast (welp!).

The second bit of good news is that we will revamp our Patreon rewards, and starting June our Cannon fodder class (5$) will get access to a chapter earlier at the end of every week. Our Sentry Class (10$) will always be one chapter ahead the posted translation. Finally the GAL Army class (20$), will have access to our private stash, where all edited and unedited chapters will available for reading.

The third and final good news is that from chapter 150 and onward, the author had his chapters VIPed (behind paywall). When he did that, he doubled or tripled the amount of words of many of his chapters. Therefore, once we reach those extra-long chapters, we will have to cut some chapters into 2 or even 3 parts. So for those who love SRH and do not wish for it to end too soon, don’t worry, it’s not. Not for a long while.

And that’s about it. Both my editor and I suck at composing endings, so we will do the usual and hereby thank you all wholeheartedly for your endless support of SRH!