Lucian didn’t harbor any ill will toward the girl known as Crownslayer.
Beneath the mask and the hostility, she was quite pretty, sharing a striking shade of red hair with Exusiai.
She possessed a foul mouth and a biting, sarcastic edge, but beneath that abrasive exterior lay a surprising core of reason—and an unmistakable soft spot for children.
Sure, she was ruthless.
She had tried to slide a blade into his back without a second thought.
But considering she ran with the Reunion Movement, that kind of lethal pragmatism was hardly surprising.
Terra was not a gentle world.
Every passing minute, Infected were dragged into the mud, dying tragic, meaningless deaths.
To push back against that suffocating, irrational prejudice, violence wasn’t just an option; it was a grim necessity.
Lucian didn’t view Reunion’s existence as inherently wrong.
In a climate this toxic, if Reunion didn’t exist, some other radical faction—a ‘Lively Movement’or a’Fusion Movement’—would inevitably claw its way out of the ashes.
He just had absolutely no intention of getting dragged into their messy crusade.
He could afford to see the cute, vulnerable side beneath Crownslayer’s violent facade for one simple reason: she posed absolutely zero threat to him.
Even when she had pressed cold steel against his throat in that shadowed alley, it had registered as little more than a tickle.
She couldn’t have broken his skin if she tried.
Because of that absolute disparity in power, Lucian could remain perfectly calm, analyzing her and her subordinates from a detached, objective distance.
Once you stripped away the heavy, bloodstained labels of ‘terrorist’and’extremist’, Crownslayer and her knife-wielding lackeys were just a group of young people.
They weren’t all that different from him.
They had their own lives, their own fragile ideals, and they bore the heavy scars of past tragedies.
The mere fact that they possessed the sheer willpower to stand up and fight back, rather than abandoning all hope and waiting for death, was commendable.
The only point up for debate was their reliance on indiscriminate violence.
But that wasn’t something an outsider had the right to judge.
Lucian was just a bystander who occasionally skimmed the morning news over a cup of tea.
He didn’t know the actual situation in Chernobog, where Reunion was currently tearing the city apart, nor did he care about the internal politics of the Ursus Empire.
He certainly didn’t think he was God.
Even back in Laterano, he had been nothing more than a sheltered Holy Son, a gilded figurehead kept safely behind pristine white walls.
It simply wasn’t his time to lead a third of the stars in a grand rebellion against his father.
So, carrying the faint, lingering scent of smoke and cold iron from his intimate little standoff with Miss Crownslayer, Lucian didn’t head straight back to the shop.
He pulled out his terminal, shooting a quick text to Exusiai and the others to let them know he’d be burning the midnight oil, and then casually killed a few hours wandering the neon-lit streets.
Only when the digital clock on his screen ticked past midnight did he finally stretch his limbs, rising from a dilapidated, abandoned sofa in a dark alleyway.
He walked up to the rusted roller shutter of a closed shop in the Slums and knocked a specific rhythm against the metal.
Without waiting for a response from the shadows inside, Lucian spoke to the empty air.
“I want to see Lin.” A short while later, Lucian found himself standing inside a remarkably ordinary apartment building deep within the Slums.
There were thousands of these decaying concrete blocks in the outer ring, stacked precariously together like discarded mahjong tiles.
Any outsider foolish enough to wander in would be hopelessly lost within minutes.
But the person residing in this particular room was no ordinary individual.
Sitting quietly in the unpretentious, dimly lit space was an elderly man.
Much like Wei Yenwu, the Chief Executive of Lungmen, this old man possessed incredibly prominent animal traits.
His head and limbs belonged to a Zalak—a rat—proving that the ancient bloodline running through his veins was exceptionally thick.
For once, Lucian lowered his head, offering a deep, formal bow.
“I am very sorry to disturb you so late at night, Lin.
Thank you for agreeing to see me.” “No worries, no worries.
But Lucian…” The old man, sporting long white eyebrows and a matching white beard, looked the picture of a kind grandfather.
Yet, he shook his head, putting on a deeply exaggerated expression of sorrow.
“I understand.
You made a fortune over at Penguin Logistics, your tea business is booming, your life is comfortable, and you’re getting along famously with that girl from the Guard Department.
You wander into the Slums all the time, but you never visit my home.
It’s rare enough for you to come see this old man, and when you do, you still call me ‘Sir’.
You don’t even have the respect to call me Lao Lin!” Lucian’s face contorted into a visible cringe.
“Lao Lin…
Did you watch a Siracusan mob movie recently?
Also, please just call me Lucian.” The Rat King immediately burst into a hearty, echoing laugh.
“Yes!
I went to the cinema with my daughter just the other day to watch it.
Those Siracusan gangsters are quite an interesting bunch.” Old Lin, known to the underworld by heavy, blood-soaked titles like the Rat King and Gray Lin, was the undisputed ruler of Lungmen’s Slums.
The overt king who stood in the light was Wei Yenwu, while the hidden king who ruled the shadows was this gray rat.
In truth, as a ruthless commercial hub driven by capital and profit, Lungmen had no logical need for a place like the Slums.
Those who couldn’t keep up with the city’s brutal pace were meant to be eliminated.
Expelling the weak directly into the wasteland was, objectively speaking, the most efficient and cold-blooded approach.
The only reason the glittering, prosperous city center and the sprawling, decaying Slums could coexist was entirely due to this old man’s lifelong efforts.
Lucian didn’t know the exact details of the agreements Old Wei and Old Lin had struck behind closed doors, nor did he fully understand the depths of their complex relationship.
But whatever the terms, they maintained a razor-thin, delicate balance, ensuring Lungmen’s continued prosperity by strictly staying out of each other’s territory.
The Slums essentially served as Lungmen’s massive buffer zone.
Sitting on the absolute outermost edge of the city, it absorbed the impact of both overt external threats and covert internal power struggles, mitigating the damage before it could reach the wealthy inner districts.
But the grand political chess games of important figures had nothing to do with Lucian.
To him, Old Lin was just a benevolent, slightly dramatic grandpa who had treated him exceptionally well.
When Lucian first arrived in Lungmen, a stranger with nothing to his name, he had only managed to gain a foothold in the Slums thanks to Old Lin’s quiet protection.
That made the Rat King an elder to whom Lucian owed a genuine debt of gratitude.
Because of that, Lucian always maintained the utmost respect in his presence.
Seizing the brief lull in the conversation to exchange pleasantries, he asked, “Is Miss Yuxia doing well?
I heard she’s managing several shops now, and that business is thriving.” Old Lin’s rat-like face scrunched up, his wrinkles deepening into a scowl.
“What ‘Miss’?
Is ‘Miss’ what you call her?
Call her Little Yuxia!
You’re perfectly fine getting cozy with that yellow-haired kitten from the Lungmen Guard Department, so why are you acting so distant with my Yuxia?!” Lucian awkwardly wrapped both hands around his warm teacup, staring down at the rippling surface of the water.
“…Please let me consider it.” Yuxia was Old Lin’s precious, beloved daughter—Lin Yuxia.
Incidentally, the “yellow-haired kitten” Old Lin had just grumbled about was none other than Swire.
Lin Yuxia and Swire were childhood sweethearts of the exact same age, having attended the same classes all the way through high school.
Although their relationship had grown somewhat complicated and distant in recent years, they still occasionally kept in touch.
One was the wealthy, pampered daughter of a massive capitalist empire, and the other was the underworld princess of Lungmen’s Rat King.
By all logic, they should have been irreconcilable enemies.
But back when they were young, Lin Yuxia and Swire had been inseparable, sharing everything from their meals to their living quarters, even going so far as to share pairs of stockings.
Naturally, Lucian had never actively asked about such private, girlish gossip.
Old Lin was simply in the habit of rattling off these embarrassing childhood stories whenever Lucian visited, forcing him to listen whether he wanted to or not.
Lucian was very familiar with Swire, and by extension, he was very familiar with Lin Yuxia.
But whether the Rat King’s daughter was actually willing to be familiar with him was an entirely different matter.
She didn’t appear to be home tonight, which wasn’t surprising.
It was perfectly common for teenage girls her age to go through a rebellious phase and distance themselves from their fathers.
Lucian had only asked about her out of basic politeness and genuine concern.
Old Lin, however, had a completely different agenda.
The old man took a slow sip of his hot tea, tapping his sharp, claw-like fingernails against the wooden table a few times in a rhythmic, calculating beat.
“I say, Lucian.
My Yuxia is getting on in years, and it’s simply not right for a young girl to be out and about managing the streets all the time.
Back when she was a student, you brushed me off by saying she was still too young.
But she’s all grown up now…
So, when are you two having kids?” “Having what?!” Lucian slammed his teacup down onto the table with a heavy thud, his voice cracking with absolute shock, his entire laid-back demeanor shattering in an instant.
[Rhodes’s Note: Enjoying the operation so far, Doctor?
(This daily grind literally pays the landship’s rent!
to use the links!)