The Legendary Mechanic

by <unknown>

  Darryl frowned and said, “That’s is completely not true. There’s more to this.”

  “I would like to hear what more there is then.”

  Han Xiao had no fear. His attitude made Darryl clench his teeth. For the family’s sake, they had to cut ties with the Germinal Organization very clearly. The war between the Six Nations and the Germinal Organization was about to break out, so if they were misunderstood, Alumera would be in a dire situation.

  Although Han Xiao had come alone, Darryl did not dare do anything to him. After all, he was Black Phantom; with his identity and strength, the fact that he was there might even have been an order from the Dark Net. If they killed him, the Dark Net would become their enemy, and it would prove the fact that they were working with the Germinal Organization.

  Most importantly, Black Phantom was unfathomable. The people in the headquarters had no confidence in killing him, and finding out if they could was not worth the risk.

  Therefore, at this point of time, Darryl could only endure the arrogance of Han Xiao. He stared at Xiao Jin with a fierce look; he felt this was all caused by Xiao Jin. Therefore, he spun his eyes and said loudly, “Okay, Leader Xiao, you shall tell him the details.”

  Xiao Jin looked at Darryl faintly. He turned his head and said, “Xiao Hai, tell him.”

  A handsome young man walked out from behind Xiao Jin, his expression rather vicious.

  Xiao Hai, the first and best son of Xiao Jin, partly in charge of the Xiao Faction.

  He was someone with actual political power, and Xiao Jin had raised him to take his place.

  “One year ago, I was guarding a convoy of supplies and was attacked midway. Han Xiao went missing. I have no clue what happened to him afterward,” Xiao Hai said coldly.

  This time, a leader from the Northern Faction said, “More details, please. Our guest doesn’t seem to believe it.”

  Xiao Hai let out a grunt and said, “The attackers came for me. Han Xiao is my brother, so I made him look like me and divided their attention as bait—only then I could escape successfully. I went back searching with more troops afterward, but we weren’t able to find him.”

  Han Xiao raised his eyebrows. “So, you let your little brother die for you. Was he willing to?”

  “What do you think?” Xiao Hai was already annoyed.

  The crowd chatted among themselves, eyes with all kinds of different emotions fixed upon Xiao Hai.

  “That is what happened,” Darryl said. “We can show you more evidence, and whether you believe it or not, we have no relationship with the Germinal Organization.”

  Han Xiao nodded. He had already received the information he needed—what happened to the original owner of this body and the attitude of his family toward him.

  When he mentioned the original owner of this body, the people in the Xiao faction treated it like it was a stranger. This was especially so for Xiao Hai, who did not show even a shred of remorse toward killing his own little brother, and Xiao Jin had no problem with that.

  In conclusion, the original owner of the body was not loved by anyone; everyone treated him like nothing.

  You had a pretty hard life, Han Xiao thought.

  The people in the hall suddenly realized something.

  What happened to controlling the situation?

  When did it become Black Phantom interrogating us?

  This is our territory—what about our dignity?

  Chapter 205. Assassination! |

  “You killed my foster son,” Xiao Jin suddenly said.

  “This is a private matter chieftain Xiao,” Han Xiao replied. “Let’s discuss it privately.”

  “Sure.” Xiao Jin nodded.

  The crowd’s eyes twinkled. Black Phantom’s reply to the same matter was completely different.

  Darryl showed unhappiness on his face but did not say anything.

  Han Xiao turned his head to look at Darryl and said, “It’s late. You don’t mind if I stay the night, right?”

  “Xiao Jin, take care of him, meeting dismissed.” Darryl stood up and walked out.

  The crowd walked pass Han Xiao with different expressions on their faces.

  A man walked up to Han Xiao, smiled, and said, “I’m Xiao Ming, a foster son of Leader Xiao. I will be taking care of you during your stay. Please follow me.”

  Han Xiao looked around and realized that Ummil, who had brought him here, was missing. The internal conflict in Alumera is really very severe.

  The tense atmosphere in the hall earlier on further proved his point.

  With such thoughts in his mind, Han Xiao walked out of the hall. Suddenly, a dozen or so players surrounded him with excitement on their faces. They were all from the Bamboo Rain guild. Bamboo Rain Xuan enabled the recording functions.

  “We want to learn abilities,” Bamboo Rain Fragrance said.

  Han Xiao surely would not miss out on an opportunity to earn some experience points, so he casually opened the ability interface.

  Xiao Ming, who was standing on the side, asked in surprise, “Do you know them?”

  Han Xiao shook his head.

  “Black Phantom seems to be very popular among the Inhumans.” The Alumera members who happened to pass by noticed this, and they were rather surprised.

  The Bamboo Rain Guild wanted to trigger missions, but Han Xiao did not make any other interactions. He walked away after stopping for a few seconds.

  “It’s an unexpected plotline, but there’s no mission.” Bamboo Rain Fly was confused.

  “Seems like my recording has nothing of interest,” Bamboo Rain Xuan said in frustration.

  …

  Xiao Ming arranged a room for Han Xiao. Although Han Xiao’s attitude in the morning had made many of the high ranked officials very angry, he did explain the source of his hostility. Therefore, the atmosphere was not all that tense.

  That night, Xiao Jin invited Han Xiao to his mansion with the purpose of discussing compensation.

  Upon arriving at the place, Han Xiao realized that Xiao Jin’s children were all gathered around, including Xiao Hai and other brothers and sisters. However, the foster kids were not there.

  Xiao Jin had the same expressionless face as he had in the day, unpredictable.

  Han Xiao was looking at Xiao Jin and his children, and these people were looking at him, too.

  “What compensation do you want.” Han Xiao looked at Xiao Jin and put on a smile that did not really look like a smile.

  “It’s his bad luck that he died.” Xiao Jin’s expression was cold. To him, foster children were just assistants and tools.

  “Then why did you invite me here?” Han Xiao raised an eyebrow.

  “There are no bad sides to getting to know a famous killer.”

  Han Xiao could not figure out Xiao Jin’s motive, maybe it was just to build a relationship, maybe there were other motives, anyway Han Xiao was interested in making more contact with the family of his original body owner so he could lure more information out of their mouth.

  They chatted casually, talking about all sorts of things. Xiao Hai and his siblings said a word or two once in a while, and the atmosphere was peaceful. Xiao Hai was the leader of the siblings; one could feel a sense of adoration when the siblings talked to him, but Xiao Hai did not react to it, as if that was the norm.

  One hour had passed without anyone’s notice. Han Xiao suddenly frowned and said, “I’m very interested in Han Xiao. Let’s talk more about him.”

  The atmosphere suddenly turned cold. Xiao Jin put the cup down and said slowly, “He’s my son. He has always been incompetent, but I didn’t think he would become wanted by the Germinal Organization.”

  “I thought he’s dead for sure,” Xiao Hai said. “No wonder they say scourges last for thousand years; he’s still bringing us trouble.”

  Han Xiao pointed at himself and said, “You mean I’m trouble?”

  Xiao Hai gave a cold laugh and said, “Are you not?”

  With a light cough, Xiao Jin said
, “It’s getting late,”

  “Indeed, it is.” Han Xiao stood up and left.

  Xiao Ming brought him back to his room. He passed a stack of documents to Han Xiao as he walked through the door. “This is Han Xiao’s information. Father had told me to give it to you.”

  Han Xiao nodded and accepted it.

  As soon as Han Xiao entered the room, he checked every corner of it thoroughly. There had been three monitoring devices before he left, and now there was one more. He shook his head and used a program to crack it once again. After he was done with that, only then did he start reading the documents, from which he gained a deeper understanding of the original owner of his body. He was basically a nobody, and he did not hear about any NPC called ‘Han Xiao’ in his previous life either.

  “Sigh.”

  Han Xiao shook his head. He had made contact with Alumera to know more about the original owner of his body, and he had already achieved that. Whether it was Alumera’s attitude or their internal problems, none of that mattered to him because it had nothing to do with him, and his so-called hostility was just a form of showing his strong stand.

  Alumera was already sucking it up and did not want to become his enemy, so Han Xiao would be stupid to kill their people in their headquarters. There was no benefit to creating another enemy for himself for no reason.

  Once Alumera knows I’m ‘Xiao Han’, I wonder how they will react.

  Han Xiao put the documents aside, lay on the bed, and closed his eyes. He planned to leave the next day.

  …

  At midnight in Darryl’s mansion…

  “It’s all because of that asshole Xiao Jin that Alumera has been sucked into this. That asshole has been building on his power with no worries at all. He’s obviously trying to seize power. However, the North Faction is my ally, and Se Qi’s Red Island Faction has always been neutral. What does he have to be up against me?” Darryl clenched his teeth.

  When Alumera was created, it had been peaceful internally, but when the size of the organization started to snowball, conflicts started to happen. As the master of the house, the Home Faction gained most benefits and were in the middle of the conflict. Although all the factions followed the orders on the surface, they all had the ambitions to take over and seize power.

  Luckily, after all these long years of partnership, they were all connected to each other deeply, so none of them dared do anything too over the line. A murder was nearly impossible to happen. Even if there was one, it was planned in secret.

  Xiao Jin posed the largest threat, and Darryl was the one who secretly planned the attack on Xiao Hai, which sadly failed. They had only managed to kill Han Xiao, who did not matter at all.

  Who would have thought that after one year, the Han Xiao who nobody cared about would become a wanted person with an outrageous reward from the Germinal Organization and bring the family such a horrifying enemy?

  Thinking back now, Darryl was filled with regret.

  At this time, Darryl’s son, Lagos, walked in and said, “Father, Black Phantom has left Xiao Jin’s mansion. The meeting lasted for one hour and thirty-seven minutes.”

  “Xiao Jin is becoming more unbridled. Now he even dares meet Black Phantom privately without my consent.” Darryl was enraged.

  “What do we do, just let Black Phantom leave?”

  “Don’t mess with him.”

  “But he dared to be this arrogant in our territory.” Lagos was unconvinced.

  “I said don’t mess with him!” Darryl slammed the table in a rage and shouted, “Get out!”

  Lagos clenched his teeth and closed the door after he walked out. The moment he turned his head, his expression turned vicious.

  …

  As the sky started to brighten, loud noises woke Han Xiao up, who was in a light sleep.

  He jumped out of the bed and looked outside through the window. Alumera members were yelling and rushing somewhere.

  “What happened?” Han Xiao asked in confusion.

  Footsteps closed in rapidly, and dozens of soldiers surrounded the room with guns.

  “Black Phantom, don’t move!” one of the captains shouted.

  These soldiers’ mission was to control him. They were all in a state of nervousness that could pull the trigger wrongly anytime. Han Xiao saw the people outside running in another direction.

  Seems like something has happened, but it’s not about me. Han Xiao squinted his eyes and watched things unfold.

  Not long after, the captain seemed like he had received an order. He yelled, “Come with us!”

  Han Xiao wanted to know what had happened, too, so he followed the nervous soldiers. To his surprise, they went to Darryl’s mansion.

  It was already extremely crowded; the high-ranking officials from all the factions had come. They were looking furiously at Han Xiao, and the latter was rather confused.

  Han Xiao only discovered what had happened after he walked into the mansion.

  In the office, Darryl sat on the chair with his head facing up, a bloody blue hole on his left eye, penetrating through the back of his head. The blood on the wooden floor had already coagulated, and the metallic smell of blood filled the room. The dead body’s hands hung from the shoulders, and the legs pushed against the table, holding him on his chair.

  The leader of Alumera had been assassinated!

  “Cause of death: gunshot. The bullet entered through the eye into the brain, penetrating and leaving through the back of his head. He would have died on the spot. From the size of the bullet hole, the killer used a high caliber handgun, and the leader did not show any sign of resistance. There are no clues at the scene that showed any signs of the killer ever being here.”

  Han Xiao suddenly understood why the others were looking at him that way.

  Darryl died in the night, and being the killer who came without invitation, he was the most suspicious. Also, the killer used a high caliber handgun, and the assassination-style was phantom-like.

  There were too many coincidences.

  He was being framed!

  Han Xiao blinked. He took out a cigarette from the pocket, lighted it up, and inhaled deeply, blowing out a smoke ring in the face of the surrounding nervous soldiers.

  “Now this is interesting.”

  Chapter 206. The Real Killer (One) |

  The soldiers surrounded the place securely. The high ranked officials had different expressions, the home faction was furious, Xiao Jin’s faction was frowning with confusion on their faces, Red Island Faction lead by Se Qi and the Northern Faction all had surprise on their faces, they couldn’t believe it.

  “Get him!” Lagos’s face was twisted.

  Xiao Jin frowned and stopped him, “there’s more to this, Black Phantom visited us in bright daylight, there’s no need for him to do such thing.”

  “What if that’s exactly what he made us think!” One of the chieftains of the Northern Faction said.

  “Then why did he have to visit us, it’s more discreet to assassinate him.” Xiao Jin said.

  “Our guarding power is strong, he wanted to get in!” Someone said.

  “He’s the killer, and you still want to find excuses for him?!” Lagos was emotional, he took out his gun and pointed at Han Xiao, Se Qi who stood on his side hurriedly stopped him.”

  “Calm down, there’s no motive for Black Phantom to do this—”

  “Motive?!” Lagos was enraged, he stared at Xiao Jin, clenched his teeth and said, “is there no motive?”

  Xiao Jin frowned and said, “you’re overthinking.”

  The Northern Faction and the Home Faction agreed they should first control Black Phantom who was the most suspicious, then get on to find more clues. Se Qi felt Black Phantom was too dangerous, and suggested to question Han Xiao on the spot, but was interrupted by Lagos who believed they couldn’t trust anything Black Phantom says, they were unable to come to an agreement.

  The soldiers surrounded Han Xiao, many strong presences in the dark were
locking their attention on him, and the high ranked officials also had their attention on Han Xiao even as they were discussing, they were ready to engage the moment Han Xiao does anything suspicious.

  Han Xiao thought to himself, “the result of framing me to take responsibility for the assassination is a conflict between Alumera and the Dark Net, only the third party will benefit from it. Could this be the goal of the people behind all this? If I start a killing spree, it would also fall right into his trap, it was planned for me to be in such a situation where my actions are very restricted.”

  Han Xiao could kill his way out anytime, he didn’t care about making Alumera angry, but if he did it, it would be falling into the trap of the people behind this, as escaping would mean he admitted he was the killer, and killing someone creates hatred, he also could not just let them capture him. It seemed like the plan made by the person behind this had worked.

  “I’ve only been here for one day, and they could make the assassination look like I did it, there has to be someone who’s an expert in assassination that has been here for a long time, and my arrival had given them the opportunity.”

  Unless they could find the real killer, no matter how many things showed that Han Xiao had no motive to do it, he would still be the most suspicious person without any solid evidence that proves otherwise. After all, no one can truly know someone else unless they can read their mind, logical assumptions could not be taken as evidence.

  “Wait, evidence—” Han Xiao had a flash of insight, it hasn’t been long since Delo was assassinated, the crime scene was not checked thoroughly yet, the killer might have left some clues.

  This time, the discussion between the high ranked officials had come to an end, Lagos yelled, “Black Phantom, disarm yourself and surrender!”

  Xiao Jin added, “if you didn’t do it, we will investigate clearly.”

  Han Xiao smiled, “you know that’s impossible, how about you guys disarm yourselves?”

  Both parties couldn’t trust each other, there was no way they would take the risk of disarming themselves, it was a problem that had no solution. However, Han Xiao had a thought, “there’s no point of continuing this argument, I can stay temporarily, and you can send people to monitor me 24/7, I will wait till you find the truth.” He said.