Chapter 100: Fred
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Fred’s appearance panicked Brent. Ye Chong showed ignorance to this elderly’s debut however, as he raised his fist, "Wait a moment, Ye!" Mu stopped him with a scream. The rationale behind this pause from him was apparently to avoid further contradiction from brewing since they had already gotten full control of the situation.
Brent seemed very alarmed, as deep inside he feared his uncle being wounded by this beast.
Fred who had seen ample of dark sides of the world was pretty calm surprisingly, "I was not expecting you to take such trickery in response to my rejection upon your request. And I guess you used the same way to invite my old friend Zuo Moucheng over your place, didn’t you?" Anger was embedded within his words while Brent’s eyes were also coated with rage as he glared upon Ye Chong.
"I don’t understand what the heck you are saying." Ye Chong was bewildered, his voice went somberly, "But you guys better be acting on my will."
"Hmph!" the elderly sneered. "Save the silly acting skills! We are already the fish in your net and this time the organization must be serving compliments to your plate I supposed. And at this rate someday you’ll enjoy being one killer-whale bounded by the organization as you killed the insignificant others. You might be great, but you still are preposterous and pathetic!"
"My request…" Ignoring the elderly’s words, Ye Chong spoke on, "Change the direction."
"Oh? Change the course you mean?" The mock on Fred’s face intensified, "Very well then, to where we change the course, mister?"
"Uh!" Ye Chong did not see that question coming, "Um… Anywhere you want!"
"Anywhere… I want?" His eyes enlarged as he turned speechless while Brent’s face went dazed as well. "Wait…" Fred reformed his understanding to the situation, "Mister, are not you from those men?"
"I seriously do not have any idea what you guys are saying!" Ye Chong was annoyed by how these men were acting so confusingly and why they could not just act on his orders already, "You seriously better be changing the course right now." He wondered if he should demonstrate his threatening tactic taught by Shang to make the men move.
"Alright, alright, alright. We are changing the course!" Fred looked joyful as he nodded his head, he stayed quiet for a moment as if pondering and then he enquired, "How about Morienste?"
"Morienste? Is it far from Blue Ocean planet?" asked Ye Chong.
"Very!" replied Fred.
"Good. Morienste it is," stated Ye Chong while both Fred and Brent looked at each other, sighing in relief. They appeared much relaxed by then.
"Is there anything going on in Blue Ocean?" Brent asked after staying silent for long enough, obviously liberated from his fear and fright as soon as he identified Ye Chong as not the "men" mentioned by his uncle. They were in much comfort as Fred even poured Ye Chong a glass of wine, of the colour amber and he gestured him to have a drink. Brent collapsed onto the sofa and started bandaging his wounds.
Ye Chong did not know what to answer to keep the ball rolling, he just mentioned whatever he had heard, "Oh… They said some kind of virus was discovered. Charl… Charles-II was it?"
"Charles-II?" Fred was wondering if the boy made a mistake, then he realized something, "Charles-V? Charles-V you mean!" Fred’s glass fell off from his hand as he was horrified, while Brent held his hands and watched in dismay. "Black Charles?" Fred began mumbling for quite sometime. After literally half a minute, he collected his thoughts as his shaking hands slid into his pocket for a communicator.
Brent was so startled by his uncle acting so gracelessly. In his impression of his uncle, he had always been an untroubled great man no matter what horrible things had happened despite being an odd-tempered elderly, which was a virtue he wanted to learn from his uncle.
Fred inhaled heavily as he tried calming down. He connected the communicator to Captain Hatik’s room.
"Yes, Fred the Great sir, how may I help you?"
And that was what happened next chapters ago…
…
Since the course had been changed and the major dispute between both parties had been resolved. The atmosphere had turned much lighter. Other than that kick on Brent, there was nothing dissatisfying. Brent was not the kind who would mind a kick, while Ye Chong did not have any specific request in mind. Fred on the other hand was rather intrigued by the mech behind Ye Chong as he watched his nephew chatting with Ye Chong.
"My name is Brent. That’s my uncle Fred. I wonder how should I address a fine man like you?" Introduced Brent with a gentle smile, trying to break the ice while Fred, his uncle was circling around Mu with his eyes lustered as he touched the body and mumbled occasionally, then he would ponder, strangely he acted upon the mech.
"Kun Ting," Ye Chong replied flatly as he came up with a random name. Well he was still pretty close to Blue Ocean planet, the place of his plagued fate. He would not want to be recognized by someone right away.
"Great name. Great name. You have such amazing dexterity. Both your speed and strength are the best among the people I had fought before. There were a lot of well-known fighters who shared inferiority to your capability," complimented Brent sincerely.
"It was nothing," Ye Chong was not acting out of humbleness. It was simply because he had seen Mu in action before and he knew his skills were nothing in comparison.
Well, Brent took the line as a humble act though. He smiled briefly.
They grew friendly on each other so quickly that Ye Chong did not sense the urge to hijack the ship while Brent seemed to have forgotten the fact that he and his uncle were the hijacked.
The chatter mostly consisted of Brent’s patient description on the world as he realized that somehow this young man who was only a few years younger than him knew nothing about the chaos and darkness in the world - untainted like a plain paper. Even though a kind man like him was agitated by Ye Chong's animal nature at times, he showed tolerance and love as he imagined the suffering this poor young man had gone through when he was a boy.
They dueled on fists and kicks as their afterimages overlapped each other, which twisted the airflow inside the room to and fro with the sounds of fighting resounded. Such kind of combat was experienced daily by both of them, with most of them being Ye Chong’s victory during the first few days. However, Brent’s tenacity grew stronger in a few days time as he lasted longer on Ye Chong’s fists. The number of times he made a successful strike-back increased and those were some smart strike-backs too, which left Ye Chong clumsily reacting in place. On the other hand, Ye Chong attempted to copy Brent’s fighting style. Though he succeeded in mirroring his moves, something felt amiss within. Compared to the original, his moves felt different. Well that did not bother Ye Chong for long because he was not the kind to be stuck with such trivial detail. While most of his moves were learned from mutated lifeforms, he took a few useful ones for continuous practices. As time lapsed with much reference he made on moves, his attack turned acute and it became that Brent was tasting the bitter side of the fight instead! Brent the helpless man could only boggle his mind to figure out some tricks to turn the situation around at his best. Their skills improved dramatically as they trained on.
"Kun Ting…" Brent gently advised, "You might have exceptional speed and strength but your skills were too crude for a fighter. You would inevitably suffer if you met an expert."
Ye Chong understood Brent’s words deep down, however he was powerless in this aspect as he lacked an appropriate teacher to this. Not even Mu could be his teacher, as long as Mu trained him, it never seemed to show significant refinement. Mu tried researching about it but said that he could not find a thing addressing to such issue in most of the major data banks and literally the whole virtual network.
The fighters were conservative regarding inheritance of skills. They had always been keeping it only to their apprentices that not anyone from the outside could receive them. Thus there was no way that these fighters would put their secret techniques online for education purposes. Even if one became the apprentice of these fighters, one might have absorbed a different aspect of the technique as one’s teacher demonstrated.
Seeing how hard Ye Chong trained, Brent considered something in his mind. Since Kun Ting was willing to suffer tenaciously for what it took to be a great fighter and he turned out to be quite a simple person after days of interaction, he might be a good material to be trained. Kun Ting might have had some odd behaviors but that was because he was not aware of the social norms. He was still as simple-minded as Brent would assume. If Kun Ting was given proper education and exposure to the society, he would change very soon for sure!
Yeah, if I get him to master, master would be more than joyous. And I would get a brother!
"Kun Ting, if I introduce you to a master, would you be willing to become his student?" asked Brent carefully.
"Mhm!" Ye Chong nodded right away. He was long in desire of Brent’s refined combat techniques. It was just that Brent kept mentioning how the techniques would never be taught to an outsider; the norms that kept him out. Brent however did offer some tips he learned before to Kun Ting in exchange of classes being forbidden, which were still an eye-opener to Ye Chong. He was inspired and he wanted more. His desire to join Brent’s group grew!
Meanwhile, Fred had never left Mu even when he was going for lunch. For his own safety, Mu acted like an ordinary mech as he stood there like a statue. Fred’s intoxication frightened Ye Chong, "Kun Ting, just leave my uncle alone," Brent laughed as he spoke. "He always acts like this whenever he got into work. I had gotten used to it."
Brent redefined his uncle’s impression in Ye Chong’s mind as he provided him some information about his uncle.
Fred, also known as Fred the Great, was one of the few remaining mech-making master in the 5 major galaxies. Yes, as the title went, "master" defined his craftsmanship being the topmost. Being a mech-making master, not only he had to master the designing of the mech’s main body, but he also had to master in designing everything from scratch. That included engines, armor, circuit, weaponries and other aspects in study. As limited as a man’s intelligence and vitality, the knowledge in any study was vast and boundless, it would be a miracle if a man could at least master one or two of them. Only geniuses, those with talents inborn while possessing strong curiosity to research and development could master multiple aspects of the study. While a master like Fred the Great, being the genius of the geniuses able to master every aspect relating to the mech-making expertise, he was one of the few, or even the one and only in the 5 major galaxies.
In this era where mechs were demanded and pilots existed everywhere, one could not imagine how much a mech-making master like Fred could have earned. It was more than just authority, wealth and social status.
Just like the spacecraft he throned upon, the Sabre of the Slan grade for instance was actually a gift from a very wealthy company after knowing his plan for galactic tour. Such an astronomical budget… that no folk would ever dare to even dream about.
"Oh… Beauty…" Fred, stared at Mu, mesmerized, "Oh? Oh!" He wiped his drool off as he did not notice he was drooling in desire. Ye Chong could not imagine that old man being a mech-making master as Brent claimed when he acted like a pedophile towards Mu…
Ever since Ye Chong had entered this room, he noticed that no one else would have ever stepped into this room. At most, the maid would send food to the doorstep on meal hours.
The room might be spacious but it felt suffocating to spend day and night inside.
Galactic tour was long and certainly there would be a moment of boredom for a mere man like Ye Chong. Not everyone could understand the romance behind it as much as Fred did. While counting the stars in the milky-way, Ye Chong was suddenly notified, "Ye! Something’s going on in the ship!"
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