Chapter 130: Return
“How would I dare?” Dias made an innocent expression, “At best I’m just driving a duck onto a perch*.”
*driving someone to go beyond their abilities
“My sincerest apologies then, but I am not a duck. Please hire your duck somewhere else.”
“Sigh, you know it, my arm…” Dias looked desolate for a second, but he was interrupted by Cillin before he could finish.
“It’s no use trying to feign pitifulness.”
“Ahem,” Dias straightened his expression and said seriously, “I’ve discussed this with Asiya already. Once we get out of Sector Z, the wounded in the Sixth Squad like me would all be transferred to Sector E. As you know, Sector E is most famed for their medical science, so we will be going there to recover our wounds. The problem is that we do not know how long we’ll be there until everyone recovers. Therefore, after thinking it over for a bit, I’ve decided that you should be the lieutenant commander of our squad, and if you dislike it then you can hold the position temporarily until I come back for another chat. Don’t say I didn’t warn you though, I may be recuperating for a very long time.” The reason Dias had hurt himself this badly was to protect Asiya, but it could be considered a blessing in disguise since his relationship with Asiya had progressed very swiftly since then.
Cillin looked at the hopeful looking Dias and said, “I’m going back to sleep.”
“Hey, don’t leave. Really, our squad normally has nothing to do, and even when there is something, Beaver’s there to handle it all. Therefore, you can say that I’m freer than the other LCs. It’s just a title, you know? A hat*. An LC sets out only when there is something important, so this responsibility is actually pretty idle.”
*a label
Dias talked endlessly about the benefits of being a lieutenant commander. If Cillin did not want to manage too many things, then he didn’t have to. It’s not like Dias did much management himself back when he was the lieutenant commander. He would feel a lot more at ease if it was Cillin who had taken over his job. No one would object to Cillin taking over as the lieutenant commander either.
In the end, Cillin agreed to Dias’ proposal. He had his own considerations for accepting the position. As Dias had mentioned earlier, those who held the rank of a lieutenant commander would be given greater power to learn about certain news and come in touch with certain things. That was to say that he would have a greater chance to learn about the High Tree Fuji Gen Family.
Cillin did not doubt in the slightest that the Gen Family was so high up the hierarchy that he would not be able to learn even the superficial information unless he reached that level. At the least, he found no news at all at the current stage.
After Cillin had exited the sick ward, he touched the veined pattern on his thumb. Genya’s coffin was still inside. Just how long would it take before he could send Genya back home?
At the same time, at Eudy and Beaver’s sick ward. The duo had already escaped critical condition, and they only needed to recuperate for a while longer before they would fully recover. With their genotype rank, their healing speed was much greater than others.
Right now, Cary, Xiao Shang, Tang Qiuqiu and others were all gathered inside the sick ward. After having their emotions pent up for such a long time, the group finally felt a lot better. Tang Qiuqiu, who had been quiet for several days, had finally begun to start talking again as well.
Eudy was playing an IQ game with Dough on a microcomputer while chatting with the others.
Suddenly, the sick ward’s door opened with a clack. There was no one outside, but if you move your gaze downwards then you would see a gray cat with a raised tail entering the room with light cat steps in full arrogance.
The gray cat glanced once at Eudy and Beaver on the sick bed before throwing down a line heartlessly, “Look at your sorry selves. You guys are so weak.”
The crowd: “…”
Please don’t compare us to you and that monstrous master of yours, thank you!
Although Cillin did not talk about what happened on the planet, judging from the images they captured from outer space, the scene could only be described as appalling. They never realised that Cillin had such amazing methods until now.
The second Dough saw the gray cat, it immediately jumped out of its seat and ran towards it. On the surface it appeared that it was networking with the gray cat, but in reality it was just casting attention away from itself since it was about to lose the game to Eudy.
After it gave Tang Qiuqiu face and ate a sweet she handed it, the gray cat circled around the group once like a leader inspecting its crew. It nodded in satisfaction: everyone’s looking spirited today!
“Wheeze, why did the lieutenant call Cillin over?” Cary asked.
The gray cat jumped to a high spot on the cabinet and looked down on everyone. Then it said very smugly, “Dias is leaving soon to recover, and he wants Cillin to take over him as the lieutenant commander. Uh huh, don’t worry, as the lieutenant commander it is my responsibility to watch over you lot. If you guys run into trouble in the future there’s nothing to worry about. I’m here.”
So, who was going to become the lieutenant commander, Cillin or the cat? Because right now it looked like it was wearing a lieutenant commander’s title on its head.
The fact that Dias was leaving to Sector E to treat his arm was anticipated by everyone, but they were a little surprised that he would choose Cillin to take over his responsibilities. They had no objections to the appointment though. Cary and the others who were close to Cillin aside, the other members in the Sixth B Squadron would not object to it as well. After the Poison Fang incident, Cillin’s reputation was pretty sizable.
Eudy smiled and said, “That’s pretty great. Please watch over us in the future then, elder cat.”
And he meant it. Everyone had a measure of the gray cat’s ability in their heads. It had saved Cary once, and now it had saved Akayi and the others. One day they might need it to stretch them a helping paw too.
The next day, during the meeting at the Sixth B Squadron’s main starship attended by both Barthus and Songba Leruo, Shawton announced that Cillin would take over Dias, the squad’s former PIC and become a lieutenant commander in Sixth B Squadron. Meanwhile, a new PIC had been appointed for Asiya’s squad as well. Her name was Zaya Kasa, and she would take over Asiya as the new lieutenant commander. Asiya herself would be accompanying Dias to Sector E while his arm was healed.
At the end of the meeting, Barthus had purposely patted Cillin twice on the shoulder heavily, saying, “Well done, kid. We’ll be waiting for you at the A Squadron.”
Songba Leruo did not object to Barthus’ words after hearing it. He was obviously approving of Cillin as well.
With Cillin’s current performance, he absolutely had the ability to enter the A Squadron. However, they had decided to observe Cillin for the moment and not recommend him the team immediately. It would be awkward to take away the Sixth B Squadron’s talent now not long after they’d acquired him anyway.
If no issues were to turn up during Cillin’s charge as a lieutenant commander, then Barthus and Songba Leruo would be ready to lift Cillin straight up into the A Squad.
The fact that Cillin was acknowledged by both famous personages in the A Squad, Barthus and Songba Leruo, meant that Cillin’s status had risen imperceptibly in the Sixth B Squadron yet again.
The weapons developed based on the new energy ores were officially released and put to use, so this was no doubt a boost to the Sixth B Squadron’s confidence as well.
After a period of recuperation and consolidation, the Sixth B Squadron finally stepped on their return journey. They had completed their mission, and they had collected enough data on the planets. They had even found many special energy ores and destroyed Poison Fang’s secret base at Sector Z. These achievements were enough for their little Vanguard B Squadron to show their face proudly, not to mention that they had only used half of the original five years time limit.
Barthus had even told them that the A Squadron was ready to allocate a huge sum of funds to the Sixth B Squadron as reward for their achievements. The additional funds would enable the Sixth B Squadron to better develop themselves.
Just outside Sector Z, at a loosely scattered rock belt, there were twenty or so starships parked in the area. Among them were Navigator and Heaven’s Birth’s B Squadrons.
The reason they were parked there was because this particular rock belt only had one passage, and only one squadron was allowed to enter at a time. Any more and accidents might occur.
So here comes the question. Before Navigator and Heaven’s Birth’s arrival, the Hunter regiments were already arguing about who should go through the passage first. Neither were willing to give way to another because they all shared the the same mind: Why the hell should we let you go first? (T/N: wow)(E/N: when the top Hunters of the galaxy have the mentality of kindergartners)
Not long after, a Heaven’s Birth B Squadron and a Navigator B Squadron showed up at the passage almost at the same time. And so the rest of the Hunter regiments shut up, happily watching the B Squadrons of the two of the four great Hunter regiments arguing with each other on the sidelines.