Eclipse Hunter V4Prologue: Prologue

Eclipse Hunter Volume 4: Truth and Lies, Boundaries

Original novel in Chinese by: 御我(Yu Wo)

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Prologue—translated by Trespasserby (proofread by Xuan & Arcedemius; C/E edited by lucathia)

“Gēge! I’m here.”

Ri Xiang Ye opened the door to the study while wearing an adorable smile. He sneakily stuck his head inside and quietly asked, “Are you busy, Gēge?”

“Of course not. Come in.”

Although he was buried in paperwork, as soon as Ri Xiang Yan heard the sound of his little brother’s voice, he immediately lifted his head, abandoned his paperwork, and ignored the secretary he was in a phone call with. He smiled and said, “Tell Gēge, have you been happy today, Ah Ye?”

“Yup!” Ri Xiang Ye skipped over and threw himself onto Ri Xiang Yan, clinging onto the other person’s shoulders like a child asking to be pampered.

“Really?”

Ri Xiang Yan smiled as he hugged his beloved little brother back. He rubbed his head and indulgently asked, “What did you do today? Why are you so happy? Tell Gēge, was it that going to school was very fun?”

Ri Xiang Ye tilted his head and said grumpily, “I didn’t go to school! Gēge, you forgot again! I’m playing with Dr. An Te Qi at home.”

The smile on Ri Xiang Yan’s face seemed to stiffen after he heard that. But he nonchalantly replied, “Is that so! Sorry, Gēge was wrong.”

“It’s O.K.,” Ri Xiang Ye giggled and said back.

Knock knock…

Ri Xiang Yan raised his head. The door to the study wasn’t closed. The person who had come was simply knocking out of courtesy.

Another Ri Xiang Ye was standing in the doorway.

His looks and build were exactly the same as that of the Ri Xiang Ye inside the room. The only difference was that the Ri Xiang Ye in the room was beaming. Even upon seeing someone who looked exactly like him, his smile didn’t shrink in the slightest. However, the Ri Xiang Ye at the door had no expression on his face. Half of his body was hidden in the shadows of the door.

Although their appearances were exactly the same, their expressions alone meant that no one would mistake them. One was like an angel, while the other was like a devil who would devour you at any moment.

Ri Xiang Yan looked at the Ri Xiang Ye in the door, then back at the widely smiling Ri Xiang Ye next to him. He opened his mouth, but not a single word came out.

“Ah Ye!”

At this moment, An Te Qi ran over, wheezing as he shouted. Once he ran up to the door of the study, he glanced out of the side of his eye at Ri Xiang Yan and the Ri Xiang Ye inside the room.

After that, ignoring the two people in the room, he patted the shoulder of the Ri Xiang Ye in the doorway and warmly said, “Head back to the lab first. I’ll be over shortly to do an examination on you.”

“Understood.” Ri Xiang Ye nodded with no expression at all still and immediately turned to leave.

Following that, An Te Qi looked at the “Ri Xiang Ye” inside the study. He said in a businesslike tone, “DSII, leave as well. Return to the laboratory.”

Ri Xiang Ye—No, the “DSII” that An Te Qi had referred to—nodded and then followed suit in leaving the room. He wore an adorable smile the whole time.

Once the two identical-looking people had exited the study, only An Te Qi and the Sun Emperor were left.

An Te Qi flatly looked at the monarch in front of him. He was rather discontent, and even criticized, “Sun Emperor, I booted up Ah Ye’s modified human backup copy, DSII, to run experiments on how to restore Ah Ye’s condition, not for you to treat as a replacement for Ah Ye!”

Hearing that, the previously dumbstruck Ri Xiang Yan became infuriated. With one hand, he pulled out his derringer, the opening of the gun aimed right at the center of An Te Qi’s head. He furiously roared, “I know what I’m doing. You don’t have to tell me!’

An Te Qi frigidly looked at him for some time. Then he said, “Put down the gun. Guns can misfire. Before, if it really went off and I died, it wouldn’t really matter. It’s not the same anymore. If I really did die, Ah Ye would go with me. I believe you wouldn’t want to see that happen either.”

Ri Xiang Yan’s face went rigid before he slowly lowered the gun.

Seeing that, An Te Qi relaxed his frozen demeanor a bit. He thought to himself, This guy still cares a lot about Ah Ye after all. In the past few days, he had been worried out of his mind that Ri Xiang Yan would just treat DSII as Ah Ye from now on and no longer care about the real Ah Ye.

He gave a well-intentioned reminder, “Sun Emperor, don’t treat DSII as Ah Ye. If you treat DSII well, you’ll hurt Ah Ye. Even if he is currently stuck as the unfeeling Dark Sun, no one knows if he really doesn’t have emotions…”

“I know! Of course I know!”

Ri Xiang Yan shouted and cut An Te Qi’s words off while vehemently tossing his derringer aside. He looked back and growled at An Te Qi, “I don’t want to hurt him either. But I want to see him smile. That’s all I want. But he won’t smile! He doesn’t smile!”

An Te Qi sighed.

Actually, the current Ah Ye could still smile, but he would just be smiling on command. Of course, that was not the kind of smile Ri Xiang Yan wanted to see. Seeing that kind of programmed smile would instead make Ri Xiang Yan’s heart ache even more and cause him to remember how Ri Xiang Ye came to be that way. The overwhelming majority of the blame was on how he had handled things wrong.

“I’ll go run my experiments now.”

An Te Qi thought and thought. All he could do at the moment was to hurry and quickly bring Ah Ye back. That was the only thing that could resolve the current predicament.

Ri Xiang Yan was halfway through nodding when he suddenly remembered who was being experimented on. He also remembered how after An Te Qi finished experimenting on corpses, they would be in tiny pieces… He couldn’t help blurting out, “Don’t hurt DSII!”

Hearing that, An Te Qi stopped in his tracks and turned his head to look at Ri Xiang Yan, brows knitted together.

Ri Xiang Yan struggled to come up with a reason, “He, He looks too much like Ah Ye. That’s why…”

An Te Qi was silent for a while. Then he nodded and said, “I’ll try.” Then he walked out of the study, closing the study door while he was at it…

Ri Xiang Yan heavily fell back down in the black office chair.

In accordance with ergonomics, this chair could provide the maximum reduction for fatigue and ensure the health of its occupant’s entire body. In short, this was a luxury chair that the average person would only be able to afford using several months’ worth of pay. But at the moment, it was as uncomfortable as a stool with a leg missing.

This chair was elegant. It was opulent. It was unattainable. And it was cold as ice, devoid of color, solitary… Just like the position of the “Sun Emperor.”

The owner of this seat of power buried his face in his hands and murmured, “Ah Ye. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”