82: Chapter 82 The Gene Thief is Actually the Murderer?!

Whether a planet is chaotic or not depends entirely on whether the Adeptus Arbites are still present.

At the critical moment just after the rebellion suppression, an Imperial Arbitrator died in his Hive City; on the surface, he was the greatest beneficiary, and everyone would assume he had sufficient motive for murder:

To cover up the shady dealings during the rebellion suppression, to evade the Imperial Tithe, or even to start a rebellion...

Once this blame is pinned on him, not only will the subsequent troop conscription plan be unable to proceed smoothly, but even the galactic trade fleet won't be able to be established.

If things go wrong, the Imperial suppression fleet will arrive in the planet's orbit in the blink of an eye, and the evaded Tithe will be collected with tenfold interest.

Thinking of this, Fu Haoran didn't dare to delay for a second and rushed to the crime scene.

The scene was already surrounded by Judicial Police Officers, leaving no way through.

As soon as Fu Haoran walked into the courtyard with Wade, they were stopped by two Judicial Police Officers.

"Governor, this is a crime scene. You cannot enter."

Fu Haoran glanced at him, said nothing, and continued walking inside.

The guard soldiers in power armor behind him instantly stepped forward, looking on menacingly.

The two Judicial Police Officers exchanged a look, and just as they were in a dilemma, a cold, hard voice came from inside the building.

"Let him in."

The door pushed open, and Fu Haoran walked in; several Judicial Police Officers were organizing evidence.

He didn't stop and walked straight inside.

A man stood at the bedroom door.

He wore matte black Adeptus Arbites standard issue carapace armor, with the Imperial Aquila and the scales of the Adeptus Arbites engraved on his chest.

A semi-covered tactical visor obscured the upper half of his face, revealing only a taut jawline, with an old, diagonal scar on his chin, and he exuded an oppressive, "stay away" aura.

He held an Adeptus Arbites-specific Bolter pistol in his hand, a power maul tucked at his waist, a shotgun on his back, and a cyber-mastiff at his feet.

His posture was as straight as a pine, typical of the hard-nosed types forged in the Schola Progenium on Terra.

Joseph Dredd, an Adeptus Arbites Judge, a graduate of the Schola Progenium, and Horn was his direct superior.

"Governor, this is a crime scene; it is not your place to interfere."

Fu Haoran didn't take a step back and lifted his chin: "An Imperial Arbitrator died in my Hive City, and I have a responsibility to find out the truth."

Dredd sneered internally, a flash of undisguised contempt crossing his eyes.

He had upheld Imperial law for twenty years and had seen plenty of messes on Planet Scylla IV.

The security on this planet had long since rotted away; the local law enforcement teams were either private thugs for the nobility or riddled with holes from gang infiltration.

Therefore, he didn't trust any local on this planet, including the Governor before him who had crawled out of the Underhive gutters.

In his eyes, Fu Haoran was an opportunist who had climbed to the top by exploiting loopholes and breaking rules, stopping at nothing to achieve his goals.

"I know what you're thinking." Fu Haoran stepped past him and walked straight into the bedroom. "You think I killed Horn and framed someone else."

"No, you wouldn't be that stupid." Dredd reached out to stop him but didn't try to force him out again. "I understand Underhive rats; although they lack culture, they have a set of survival rules."

"Rule number one of the unspoken rules: never kill members of the Adeptus Arbites."

"Law enforcement requires evidence, while suppressing rebellions only requires coordinates; this is a principle even the Underhive understands."

Fu Haoran didn't respond, his gaze falling on the two corpses in the center of the bedroom.

Horn lay on his back, the blood on the back of his head already congealed into a dark brown color, and he hadn't even furrowed his brow.

Awen, the second daughter of the Grenna family, lay on her side next to him, the folds of her pajamas perfectly neat, her expression so calm she didn't look like a dead person.

There were no signs of a struggle.

No signs of resistance.

The doors and windows were all locked from the inside, with no signs of external force.

It was as if both people had been killed with a single blade while they were asleep.

Fu Haoran crouched down, his fingertips not touching the corpses, his gaze fixed on the wound on the back of Horn's head.

The wound was clean; the dagger had been precisely inserted from below the occipital bone, with the depth just enough to pierce the brainstem—the perpetrator was extremely professional.

But what really sent a chill down his spine was the visible pale purple bruise on the victim's neck.

"Grave-Thief?!"

Fu Haoran could recognize it at a glance because the feature was too obvious.

It was the signature mark left by a Grave-Thief using its tail stinger to anesthetize its prey; only those who knew the truth could recognize it.

In an instant, all the clues in his mind connected.

It was the Grave-Thief.

Only the assimilation anesthesia of a Genestealer could cause two living people to instantly lose consciousness, without even a chance to struggle, perfectly creating a locked-room murder scene.

But with such an obvious feature, how could the Adeptus Arbites have missed it?

Fu Haoran glanced peripherally at the Judicial Police Officers who were organizing the evidence; they were closer to the corpses, yet no one had looked twice at that bruise.

Fu Haoran immediately asked: "Judge, do you know about the Gene-Stealer Cult?"

"No."

"What about Grave-Thieves?"

"Never heard of them."

"Are you sure?" Fu Haoran asked, unwilling to give up.

Dredd looked over with a hostile gaze: "I am very certain; the Empire has no records related to them."

"Governor Fu, why are you suddenly bringing up an alien cult? Don't tell me you want to pin the blame for killing the Arbitrator on non-existent aliens."

Dredd's answer made Fu Haoran feel that the situation was very bad.

Because he had also found no information about Grave-Thieves in the Hive City database, and there was even no record of the Tyranids behind the Grave-Thieves.

Fu Haoran stared into Dredd's eyes, determining that he was not lying.

Either the Empire had deliberately sealed off news of the Tyranid invasion for fear of causing panic.

Or the Grave-Thieves' infiltration was deeper than imagined, and even the Adeptus Arbites' database had been tampered with.

Regardless of which possibility it was, it made his back go cold.

Fu Haoran immediately felt that the matter had become tricky.

He knew who the murderer was.

But he couldn't say it.

Dredd represented the Adeptus Arbites; if he didn't believe the claim that the Gene-Stealer Cult had infiltrated the Hive City and assassinated the Arbitrator, he would only think it was a story fabricated to escape guilt, which would instead increase his suspicion.

As for catching the Grave-Thieves...

Don't joke around; when you find one Grave-Thief, it means there is a whole nest of them in the Hive City!

Dredd glanced at Horn's corpse, with not a shred of pity in his eyes.

This high-born superior was, on the surface, the embodiment of Imperial law, but behind the scenes, he was colluding with nobility and gangs, rotten to the core.

But even if he hated Horn, the man had died in his jurisdiction, and died in bed while meeting a noble lady, so this was not a small matter.

A married Imperial Arbitrator and an engaged noble daughter dying in the same bed would be a massive scandal for the Adeptus Arbites if it got out.

He had to announce to the outside world that the two had met with an accident while discussing official business to preserve the face of the Empire and the nobility, but internally, he had to ferret out the killer.

Just then, the apartment door was pushed open violently.

A group of nobles wearing luxurious formal wear burst in; the leader, an elder of the Grenna family, had a livid face, his gray beard trembling violently, his eyes red, yet he didn't glance at his daughter's corpse in the bedroom the entire time.

"Judge Dredd, we have only one demand." The elder's voice was as cold as ice. "Within three days, Awen's body must be buried, and it must be announced that she died in an accident while accompanying the Arbitrator on official business."

"I hope you can understand; for us nobles, scandal is more terrifying than murder."

Fu Haoran narrowed his eyes, vaguely feeling that something was wrong.

He had already investigated; the Grenna family mainly dealt in Hive City luxury trade, intergalactic spice smuggling, and noble art collection; they weren't extremely wealthy, but they were stable.

But anyone with a discerning eye knew they did plenty of smuggling on the side.

Being in such a rush to bury the body, on the surface, seemed to be out of fear that a deep investigation would drag out the dirt on Horn helping them smuggle and evade taxes, leading to accountability and confiscation of their property.

But was Horn meeting the Grenna family privately really just about smuggling and tax evasion?

Or was it to hide clues about the Grave-Thieves?

After all, intergalactic luxury smuggling was the best vehicle for Grave-Thieves to infiltrate the upper and lower levels of the Hive City.

In the end, Dredd suppressed the Grenna family's protest and kept the bodies.

Fu Haoran left the apartment with Wade.

After investigating for the day, aside from receiving Dredd's eye-rolls and contempt, he had made no progress that could be put on the table.

On the air-car back, Fu Haoran directly sent a communication to Yuri: "Issue a Hive City-wide bounty; anyone who can provide effective clues related to the assassin can receive 5000 throne coins."

"Also... we might be in big trouble; put the military expansion on the agenda."

Yuri's eyes widened: "5000 throne coins? You're going to turn the Underhive upside down! This amount of money is enough for a family of three in the Underhive to live comfortably for fifty years!"

"You can't catch the wolf without sacrificing the cub."

Fu Haoran leaned back in his chair; he knew very well that the bounty wouldn't catch a Grave-Thief, he just wanted to use the bounty to disrupt the deployment of the cult in the shadows, and at the same time see if there were any leaked clues.

But that was far from enough; the moment he thought about the Grave-Thieves hiding in the complex tunnels of the Underhive, Fu Haoran felt a headache.

Such places were not suitable for large vehicles to enter, which also meant that when facing the terrifying numbers of the Gene-Stealer Cult, Fu Haoran had no heavy firepower at hand to suppress them.

"Wade, come with me to the prison; we might need to recruit a batch of new soldiers!"

Wade was stunned instantly, his face full of confusion: "Governor? The prison is full of hardened criminals and gang thugs; what kind of new soldiers can you recruit there?"

"You don't understand," Fu Haoran shook his head. "We probably don't have much time left; we need a squad capable of carrying out a decapitation strike."

"The only ones who fit this condition are those ruthless characters who can survive in the most chaotic prison in the Hive City."

"Those desperadoes in the prison are just right."

Fu Haoran stood up, picked up the Bolter from the table, and checked the magazine.

"Let's go, time to pick out a few good dogs."