Enforcer Manual
Chapter 766 - 764 - : Mechanism God Cult 2023_1

Chapter 766: 764 Chapter: Mechanism God Cult 2023_1

The Law Enforcer department in The Seventeenth Region had amassed a substantial amount of information on the Red Lotus Gang, much of which was organized during the tenure of the former director. It was evident that this gang had also been a focal point of attention for the predecessor.

A group of gang members with highly advanced cyborg prostheses, more than seventy percent of them were no longer recognizable as human.

Even Chai Ke had been reluctant to casually deal with these potential cyber lunatics.

Strangely enough, while everyone deemed the Red Lotus Gang to be a gathering place for cyber lunatics, the few cyber lunatic attacks that happened in The Seventeenth Region had nothing to do with them. For some unknown reason, these individuals brazenly modified their bodies but seemed never to be affected by cyber psychosis.

Moreover, compared to the notorious Chai Ke Group, the Red Lotus Gang rarely engaged in murder or robbery. If they had to be convicted of anything, it would be the illegal smuggling of military-grade prostheses.

"What do you think, should we let Old Sa and his team blend into the Red Lotus Gang first?"

Lu Xiang asked.

There was no chance for her and Song Lan, not with the degree of prosthesis modification for penetrating the organization’s ranks probably needing to be no less than 20%.

Up until now, no one in The Seventeenth Region had ever formally assessed the degree of prosthetic modification for people of the Red Lotus Gang.

Only Old Sa and the Shadow Guards could possibly meet the recruitment standards of the Red Lotus Gang.

"No need, I suggest we go straight for the arrests."

They currently knew nothing about this mechanical plague, but considering their experience in The First Region, if the plague was brought by the "Mother" wielding authority over the "King," then sending Old Sa into the Red Lotus Gang would only endanger them.

Even the degree of their understanding of prosthetic technology was inferior to that of the Red Lotus Gang members.

Lu Xiang considered Song Lan’s suggestion and by that afternoon had mobilized all special action teams, deploying all the armored floating cars, and to ensure the operation was foolproof, Song Lan also concealed himself to supervise from the shadows.

However, the capture went unexpectedly smooth.

When Captain Doug and his team stormed into the Red Lotus Gang’s stronghold, the gang members barely put up any resistance.

Their base was an abandoned modification factory, and the armaments found inside were a startling sight: apart from a large number of discarded military-grade prostheses, they discovered plenty of laser mines, automated turrets, and even an old-fashioned military exoskeleton armor in the warehouse.

If the Red Lotus Gang had used these weapons, they could easily have sparked a small-scale war in The Seventeenth Region at any time.

The primary target of this operation was a man named Krieger Anders, whom everyone in the gang called the "Prophet."

According to intelligence gathered by the network monitoring department, Krieger hardly ever left his place, spending his days in his lair. His face had undergone so much modification that it was barely recognizable, with cracked skin revealing the dark metal framework beneath, at the center of which was a rotating prosthetic eye.

Song Lan believed that anyone who saw Krieger would regard him as a robot rather than a human.

And he resembled an outdated model at that, as if today’s robots looked almost indistinguishable from humans.

Lu Xiang personally conducted the interrogation.

"Director Lu, under what charges do you intend to arrest me this time?"

Krieger’s red glowing prosthetic eye stared at Lu Xiang. His demeanor was far calmer than the rumors suggested, sitting in the interrogation room as if he wasn’t worried about his predicament in the slightest.

"Smuggling military-grade prostheses."

In front of Lu Xiang were stacks of thick documents, the evidence of the Red Lotus Gang’s smuggling of military-grade prostheses over the years, which would be sufficient to keep him in a remote prison for the rest of his life.

"I admit it, but our actions are more akin to recycling. We only take what they don’t want."

Krieger was sure Lu Xiang understood the ins and outs of it.

Even military-grade prostheses were extremely expensive only when first sold. As for parts stripped from corpses, most were discarded as trash.

The non-belief in incorporating human tissue meant that prostheses could never become high-value goods circling the black market.

After a pause, Krieger continued, "You can send me to jail for this, but then you’ll be giving up the answers you’re seeking."

"You know what I want to ask?"

"My boys told me that three people died in an alley near the theater square yesterday, their hearts carved out. What’s more crucial is that they had been to our territory."

"Start with their visit to your territory."

"Just like you’d imagine, they wanted to join us, mumbling some nonsensical talk... Of course, I refused them." Krieger shook his head, "Because they lacked faith."

He saw through their hearts the first time he met them, "They were only after identity and status, hoping to have someone cover for their misdeeds outside."

"Isn’t that what you are?"

What Krieger mentioned echoed the thoughts of nearly all gang members in The Seventeenth Region, but before now, she had never heard any gang member speak of faith in front of her.

Yet any case involving faith invariably became exceedingly complicated.

She would rather the incident near the theater square turn out to be a series of murders than a dispute over faith.

"We believe in the Mechanical Deity guiding our path."

Even though Krieger’s voice had been completely replaced by a mechanical synthesized tone, Lu Xiang still perceived the utter devotion in it. "We believe that doing so will bring us happiness, and only those who share the same faith can become our companions," Krieger stated firmly.

"Excuse me for being blunt, but do you mean to say that the path to happiness you pursue involves transforming yourselves into machines?" Lu Xiang asked.

"It is the path to happiness, the process of opening our hearts to the Mechanical Deity. Eventually, all our minds will be connected, understanding each other’s true thoughts without any misunderstandings or suspicions..." Krieger seemed eager to share his faith in the Mechanical Deity, and Lu Xiang had no doubt that if not stopped, he would continue to ramble on.

But they had not brought Krieger here to listen to his preaching. At this very moment, a similar case could be happening somewhere in The Seventeenth Region.

So, Lu Xiang had no choice but to interrupt Krieger. "Let’s get back to the case at hand. I want to hear your opinion on the deaths of those three people."

"We know nothing of the murderer’s identity, but the war between faiths has never ceased. Perhaps they will find us soon."

...

This is the difficulty of communicating with Clergy.

Although their beliefs differ, the way Krieger and Father Bruno spoke were like two peas in a pod. You could never get a straight answer out of them.

For example, it took nearly forty minutes into the interrogation before Lu Xiang could extract the potentially useful term, "Church of the Mechanical God."

"As I understand it, the Red Lotus Gang is just one branch of the ’Church of the Mechanical God,’ with similar organizations present in the cities of the United Government," Lu Xiang said, leaning back on the sofa in a small conference room, sharing the information he had gathered with Song Lan. "One of their doctrines is to discard the weak flesh and return to the embrace of machinery... a notion quite similar to many military tech slogans. ’Wild Bone’ is a product of this ideology."

She was beginning to realize that those within the United Government with an ardent pursuit towards prosthesis, though not flagging themselves as believers of the Church of the Mechanical God, had in fact been adhering to its doctrines all along, and the trend towards their own cybernetic modification was becoming more and more apparent.

It started out as something used only on the frontlines. Now, even everyday life and work required the implementation of cybernetic prosthesis.

If a scale were set for the level of non-military-grade prosthesis modification, the figures for the workers in The First Region would be quite astonishing.

"As for the war Krieger mentioned..."

Lu Xiang suddenly looked up at Song Lan, harboring a reasonable suspicion, "Your ’children’ have been fighting against those from the Church of the Mechanical God."

"First of all, I don’t have children, that’s something they’ve come up with," Song Lan had to clarify again. He was no one’s "Father God" and did not fancy the role. On the other hand, he had to agree with Lu Xiang’s perspective.

The case could simply be summarized as a massacre between different Sects.

"Whether you acknowledge them or not, they are faithfully carrying out the task of eliminating another Sect," Lu Xiang said, feeling as though she was getting closer to the truth of this world. "Maybe you could easily stop them."

"How?" Song Lan inquired.

"Perhaps... convening an emergency meeting, informing them that we live in a society governed by the rule of law and that killing is a criminal act?" suggested Lu Xiang, deep in thought. According to δ’s verbal account, those unknown beings had once communicated with them through "Whisper," which might be a skill Song Lan had grown rusty from disuse. "You could try reaching them through ’Whisper’?"

If Song Lan’s recent bizarre dreams were seen from another angle, it would reveal that they were likely not coincidental.

They appeared almost simultaneously with the "children."

They gave him the ability to witness everything happening in Silvermoon Harbor from thousands of miles away, through the eyes of the "child," and he indeed taught the orphans in Silvermoon Harbor how to make fishbone porridge, based on his practical experience...

Of course, to those believers in Spiritual Energy, Song Lan might not be the Deity they were looking for.

"As for the Church of the Mechanical God, I’ll handle the investigation. Medea and the others might know some secrets about the Church," Lu Xiang declared, ready to make a trip to the junkyard.

For not long ago, Dr. Bai Zhu had uncovered some history about the Church of the Mechanical God.

Its existence spanned far longer than she had imagined — back to 2023, before the third war broke out. A group of people yearning for immortality had come together, giving birth to the embryonic form of the Church of the Mechanical God.

Coincidentally, the Spirit Troupe was also a product of roughly the same period.

Shortly after their formation, the world was plunged into an unprecedented war, and with the destruction of the old net, all records of the Church of the Mechanical God and the Spirit Troupe vanished.

It wasn’t until a century later that these believers once again appeared in people’s sights.

No.

Apart from them, there were also flesh conglomerates, whose origins were unknown.

The rule of the United Government was fading, and once again, she could smell the gunpowder in the air.

Everything seemed to revert to that turbulent and chaotic era.