Arknights: How Did I Actually Become the Doctor? — Chapter 43

Chapter 43: The Victoria White-Stocking Beauty Fraud CaseYou're reading this on the wrong site. This chapter was translated by Elysian Reads and posted for free at elysianreads.com — if you're seeing it anywhere else, it was copied without permission. Read it at the source so the people who actually did the work get the credit.

Silence was indeed laying the groundwork to help Mountain break out of prison.

Four months ago, she had already entrusted her friend Kafka to infiltrate this inescapable mobile penitentiary under the guise of a humble cleaner.

Mountain’s wrongful imprisonment was the direct result of vicious threats from Hydebro. Left with no other options, Old Anthony had been forced to send him into this fortress, widely recognized as the strictest correctional facility in the world, just to seek refuge.

As a monolithic tech conglomerate capable of hand-crafting weapons that posed national-level threats, Rhine Lab’s immense power was distributed across ten distinct branches, collectively known as the Rhine Ten Sections. These included the Control Section, Structural Section, Energy Section, Originium Arts Section, Ecology Section, Scientific Investigation Section, Defense Section, Engineering Section, Human Resources Section, and the Business Section.

Is that a bit too complicated to remember?

Do not worry about it. Listing all of that out was merely to prove that you are a serious, lore-abiding reader.

For this particular trip, you only had to face the Energy Section. At worst, you might cross paths with the former head of the Defense Section, who was probably still counting on you to sign off on her paycheck.

However, once you successfully pulled off this prison break, a certain water sprite would likely be unable to wait a second longer to contact you, handing you the perfect opportunity to interfere directly with Rhine Lab’s internal decision-making.

Although Silence had already asked Kafka to spend four grueling months infiltrating the facility, that did not mean you had the luxury of burning the same amount of time to sneak in flawlessly.

Fortunately, there was a much simpler, far more direct method to get inside a prison.

“Inmate Number 4332, Bursting Dawn. Sentenced to twenty-three years and six months for using excessively violent means during a corporate business competition, resulting in mass casualties.”

“Inmate Number 4333, Duq’arael. Sentenced to three thousand and sixty-three years and four months as an accomplice in the special-grade Victoria white-stocking beauty fraud case.”

“Inmate Number 4396, Will of Fire… What kind of absolute garbage names are these? Sentenced to four thousand one hundred and eighty-four years flat as the principal offender in the Victoria white-stocking beauty fraud case.”

Duq’arael shifted his weight, causing his remarkably proud, entirely fabricated chest to bounce slightly. He frowned in deep thought. Just a day ago, the Doctor had suddenly muttered something along the lines of wanting a good, lucky number, swapped his prison ID, and deliberately distanced himself.

Was that man still wary of him? That made no sense. Was the Doctor not supposed to be a naturally gifted undercover agent?

Standing a short distance in front of him was a white-haired Sarkaz of the same race. Her face was clearly heavily disguised, but the lines of her figure were irritatingly familiar, and she kept turning back to glare daggers at him.

She looked exactly like a hot-tempered, inferior Sarkaz. A wretched traitor with absolutely zero sense of ethnic identity or pride.

Duq’arael cast a gaze of pure, aristocratic disdain over her. When she turned back to glare at him yet again, he deliberately locked his eyes onto her chest, twisted his waist with practiced elegance, and shamelessly put his artificial maternal radiance on full display.

The white-haired woman looked like she was about to pop a blood vessel.

Duq’arael sneered coldly in his heart. As expected, this lowly creature could not even feel the majestic bloodline resonance of their shared kin. All she harbored in her heart was this ridiculous, petty competitiveness. The descendants of the Teekaz had truly fallen into the mud.

What an utter disgrace to the Sarkaz.

That fleeting sense of familiarity from earlier had clearly been an illusion.

On the other side of the glaring match, Wis’adel had originally just turned her head out of morbid curiosity. She simply wanted to see exactly what kind of horrific crime the Doctor had committed to earn a four-thousand-year sentence. Instead, her eyes locked onto a cross-dressing Lord of the Royal Court.

It completely shattered her worldview.

After a few rounds of silent, venomous glaring back and forth, she was so consumed by rage that she wanted nothing more than to pull out her detonators and blow this freak to kingdom come.

‘The Sanguinarch! What the hell is this ancient bloodsucker doing? Dressing up as a busty, white-stockinged older sister just to seduce the Doctor? And he has the nerve to shake those fake breasts at me?!”Do not come out here and disgrace the entire Sarkaz race like this!”And why the hell is he trying to trigger a Teekaz bloodline resonance while jiggling them? Does he want me to [Sarkaz profanity] with him?!’

In that singular moment, both of them felt that the sacred Sarkaz bloodline had been irreparably shamed.

“Straight.”

“Follow.”

“Bomb.”

“I will bomb too.”

“Bomb again.”

The surrounding inmates watched in absolute disbelief as the handsome, slender young man sitting in the center of the circle cleared almost every single card in his hand within a single, devastating round. He casually stroked the little white creature hovering lazily beside him and calmly drew his final card.

“I accept your concession.”and support the real translator.Read at elysianreads.com This is a stolen translation. You're reading this on the wrong site. This chapter was translated by Elysian Reads and posted for free at elysianreads.com — if you're seeing it anywhere else, it was copied without permission. Read it at the source so the people who actually did the work get the credit.

With smooth, polite movements, he reached out and collected the crumpled packs of low-quality cigarettes the hardened criminals had tossed onto the concrete floor as bets.

This was his sixteenth consecutive victory.

Several inmates patted their empty pockets, exchanging uneasy glances. Not losing a single round in a game of pure chance… did this guy come in here just to rob them blind?

Another inmate replied with a subtle twitch of his eyes. It was not worth the trouble of starting a fight.

Finally, one burly man could not hold back his sycophantic urges. He stepped forward with an obsequious grin, eagerly striking a match to light a cigarette, and held the trembling flame toward the young man’s lips.

The young man frowned slightly, seemingly unaccustomed to the harsh, acrid smell of cheap tobacco. He gently but firmly pushed the eager hand away. Maintaining a perfectly polite, unreadable smile, he voiced the exact accusation the others had been too afraid to say out loud.

“You think I am cheating.”

The man with a jagged scar running down his face quickly plastered on an apologetic smile. “That is not what I meant at all, boss. We were just… just a little curious. How did someone as capable as you end up in a hellhole like this?”

There was no cliché, brain-dead plot of sore losers flipping the table or demanding a rematch. None of the people who had committed crimes severe enough to be thrown into Mansfield Break were stupid. This seemingly frail young man dared to casually humiliate them in a game of cards while completely alone. He had to be hiding a terrifying trump card.

Just this impeccably clean, lazy demeanor alone was not something that could be cultivated in the slums. He was likely the heir of some untouchable noble family, hiding out in a maximum-security prison just to avoid a political disaster.

The young man smiled noncommittally. He stroked his little white pet once more and tilted his head. “You are quite observant.”

“You were holding a four, a five, a ten, a single Ace of Spades, and three twos in your hand just a moment ago, correct?”

The scarred man subconsciously looked down at his lap. Not a single card was out of place.

“The gentleman sitting opposite you just cheated. He actually has a bomb in his hand right now. If you do not believe me, feel free to count the total number of cards in the deck. He has been clutching it tightly for three whole rounds, too terrified to play it, and in the end, it just rotted in his sweaty palms along with a six.”

The surrounding inmates cast shocked, deeply suspicious glares at the accused. The crew-cut man sitting opposite them immediately flushed a dark, angry red. “What the hell are you looking at?! You are just going to believe whatever this pretty boy says?”

The young man added in an unhurried, measured tone, “Given his rather hesitant personality, he should still be sitting on a few of those cards. Shall we ask him to stand up?”

A few playing cards fluttered to the ground. The crew-cut man had already been violently hauled to his feet by the very inmates who usually lost their rations to him. The rest of the crowd remained completely motionless, staring intently at the terrifyingly calm young man before them.

“Is your Originium Arts mind-reading?” one of the Liberi inmates stepped forward boldly, breaking the heavy silence.

The young man shook his head nonchalantly, blinking with an expression of pure, unadulterated innocence. “Does something like this really require mind-reading? Is it not just a simple matter of doing a little basic math?”

So arrogant. That was the collective first reaction of every criminal in the room.

The second reaction was a chilling realization. How the hell was he so completely natural at it?

The scarred man who had tried to light the cigarette swallowed hard, plucking up the courage to ask in a trembling voice, “Brother, you are obviously a genius. How did you actually get locked up in here?”

The young man did not shy away from the question. “I came in for fraud. Since you all agree that I am so smart, I figured I should not waste my talents on petty theft.”

The crowd exchanged bewildered looks. If someone with a brain like this wanted to make money, would he really risk getting himself locked up in Mansfield Break?

Just what exactly did he scam?

Seeming to sense the burning confusion of his captive audience, the young man let out a soft, melancholic sigh. He looked up at the ceiling and explained in a deeply lyrical, almost poetic tone.

“I swindled the heart of an empire away for a brave, beautiful young lady.”

The inmates nodded in sudden understanding. Got it. A high-stakes romance scammer. Which country’s royal family did this madman manage to swindle?

Before they could ask, the young man added a casual afterthought.

“Right now, that heart is already being transported toward that young lady at roughly three hundred kilometers per hour. I just hope those military landships cannot catch up to it.”

Suddenly, every single hardened criminal in the room froze perfectly in place.

Wait a minute. Should the heart of an empire not be a living person?

What on earth did this lunatic actually steal?!You're reading this on the wrong site. This chapter was translated by Elysian Reads and posted for free at elysianreads.com — if you're seeing it anywhere else, it was copied without permission. Read it at the source so the people who actually did the work get the credit.