Chapter 373 The Phantom

The room was stunned into silence after Ashton's outburst. Although he had only lost his composure for a second, it was enough for the security protocols to kick in. Within moments, guards rushed into the meeting room, their weapons ready to obliterate Ashton's brain.

If it hadn't been for Mazton's intervention, that would have been the end of Ashton's life, right then and there.

"Stand down, I have everything under control here." Mazton ordered the guards, "Return to your posts, your presence is not needed here."

"But Admiral-" One of the guards tried to argue, but Mazton had none of it.

"I think you have already been given your orders, captain. Go and make yourself useful elsewhere."

Mazton waved his hand and the guards left without another word. Still, a bunch of guards were stationed right outside the meeting room in case they needed to intervene in the matter.

Once they had left, Mazton looked around the meeting room and it wasn't in good shape. Ashton might not have intended to do something like that, but his outburst had nearly destroyed the room. A room designed to withstand even the biggest of Asteroid impacts was now filled with cracks all around the place.

Mazton was the only one who had regained his composure following the outburst. The rest of the squad was quite shaken, especially Vimur when he realised Ashton had gone easy on him during their spar.

"Do you have any idea how expensive constructing one of these rooms is? I sure as hell not giving you a penny-"

Avvo immediately shouted at Ashton, but one look from him was enough to silence her. Right now, he did not care about her or anyone in the room for that fact. The only one who had his attention was Mazton.

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"What is the meaning of this?" Ashton asked while trying to calm down his raging nerves.

"First breathe, I promise I'll answer whatever you want to ask to the best of my ability, before doing anything else," Mazton replied and sat back down before gesturing Ashton to do the same.

It took a couple of minutes for Ashton to calm down. But as he did, he nearly broke down. Hundreds of questions were going rampant in his head. But the most obvious one was whether the man he saw in the image, was really his father.

Another look at the image clarified his doubt instantly. The man in the image definitely looked like his father. It had been over twelve years since he saw him, but the moment Ashton saw the mark on the man's cheek, he knew the assassin was his father. There was no other explanation for the assassin to have the same mark on his cheek, even if he was a lookalike of his father's.

This revelation brought along another series of questions with it. The last thing Ashton remembered about his father was, that he had been sent over to the undead territory as an offering to make peace between them and the werewolves. Then what the hell was he even doing in space?

Also, the file mentioned that the assassin in question had been active for the last decade. This meant his father had been free from the undead's captivity for such a long time but never returned to see him or even Avalina. Why would he not help out his son and wife after being freed from his shackles?

Well, Ashton wasn't his biological son so it would make sense, in a twisted logic, that he did not help him. But Avalina was his wife! There couldn't possibly be any reason for him to not try and rescue her from the vampires.

[Ashton... your rampant thoughts are not going to help you in this stage. Let them go and listen to what the Admiral has to say. Maybe it'll help you out deduce some theories about your father's presence in space.]

Ashton nodded and took a deep breath. It was as Astaroth said, brainstorming wasn't going to help him, and then there was the mess he created... it wasn't looking good for a mercenary on his first day.

"My apologies," Ashton curtly bowed his heading Mazton's direction before continuing, "I shouldn't have lost my composure. At least not in the way I did. It's just that... my father- I mean, the person in the image looks a lot like my father whom I thought had died more than a decade ago. Watching his image after all this time made me lose my shit for a moment."

"I understand," Mazton dismissively waved his hand, "Believe me when I say this, I had my own share of daddy issues, so I know how you feel. It's all water under the bridge... for now. That being said... you might not like what I'm about to tell you about the assassin known as the Phantom."

And so, Admiral Mazton began explaining everything he, or anyone for that matter, knew about Phantom. The 'faceless' assassin first made his debut a decade ago. As every other bigshot in the industry, he began doing little things here and there, until one day he killed one of the biggest businessmen established in the Orion belt of the galaxy.

The fact that he killed such a big personality wasn't as shocking as the fact of how he managed to do it. Unlike any other assassin, he didn't hide nor did he stealthily pull a miracle. All he did was to walking, kill the businessman, and then calmly walked out. Everyone saw him, yet no one saw anything suspicious.

"Interestingly, the one who walked into the mansion, the one who killed the businessman and the one who walked out of the mansion were three different men," Mazton sighed, "Well, technically, it was the same man in different forms. He entered the mansion as a security executive, met and killed the businessman as one of his mistresses, and walked out of the place as a paramedic."

He continued, "Within twenty-four hours we found out all three people he disguised himself as, were already dead and had been for over a week. This gave us a theory to work with. The Phantom has the ability to perfectly mimic anyone he kills, regardless of their age, race and gender. It was because of this alleged ability he was given the name, 'Phantom'."

Ever since then, he had been on a killing spree, using the same pattern and yet no one was able to stop him. His efforts finally paid off when he made it to the list of top five assassins for hire.

Considering how he never failed any mission given to him, he was one of the favourites to be hired. Also, Phantom was the man who killed the high-profile target inside the Kernel Tower. That was the kind of assassin he was... daring, enigmatic and untouched.

"The image I showed you was a photograph from his most recent assassination. It is possible that's not how he looks at all." Mazton clenched his fists in anger, "It is harder to predict what he is about to do, especially because no one even knows what he looks like."

However, Ashton wasn't paying attention to any of it anymore and Mazton knew exactly why.

"I'm sorry about telling you all this," Mazton said while caressing Ashton's shoulders.

No matter how strong Ashton was, he was still a kid and this information could prove to be a bit too much for him.

From what Mazton had just told him, Ashton could come up with two scenarios. Either the phantom had killed his father and was using his identity to do more of his dirty work or his father was the phantom and was alive but on the wrong side of the galactic civilisation.

If the first case was true, then he swore he would be the one to capture and give the bastard the most horrid death possible. A death that would brand him as the most psychotic person in the galaxy. Well, this would be the easier possibility to handle out of the two.

,m That being said, he had no idea what he would do if the Phantom turns out to be his father. The mercenary association wants his head and most likely the rest of the galaxy does as well. There was no way in hell they would allow someone like him to roam freely in the galaxy.

The more he thought about it, the more sickening the situation became. On one hand, he would be happy to meet his father again, but then... he knew he would have to do the obvious thing and deal with him.

'If only I was strong enough!' He cursed himself.

If only he had been an S-grade being, he too would be able to do whatever he pleased without facing any repercussions. Sadly, that wasn't the case. The only thing he could do now was to pray for one of two things.

Either the Phantom wasn't his father, but his killer or the Phantom does not accept the assassination job or show up to kill Eula at all.