The video of the sniper firing from the door of a hovering shuttle was completely unbelievable to people that found their way to it in the Akashic Record. Not to mention the distance it was fired from, just the fact that it had enough power to penetrate a reinforced bank vault from one side, essentially disintegrate the person it hit, then penetrate a second reinforced vault wall was incredible enough. And that wasn't even mentioning that the sniper had no visual on his target and was firing completely blind!
The people that saw it had chills running down their spines and goosebumps all over their bodies. Especially considering the empire hadn't hidden that capability, which made them wonder just what actually was hidden in the classified files of the Akashic Record.
Thus, they took the footage and posted it online, either in its raw version or with different edits, and through that method, the empire's capabilities finally filtered down to non-citizens. Although the internet was freely available for everyone, citizen and non-citizen alike, people that had refused the offer of imperial citizenship had no access to the Akashic Record.
The discovery of the empire's capabilities, and the havoc that superhumans could wreak, terrified the non-citizens. Realizing the level of danger they were in, as the empire definitely wouldn't expend any effort on their behalf, millions of people rushed to apply for imperial citizenship. But as they had sat on the fence for too long, and even drifted to the wrong side of it, the empire certainly wasn't about to make the process easy on the new applicants, nor would they offer them the same free perks that people who had signed up for citizenship during the grace period received.
Though they were unhappy that they would be charged a premium for housing and the initial visit to the cubes to undergo their genetic corrections, given the choice between safety and financial stability, they still overwhelmingly chose safety. Especially those who had families and loved ones to consider. They simply had to queue up and patiently wait for the imperial immigration agency to approve their requests for citizenship in the Terran Empire.
That said, there were still hundreds of millions of holdouts who believed that even if there really were supervillains once the non-citizen blessed woke up with their superpowers, there would certainly be superheroes as well. Thus, though their convictions had been shaken and they were filled with a not inconsiderable amount of uncertainty and fear, they managed to somewhat conquer their fears and remain firm on their decision not to join the Terran Empire.
The only question remaining on everyone's mind was what was going to happen to Kim Ho Song. While they knew the punishment he would receive, and they were positive that he would be found guilty, given the preponderance of the evidence against him, how exactly was the empire going to put a severed head on trial? No matter how many times they watched the recording of the young man's fate, all they saw was his gruesome death and his head being dragged out in a sack. Was the imperial judiciary really going to try a corpse as a defendant? And not even a complete one, at that!? Even if they were, what kind of due process would a severed head be afforded?
That, if true, would most certainly set one hell of a precedent for future trials in the empire's justice system.
A month later.
"Drag out the spy and make sure to loosen his tongue! Who bribed him, and what did they bribe him with? What does he have to gain by killing the shepherd?" Katarina Markov ordered the men following behind her. They moved forward and started dragging the doctor out of the room they were in.
Panicking, he shouted, "If there was something to gain from keeping him from waking up, why would I be stupid enough to do it when I'm the only possible suspect!?" He was frantically struggling in the grip of the two large bodyguards that accompanied Katarina everywhere she went.
"So why, then, despite most of our resources being invested in the shepherd, is he the only one who hasn't woken up? Everyone else was already awake three weeks ago! Why is Rick the only person who's still in a coma now? Six weeks! It's been six... fucking... WEEKS!" she screamed.
The doctor, knowing that his fate would be dire if he were dragged out of his office, replied, "Although it's rare, there are still people in the empire that haven't woken up yet. And they've got the best resources available to anyone on the entire planet!"
Over the past six weeks, anyone who had annoyed Katarina Markov had been dragged to the target range, where they were tortured to death by awakeners learning to use their new superpowers. The doctor himself had even patched some of them up, and the parade of third degree burns from fire-aspected awakeners and the various injuries caused by projectiles was staggering. There were even a few that were brought to him suffering severe frostbite after being encased in ice that was as hard as steel, or half drowned after having their heads surrounded by a sphere of heavy water. Thus, he could only tell Katarina of the situation in the empire as a last-ditch lifesaving measure.
"You think I didn't know that?" she spat. "I listened to the same reports as you did!"
While the two were arguing back and forth, the only person still in an infirmary bed in the room twitched his right index finger and his eyelashes fluttered despite there being no breeze, both of which went completely unnoticed by the arguing pair.
His heart rate, as displayed on the monitor beside the bed, began rapidly climbing. From a slow and virtually unnoticeable five beats per minute, it soon reached a dangerous level as the man's body was finally beginning to stir.
Moments later, his eyes opened.
