novelraw Chapter 124: The Iron Empire
Chapter 124: The Iron Empire
A week later, in the bustling port city of Calais in northern France, perpetually shrouded in sea breezes and mist, the Iron Triangle rapid response team completed its full assembly.
After submitting a detailed mission report to the London Branch and properly arranging his daughter's future living expenses and correspondence address, William's overall state was even more relaxed and focused than it had been in Ireland.
His meticulously maintained Winchester was carefully wrapped in oilcloth and slung across his back, while the French original of *Les Misérables* in his arms was already more than halfway read.
Julian arrived, travel-worn and weary, at the very last moment of the agreed-upon date, rushing in from Paris.
The elegant Curator looked somewhat thinner, with slight shadows under his eyes from lack of sleep, having expended great mental effort to hand over his vast "archive empire."
Yet, his eyes burned with the excitement of heading to a new "battlefield of knowledge," and three crates of "intellectual armaments" heavier than himself had arrived as scheduled, securely placed in the station's luggage check.
After a brief rest and intelligence exchange, they did not linger long in the port city of Calais.
Early the next morning, the three boarded the international express train "Rheingold," which would traverse the plains of northeastern France, cross Belgium, and finally penetrate deep into the heartland of the German Empire.
This was a long-distance, cross-border journey.
After the train entered German territory, the scenery outside the window began to change in a markedly and visually impactful way.The pastoral landscapes tinged with French romanticism were left behind.
A new panorama, unique to the Second German Empire, took the stage, presenting a sense of power, order, and also oppression.
Across the vast Ruhr industrial region, colossal clusters of chimneys stood on the horizon, spewing thick, yellow-black industrial smoke into the sky, dyeing it a sickly, perpetually overcast, and gloomy hue.
Gigantic steel mills, coking plants, and machinery factories constructed from black steel and red brick stretched in continuous rows along both sides of the railway, their interiors periodically emitting deafening steam hammer blows and piercing metal screeches.
Even the sparsely visible villages and towns were planned completely differently from those in France and England.
Here, the houses were uniform and orderly, the streets were ruler-straight, and the divisions of farmland possessed a geometrically rigorous beauty.
The entire nation resembled a colossal war machine, meticulously calibrated and operating at peak efficiency, displaying an overwhelming sense of order that felt suffocating.
"This is the embodiment of the Prussian spirit," Julian said, looking at the steel landscape outside the window, a complex expression on his face.
"Order, discipline, efficiency, and a certain madness hidden beneath this formidable order that has made all of Europe tremble."
As a proud Frenchman, he harbored a wariness and a culturally ingrained complex sentiment toward the "nouveau riche neighbor" that had humiliated his homeland twenty years prior with a painful Franco-Prussian War.
Lin Jie, meanwhile, read a disquieting significance from this landscape imbued with the unique aura of the Second Industrial Revolution.
He retrieved from his backpack the black diary translation, inherited from the Cartographer Karl, which he had already read countless times.
He revisited the sporadic records Karl had written about his own homeland in his precise, German-style prose.
He discovered that this German hunter, who had remained calm and objective even when facing UMAs, always revealed a contradictory mix of pride and wariness between the lines whenever he mentioned the land of Germany.
In one diary entry, Karl wrote: "Too many ancient secrets are buried beneath this land."
"Secrets far deeper and darker than Celtic Druids or Gallic spirits—the whispers of the Teutoburg Forest, the gold of the Nibelungen, and those ancient beings that did not truly perish even in 'Ragnarok.' They have never vanished;
they have merely fallen into a temporary slumber under the overly powerful order imposed upon this land."
In another record detailing his early encounter with a low-level UMA, a "forest spirit," in his home state of Bavaria, Lin Jie found an especially memorable and philosophically reflective summary.
"The UMAs I have encountered within Germany all seem to share a common and unique 'duality.'"
"Their forms of existence and behavioral patterns always swing wildly between two seemingly diametrically opposed extremes: either a rigid, one could say 'mathematically beautiful' absolute order, or a chaotic, utterly illogical absolute madness."
"It's as if the 'Gaian consciousness' of this land itself exists in an irreconcilable state of schizophrenia."
"The monsters here appear to be inextricably bound to these two extreme concepts of order and madness;
there is no 'middle ground.'"
"This characteristic also makes them far more unpredictable and more lethal than the 'pastoral idyll' ghosts of England or the 'romantic' spirits of France."
Karl's wise warning echoed in Lin Jie's heart.
Looking at the orderly steel landscape outside the window, and recalling the "madmen" born from this land—Nietzsche, Schopenhauer, Wagner—he began to understand the deep concern revealed between Karl's lines.
The most terrifying madness is often nurtured beneath absolute order.
This concern would ultimately erupt completely forty-three years later.
"Alright, gentlemen," Julian's voice interrupted Lin Jie's contemplation at this moment.
The Curator had already retrieved a detailed map, annotated with all railway lines in southwestern Germany, from his three heavy crates of "intellectual armaments" and spread it on the small table between them.
"According to the 'Pandora' observation list provided to us by Sir Henderson, the location of the nearest high-risk anomalous phenomenon is deep within the 'Black Forest' of Baden-Württemberg."
"It is said a UMA codenamed 'King of the Forest' lurks there."
"But..." Julian's tone shifted, a sly glint flashing in his eyes. "Before paying a visit to that 'King,' I personally strongly recommend we first go to a more 'civilized' place to make some necessary preparations."
He tapped his finger on a city name on the map: "Here, Heidelberg, Germany's oldest and most prestigious university town, famous for its beautiful castle, the picturesque Neckar River, and that 'Philosopher's Walk' said to bestow philosophical inspiration."
William frowned. "We're going hunting, not sightseeing, Professor."
"I am well aware, my friend," Julian said. "But even the most skilled hunter, before entering a completely new and unknown forest, needs to visit the most experienced local 'guide,' does he not?"
"I have an old friend who researches ancient German folklore currently teaching at Heidelberg University," Julian explained.
"His name is Hermann Schmidt. He is the foremost living encyclopedia in all of Germany on the archetypes of 'Grimm's Fairy Tales' and 'Germanic pagan mythology.'"
"I need to obtain from him the most original, most unknown unofficial intelligence about the 'Black Forest' region."
"Believe me, these folkloric, superstitious stories sometimes come far closer to the truth than our I.A.R.C.'s cold, bureaucratic observation reports."
The reasoning sounded impeccable, possessing a scholar's rigor and professionalism, leaving neither Lin Jie nor William any grounds for rebuttal.
Thus, the first stop of their journey was settled—not the unknown target on the "Pandora" list, but this picturesque university town of Heidelberg.
Although Lin Jie also agreed to the proposal, watching the flicker of excitement with a "personal agenda" hidden deep in Julian's eyes, he keenly sensed that Julian's "academic visit" might not be solely for gathering intelligence.