novelraw Chapter 194: Diamonds and Prisoners
Chapter 194: Diamonds and Prisoners
Julian burst through the heavy steel gate and rushed back into the interrogation room where the air had frozen solid.
The file in his hand recorded Humboldt’s final whereabouts, and that document detonated the tense suspense in everyone present.
"Alexandria! The Serapeum Temple beneath Alexandria!"
Julian barely had time to calm his rapid breathing from the run before he dumped the discovery in front of everyone.
Humboldt’s disappearance, that bizarre ominous key, and the legendary City of Gold — every fragment snapped together in an instant because of Julian’s find.
After hearing Julian’s intelligence, Lin Jie turned his gaze back to the prisoner on the steps below.
"Now," Lin Jie was peeling open Nephthys’s shattered psychological defenses, "I think you can tell us why you, or rather your cult, stole the diamond, why you were so intent on finding this key?"
"What exactly are you trying to find in that forbidden place where even the explorer Humboldt vanished without return?"
Nephthys slumped in the interrogation chair, her lips continually moving, producing broken syllables that made no sense.
"Treasure… no… prisoner… it is… the great source… for the return of the Father God…"Her mind had clearly collapsed.
But Lin Jie keenly caught the handful of most crucial core words from her chaotic mutterings.
"Prisoner"?
"Father God"?
Before he could dig deeper, a more immediate, concrete question loomed over everyone.
That was the Tear of Apophis.
Where had that transferred cursed diamond gone now?
"Tell me where the diamond is!" Ethan, who had been watching from the side, finally couldn’t hold back. He strode to Nephthys and hauled her up.
For the first time since she’d gone vacant, a faint clarity returned to Nephthys’s scattered pupils.
She lifted her head and stared at the "victors" who had crushed her with a hateful, delightfully malicious look.
"In Alexandria…" she said in a voice as thin as a wisp, "in our cult’s 'Dark Sanctuary'…"
"You will never find it…"
Before her words finished, a more authoritative, decisive voice cut in.
"No, we will find it."
It was Old Ab — Abdul.
The living fossil of the Cairo Branch wore the quiet confidence of an old hunter on his face.
"Don’t underestimate our Cairo intel network. I’ve already activated all of the branch’s secret informants in Alexandria."
"At most three hours."
"I can pry open the gate of that 'Dark Sanctuary' for you!"
Twelve hours later.
Alexandria, western harbor district.
Night pressed down. A deep-draft Egyptian felucca, bearing no flag, slid soundlessly into an abandoned private breakwater, aided by the Mediterranean’s cold wind.
Such craft are common along the Nile and Mediterranean coast, ideal disguises for smugglers and secret societies.
Lin Jie, William, and Ethan melted into the darkness and nimbly leapt down from the rocking deck.
Julian remained at the Cairo Branch’s telegraph room, where electromagnetic hums echoed.
He would serve as the remote comms support for this assault team, syncing intelligence with headquarters and coordinating any necessary outer support.
Beneath the shadow of the dock where they landed, a local "guide" dressed in fisherman's clothes with a heavy headscarf had been waiting a long time;
he blended into the surroundings.
He said nothing;
instead he flashed his windproof kerosene lamp three times in a discreet rhythm — the I.A.R.C.’s security signal used across North Africa.
Led by the silent guide, the three moved through narrow alleys heavy with briny sea air and cheap shisha smoke, finally stopping in front of a three-story white stone building that looked no different from the surrounding Greek-style houses.
A weathered hand-painted wooden sign hung above the entrance, inscribed in Greek and Arabic with "Apollonia Seafood Restaurant."
This was the Descendants of Apophis’ only secret sanctuary in Alexandria.
The guide finally spoke in a very low voice, relaying a directive from Cairo:
"Mr. Abdul ordered that half an hour ago, a not-small 'accident' occurred at the shisha house south of this block, which drew away all the patrols on this street. The northern dock gang fight will keep those British troops busy for an hour."
He paused, then shoved an old, wound-up brass pocket watch into Ethan’s hand.
"He said that from now until the watch’s minute hand moves a quarter turn, this area is 'clean.'"
With that, he bowed, slipped back into the dark alley from which they had come, and vanished.
Ethan glanced down at the ticking watch in his palm.
The minute hand pointed at twelve midnight.
A quarter turn.
That meant they had only fifteen minutes.
"Enough," Lin Jie answered calmly, then exchanged cold, murderous looks with William and Ethan at his side.
The "operation" began!
Boom!
With a dull thunder from Ethan himself setting a small charge of Alchemical Explosives, the heavy back door of the sanctuary disguised as a "seafood restaurant," along with half of the surrounding wall, was blown into rubble.
"Intruders!!!"
A piercing alarm shredded the false peace within the sanctuary.
Dozens of cult guards in black robes, armed with the latest German-made Mauser rifles, poured out like enraged snakes disturbed in their nest, swarming toward the forced breach from every corner.
They were met by Ethan’s accumulated rage.
Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!
Ethan was the first to surge into the smoke and death that filled the breach.
His Morning Star and Evening Star unleashed a terrifying, uninterrupted hail of fire.
He alone was a one-man army.
William served as that army’s immovable mobile bulwark.
Having lost his familiar Winchester, he turned his bear-like physique into the deadliest weapon, using perfected military hand-to-hand techniques to disassemble any cultist trying to flank or sneak up on Ethan, reducing them to unrecognizable heaps of bones and torn flesh.
Lin Jie did not participate in the front-line bloodbath.
From the first second of combat, he used the explosion’s smoke and darkness to slip silently past the chaotic firefight, then infiltrated deeper into the sanctuary.
After disarming several hidden traps concealed in the shadows, Lin Jie finally reached the underground altar, a place reeking of desecration and blood.
At the altar’s center stood a gaunt man in a gray robe wearing a grotesque beaked mask, holding a copper bell that radiated a chilling aura.
On the altar behind him rested the cursed diamond itself.
"We have waited a long time for you, vermin," the beaked man croaked a hoarse, ugly laugh.
He suddenly raised the copper bell high overhead.
"Let you all taste my latest work!"
"The Seventh Plague!! Ding—"
A yellow-green gas spewed wildly from inside the bell.
But just as that gas was about to engulf the entire altar—
Bang! A gunshot.
The copper bell the alchemist had hoisted was shattered by a shot.
"No!!"
The gray-robed man screamed in disbelief, and Lin Jie had already appeared at his side while he was off balance.
"Too bad…" Lin Jie’s voice was cold.
"Your experiment failed. Next time don’t lift it so high."
Lin Jie pressed the muzzle of Serene Heart to the gray-robed man’s neck.
"Now tell me."
"Why did you seek Humboldt’s key?"
Heh… heh heh…
Knowing his fate was sealed, the gray-robed man began to laugh in a fit of fanatical, mocking hysteria.
"You think we wanted Humboldt’s rusty junk of 'treasures'? Foolish mortals…"
"What we want is the 'prisoner' locked in the deepest part of that 'City of Gold'!"
"Alexander von Humboldt, that damned hypocrite, did not disappear in the Serapeum!"
"He used a forbidden alchemy to forcibly subdue the 'Guardian' that belongs to our great Father God and lock it in that damned underground labyrinth!"
"Hahaha!!!"
"That beast will use its world-ending power to provide the perfect living energy for our Father God’s awakening!!"
After this mad howl, the beaked, gray-robed official tried to bite the poisoned false tooth hidden in his molar with his last strength.
But he was too slow.
Lin Jie had predicted this move.
He ripped the man’s jaw open roughly, preventing the suicide.
"You cultists all love this little trick," Lin Jie muttered.
At that moment, hurried, frenzied footsteps echoed down the corridor.
It was Ethan, who had finished dealing with the remaining cult guards outside and burst in.
The English noble was smeared with blood that did not belong to him.
A dagger remained embedded in his side, not yet pulled free, but he ignored his wounds.
His reddened, bloodshot eyes were locked motionless on the diamond lying in a corner of the altar.
"Found it…"
Ethan scrambled up to the altar, crawling, ignoring the gray-robed official and the impassive Lin Jie beside him.
Only the inner demon that had tormented him and his family for generations remained in his eyes.
He extended trembling hands and carefully cradled the container that held the cursed diamond, treating it like a newborn, fragile and dangerous.
"Look…" the gray-robed man said with malicious delight, watching the enemy bask in triumphant joy.
"Another noble tomb raider from the 'civilized world.'"
"A thief who travels thousands of miles under the banner of guardianship and justice to rob our ancient land…"
"A despicable thief stealing what rightfully belongs to our pharaoh's heritage!"
"Grave robber."
"Thief."
Those two insulting and inescapable labels struck Ethan like two sharp slaps.
The vengeful thrill that had just flared within him sputtered out under the sting of their contempt.
Yes.
From the perspective of the Egyptian locals, what fundamental difference existed between him and the ordinary grave robbers who pillaged pharaohs’ tombs for wealth?
Weren’t they all outsiders?!
"Shut up!" Ethan raised his foot and kicked the gray-robed official hard.
"We are stopping you lunatics from dragging the world into the abyss of darkness! We are protecting order!!!"
"Protecting order?"
Even through the gray-robed man’s broken bones, his face twisted into a deeper sneer.
"Don’t use such lofty words to justify your colonial and imperialist robber logic, young master Redgrave."
"What you protect has never been order."
"What you protect is merely the arrogance and prejudice of your Western world!"
"Anyone daring to challenge your so-called order, whether we cultists or the rebels, will be branded evil and chaos by you without mercy!"
"And then, in the name of protection, you 'Templar knights' holding truth and justice will lawfully plunder and purge them!"
Ethan stood dazed on the altar, clutching the prize he had yearned for.
But the joy in his heart had vanished.