Chapter 42 Part 1

The door was pushed open. Rommel nodded to the subordinate standing in the front yard with a gun: "Jane."

The Female Alpha turned her head at the sound, only to find her superior's expression was unexpectedly terrible. His shirt was mostly soaked with sweat, and his pupils showed faint signs of turning gray—an indication that he was about to lose control of his emotions.

"Colonel, you..."

"Truth Serum."

Jane was very surprised, but she quickly controlled her expression, pulled out a syringe, and handed it over.

Rommel slammed the door shut behind him.

Si Nan's entire body looked as if it had just been fished out of cold water. Soaking wet hair covered his snow-white face, and pale blue veins bulged on his arms and neck. Even on his tightly shut eyelids, terrifying blue threads were faintly visible.

But it was useless. Rommel knew he had already developed a resistance to electric shocks.

Rommel expelled the air from the syringe, grabbed one of his hands, and, gritting his teeth, injected the entire dose of the drug.

He had prepared the Truth Serum before coming to China, but based on experience, this drug couldn't provide the user with highly accurate details and had a certain degree of misleading potential. What was worse, sometimes the Truth Serum wouldn't make the subject immediately recall all the answers, but would instead take effect slowly over a week; all in all, it wasn't a very convenient interrogation tool.

He wouldn't have resorted to this method if he hadn't been completely at a loss.

In a daze, Si Nan began to struggle, making the handcuffs clatter, but Rommel held him down firmly.

"Where is the Ultimate Antibody?" He gripped Si Nan's sweat-drenched chin, preventing him from turning his head away in discomfort. "After your plane crashed, that Shockproof Cryo-Box you were carrying, where is the Ultimate Antibody that was inside?"

Si Nan groaned, his eyelids fluttering open slightly, but he couldn't see anything clearly.

"Did you inject it?" Rommel asked several times in both Chinese and English, forcing him to look at him. "Did you inject the Antibody?"

Antibody...

Ultimate Antibody...

Si Nan gasped for breath, as if drifting in the deep sea. Boundless seawater blocked out all sound, seeping into his body through his eyes, ears, mouth, nose, and even every pore, squeezing his internal organs into a tight ball.

"There is no Antibody," he heard a mournful female voice say slowly.

In a daze, he became very small. The Twelve Apostles on the church's stained-glass windows looked down on him. He had to bend his neck back completely to see the white, carved cross piercing the heavens.

A woman in a black veil held his hand, standing before a black pinewood coffin.

The priest asked, "Have you made up your mind, madam?"

"I pulled him back from hell, but I couldn't bring him back to the world of the living completely. He is not alive, nor is he dead. He wanders my laboratory, day after day, as autumn turns to winter, letting out sobs of loneliness and resentment..."

Tears streamed down her gentle, beautiful cheeks, soaking the white flower on her chest.

"Pandora's box has been opened. Disaster, plague, virus, and pain have flown out laughing. They will cover the earth before winter comes, and before spring arrives, they will destroy the entire world."

"I am powerless. There is no antidote in the world that can save this all. I can only close the box again with my own hands..."

The woman stepped forward, took a black wooden box from the priest's hands, opened it, and took out a green test tube as thick as two fingers, placing it on the coffin. Then, she pulled a blazing torch from the wall.

Young Si Nan took half a step back in fear.

In the firelight, the glistening green test tube was like a viper's fang, glinting with a captivating and deadly light.

"...to utterly annihilate the punishment humanity received for stealing the Fire Seed of the gods in the raging flames..."

Suddenly, the main doors were smashed open. The woman turned back in astonishment as a bullet tore through the air, sending the torch in her hand flying.

Soldiers flooded into the church. Cries and curses drowned out everything. Si Nan was swept up in the fleeing crowd and fell. The soldiers pounced like wolves, snatching the test tube from the woman's hands.

"Report, report, we have successfully obtained the Virus Stock Solution..."

"Run!" The woman's shrill roar pierced through the chaos. "Run—!"

The following scenes all overlapped chaotically in his memory, forming countless bizarre images.

Si Nan only remembered the ground constantly trembling, which was actually him stumbling backward; the last scene before his consciousness completely faded was a soldier opening a cryo-box and, amidst wisps of white vapor, carefully placing the green test tube inside.

It was clearly just an insignificant detail, yet for some reason, it remained incomparably clear so many years later, vivid and glaring in the faded memories of time—

On the lid of the cryo-box was cast a spread-winged, expressionless White Eagle.

At the top of the laboratory, a White Eagle relief was engraved on the metal ceiling.

The last drop of green liquid from the syringe was injected into the spine. After a few minutes of silence, under everyone's watchful eyes, the dead body began to twitch, letting out a muffled, dull roar from the depths of its chest.

Applause erupted. The researchers congratulated and hugged each other, then suddenly burst out in alarm—the dead man staggered and fell, grabbed the nearest researcher, and bit down on his ankle!

Screams of struggle, splashing blood, followed by the frantic footsteps of escape.

Si Nan stood behind the glass wall at the top of the laboratory, looking down as the group of people repeatedly pounded on the door, shouting in despair. The Living Dead tossed aside the half-eaten corpse, got on all fours on the floor, and crawled towards them step by step, dragging a long trail of black blood behind it.

Si Nan raised his gun but hesitated to take any action, until the reflection of the person behind him appeared in the glass window: "Noah."

Si Nan pulled the trigger.

With a soft whoosh, the Zombie, only two or three steps away from the terrified crowd, was headshot, its brains splattering everywhere.

"What were you doing just now?" the newcomer asked coldly.

Si Nan didn't answer. He turned, tossed the empty gun aside, straightened his cuffs, and walked out.

But in the instant they brushed past each other, Rommel suddenly grabbed him by the collar, slammed him hard against the glass wall with a thud, and stared into his cold eyes from up close. "You could have shot it the moment you realized the experiment had failed. Why did you hesitate?"

Si Nan said nothing.

"You deliberately watched that researcher get bitten to death because he interrogated you with torture when you were a child," Rommel said softly. "Isn't that right?"

Their eyes met for a long time. The corners of Si Nan's lips curved up slightly.

His lips were very pale. To someone who didn't know him, that smile would look quite beautiful at first glance, even having a hint of softness.

"You tore up my report requesting to destroy the virus and terminate the experiment again, didn't you?"

Rommel's brow twitched for a moment.

"It's fine," Si Nan interrupted his unspoken defense, his voice carrying its usual slightly husky quality, which was actually quite pleasant to listen to if you ignored the sarcastic tone. "It's the last time, anyway."

Si Nan broke free from his grip and walked towards the door. Rommel watched his straight back and shouted, "How many times do I have to tell you, Noah! The Pandora Virus is a breakthrough for extending human life and reviving the dead. From now on, there will be no gods; humanity itself can achieve eternity!"

Si Nan didn't look back.

"Your mother's experiment failed because she didn't unlock the final code of the virus. That's the key to the secret of eternal life. It's like the last thing in Pandora's box—hope. Now is the time for humanity to release it. Only by persevering can the final code be..."

"There's no such thing," Si Nan said faintly. "That isn't hope."

Rommel crossed his arms and frowned, only to see Si Nan turn his face to the side.

—From this angle, he actually looked a lot like his mother, with an ineffable kind of spirit.

"The last thing left in the box was an unrealistic fantasy. In mythology, it paved the road to the hell ruled by Ajax."

"Just like everything you're doing today, when the box is opened again, the final code of the virus will be the doom of humanity, dragging the entire world into hell..."

"But what does that have to do with me." Si Nan paused, then actually smiled again. "I'm not going to die anyway."

Rommel stood frozen on the spot, watching him walk out steadily.

Lightning tore through the dark clouds, and a torrential downpour began. The scattered tombstones in the cemetery were soaked with rain, turning a salty, grayish-black.

A helicopter slowly descended with a roar. Several plainclothes Chinese men, holding flashlights, jumped into the muddy, viscous graveyard, but Si Nan didn't turn around. He stood before the tombstone, his lips cool and soft, murmuring unknown scriptures and kissing the brass pendant on his chest, letting droplets of water fall in streams from the edge of his raincoat hood.

The beams of the flashlights rapidly approached with their footsteps. The steps were cautious and wary amidst the whooshing rain. Finally, someone coughed and said hoarsely in Chinese, "Sir."

Si Nan remained unmoved.

The man said cautiously, "...Old Mr. Guo, as agreed, has sent us to deliver something to you."

He stepped forward, his feet splashing mud, holding a bouquet of soaked white roses.

Si Nan stopped praying and stood silently for a moment under everyone's gaze before reaching out, pulling out a single rose, and stooping to place it in front of the tombstone.

This prearranged action made everyone simultaneously sigh in relief. The man couldn't hide his excitement. "Hello, we've been trying for a long time but never had a chance to connect with you successfully. Old Mr. Guo has completed all the preparations, and the person in charge of the confinement cells inside the White Eagle Base has also been arranged..."

Si Nan spoke, and to the man's surprise, his Chinese was even more fluent and natural than imagined. "Where is the contact?"

The man was stunned. "It's Old Mr. Guo's trusted confidant."

Si Nan shook his head.

No one knew what he meant. The cemetery fell silent for a moment, leaving only the deafening roar of the downpour.