Photo Prison
Lu Xun didn't enter the door.
He just stood there quietly, looking up at the Buddha statue between light and shadow. In those eyes that had always been steady and profound, a hint of confusion still appeared at this moment...
His encounters over the past few days flashed through his mind, as well as the helicopter pursuing him. After a long silence, he still murmured to himself uncertainly:
"My sacrifice is meaningful to humanity... right?"
Lu Xun didn't believe in Buddhism, nor did he believe in any religion. He was asking that Buddha statue in the darkness, and even more so asking himself... He didn't flee far away like Wu Tongyuan and the others, but chose to stay behind and actively cooperate with the experiments. This was a gamble between trust and trust. But now, he felt confused about the future of this gamble.
The Buddha statue didn't speak. It just quietly guarded its Divine Rank, overlooking all living beings;
Lu Xun took a deep look at it, then prepared to turn around and leave. He had just stepped back half a step when a blinding camera flash suddenly lit up from behind!
Click—
His figure instantly disappeared on the spot!
In the empty connecting corridor.
A young man wearing a black windbreaker slowly walked over, holding a camera against his chest with one hand.
"Tsk... Just for this one moment, making me toss and turn all the way here." The young man's face still held quite a bit of resentment. He looked down at the camera's screen. A moment later, a photo was printed out on the spot.
He pinched a corner of the photo with his fingertips and waved it in the air. Then, facing the dim starlight, he narrowed his eyes and carefully sized it up.
In the photo was an open main door of a Buddhist hall. A Buddha statue sat upon a Divine Rank of light and shadow. In front of it, a black-clothed man turned his head sideways to look back.
"Don't say it, the composition of this picture is really not bad."
The young man mumbled narcissistically, turned around, and walked out of the temple. At the same time, a crisp phone ringtone sounded.
"Hello?"
"..."
"Yes, already caught him."
"..."
"Transferring the laboratory to the suburbs? True... He's already run out once. If any intelligence gets passed out, the old laboratory will be exposed..."
"..."
"Alright, then I'll go to the platform and wait for you guys."
Hanging up the phone, his figure gradually disappeared outside the temple's doors, heading to an unknown destination.
...
"How is it? Are you okay?"
While driving the car, Chen Ling looked at Yang Xiao in the passenger seat.
Yang Xiao's face was somewhat pale. He seemed to have not yet recovered from the terrifying leap just now. After taking a deep breath, he spoke helplessly, "Not injured... Just a bit scary."
"Your Mental Fortitude is pretty good. I thought you wouldn't jump down that easily."
"Because I saw you guys all jumped."
"We all have means to save our lives, but you don't... If I hadn't caught you, I'm afraid you would have become the first of the Nine Monarchs to fall to your death."
"..."
The vehicle parked near Huangcheng Temple. The two got out of the car at the same time and walked straight towards that temple silent in the night.
As the two arrived at the temple's entrance, Chen Ling's eyebrows suddenly frowned.
"Something's wrong..."
"What's wrong?"
"The main door is open." Chen Ling pointed at that main door which was left ajar just enough to accommodate one person passing through, and spoke in a deep voice, "With Dr. Lu's abilities, he shouldn't need to take the main door at all."
Yang Xiao's eyebrows also frowned consequently. "You're saying..."
"Let's go in and take a look."
The two of Chen Ling walked into the temple and quickly searched around. Wherever they looked, they didn't see any figures, which naturally included Lu Xun's.
"According to Old Lu's speed, he should have arrived much earlier than us." Yang Xiao was deep in thought. "But he isn't here..."
"It seems someone beat him to the punch."
Chen Ling's expression was very calm. He crouched down, and a smear of apricot red was outlined at the corner of his eyes. The [Secret Pupil] began to carefully observe the surrounding details. "No traces of fighting were found, which means the opponent likely launched a sneak attack, and their Rank is above Dr. Lu's..."
"But how did they get here so fast? We only took a few minutes to get here, yet they could be faster than us? It's simply like Foreknowledge."
Chen Ling stood up and slowly spoke, "If things go bad, it really is Foreknowledge."
"Then what do we do now?"
Chen Ling didn't answer. He just calmly took out that flip phone from his pocket. Deep within his eyes, a faint wisp of aurora diffused open...
The next moment, through the phone, Chen Ling directly connected with all surrounding electronic surveillance equipment. In this neon night, pairs of electronic pupils that never extinguished silently took over the city.
"Relax, they cannot escape my eyes."
"Dr. Lu advocates avoiding battles, and naturally I have no objections. But now that the opposing side has actively provoked us... Then we can only see which side's 'Hand' is harder."
Chen Ling spoke indifferently.
...
Looking at this world full of static noise before him, Lu Xun's expression was incredibly solemn.
At this moment, he was still standing at the entrance of the Buddhist hall. It was just that other than a small area around him, all other scenes in his field of vision were black and white. Furthermore, black particles filled the frame, like a blurry photo taken in the darkness.
Lu Xun didn't know what had happened. He only knew a burst of white light flashed from behind, and the world became like this...
He tried to walk out of the temple. But once he walked out of this 4:3 colored frame of the Buddhist hall's main doors, he would automatically walk back in from the other side, like a miniature version of a ghost wall.
Lu Xun also tried to feel the starlight and use Galaxy Tide to transfer himself. But in this world, he couldn't feel the existence of the starry sky at all...
He was already trapped here.
"The Path of some 'Black Hand'..." Lu Xun murmured to himself.
Lu Xun didn't know how they found him, nor did he know what Tier the opponent was. But he knew that in all likelihood, he had already been captured by the enemy right now... This small 4:3 colored frame was his prison.
At this time, Lu Xun's first reaction was whether Chen Ling and Yang Xiao were safe. But calculating the time, the two of them probably hadn't arrived at the scene yet. If the person who captured him left in time, there was a high probability they wouldn't run into each other... But this also meant that Chen Ling and Yang Xiao had no way to know his location, and no way to come save him.
Just as Lu Xun was pondering whether he could escape by himself, the colored frame around him suddenly distorted, as if someone was forcefully tearing it apart, splitting the surrounding world in half!
The next moment, a feeling of the sky spinning and the earth turning surged into Lu Xun's heart. He only felt his vision blur, and his figure fell heavily onto a certain hard ground.
At the same time, a voice slowly rang out from ahead:
"Dr. Lu... we meet again."