Iron Bull taucht wieder auf

Kapitel 56

The air in the camp grew increasingly heavy. The workers were all herded back to their tents, forbidden from whispering or moving around. The number of snipers on the watchtowers had doubled, and the density of sentries around the camp had quadrupled. Almost every time someone peered behind a tent, they could see the dark muzzle of a gun.

I hope to speak with Yeran. These strange drawings left by the dragon are perplexing, and perhaps only Yeran can guide us.

After dinner, Tina stormed out of the large tent and shouted at Robert, "Go, send a reinforced platoon to send all the workers back to Cairo. Give each of them two thousand US dollars as payment for their work in the mine, according to the roster."

Her voice carried directly to the workers' tents on the west side, and the group of workers who were only working for money immediately erupted in excited cheers.

Suren whispered, "Layoffs? What does that mean?"

Tina, still furious, went back to her tent without even glancing in my direction.

After a noisy commotion in the camp, the remaining dozens of workers boarded three military vehicles, waving their newly acquired US dollars and shouting louder and louder. Escaping this inexplicable land of death was a huge relief for them; at least they no longer had to live in constant fear.

Cairo's bars, casinos, and red-light districts are opening their warm and ambiguous arms, waiting to welcome them.

"What's so strange about that? The military doesn't want too many civilians to know the country's top secrets, that's all!" I stared at Gu Ye and James as they emerged from the tent, not paying any attention to Suren's question.

"Have you considered that after Yelan left, these dragon paintings will never be solved?" Clearly, Suren valued the information conveyed in these paintings very much.

I walked out of the tent and hurriedly replied to her, "Perhaps I can go see Tina and ask Yelan to stay as our assistant!"

At that moment, I didn't realize that the power structure in the camp had changed. In fact, if I had been more observant, I should have been able to guess something from Tina's angry expression.

When he met James, he still wore a mysterious smile: "Mr. Feng, you weren't frightened by the snakes in the tomb, were you?"

Tanino, who was walking alongside him, glared at me fiercely, then walked straight away towards the military vehicle outside the tent.

"It's alright, it's just a pity that ten innocent lives were lost, isn't it?" I couldn't glean any valuable information from his enigmatic smile.

“What’s there? Look—” He waved his arm and pointed due north, where the Great Pyramid of Giza stood darkly in the twilight like a silent, gigantic monster.

"It is said that the Pharaoh conscripted over 50,000 slaves to build it, working day and night. At least one-fifth of them died of old age, exhaustion, or disease. Their bodies were dumped in the foundation of the pyramids. Imagine the spectacular sight of over 10,000 slave corpses piled up..."

His self-satisfied explanation aroused my extreme disgust. I nodded slightly and headed towards Tina's tent.

James laughed and stopped me: "Mr. Feng, I advise you not to go over there. General Tina is furious—go to Cairo and ask around. In the latter half of last year alone, she accidentally killed more than 100 soldiers in her rage..."

His smile was like a natural camouflage, concealing his true intentions, and his huge glasses also blocked his eyes, making him even more unfathomable.

From the military vehicle's side, the sound of a huge iron barrel falling to the ground echoed.

I turned my head and saw that Tanino was directing six soldiers to push three extremely heavy oil drums off a military vehicle.

"The Japanese are really clever. They want to burn all the snakes to death with gasoline. Haha, Mr. Feng, you probably thought of that too, right?" James looked at the busy Tanino and his face turned into a mocking smile.

“I heard your call—” I stared at James’s face.

"A phone call?" he asked blankly.

"From yesterday until now, all the mercenaries belonging to Gu Ye have been wiped out; they've all been killed by others," I continued, recounting to myself. This information came from a report by Suren. The reason Gu Ye was personally handling everything was precisely because he had no more subordinates at his disposal.

The mercenaries all ended up disappearing without a trace, but I have reason to believe that it was all caused by the phone call James made earlier.

"I don't understand what you're talking about... But, Mr. Feng, people who know too many secrets often don't live long, right?"

James flicked the dust off his cuffs, cleared his throat, stretched his arms, and yawned contentedly. He smiled casually and said, "Soon, the 'Eye of the Moon' will see the light of day again. Let us, the lucky ones, welcome the birth of this gem together!"

I wasn't in the same good mood as him. I turned around and walked towards the large tent. As long as there was a sliver of a chance, I had to stop Gu Ye's reckless actions.

As soon as I reached the entrance of the large tent, two soldiers stopped me with a "snap" of their guns.

The power of military control was immense; they would never let me in without my superior's permission.

"Scalpel Master, High Priest Master, I have urgent business to discuss..." I shouted into the tent, suppressing my anger. Up to this point, everything I've done has been for the Scalpel Master, without a single personal gain. Being excluded as an "outsider" under such circumstances only amplifies my frustration.

Natura greeted them with a smile, raising his hand to push aside the soldiers' submachine guns. He had changed into a crisp gray military uniform, wearing a spotless hard-top military cap and, quite solemnly, snow-white ceremonial gloves.

This attire left me speechless with astonishment. I immediately realized that something significant must have happened during today's talks for Natura to suddenly change his clothes. Did this mean he would shed the mystique of the High Priest and directly seize control of military affairs? This reminded me of Suren's tape recording and Tina's furious outburst—

I composed myself before speaking as calmly as possible: "High Priest, I hope you will allow Yelan to stay. He is an expert who has worked in the desert for a long time, and he will definitely be of great help to our pyramid excavation work. Now is a critical time when we need manpower. If you let such a talent go, you will definitely regret it..."

Natura puffed out his chest, looking smug and self-satisfied. Although he kept smiling, his tone was clearly bureaucratic: "I can consider this matter further. Mr. Feng, please come in, let's have a proper chat..."

The military trucks, full of workers, were about to depart. His "I'll think about it" was clearly an ambiguous excuse, but I really couldn't do anything about it. After all, the difference in our status was huge. He was a high priest with great power, while I was just a commoner with little influence.

Upon entering the tent, I was immediately struck by a strong smell of smoke, mixed with a peculiar aroma—undoubtedly the lingering scent of burnt low-proof heroin. I already knew that Tanino was a drug addict who used drugs to boost his energy, but the sheer intensity of the heroin smell was far beyond what one person could have caused.

The scalpel lay on a long sofa, its legs covered by a thick military blanket. When it saw me come in, it simply smiled silently as a greeting.

The layout inside the tent hadn't changed much, except for the addition of a square wooden blackboard about one meter in size on the side. The blackboard was now covered in messy scribbles, the most striking being a simple line drawing of a flame in the center.

“Please sit down—” Natura sat down unceremoniously in the large chair behind the desk and gestured for me to sit in the simple chair next to him. This place used to be Tano’s cozy home, but now it had been completely requisitioned by the army and had become Natura’s territory.

On that flame, there were at least three people's handwritings, all of which left the two letters "OK".

"Mr. Feng, have you thought of any good way to deal with the snake formation?" Natura crossed his legs, picked up the cigarette case on the table, took out a cigarette and put it to his lips. It was a cigarette that Gu Ye had smoked, laced with heroin. It seemed that Natura was a kindred spirit among Gu Ye's drug addicts.

The writing on the blackboard said it all: the solution of using fire was a consensus reached by everyone.

Scalpel coughed softly, then took a cigarette and lit it at the same time as Natura. Instantly, the distinctive aroma of heroin slowly filled the tent.

He hadn't changed in appearance, but his profound temperament and heroic demeanor were completely gone. Looking at him curled up on the sofa armrest, completely absorbed in a cigarette, I found it hard to connect the person in front of me with the scalpel who once commanded respect and roamed the world.

If the experts in the tomb raiding world were to see today's scalpel, they would probably be utterly shocked and bewildered.

"No." I frowned and shook my head.

"Haha, forget it then. According to General Tina, you're the smartest Chinese person. I was hoping to hear your brilliant ideas—but now it seems there's no need! We'll just use Gu Ye's plan. Pour in a few barrels of high-energy gasoline, set it on fire, and everyone can wait to eat snake meat! Hahahaha..."

He laughed arrogantly, but I know that such a person and such laughter often indicate that he is actually very confused and has no idea what he wants to do.

The scalpel lowered its eyelids, took the last two deep drags of the cigarette, and looked so greedy that it seemed as if it wanted to swallow the cigarette butt whole.

His face was a horribly sallow yellow, his cheeks were sunken, and his teeth looked like they hadn't been brushed for days, yellowish and dull. Most striking was his head of messy, unstyled hair, haphazardly combed back, dull and lifeless.

In my memory, scalpels have always been the most particular about personal etiquette, and have never been this sloppy before.

“Mr. Feng, you came in such a hurry, is there something else you want to say?” Natura glared at me with slight displeasure, unwilling to be ignored for so long.

The desk was spotless; the books, maps, and folders that had once belonged to Gu Ye were now scattered in a cardboard box to the side. Natura stretched his arms out on the desk, exuding an air of "I am the only one who can rule the world."

Behind him, the black curtain still hung—I suddenly had an urge to go behind the curtain and see what kind of vicious trap Gu Ye had used to ambush and severely injure the tiger…

"Yes, that's my opinion. I'm against using fire, because... because a friend has given me a serious warning: we can't use open flames in the tomb, otherwise... otherwise, there will be huge chaos..."

“Friend? Warning?” Natura stared at me suspiciously, then slammed his hand heavily on the table. “Your friend isn’t the tiger that stole the scriptures and escaped, is it?”

The tiger's theft of the scriptures was the trigger for Lu Jiacan's disappearance. In an instant, Natula's face turned as red as a boiled shrimp, and his other hand quietly reached for the pistol at his waist.

The scalpel watched all this indifferently, covered its lips with its hand, and secretly yawned, appearing completely unconcerned.

“Tell me, where is the tiger? Where is the scripture?” Natura roared hysterically, pounding his fists on the table like a demon. The guards outside rushed in at the sound and quickly pointed their submachine guns at me.

I smiled and calmly replied, "He's dead, didn't everyone see that? He died from Mr. Gu Ye's hidden weapon. As for the whereabouts of the scriptures, I have no comment."

The tiger's whereabouts after stealing the scriptures are shrouded in mystery. Although I heard him speak to me using the "sound transmission" technique in Ahkan Town, I couldn't find his hiding place at all.

Natura glared at me angrily, like an enraged unicorn.

"I'm just trying to be helpful by reminding everyone that as we all know, so many venomous snakes hide underground. Over thousands of years, the venom they breathe out has turned into marsh gas. If it comes into contact with an open flame, there's a 90% chance it will explode violently. The consequences of that explosion—I don't need to remind the High Priest, do I?"

Biogas is chemically extremely unstable. A recent report in the Cairo Daily described how a resident accidentally ignited biogas in a sewer as a prank, resulting in a sudden explosion that instantly destroyed two nearby 15-story residential buildings, turning them into a scene of rubble.

Natura paused for a moment, then his arrogance subsided considerably: "Um... you don't need to worry about that."

I'm just guessing that Tang Xin meant "don't use open flames" because she was afraid of igniting the marsh gas, but I don't know if that's right. Intuitively, I take every word Tang Xin says very seriously. After all, she's the future head of the Tang Clan in Sichuan, and she's very measured and carries a lot of weight in her words and actions. She would never speak carelessly.

Su Lun's jealousy was completely unreasonable. How could Tang Xin, with her high and mighty status, possibly favor me so easily?

“Marsh gas… can be measured… air composition analyzer… cough cough…” The scalpel spoke, its voice extremely low and clearly lacking in strength.

Natura blinked violently a dozen times in a row, then suddenly realized: "Perhaps... it's not entirely marsh gas? But a mutated, highly flammable gas..."

He was able to sit in the position of high priest, so he must not be a person with low intelligence. His argument is very correct. No one can analyze the specific composition of the air contained inside the pyramids for thousands of years. The "gas analyzers" commonly used in scientific laboratories can only vaguely measure less than twenty types of air.

Whether it's the "test tube titration method," the "incineration weighing method," or even the most accurate "vacuum comparison method" currently recognized internationally, they all remain at the research stage and are only theoretically feasible, not practical guiding tools in actual exploration work.

It's important to know that every time materials are sent to any scientific laboratory, their test reports are always solemnly stamped with a statement: "This result is only responsible for the submitted sample."

Therefore, the exact composition of the air inside the pyramids remains unknown, and even if human science were to advance for another hundred years from this point onward, it is unlikely that a breakthrough will be made in this area.

"Haha...haha..." The scalpel laughed, nodded slightly, and gave Natu a thumbs up.

This seems to contradict the original personality of the scalpel—I don't remember him ever giving a thumbs up to anyone, but he said more than once that he only admired one person in his life, Yang Tian, the "King of Tomb Raiders." He treated everyone else, whether they were princes or nobles of large countries or presidents and crown princes of small nations, with neither servility nor arrogance, treating them all equally.

Since Suren said the scalpel had "changed," he must be behaving very differently than before. I observed him carefully, hoping to find more evidence to make Suren's inference more convincing.

Outside the tent, I could hear the heavy rolling of gasoline drums on the ground. I could tell that at least six large iron drums were rolling toward the derrick.

The military vehicles had already roared away from the camp and sped northward—it's best to put Yelan's matter aside for now. I'm afraid he's been terrified by the snake formation in the pyramids. Let him go back to the city to recuperate for a while.

"You mean, we absolutely cannot use fire?" Natura probed me.

I stood up and nodded firmly: "Yes! If you insist on your reckless actions, please give me two hours to evacuate fifty kilometers away first, so as not to be caught in the crossfire after a major explosion."

Two hours was enough time to take Suren away by car. As for all the other fanatics who were bewitched by the "Eye of the Moon," their fate was in their own hands.

Natura hesitated for a few more minutes before loudly summoning the guards: "Notify Gu Ye that the operation is suspended. We need to discuss this further."

Less than thirty seconds after the order was given, Gu Ye roared as he rushed in: "What? High Priest, what are we waiting for—to wait for the serpents to rise outside the Cave of Ten Thousand Serpents, seize the tunnels, and surround the entire camp? I request immediate action! Immediate action!"

He rushed to the desk, glaring angrily at Natura. This Japanese man, blinded and deluded by the "Eye of the Moon," was in a state of extreme fanaticism and was unlikely to listen to any advice.

Part 5: The Cave of Ten Thousand Snakes

— Chapter 8 - On the Eve of Dramatic Change —

I can understand Tano's feelings. He was about to get his hands on the "Eye of the Moon Goddess," and he certainly couldn't let these venomous snakes ruin his plans.

The curtain was half-rolled up, and looking towards the wellhead, six 200-kilogram gasoline drums could be seen standing upright beside the wellhead. At a single command, the operation to burn the snake array could commence within half an hour.

No one can imagine the consequences of a fire burning inside the pyramids, because the entire top of the structure is completely sealed. The thick smoke and carbon dioxide produced by the fire could only be released to the outside through tunnels. This was not a simple romantic bonfire party; we also had to take into account the venom that many snakes desperately spewed out before being burned to death, which would evaporate and mix with the air. This toxic gas would certainly become a deadly weapon.

It was already dark, and the beams of the searchlights swept across the gasoline drums with a terrifying sense of despair. Gasoline drums were known as "moving bombs," and when they were transported underground to carry out this special mission—I dared not think about it. Unfortunately, I didn't take Tang Xin's warning too seriously at the time and didn't pursue the matter further.

"I only said to postpone the execution, calm down! Please calm down!" Natura roared as well, because Tano's crazy intrusion was clearly a disregard for his rights.

"High Priest, I can't stay calm! I can't stay calm—just give me ten soldiers, and I'll bring back the 'Eye of the Moon' within twenty-four hours..."

Taniguchi seemed to view acquiring the gem as a piece of cake. If he were wise enough, he would have understood that when a person comes into close contact with the white light emitted by the gem, they will suffer a shock similar to high-intensity radiation. The soldier who was pierced through like a cicada shell perfectly illustrates this danger. If he weren't a stubborn Japanese, and it were someone else I didn't dislike so much, I might have kindly warned him.

Now, seeing his ferocious, mad dog-like expression, I couldn't be bothered to say anything and just stood quietly to the side.

Today's special meeting had five attendees, but only three signed "OK" on the blackboard. There must be two others who opposed the fire attack. I guess one of them is Tina, and who could the other be? Is it Scalpel?

The scalpel remained calm, curled up on the sofa, one hand supporting its forehead, eyes closed, it was hard to tell whether it was deep in thought or dozing off.

Natura clearly showed his displeasure: "Mr. Gu Ye, have you ever considered that there might be flammable and explosive gases inside the mysterious pyramids? If a fire were to start one, wouldn't it cause a tremendous explosion? It's not just about destroying the Egyptian government's great heritage, but the possibility of the entire camp being reduced to ashes. Can you bear that responsibility?"