Chapter 998: From Despair to Hope
Translator: Sean88888 Editor: Elkassar1
Sheyan thought that he was already cautious enough, yet he could not help but feel that he had severely underestimated the designer of the prison when he saw this spectacular scene. Even if the "key" was lost or stolen, as long as one did not know the correct method, one would definitely just plug the key into the keyhole, which was the most logical thing to do. Who knew what would have happened. The consequence was definitely not as simple as the door staying locked.
With the illumination of the light, the two steel bars blocking the door started to lift slowly. The first layer of door slid slowly to the left and right, revealing the second layer of smooth inner door. The surface of the inner door was very clean, like a mirror, but it gave off an indestructible vibe. Right in the middle of the inner door was a spiral-shaped indentation, accompanied by what seemed to be an LCD screen that had various numbers flashing on it.
Sheyan and Sanzi were quite confused seeing this, but the deputy warden just walked over and picked up a small hammer beside the device and tapped it gently on the crystal key. It made an extremely low buzzing sound which seemed to reverberate inside their body.
Lines of words suddenly appeared on the inner door.
"Voiceprint analysis passed"
"Compatibility: 100%"
"The door will open in 10 seconds"
Amidst the thunderous roar of motors, the emergency battery played its final role. The steel barrier in front of Sheyan was helplessly infiltrated.
Like most fortified strongholds that had fallen in history, it collapsed from the inside.
A dark corridor appeared in front of Sheyan. Both sides of the corridor were like honeycombs that housed vicious criminals. Sheyan's arrival no doubt gave them great hope, so almost every one of them was shouting to be freed. The place became as noisy as a wet market.
At that moment, Sheyan once again saw the mocking intent in the deputy warden's eyes, but he already could not be bothered with the deputy warden. He instructed the grown creature, "Keep an eye on him. If anything happens, eat him!"
The grown creature stuck out its frog-like long, red tongue to lick the face of the officer, who was panicking, and nodded gleefully.
Sheyan and Sanzi stepped into the corridor and identified the room numbers in turn. They've long committed Mr. Nicholas' cell number to memory. After more than ten meters, they finally saw Cell No. 16. Through the narrow cell window, Sheyan saw a figure curled up on a narrow military bed inside the dim cell. He seemed to be asleep.
Sheyan knocked on the door and enquired politely, "Mr. Nicholas? Congratulations on regaining your freedom. Let us leave at once, if you please; we're in a hurry, and I'm sure you can't wait to taste the delicious food outside."
But there was no reply.
Sheyan did not believe that Nicholas had the kind of willpower to remain unmoved when the chance of freedom was presented to him. Even if he did not dare to run away, the response should not be so calm.
Sheyan's eyes flashed past the mocking intent hidden behind the deputy warden's eyes. An ominous feeling rose within him.
He rammed his shoulder onto the cell door, and the steel door creaked in protest. Sheyan slammed the door once more and it immediately gave way. As soon as he entered the cell, Sheyan was hit by a bout of dizziness. His nose detected the faint smell of almond.
'Poison!!' That was the first thought in Sheyan's mind.
He acted immediately. He grabbed Nicholas who was still on the bed and carried Nicholas out. But it seemed that Sheyan was too late. Anyone could tell that the man was dead. Yup, he had died just like that.
Sheyan could not stop the anger rising in him. He walked out with a nasty look on his face and stared daggers at the deputy warden.
"Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant."
The deputy warden was about to speak when Sheyan suddenly snapped a prison officer's neck. He then walked towards the deputy warden with a chilly look.
When the deputy warden saw the murderous intent in Sheyan's eyes, he roared, "I didn't do anything! When the prison was built, it was programmed that every five to eight minutes, the core inner zone must make a connection to the outer zone. This is done by the AI! Once the connection is unsuccessful for three times in a row, nerve gases will be sprayed into specific cell rooms to kill the prisoners inside. The secrets these prisoners hold can't be allowed to leak out, even if it means killing them! It's been nearly half an hour since the blackout started. It's all done by the computer!"
Sheyan didn't know what to think upon hearing that. He felt like he had been played. He was angry at being cheated, and he was also unwilling to simply give up. He couldn't help feeling suspicious.
'This doesn't make sense. It's hard enough to escape from this damn place even if I don't have to take anybody with me, let alone when I have to bring along a baggage like Nicholas?'
Sanzi was gutted too, but those looking in from the outside could usually see a bigger picture. Sheyan, being the receiver of the mission, could not escape from the stereotypical way of thought of someone in the game. Sanzi was able to look at the problem in a more objective way. When he saw that Sheyan was silent, he couldn't resist saying, "Bro, if we've failed the mission, then let's just go."
When Sheyan heard Sanzi's words, he suddenly sensed that something was wrong. That's right, failing the mission! Why had he not received the notification telling him that the mission had failed? He immediately looked at the previous series notifications and found that although all the key person in the mission had died, the notification remained unchanged:
[ Warning: You must find Nicholas as soon as possible to discover the truth. ]
This discovery immediately rejuvenated Sheyan, as if he had just taken a stimulant. He searched the corpse of Nicholas carefully and found that there were no suspicious marks, but there were several very obvious scars on his body. The scars were probably not knife wounds or something similar to that, because it was in the position of the heart. If there really used to be a wound there which could leave such terrible scars, the person would have died long ago.
Nicholas must have had a major surgery which resulted in those scars. It means that he had always been in bad health.
As soon as Sheyan noticed this, the mission hint changed.
[ It seems that you have discovered Nicholas' secret. Please find out the truth that has been buried in time. ]
Sheyan narrowed his eyes as he looked at the hint. For some reason, he felt that there was something left unsaid in the mission hint. Sheyan returned to Nicholas' cell, but found nothing useful. At the same time, Sanzi sneered maliciously at the deputy warden. It seemed to be something he had a lot of practice doing.
"Retrieve Nicholas' possession when he was brought here and hand it over to me. Don't even think that you can take your own sweet time. From now on, after every minute, I'll kill one person! They'll all be dead because of you if you don't come back here in 10 minutes!"
It turned out that when each prisoner entered this prison, everything he carried, including his clothes, cash and mobile was kept by the prison. His possession will be returned to him when he was released.
The deputy warden opened his mouth and seemed to want to say something to delay, but one of his subordinate, in the face of life and death, was having none of it. He shouted in a frenzy, "Send me! Please send me! I know where it is. I promise to get what you want in three minutes!"
And just like that, Sheyan successfully obtained a very old-looking bag, and it did have Nicholas' name on it. Sheyan pondered for a while and instructed his grown creature over. He tied Nicholas's body tightly to the creature's back with tape, then left with Sanzi.
I goes without saying that the outside of the prison was already in high alert by now. However, the prisoners Sheyan released along the way had caused great trouble to the government and the military.
Over a thousand vicious criminals were, in actuality, not that scary. A powerful bomb could instantly solve the problem. But there was also prison officers and staff inside, who numbered more than 500. Among them, there were also a few high ranking officials with some impressive backgrounds. No one in the government dared to abandon them.
A thousand criminals was definitely not the kind of hostage-taking situation where a shot from a sniper could solve the problem. This was a huge problem that had almost no solution. The government couldn't even negotiate with them silently.
Under such circumstances, Sheyan and Sanzi took the simplest and most unexpected way to leave the besieged Fox River Prison.
They raised their hands and walked out. Sheyan had given his grown creature a disguise, of course. Otherwise, as soon as the creature that was totally beyond the current level of human understanding stepped outside, it would definitely be shot at without hesitation!