Chapter 68 - 67: Change of the Statue
Chapter 68: Chapter 67: Change of the Statue
Allies? Information?
France had far too many allies. All the members of the European Union, for starters. Then there were the NATO members, which of course included the United States. On top of that, there were countless other countries of all sizes around the world with which they had treaties.
It wasn’t just France; nearly every major power was in a similar position.
"Uh, Minister, which ally?"
"Minister, what information is it?"
Henry and Kodell asked one after the other, each focusing on a different point.
The Minister of Defense was already white-haired. If it weren’t for his high-ranking position at the Ministry of Defense, he would have been at retirement age in any other post.
Without trying to build suspense, the old minister, Franco, gestured behind him. He signaled to the departmental subordinates—who had been watching their superiors argue from beginning to end, too terrified to speak—to turn on the conference room’s electronic screen.
Then, he methodically pulled a USB drive from his suit pocket.
"The Brits actually helped us out this time!"
The old minister’s tone wasn’t happy. Instead, it carried a hint of gravity.
As the screen lit up, he inserted the USB drive into the port on the conference table. Someone beside him quickly opened the only file on the drive: a collection of data presented as a slideshow.
The first slide showed an unusually large flowering plant. Its blossoms were exceptionally vibrant, causing everyone in the room, aside from the old man, to silently marvel at its beauty.
But the second image plunged their admiration straight into the Abyss.
The moment the picture appeared, goosebumps erupted on everyone’s skin.
It was the same flower, but the photo was framed wider than the first, capturing the plant’s roots.
Bodies. Countless bodies!
Piled up at its base.
The unnervingly crimson roots were all burrowed into the corpses. Some even protruded from the bodies’ mouths, eyes, and ears.
Perhaps they weren’t all corpses.
In the photo, many of the figures impaled by the roots were still reaching outward.
The photograph was static, yet for the viewers, it was somehow more terrifying than a moving image.
Later slides showed isolation rooms, parasitized individuals with a faint blue tinge to their skin, and, inevitably, medical staff who, for some reason, were also parasitized despite wearing hazmat suits.
This was the first half of the slideshow. The limited text and images reflected the nightmare a joint expedition team had endured.
This nightmare concluded with a short video clip of bombers being deployed.
The second half of the slideshow clearly took place in the United Kingdom, which was evident from the police uniforms in the photos.
However, what they were doing was somewhat baffling to everyone.
This group had surrounded a large supermarket, locking it down completely from the sky to the ground.
The next part was a link to a video.
When played, the video was remarkably clear—obviously filmed by an officer on the scene.
There was no standoff between police and criminals, no one shouting orders into the building.
At the beginning, two SWAT teams were sent in, one through the front Door and one through the back, but after that, there was no further action.
The crucial part was that the SWAT officers who went in never came out. Not even a gunshot was heard.
Afterward, the police sent in small remote-controlled camera drones and rovers, but they couldn’t find anything unusual.
The only eerie thing was that they also couldn’t find the customers and police officers who had previously disappeared.
The text documentation stated that the Manchester police had the supermarket surrounded for 48 hours, during which time no one went in and no one came out.
When they sent people in again after that, they were perfectly safe.
Although nothing strange has happened there since, the place is still cordoned off by the police under the pretext of searching for bombs planted by terrorists, and nearby residents have been temporarily relocated.
The slideshow didn’t end there but switched to another region.
This time, it obviously wasn’t the United Kingdom.
There wasn’t much information. Compared to the first two parts, the third and fourth sections only had a few pictures and one video, but they were just as memorable.
The picture was of a naked man whose body was covered in crystals. Even in a photograph, it was clear the crystals were growing from inside his body, not inserted into it.
A close-up of where they met the skin and keratin made this perfectly clear.
The fourth section’s video showed fighters from some unknown organization in the Middle East Region, frantically firing at a mud-brick house. They even launched rockets at it.
At the end of the video, a piece of scaly, shredded flesh was still writhing.
After watching the entire slideshow, with the goosebumps still not gone, everyone in the conference room had the same thought.
’This is global!’
Kodell turned his gaze back to Henry, the meaning in his eyes perfectly clear.
’You still dare to block this?’
Henry was extremely annoyed by Kodell’s insolent stare and disliked the man intensely, but he had to admit he was ready to compromise. He *had* to compromise.
He gave no other indication, simply taking out his fountain pen and signing Kodell’s proposal.
"I suggest we convene another, larger-scale meeting. And, Kodell, your department needs to be expanded!"
The old minister said this as he clapped Kodell on the shoulder.
But the pressure on Kodell was far greater than the weight of that hand on his shoulder.
"Right. Since the Brits have been decent enough, as allies who have fought shoulder-to-shoulder since the World Wars, we should return the favor. Make a copy of the Guardian Organization’s email and forward it to them."
...
「Qingzhen, the Association building’s empty hall.」
Since the work began, the three of them had divided each day into three parts, with each person resting for eight hours in rotation to ensure they had enough energy.
However, this planned three-shift rotation didn’t go as scheduled. South Wind and the others would basically sleep for only five hours before rushing out to continue their work.
It wasn’t that they were truly that passionate about the work; rather, the statue seemed to possess Magic Power, exuding an extraordinary allure.
Even their dreams were filled with visions of the statue.
The sculpting material was also very peculiar—peculiar to the point of being eerie.
It felt soft to the touch, but you couldn’t even make a dent in it. Sometimes it felt warm, but a thermometer placed on it would show no change.
They felt as if they were carving a living thing. Sometimes, when sleep-deprived and bleary-eyed, they would have the illusion of glimpsing a faint purple flame burning on the transparent, jelly-like "stone." But after rubbing their eyes, they would find nothing there.
Besides the unfinished sculpture in the hall, the intermittently appearing Shadow of the Red Demoness also captivated their minds.
Fortunately, the three were resilient. Plus, Qin Xiaoxia had repeatedly sweet-talked them into feeling a sense of mission, as if participating in some grand endeavor. Otherwise, anyone else might have tried to run away several times by now.
Qin Xiaoxia hadn’t given them a clear design brief, only telling them to sculpt a robed human female that fit the material’s dimensions.
As a result, whenever Qin Xiaoxia came to check on the statue’s progress, he would find that it was strangely morphing into a form closer to the Red Demoness.
Not the Red Demoness exactly, but an anthropomorphized version of her.
Furthermore, due to the unique properties of his Magic Power Polymer, the material automatically sensed the artisans’ inspiration and state of mind, changing on its own.
This led to Qin Xiaoxia returning this evening to find that the sculpture’s hair had turned fiery red.
"Doudou, what’s going on?"
Qin Xiaoxia quietly approached Doudou, who had been watching from the corridor above the empty hall all day, and whispered his question.
He remembered it wasn’t like this during the day.
This situation was beyond his expectations, especially since down in the hall, the Shadow of the Red Demoness was also staring at the statue.
Doudou took a bag of potato chips from Qin Xiaoxia’s hand, looking puzzled while opening it.
"I’m not sure either. There hasn’t been any special interference."
"Big Bro, it’s your Magic Power Polymer. Can’t you feel what’s wrong with it?"
This was followed by the sound of CRUNCH CRUNCH CRUNCH as she chewed the chips.
"That’s what’s so strange—the fact that I *can’t* sense any particular change."
Qin Xiaoxia’s voice was very soft. His eyes were half-closed, his attention completely focused on the space between the Red Demoness and the statue, as if trying to see if there was some invisible connection.
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