Under the towering dome of Hangar 3, lights illuminated every inch of the space as bright as day.
Several sharp-looking VTOL aircraft, painted in matte dark colors, lay quietly in their designated areas like resting birds of prey.
Ground crew members in jumpsuits swarmed around the aircraft like worker ants, performing final checks.
The air was filled with the clatter of tools against metal, the *shiss* of energy conduits connecting, and the low, vibrating hum of engines warming up.
Christina stood by the boarding stairs of one of the aircraft.
She had changed out of her stiff examiner’s skirt and into a form-fitting set of black tactical gear.
She was performing a final equipment check before departure.
Just as her fingertips were about to touch the specialized tactical gloves lying aside, Vigus’s unique broadcast voice splashed into the busy, orderly space like invisible ice water.
Christina’s movements froze instantly.
Her slender fingers, coated in matte anti-glare paint, hovered just a centimeter away from the gloves.
She snapped her head up, her gaze immediately locking onto Professor Corso, who had just entered the hangar with an equally solemn expression.
A flicker of annoyance at being interrupted flashed in her azure eyes, followed quickly by an incredulous rage beginning to gather beneath the blue.
“Professor?!”
Her voice rose involuntarily.
“Lin Yu is also participating in this mission?! Is there a mistake in the order? Or was there a communication error somewhere? He doesn’t even know which way the door to the basic theory classroom opens! Physical tests, weapon familiarity, battlefield survival protocols… he’s a complete blank slate! Letting him participate in a Grade A combat mission is equivalent to…”
She panted sharply, seemingly searching for the most accurate word.
Finally, a cold and direct term escaped her lips.
“…murder!”
The scholar-like gentleness and composure usually present on Professor Corso’s face were nowhere to be found.
He walked toward Christina, his voice kept very low.
“The order source is the Board of Directors, through the highest-authority channel. We…”
His voice trailed off, carrying a sense of helplessness when facing a massive system.
“…do not have the power to question or refuse.”
“The Board of Directors really is… a bunch of incurable lunatics.”
With those words, Christina regained her calm and resumed checking her gear.
More than ten minutes later, Tangris led Lin Yu and the others into the hangar.
“Lin Yu.”
Professor Corso walked quickly toward him, his eyes deep and hard to read.
“The situation is somewhat beyond my expectations…”
Lin Yu was about to explain when a voice came from the side.
“Take him to change his equipment. We move out in ten minutes.”
Tangris’s voice was crisp and decisive, cutting off their conversation.
Christina performed one last quick check of her gear—pistol, dagger, several mounting modules of unknown function—and finally, her gaze landed on Lin Yu.
She hesitated to speak, but ultimately, she could only lead Lin Yu further into the hangar.
***
Ten minutes later.
The group, now fully geared up, stood before the hangar exit.
The heavy alloy doors slid open slowly accompanied by the hiss of air pressure.
The violent roar of engines and the hurricane-force winds kicked up by the rotors instantly slammed into them like a physical wall, battering their eardrums and bodies, swallowing all other sound.
The streamlined VTOL aircraft looked like a crouching metal beast.
Its hatch was already open, and the interior lights were a cold, ghostly blue.
Professor Corso gave Lin Yu one last pat on the shoulder.
His voice was almost drowned out by the roar, and Lin Yu had to rely on lip-reading and lingering syllables to understand:
“Remember, the most important thing right now is to ensure your own safety…”
Lin Yu nodded, stepped forward, and followed closely behind Christina’s back into the aircraft.
The heavy hatch closed with a tight *thrum* behind Lin Yu, completely isolating him from the campus.
The deafening roar of the engines outside was instantly suppressed, transforming into a low, continuous vibration that penetrated the bones, like the heartbeat of a sleeping giant.
The air inside was a mixture of the pungent scent of ozone and the metallic tang of specialized hydraulic oil.
He was motioned to sit in a fixed seat near the cabin wall.
As soon as he sat down, the seatbelt at his side extended automatically like it had a life of its own, clicking into place with a precise *snap* that bound him firmly to the seat.
Christina sat right next to him.
She had removed some of her non-essential equipment, but her tactical vest, thigh holster, and several modular attachments of unknown use still made her look incredibly sharp.
Her eyes were piercing, a world away from how she had appeared during the interview.
Further forward sat the overall commander of this operation, Director Tangris.
He sat like a stone statue, arms crossed over his chest.
The support team, totaling six members, sat scattered throughout the cabin.
They included three regular members of the Execution Department, one regular member of the Logistics Department, one intern from the Execution Department, and Lin Yu—the intern from the Logistics Department.
A burly man, built like a grizzly bear, was silently checking a heavy-duty, large-caliber weapon with an exaggerated design.
A lean member with quick, sharp eyes had his fingers flying across the portable terminal of a miniature screen.
There was also a woman with a calm aura and a clear medical cross on her arm, who was counting items in an open medical kit with countless internal compartments.
Everyone seemed busy; only a girl who looked to be about his age was looking around, just like he was.
The girl appeared to be Asian as well.
She had hair dyed in a gradient of purple-gray to light blue, and a long blade was tucked at her waist.
Suddenly, the aircraft jolted violently, and a powerful force pressed Lin Yu firmly into his seat back.
Outside the porthole, the strange lights of the Thanatos Academy campus—a blend of the ancient and the modern—sank and shrank rapidly before being completely swallowed by thick, cottony clouds and the bottomless night.
They were moving away from the safe harbor at an incredible speed, rushing toward an unknown abyss.
“We are heading toward the target sea area. Estimated flight time is 2 hours 17 minutes,” Christina’s voice sounded in his ear.
Her tone was steady, clearly cutting through the low background hum of the engines.
“While we have time, you need to understand what we are facing and why we are going there.”
She raised her wrist and activated a micro-terminal.
A thin beam of light projected into the air between them, quickly condensing and expanding to form a detailed electronic map of the Mediterranean Sea.
A pulsing, glaring scarlet dot was marked at the coordinates 32°30′ N, 30°30′ E.
“This,” Christina’s fingertip hovered over the red dot, “is where Tang Rou—the primary search and rescue target of this mission—sent her last valid signal.”
Her tone grew a fraction more solemn when mentioning Tang Rou.
“She was responsible for escorting the Divine Artifact successfully recovered from Egypt’s Valley of the Kings—the Eye of Ra—back to headquarters.”
“Eye of Ra…”
Lin Yu repeated the name in a low voice.
“It is one of the seven Divine Artifacts explicitly recorded in the *Remnant Scrolls of the Underworld*,” Christina explained further.
Her fingers slid gracefully through the air, and beside the map, seven ancient and mysterious symbols of differing styles immediately manifested.
They rotated slowly, emitting faint glows of various colors.
“Legend says it contains part of the authority and will of the Sun God, Ra, from ancient Egyptian mythology. These seven Divine Artifacts are scattered across every corner of the world. Finding, recovering, and ensuring they do not fall into the hands of dangerous elements is the primary objective of Thanatos at this stage.”
Her tone turned grave.
“Lin Yu, as Professor Corso said on the train, the Gods… they haven’t truly died. It is more like they have ‘entrusted’ their existence into these Divine Artifacts, falling into a dangerous slumber.”
She enlarged a section of the map, switching to a dynamic simulation of the crash site.
The icon representing the transport plane could be seen surrounded by dots representing a tide of Scarabs.
Subsequently, a massive interference wave covered the area, followed by an explosion symbol.
“According to the extremely fragmented communication records Tang Rou sent back at the end, her transport plane first encountered an unprecedented, large-scale attack by Scarabs—an external manifestation of the Eye of Ra’s violent divine power fluctuations. However, the key point is that the communication was then instantly cut off by a non-natural, high-intensity interference, followed by an explosion that did not originate from an impact. This points almost clearly to one fact: a third-party force with high organizational and technical capabilities intervened and launched a coordinated attack.”
“A third-party force…?”
Lin Yu pressed.
“We don’t know their identity or purpose yet.”
Christina’s voice turned cold instantly, like a frozen lake. A flash of disgust crossed her eyes.
“The only thing for certain is that they are… human.”
She shut down the projection.
All the light and shadow vanished instantly, and the cabin returned to its previous dimness, illuminated only by the ghostly blue glow of the instrument panel reflecting off her face.
“However, none of that has anything to do with the current you. Your task is to recognize your role, Lin Yu,” Christina said in a tone that brooked no argument.
“In this mission, you are an observer and a learner, but ultimately, your primary identity is a survivor. You have not awakened your Divine Sense, and you lack basic combat training and survival experience. In any potential direct conflict, your value is practically zero. Therefore, you only need to follow the team like a shadow, unconditionally obeying every command issued by me or the Captain. Use your eyes to see, your ears to hear, and your brain to think.”
“Understand the true face of this world and its operating rules as quickly as possible. If—and I mean if—combat unfortunately breaks out, your sole rule of engagement is to protect yourself to the maximum extent. If you stay alive and don’t get in our way, that is the greatest contribution you can make to this operation. Do you understand?”
Lin Yu nodded in silence.
He instinctively turned his head to look out the porthole at the endless darkness and the distant, scattered waves on the sea below, which reflected the cold moonlight like shards of broken glass.