Saria clearly had no desire to linger or explain herself in such a place. Upon seeing the researcher and his nominal partner, she immediately brought them onto the vehicle and departed from Lungmen.
On the road, Saria's attitude toward the two men was one of cold indifference. She was merely there to complete a mission. The two prisoners sat in the rear compartment, separated such that they could barely even see one another.
"Finally... we're out," Ivanov muttered, watching Lungmen recede in the distance. His heart was a mess of emotions, shadowed by a growing dread regarding his future. He had already sold out everything he knew. Even if nothing happened immediately, returning to his old life in Ursus was impossible. He could easily guess what the aristocrat backing him would do once the truth came out—and it wouldn't be pretty.
"Is the heater on too high? Why do I feel so hot? What about you?"
Once they were a certain distance from Lungmen, Ivanov suddenly felt a searing heat within his body, as if a nameless fire was gnawing at his chest. Opposite him, Donald—the researcher whose physical constitution was far inferior to Ivanov's—was already drenched in sweat.
"Director Saria! Can you turn down the temperature?! If this keeps up, we'll die of dehydration before we even reach Columbia!"
In the middle of a freezing winter, these two looked as if they were about to suffer heatstroke. Saria, sitting in the front, felt like they were playing a prank on her. She hadn't turned on any heating equipment at all; her own powerful Vouivre constitution meant the cold air didn't bother her—if anything, it kept her mind sharp.
Could it be an Originium Art? Saria wondered. She had conducted a strict inspection earlier, and neither of them possessed any trace of Originium-related anomalies. In fact, the Originium content in their blood was pathetically low—less than half that of an ordinary person without protection.
Despite her suspicions, Saria switched on the air conditioning for the rear cabin. Instantly, a mist of cold air billowed around the two men. But the freezing temperature did nothing to soothe their internal agony. They clutched their chests, hunched over in pain.
As the vehicle moved further away, Jeanne's unconscious suppression of the fire weakened. The patterns on their skin—identical to the insignia on Jeanne's flag—shifted from black to a glowing, angry red.
"No... something's wrong... Director Saria, stop the car! We have to go back to Lungmen—!" Donald screamed, hoping to return to the city to save his life.
But it was too late. The "vengeful spirits" of the Infected they had tormented, now manifested as holy fire within them, reached their breaking point. The flames chose that moment to erupt, purifying the two scoundrels from the inside out.
Saria sensed a sudden, visceral spike of danger. Before she could even respond to Donald's plea, she slammed a button on her console. The vehicle's modules separated instantly, and the front driver's cabin was encased in heavy D23 steel plating for protection.
At that exact moment, the radar pinged with two distinct Originium reactions flying toward them, followed immediately by a thunderous explosion from the rear.
"Here it comes!"
On the cliffside, the two Lazurites stared intently at the approaching vehicle. To ensure they weren't detected by the vehicle's onboard Originium Wave Detector—a device designed to spot Catastrophes but often used to sniff out enemy Arts—they had set up their nest at a considerable distance.
If they were detected before firing, the mission's difficulty would skyrocket. They had a window of less than five seconds to execute the assassination.
"I go first, you follow!" Roy's usual frivolous expression vanished, replaced by solemn focus. A gale of turquoise wind began to spiral around his arrow. This was a shot of total commitment—one of the few times in years he had felt the need to be this serious.
As the car entered their range, two arrows wrapped in their respective Originium Arts streaked through the air like green lightning. They struck the Rhine Lab transport, triggering a massive blast.
However, to their disappointment, the front of the vehicle had already detached, meaning the escort had detected the threat in time.
"Why was the explosion so big?" Monique looked at the towering inferno with confusion. "Did you miss and hit something explosive inside the car?"
Roy frowned. They had hit the rear section, but according to the design, it shouldn't have produced such a catastrophic explosion. Thinking back to the sound, he realized something was off. There had been an "inharmonious" bang just before their arrows landed.
"Let's retreat," Roy said. "We'll report this to the Darksteels. It looks like we really were used as scapegoats."
Without looking back, the two vanished into the wasteland. They didn't even plan to return to Lungmen until things cleared up. The Rat King had likely known exactly what was going to happen when he gave them the location.
"Did they run?" Saria muttered, looking toward the cliff where the arrows originated before turning back to the burning wreckage of the rear cabin.
She was thankful for her instincts; by detaching the cabin, she had avoided the brunt of the blast. While she could have tanked the explosion with her Arts, no one in their right mind tests their physical durability against a high-intensity blast for fun.
She knew that while the snipers were skilled, they weren't the primary cause. The prisoners had exploded from the inside.
She pulled out a communication device. "Hello, Control? We have a problem. Yes, the two targets are dead. An abnormal energy fluctuation occurred within their bodies mid-transit, leading to a spontaneous explosion. Two snipers were present at the scene, but I cannot confirm their direct link to the internal combustion."
On the other end, the Director didn't seem particularly bothered by the deaths. Neither of those men were "theirs" to begin with. However, the method of death was intriguing. If it wasn't an Originium Art, what caused it? A new technology from Lungmen?
Far away, Wei Yenwu and his men heard the distant boom and turned back toward the city. The explosion was larger than he had anticipated, but the result was satisfactory.
He now had to inform the L.G.D. high-ups—they had been waiting for the "conclusion" of this affair.