And finally, Lisa completely accepted Javier and the others. The Plaga parasite tentacles, which had been frantically wriggling behind her, retracted into her back. Although the Desert Eagle's bullets had broken Lisa's Plaga parasite tentacles, to Lisa, who possessed the G Virus primary body, it was merely a minor injury that could heal at any time.
Now that Lisa could retract her wriggling tentacles, it also indicated that she had completely accepted Javier and the others. At the same time, she spoke to Javier in a hoarse voice: "Hoo hoo..."
"Help... help me...!"
It was still a hoarse and obscure voice,
but Lisa's words were barely discernible.
After Lisa finished speaking her plea, she walked directly towards the mine tunnel ahead. Seeing this, Jill and Rebecca narrowed their eyes slightly, fearing Lisa might play another trick, and quickly retreated, holding their guns in a state of alert. But Lisa ignored them and continued walking forward, turning her head back every few steps, staring blankly at Javier, as if wanting him to follow.
Seeing this,
Javier, puzzled, scratched his head.
But he still chose to trust Lisa, picked up the gas mask from the ground, tucked it away, and quickly followed. The others did the same. Jill and Rebecca, fearing Javier might be in danger, exchanged a look and then jogged to catch up.
Only Barry, an old man, stood dumbfounded in place. Coming back to his senses, Barry, helpless, could only use his Colt revolver to shoot the already dead Hunter on the ground once more, then quickly caught up with the team...
"Thump thump thump...!"
"Thump thump thump!!!"
"Thump thump thump!!!"
After an unknown period of walking,
Lisa, who was leading the way, slowly stopped. Her hands, shackled with heavy restraints, pointed to the cave entrance ahead, and she walked in without any hesitation. Javier was also very curious about this and turned his gaze.
But he didn't expect that
what came into view was a huge hanging platform.
And on the platform was placed an incredibly heavy stone coffin, massive in scale, looking several tons in weight. All around were thick chains, firmly pulling the platform suspended in mid-air. As for below... it was an incomparably dark abyss, terrifyingly deep, the kind where you'd be utterly annihilated if you fell.
But compared to this,
Javier was more curious about Lisa's purpose in bringing him here, and who the owner inside the stone coffin was—?
Chapter 27: 31 Years of Suffering
Below was an incomparably dark abyss,
and above was a half-suspended stone coffin.
This combination, no matter how you looked at it, seemed more like an ancient tomb adventure than Resident Evil. Faced with such a situation, Javier could only lament at the sheer number of elements.
And if,
the steel coffin sealed by chains that he had seen in the basement of the Mansion Villa before was Lisa's father, George Trevor, then the one currently suppressed by the heavy stone coffin... it probably didn't require much guessing to roughly determine it was Lisa's mother, Jessica Trevor—
After all, the two were simply too similar.
The same mechanism, the same coffin, made it difficult to guess wrong. Of course... this was indeed the case. The reason Lisa wanted Javier and the others to follow her here was to ask them to help open this heavy stone coffin.
This was also the real reason why Lisa often lingered in the mine dungeon. She could smell her mother's scent, right on this suspended stone platform. But the only problem was... Lisa couldn't open this heavy stone coffin.
Her remaining intelligence was limited, preventing her from solving the mechanism's puzzle. And if she used violence, the stone coffin was incredibly hard. Lisa had attacked it many times with her Plaga parasite tentacles and the shackles on her hands, but it was ineffective; there was no way she could shatter the stone coffin. In fact, due to excessive force, she almost caused the entire stone platform to collapse.
Therefore...
Lisa gave up on the method of violent destruction.
She could only grasp the heavy iron shackles and slowly chisel at the outside of the stone coffin bit by bit. And so far... Lisa had only managed to make a small dent, and it would take a very long time to completely shatter the stone coffin.
After all, she couldn't use too much force, nor too little.
Too much force would cause the entire stone platform to shake, potentially loosening the chains or even collapsing into the abyss. Too little force would greatly delay the progress of chiseling. Lisa was almost driven mad by this forced control of her strength.
But this restraint also brought Lisa many benefits. She learned to control her strength and gradually learned to control her easily agitated and irritable emotions, which had a very good effect on the speed of her sanity's recovery—
But now,
Lisa couldn't wait any longer. Since Javier and the others were not from Umbrella Corporation, weren't afraid of her ugly appearance, and were even willing to help her, Lisa chose to trust Javier and pleaded with him to help open this heavy stone coffin!
"Hoo hoo..."
"Help me... help me... open it...!"
Another hoarse voice.
Lisa's swaying, deformed body slowly walked to the front of the stone coffin, sniffing the extremely faint scent emanating from within, as well as a faint smell of decay. Lisa's movements couldn't help but slow down. She might have known that her mother was already dead, but it didn't matter... she just wanted to embrace her mother one last time.
Because,
Lisa couldn't remember how many years it had been since she felt her mother's warm embrace. That warmth, which only lingered in her memory, was becoming increasingly blurred. Lisa didn't want to lose this last memory, because it was the only obsession that sustained her until now. If it were gone... then Lisa would truly go mad—!
Seeing this,
Javier also raised his gaze and slowly surveyed the stone platform in front of him, as well as the tightly connected steel chains around it...
There were only four thick chains on the entire stone platform. These four chains were all connected to the stone coffin and the stone platform, respectively. And at the four corners were heavy, anchor-like stone pillars that could be pushed down.
The stone coffin and the stone platform were connected. Once an anchor-like heavy stone pillar was pushed down, the chains of both the stone coffin and the stone platform would simultaneously rise, and the stone coffin would also be lifted a part by this immense force, equivalent to lifting one corner of the stone coffin.
But immediately following... the chains of the stone platform would break, causing the stone platform they were standing on to lose half its weight and drop.
Therefore, the most important way to solve the puzzle here was to resolve the imbalance problem: how to open the heavy stone coffin using the anchor-like tools without causing the entire stone platform to fall.
This was the key to cracking the mechanism—
Fortunately, Lisa hadn't messed with these things before, otherwise... she really might have fallen into the abyss along with the stone platform and the stone coffin.
"I think I've figured out how to play..."
"Jill, Rebecca, Barry, there are exactly four of us here. I know how to play. Come and lend a hand. Push down these anchor-like stone pillars according to my instructions. Remember, do not move those stone pillars until I tell you to."
Without hesitation,
Javier, having understood how the game worked, immediately turned to Rebecca and the others behind him. As for Lisa, Javier had made other arrangements, telling her to wait alone outside the stone platform. After all, Lisa still possessed the Plaga parasite tentacles ability. If they accidentally messed up, Lisa could help pull them back up.
It was an extra safety system, so to speak...
Of course,
this also depended on Lisa's level of intelligence. If she couldn't understand in time, then they would still be dead. Therefore, Javier tried to succeed on the first attempt.
Upon hearing Javier's words,
Jill and the others didn't hesitate. They quickly stepped onto the stone platform. They could still barely trust Javier's abilities. Although he was usually a lazy slob and annoying, he was still somewhat useful at critical moments.
Furthermore, none of them had figured out how to operate the mechanism of this half-suspended stone platform and stone coffin after looking at it for a long time. Since that was the case... they could only blindly hand it over to Javier.
"Thump thump thump..."
"Thump thump thump..."
Each stood at one of the four corner positions of the stone platform.
Javier looked at the four people who were ready. Without hesitation, Javier decisively kicked down the stone pillar in front of him.
"Rumble...!"
The next second,
a violent tremor sounded.
The chains crashed down. The speed and force of the stone pillar's descent directly caused the heavy, massive stone coffin lid to slowly lift and rise a little. This made the monster girl Lisa in the distance suddenly let out an excited shriek, her whole body trembling uncontrollably.
She hadn't expected Javier and the others to solve it so quickly. This was much faster than her chiseling it little by little with iron shackles.
But Javier was unfazed. After all, this was merely the power of levers and pulleys. Archimedes, the famous Greek physicist, once said, give him a fulcrum, and he could move the entire Earth. Javier, naturally, wouldn't be surprised by such elementary physics.
Poor Lisa, this child,
she hadn't even finished school before Umbrella Corporation imprisoned her here and turned her into a monster girl, and she was so surprised by even the simple principle of levers and pulleys...
Ahem—
Back to the main topic,
as the stone pillar fell, the heavy stone coffin naturally lifted one corner. But in contrast... the stone platform in Javier's area also began to quickly drop one corner due to the disappearance of the chain. At this moment, the entire stone platform had already tilted, though the angle of tilt was not that severe, otherwise Javier and the others would have all fallen into the abyss.
Therefore, this is also why it is said...
The key to this mechanism is actually the true reason for "imbalance"—!
"Alright, now Barry, Jill, both of you come over here. Rebecca, you push down the stone pillar under your feet. Don't be afraid... you won't fall. We three will support it with our weight; it should barely achieve a triangular balance."
After pushing down one stone pillar, Javier narrowed his eyes and surveyed Jill and the others, realizing that among the three, Rebecca had the lightest weight. Barry, needless to say, was an old man in a mid-life crisis; fat must have started accumulating. This fisherman was the heaviest!
As for Jill...
Although tall and slender, the four masses of fat accumulated on her chest and butt were definitely much heavier than Rebecca's tomboyish flat chest. Therefore, it was most suitable for Rebecca to push down the stone pillar, since she was the lightest.
And upon hearing Javier's words,
Rebecca, that girl, also slowly narrowed her eyes, emitting a dangerous glint. Without a doubt... that girl was holding a grudge. Although Javier didn't explicitly state it, Rebecca could still detect the disdainful words directed at her.
When the mission is over,
I'll have to teach this guy a good lesson!
But despite being angry,
Rebecca was still obedient for the sake of the team. Looking at the stone pillar in front of her, she rubbed her hands together for a moment, then used all her might to push it down!
"Rumble...!"
Another loud crash.
The thick steel chain instantly snapped. The stone platform, which was originally suspended by only three chains, now had only two left. And the entire stone platform, having lost the stabilizing restraint of the chains, began to sway violently, potentially tilting sideways at any moment and flinging Javier and the others standing on it into the abyss.
But fortunately,
Javier was indeed clever.
He utilized the relationship of their own body weights to achieve a reasonable distribution, using their combined weight to replace the support of the chains, allowing the stone platform, which was about to tip over, to achieve a precarious triangular balance. Although it was still trembling, not being thrown off was already impressive enough.
"Click—!"
And with the descent of the second chain,
the heavy stone coffin was once again opened at one corner. The front and back two corners were simultaneously lifted, and this time, the group finally saw the true face of the stone coffin's owner...
What lay inside,
was actually just an ordinary skeleton.
It was covered in a layer of tattered clothing, which had mostly oxidized and decomposed. The skeleton was covered in black stains, but from the bone structure, it could barely be discerned that this was a female corpse. There was no dried flesh adhering to it, and with the mostly oxidized and decomposed clothing, this indicated that the corpse had been dead for at least ten years or so—
This was already a completely unimaginable and untraceable timeline...
"..."
"Mom... Mother...?!"
And upon truly seeing the skeleton inside the stone coffin,
Lisa, who was standing above, finally couldn't control her emotions and began to shriek hysterically in a hoarse voice. Without a doubt... this was indeed the remains of Jessica Trevor. She hadn't become a rampaging zombie like George, but had peacefully passed away first. For a mother, perhaps this was the most dignified way to leave.
After all,
she sacrificed herself to protect her child.
Unable to adapt to the T-Virus, she would eventually be consumed by it, turning into an ugly zombie and then eating her own child. To prevent such a tragedy, Jessica, as a mother, ended her own life first, which was truly a moving act.
"Wait...!"
"Lisa, I know you're excited, but please don't jump down. The stone platform can't bear the weight of another person. If you jump on, we'll all fall into the abyss. Calm down... I know you can hear and understand what I'm saying."
"Stay put. We will help you retrieve your mother Jessica's remains. But you absolutely must not jump down. Rebecca! You're the lightest and most agile. Take my tactical backpack, put Lisa's mother's remains inside, and then you jump up first!"
Seeing Lisa's emotions growing more and more agitated,
and even the monster girl Lisa wanting to jump down to personally touch her mother's remains, Javier's expression suddenly became anxious, and he quickly shouted to stop her.
You absolutely cannot jump down.