"In my opinion, we should turn back."
"What nonsense are you talking about?"
The Female Hunter-Duke stared into Horatio's eyes, suspecting his brain had been clamped by a door.
"We're already here! And you're telling me to turn back?"
"The symmetrical structure of the monastery means there can't be only one way up. Since the enemy is concentrated directly above us, the other side will surely be easier to navigate than this one."
"That's true, but do you know how long it will take us to get to the other side? Time is precious; every second wasted could lead to eternal damnation."
"Corridor bridge. Where would a chapel usually have a corridor bridge?"
The third scene Horatio had seen in the fragments was a broken corridor bridge; he believed there must be a safe retreat there.
"The Icon Altar."
"Let's go there, you lead the way."
The Female Hunter-Duke sighed and said nothing more.
After hearing Horatio's warning, she activated the tactical analyzer's thermal vision system and scanned above them. Indeed, just as Horatio had said, there were people everywhere above, and even one extremely large heat signature.
But then again, this kid didn't have this set of cutting-edge custom equipment worth tens of millions of gothic coins, and the short-wave thermal vision consumed an extreme amount of energy, so even she didn't often turn it on.
How did he know there were people upstairs?
Farida narrowed her eyes suspiciously, sizing up Horatio.
Horatio: ⊙﹏⊙!!
Horatio, who was busy scavenging ammunition from the Evil Cultists' thugs, shivered and turned to Farida with a bewildered expression.
"Why are you looking at me like that? It's creepy."
"Nothing. Go to the altar, you go first, I'll call out the route."
Farida, slightly shorter than Horatio, stepped forward and pushed him, urging him to turn around and get moving.
Horatio pouted, unable to guess what this girl was thinking, and so he walked forward.
Suddenly, his peripheral vision caught a glimpse of a rapidly passing red-haired figure, moving with unhuman speed. When he turned to confirm, there was no trace.
"What's wrong?" The Female Hunter-Duke saw Horatio uncharacteristically distracted, so she turned to look where he was looking, instinctively performing light and heat detection to prevent any enemy ambushes.
However, this time she found nothing.
"Hmm, nothing, maybe I was too nervous and saw wrong."
Horatio re-aimed his gun forward and cautiously walked towards the altar.
—
At this moment, above Horatio's head.
"My Lord! Chief Priest! Something big has happened!" The Gentleman, whose face was injured and couldn't pronounce words correctly, stumbled towards a fat man.
The man was wearing a wide silk robe, embroidered with gold thread, indicating high-quality material. He also wore a half-face mask, but against his fat face, it appeared much smaller than the one on the Gentleman's face.
"My Lord, that condemned prisoner, I don't know what method he used, but he actually made that woman from the Hood Family submit to him, and they teamed up to kill all thirty-seven of my brothers and Sisters! Only I fought desperately and luckily escaped with my life!"
The fat man's expression subtly shifted upon hearing this. He forced down the corners of his mouth, not showing much surprise.
"Then where are they?"
"Uh... I don't know."
"Useless!"
Slap!
"Ow ow ow!" The Gentleman received a slap from the fat man in the blink of an eye, covering his gunshot wound and wailing incessantly.
"You can't even lure the enemy!"
The fat hand holding the cane tightened, and the fat man's face turned grim:
"They dared to sneak in; I'm afraid they don't just want to dig into our foundations. Take fifty more people and guard the necessary path near the altar!"
"Yes! Yes! Chief Priest!"
Looking at the spiral staircase where no one had ascended for a long time, the fat man let out a long breath of anger, then muttered, "Anton, take your men and guard the shuttle. Don't let even a fly get in."
"Chief Priest, I will. Not even a fly."
The iron mountain beside him made a crisp sound of metal scraping, slowly moving. It was covered in shiny trinkets, truly a 'Brezhnev' look.
The big man was nearly three meters tall, covered from head to toe in rough steel plates and ceramite armor. This outfit would be difficult for even a Space Marine to deal with.
—
Perhaps the enemies were called to a higher level for defense, as Horatio only saw a small team burning down the mailroom on the way.
After killing all of them, Horatio looked at the raging flames inside, touched the clues he had collected in his pocket, and was glad that the fire hadn't swallowed all the secrets.
After a tense and silent journey, rapid footsteps finally echoed through the empty altar corridor.
It was Horatio's first time seeing so many magnificent colossal statues; the visual impact they brought was far beyond what illustrations could convey.
In front of them, he was so small, like an ant.
Horatio looked down through the stone railing; the corridor below was bottomless, and even clouds and mist floated in mid-air.
He had only a vague, simple impression of a Hive City's structure, but when this unprecedented sense of three-dimensionality appeared before his eyes, a shock even stronger than his first arrival in Chongqing came over him.
"Why did you stop?" Farida asked, seeing Horatio looking around for something.
"We're not going through the front. It must already be heavily guarded by the Evil Cultists up there."
Horatio was still searching for something.
[Ah, there it is!] A smile spread across his lips.
"You were the one who wanted to run from there to here earlier! Now that we're here, you're passively avoiding battle?"
The Female Hunter-Duke's brows furrowed tightly, and she gasped roughly, her breath turning into cold mist, as she prepared to raise her gun.
Horatio's gaze fell on her leg. He had been walking in front the whole time and hadn't noticed that the girl's injured leg could now only drag along with the help of the power feedback device on her power armor.
"Your leg might need emergency treatment." Horatio took a step forward.
"Don't come closer!"
The Female Hunter-Duke placed her finger on the trigger and asked in a tone that left no room for discussion, "Horatio, what exactly do you want?"
"We're already here." Horatio laughed heartily and spread his hands.
"Huh?" The Female Hunter-Duke's eyebrows rose, her expression strange.
"Look." Horatio turned his head and pointed to the broken corridor about 30 meters diagonally above them.
"Can a jetpack carry two people?" he asked.
The Female Hunter-Duke lowered her gun, and her tightly clenched heart finally let out a sigh of relief.
[Was I overreacting...?] Her pink lips trembled slightly, feeling a bit sorry.
She pursed her lips, then blushed and mumbled softly, "Sorry."
Then she coughed twice and returned to her normal tone, saying, "Usually not, but with your scrawny appearance, perhaps it can just barely."
"Let's try it. If we can get up there, we can reach the landing platform without anyone knowing."
"Even if it goes as smoothly as you say, how will you carry me up?" the Female Hunter-Duke asked again.
Horatio pinched his chin with one hand, sizing up the girl's body.
"Quick... quickly make up your mind! Let me just say this, I can't carry you, you big guy." Farida's cheeks flushed under the gaze of the handsome young man, feeling completely uncomfortable.
"Get out the handcuffs."
Horatio took the handcuffs from the girl's hand and cuffed his belt with two pairs of handcuffs, one on the left and one on the right.
"Cuff the other end to your tactical belt."
"Then what?"
"Then... pardon my offense!" Horatio said with a cheerful laugh.
"Ah!"
Horatio wrapped his arms around the girl's slender waist, his hands clasped tightly behind her back.
The Female Hunter-Duke grimaced, her expression quite rich, but no matter how displeased she was with Horatio's actions, there was indeed no better posture at the moment.
But his smirking face was so annoying!
[After we get out, I'm definitely sending this kid to the Adeptus Arbites for ten years...]
Whoosh whoosh— The jet wings on the Female Hunter-Duke's back spread like wings, and the ducted engines began to operate, a huge whistling sound breaking the silence of the altar.
Horatio watched as his feet gradually lifted off the ground.
"Height five meters..."
"Height ten meters..."
Horatio's heart pounded.
"Height 25 meters... beginning forward movement."
Both of their hearts were in their throats; below, the corridor had already turned into a bottomless abyss.
As the height increased, if this thing malfunctioned in the air, or exceeded its height load, then the two of them would truly be making a one-way trip to the Golden Throne.
Uh... could someone like him reach the Golden Throne?
Well, he still hoped her 'money-power' equipment was reliable enough!
A cold wind whistled from the distant vents, and Horatio truly experienced what it meant to be 'lonely at the top,' his body beginning to tremble uncontrollably.
"Don't shake! Do you want to die?"
"But you're shaking too."
The Female Hunter-Duke's face turned crimson. Cold wind constantly poured in through the gaps in her armor, and the cold rapidly sapped her physical strength.
Horatio suddenly felt himself sway in mid-air, his legs knocking together and trembling.
"Hey, hey, hey! Hang in there, I believe you can do it." Horatio said tremblingly, his arms wrapped around the Female Hunter-Duke's waist tightening, his heart already beginning to pray to the God-Emperor that the jetpack would hold up.
Finally, his feet landed on a corner of the broken corridor. At this height, even if he fell, he wouldn't be seriously injured.
"Hoo..."
The Female Hunter-Duke was drenched in sweat. Exhausted from carrying heavy weight, she desperately wanted to land, so the descent was very rough.
Horatio was dragged and thrown to the ground like a landing paratrooper, with the Female Hunter-Duke landing on top of him immediately after.
Horatio let out a muffled groan, finding himself lying on his back, the Female Hunter-Duke supporting herself with her hands, straddling him with her legs spread. Their eyes met, and large beads of sweat continuously dripped from her face. Her small face was flushed, like a ripe apple.
The Female Hunter-Duke straightened up, unlocked the handcuffs, and got off him without wanting to stay a second longer, leaning against the railing to catch her breath.
"A warning, leaning there isn't a smart choice. If you fall, you'll have to fly back yourself."
"Shut up... Huh?!"
Before the Female Hunter-Duke finished speaking, the broken stone railing behind her loosened and shattered, and her body tilted backward.
A force pulled her, her vision stopping abruptly when looking up at an 80-degree angle, then returning to normal.
Coming to her senses, the Female Hunter-Duke quickly took a few steps forward, not daring to approach the broken railing again.
She turned her head and saw Horatio with a half-smile, schadenfreude-filled, raised-eyebrow expression, as if he was saying to her mockingly, 'See, you got hurt, didn't you!' The only bit of gratitude in her heart was instantly replaced by a tightly furrowed brow.
[Tsk, I really want to punch him...]
The Female Hunter-Duke turned to leave, but the pain in her calf made every step feel like an execution.
"Unfasten your leg armor, you can't walk like that."
Horatio knelt down and took the Adeptus Arbites's standard emergency kit from the girl's tactical belt.
"Let me see, hmm, hemostatic forceps, surgical blades and handle, trauma hemostatic gel, gauze, analgesic, adrenaline, beta-blocker, anti-swelling agent, stimulant..."
The Female Hunter-Duke removed the greaves from her power feedback boots, then took off her combat boots, revealing a horrifying area of bruising that made the middle of her calf swell like a thick radish, destroying the slender beauty of the girl's legs.
"Bear with it for a moment, it will hurt a bit."
Horatio wiped her thigh with a sterile cloth, then cleaned his hands, picked up the surgical knife, and carefully made a small incision. With a pinch of two fingers, black blood oozed from the wound.
"Mmm..." The girl bit her pearly teeth tightly, closing her eyes and furrowing her brows, her upturned little nose sniffing cold air in short bursts. Soon, her upper teeth began to bite her lower lip, showing that it really hurt, but she remained silent, even though naturally secreted tears gathered in the corners of her eyes, they did not fall.
Horatio applied the medicine according to the instructions, finally smearing trauma gel and finishing by wrapping it with a circle of medical gauze.
"Hold on a little longer, don't give up halfway." Horatio closed the emergency kit and put it back on the girl's waist, steadying her.
The girl's forehead was covered in sweat, her gaze hazy and slightly blurred, surprisingly alluring.
"Heh..." She limped as she reattached her armor plates, coldly sneering, unwilling to show weakness:
"Perhaps I will fall, but never today, and certainly not here!"