amaotonovel Chapter 4633 Desperate Escape (5)
Chapter 4633 Desperate Escape (5)
Chapter 4633 A Deadly Escape (Part 5)
"You...you...you...you..." Lucifer stammered for a long time, pointing at the thing, unable to remember how to say it in English.
Anatoly had already begun examining the small bedside table, the only item in the room besides the bed that was of any real research value. The bedside table was made of iron, so it couldn't be broken open by force; it was also embedded in the wall behind it, making it impossible to remove. There was nothing on top, but there was a drawer. The drawer had no keyhole, so it probably wasn't opened with a key.
The drawer has a handle on its surface, which cannot be pulled open directly. However, when you try to pull it open, you'll find that the drawer moves and makes a "clattering" sound.
Anatoly was busy examining the cabinet and ignored Lucifer. Lucifer reached out to grab him, but the instant he touched his shoulder, he heard him groan.
Lucifer quickly withdrew his hand, his wings folding in a flash. Anatoly turned to look at him and said, "If you can't help, go sit over there for a while, don't cause trouble here, okay?"
“Who says I can’t help?!” Lucifer raised his voice. “This is a two-player game, of course I have to participate!”
Anatoly looked somewhat helpless. He squatted down, turned around, and pointed to the bed over there. Lucifer assumed Anatoly wanted him to check the bed, so he went over. But Anatoly simply grabbed the side of his wing and made him sit down.
Anatoly crouched down, looking up at him, and said, “You are a god; you can get anything you want without any effort. This means that for thousands of years since your birth, your mind has never been working. Lucifer, this kind of puzzle game is not for you. You'd better just stay put, okay?”
Lucifer almost jumped up, but he had no divine power now, and his wings made him much heavier than an ordinary person, so he couldn't jump at all. He just flapped his wings violently in place.
"Are you saying I'm stupid, Anatoly? You're the first person to say that. I am Satan, the ruler of Hell..."
“You’re not stupid,” Anatoly said calmly. “God gave you great wisdom, allowing you to understand the very complex structure of the universe and easily edit the universe’s operating program.”
"Then why did you say I'm not suited for puzzle games?"
"I'm just saying you're not good at the process of putting in effort and getting results. You usually just get the results directly. Isn't that right?"
“Do you remember the bet we made in Hell?” Anatoly looked into Lucifer’s eyes and said, “Can you capture us again without your power as the administrator of the universe?”
Lucifer's expression darkened. "I've said it so many times. If I had known you cared about them so much, I wouldn't have..."
“That’s not what I meant,” Anatoly said, taking a deep breath. “You agreed to the wager, trying to win by leading the forces of Hell to hunt us down, without using the power of the gods. But you lost.”
"It's not because we're so strong, but because you're not good at doing things without divine power. If I remember correctly, your bar isn't doing so well either, is it?"
“The reasons why the bar is not doing well are complicated,” Lucifer tried to explain. “There are always some fools who come to cause trouble, and I don’t want to always expose my identity and make a big fuss.”
"and then?"
“I found them annoying, so I had to close the bar and open another one somewhere else,” Lucifer said, spreading his hands.
“It’s not that easy,” Anatoly said. “You need to have enough money, find a suitable house, rearrange and develop a menu, and recruit staff. If all of this comes out of thin air without any effort on your part, then you will keep repeating the process of business failure.”
“I didn’t,” Lucifer said immediately. “You don’t know this, do you? The bar I opened in Seaside City didn’t go out of business this time. Schiller and I even chose the location together.”
"Limited funds? Location chosen after weighing the pros and cons? Careful management and layout?"
“Of course!” Lucifer snorted. “Although it must be quite unexpected, I’ve seriously reflected on it since I lost the bet. After emptying Hell, I rarely conjure anything out of thin air anymore. Even though sometimes I’m so poor I want to bang my head against the wall, I’ve managed to pull through, haven’t I?”
Anatoly suddenly laughed. When he laughed, the arc of his upper eyelids became particularly striking, like a crescent moon. Then his smile faded, and he lowered his eyes and said nothing more.
"Why do I feel that you are very sad?" Lucifer asked.
“It’s nothing, just that my shoulder hurts a little,” Anatoli said. “I’ve never played this kind of game before, and I thought it was normal to break a collarbone at the beginning.”
"So you really broke your collarbone completely to get that ring off?!" Lucifer roared. "Are you insane?! How could there be such a game rule that forces people to self-harm..."
“I envy your beautiful perception of the world,” Anato muttered in Russian, “while I always think of it negatively.”
“Don’t try to fool me,” Lucifer said in Russian as well. “You still only know how to change the subject in your native language. What I’m saying is, you can think of this as a giant amusement park, not some life-or-death ordeal…”
"No. Don't always be so optimistic, Lucifer. Think about what you would do if you were the one locked up?"
"Of course I'll use my intelligence to solve the puzzle, instead of resorting to self-harm like you did right from the start..."
“I just wish I could hurt myself faster than you, so I could stop you.” Anatoly turned back and began examining the bedside table, leaving Lucifer standing there stunned by those words.
Silence filled the room. Thor stood before Loki, crowbar in hand, while Loki sat on the floor with one leg curled up, turning his head to the side: "As you can see, I really can't get up."
Thor crouched down, looked him into the eyes, and said, "Why didn't you tell me, Loki? Why didn't you tell me that your collarbone was locked?"
“Because you always yell and scream,” Loki said, frowning at him, “as if I’m about to die. I know what you’re going to say. You’re going to say that it was a mistake for us to participate in this kind of dungeon, because I’ve never been injured like this before. I shouldn’t have knowingly ventured into high-difficulty, restricted dungeons where this could happen. That’s not something a smart person would do.”
Thor crouched down, then sat cross-legged, looking at Loki and saying, "Loki, you might not believe it, and I don't really want to say this. If I could calm down immediately after seeing you injured, I could tell you that I saw the effort you put into overcoming difficulties, not just the part that overwhelmed you. But the truth is, I can't. Usually, I just can't stay calm in situations like this."
"If I hadn't choked on some water earlier, which left me a bit weak, the roar you heard from me would have been ten times louder. Because I can't vent my pain otherwise. Do you understand?"
"You choked on water?" Loki stared at him, wide-eyed. "Are you an idiot? Don't you know you can't breathe underwater?!"
Loki instinctively tried to stand up, completely forgetting that his collarbone was still locked. As he exerted force with his legs, the collarbone ring pulled on him, causing him to scream in pain.
"Well!!!!"
He fell to his right, and Thor rushed over to catch him, then straightened his body, swung the crowbar in his hand, and said, "I was going to say we could rest for a while, but it seems we should get you down first."
Loki was throbbing with pain, his whole body trembling: "One thing is true. I never... Damn it. Don't let me find out who designed this... Hiss..."
After Loki started cursing, Thor fell silent. He picked up a crowbar and began to pry at the iron rod. After a few pryings, the rod loosened. As the rod fell off, Loki collapsed to the ground, panting heavily.
Thor went over and helped him sit up, then helped him to bed. Loki struggled to turn over, swallowed hard, and said, "We're still missing a key to get out... all we have left is the bedside table... look... look at the bedside table..."
Thor went over and began to examine the bedside table. He first tapped on it with a crowbar, examined the seam between it and the wall, and then tugged hard at the drawer, but nothing worked.
Of course, he didn't stop talking during this time: "Loki, you may be very smart, but your memory is really not very good. When you were a child, almost every time you got hurt, you were in so much pain that you couldn't move, and you wanted to cry yourself unconscious in Frigga's arms. But every time you plunge into danger, it seems like you never think of these things..."
“Shut up, Thor, shut up!” Loki pounded the edge of the bed with his hand. “I’m all grown up now. I’m the Prince of Asgard now…”
As a result of his hand movements, the wound on his collarbone was aggravated, causing him to tremble all over in pain. The veins on his forehead, which was pressed against the bed, bulged, and he was unable to speak for a moment.
Thor had to stop what he was doing and help him adjust his posture. He said, "I never thought that your fear of pain was a sign of cowardice, but you always think that way."
Loki pursed his lips and remained silent; he felt speechless too. After lying quietly on the bed for a while, he whispered, "I heard... a sound when you pulled the drawer open... try again..."
Thor paused. He shifted his position, kneeling beside the bedside table, leaning forward, pressing his ear close to the table, and tugged at the drawer. Sure enough, he heard a rattling sound. The sound was strange; it didn't seem like normal drawer parts, but rather like something colliding.
Loki gave him a knowing look and said, "There should be a mechanism inside."
“A ball bearing mechanism,” Eric said. “I saw it when I was cracking Fisher’s safe. You remember that guy?”
“That casino owner? Didn’t he die on the yacht?” Charles sat on the edge of the bed, fiddling with the iron rod in his hand. “You didn’t kill him?”
“No. He offended the Hellfire Club and was killed by the Black King at the time.” Eric gently pulled on the drawer. “He was a safe tycoon, with all sorts of things in his private vault. Unfortunately, he didn’t have any safes that weren’t made of metal.”
Charles laughed and said, "Then why did you bother to study the mechanism of the safe?"
“Many safes have automatic self-destruct mechanisms when subjected to external pressure.” Eric lifted the drawer up a little more, pressed his ear against it, and listened carefully to the sounds inside. “I understand. There’s a rotating S-shaped passage inside, and a ball bearing is inside that passage. It’s the ball bearing that’s jamming the drawer. I need to push and pull the drawer to make the ball bearing roll down so I can pull the drawer out.”
"Pull it out a little, then lift it up. Push it back, then lift it up again. Immediately afterwards, press the back half down..."
Click.
"All right."