"Get out here!"
A group of burly men armed with guns and knives roared at a tightly shut door riddled with bullet holes.
"Shut up! Keep talking, and I'll put a bullet in him!"
Zhou Zhenguo's roar came from inside the room, even more imposing than the men outside.
I've got a hostage!
There were five people in the room.
One lay on the floor in a pool of blood, still twitching and not quite dead.
He was the man Tang Luo and the others had forced to lead them here.
Another stranger was being held in a chokehold by Zhou Zhenguo, a revolver pressed to his head.
This was the doctor Jack White, whom the man had led Tang Luo and the others to find.
This was Jack White's office.
A few minutes earlier, just as Zhou Zhenguo and the man had barely made it through the office door, the man had suddenly turned on him and tried to snatch his gun.
Zhou Zhenguo reacted quickly and stopped him from taking the gun.
Instead, he shot him.
But the gunshot had caused a major commotion.
That had led to their current predicament: trapped inside and relying on a hostage to keep the other side at bay.
Taking hostages and all that—
They were supposed to be righteous detectives investigating Jack the Ripper, yet now they were taking hostages like the bad guys.
Something had definitely gone wrong somewhere.
The office was on the lowest level of the fourth floor, with only one door and a window directly opposite it.
Escaping through the window wouldn't be easy.
For one thing, it was too high. For another, anyone who appeared behind the door would be an easy target.
The bullet holes in the door were proof enough.
The door wasn't especially thick, and even the relatively weak rounds from a revolver here could punch through it.
Tang Luo and the others were now standing beside the door, pressed against the wall in a blind spot where bullets couldn't reach them.
Xiao Chu kept his mouth shut, his chest heaving violently.
Being mentally prepared and actually facing danger were two entirely different things.
It was like the difference between watching a war movie and going to war yourself.
"Mr. Jack, take it easy. I have a few things I'd like to ask you," Tang Luo said to Jack White, whom Zhou Zhenguo was nearly choking unconscious.
The "take it easy" in the middle was meant for Zhou Zhenguo.
He wanted to give Jack a chance to speak.
"Jack?"
The man's eyes widened. "You sons of bitches have the wrong guy! I'm not Jack!"
"Heh—"
A mocking laugh rang out. The man lying on the floor died with a look of utter satisfaction.
"Fuck!"
Xiao Chu cursed and slammed his fist into the wall.
They'd all been played!
Zhou Zhenguo also swore in his hometown dialect.
Tang Luo remained calm and nodded. "So you're not. No matter. Do you recognize this?"
He took out the letter for Hodge and pointed to the signature at the bottom.
"I don't know what you're talking about. I'm just an ordinary doctor," the man said.
"Heh."
Tang Luo chuckled. "And those people outside are just ordinary orderlies?"
Orderlies carrying guns.
"I don't know!" The man shook his head frantically.
"Is that so? Then if I push you behind the door, do you think those ordinary orderlies will shoot?" Tang Luo asked with a smile. "I hope you're as ordinary as you say. That way, you can go peacefully."
"No—"
The man didn't get to finish. Tang Luo shoved him behind the door.
No shots rang out.
But before the man could flash a triumphant smile and bolt through the doorway, a hand seemed to reach out of thin air.
It grabbed the man by the neck and lifted him like a chicken, slamming him against the wall.
The back of his head struck the wall, and pain made his vision swim.
"Whether or not you're Jack, you're still pretty important to the people outside," Tang Luo said.
"Forget about him. Charge in and kill them!"
Just then, a cold voice rang out from outside.
Someone with more authority than the hostage they'd taken had appeared, and the first thing he did was order them all killed.
He was probably Russian.
The man looked terrified.
Zhou Zhenguo's expression turned grim as he aimed his revolver at the door.
Unfortunately, the revolver held only six rounds. He'd fired one already, leaving five.
There were probably seven or eight people outside.
"Keep an eye on him."
Tang Luo shoved the man toward Xiao Chu, whose heart was pounding, then darted behind the sturdy desk.
"Bang!"
At the same time, someone kicked the office door open with brute force.
The whole door slammed to the floor with a crash.
A crowd rushed in, jostling for space in the doorway, their guns waving wildly.
Making no attempt to aim, they simply pulled the triggers, careful only not to shoot the companions in front of them.
Their faces were crazed, like those of madmen,
The revolver in Zhou Zhenguo's hand also spat fire.
"Creeeak!"
Amid the gunfire, the shrill sound of heavy furniture scraping rapidly across the floor rang out.
Tang Luo rotated the massive desk, which was lying on its side, ninety degrees.
It fit through the doorway perfectly.
He crouched down, put both hands beneath the desk, and heaved it up!
"Boom!"
A thunderous crash.
Like a boulder crashing to the ground.
The confined space amplified the sound, making everyone's eardrums ring.
After the crash, the gunfire stopped.
"All done." Tang Luo clapped twice and headed out of the office.
The corridor outside the office was stained red with blood, from the ceiling to the walls.
Most of the sturdy desk had been smashed to pieces, leaving wooden fragments scattered everywhere.
The rest was embedded in the wall, with blood still oozing through the gaps.
It was a horrifying scene, as if a millstone had ground everything to pieces. It looked like hell.
A man in a white doctor's uniform sat collapsed on the floor, mouth agape.
He stared at Tang Luo in utter horror.
Just one second ago,
he'd seen a massive black blur smash straight through everyone at the doorway who'd been trying to charge into the room.
Then it embedded itself in the wall.
It was just like someone had launched the office desk out of the room with a giant siege engine!
What had happened? How had it happened?
Who had done it?
Had the three intruders done it together?
When Tang Luo's gaze fell on him, the stunned Jack White suddenly snapped back to his senses and tried to run.
He'd only just turned and gotten to his feet when a stabbing pain shot through his left leg. It gave way beneath him, and he fell to the floor.
Only then did he notice that a piece of splintered wood had struck his left shin at some point.
Blood poured from the wound.
"Let go of me!"
The three people in the room heard a noise like a slaughtered pig.
Then they saw Master Xuanzang dragging a man into the room by one leg.
A streak of blood trailed across the floor. It was hard to tell whether it belonged to the man with glasses or the people outside.
Probably both.
"M-M-Master..." Xiao Chu stammered, unable to get a complete sentence out.
Zhou Zhenguo stayed calm and asked, "Who is he?"
He meant the original owner of the office.
"He's Jack White! He's the real one!" the man shouted.
His face was lit with the satisfaction of revenge.
Less than half a minute ago, Jack White had abandoned him.
Now the tables had turned, and it was his chance to get even.
"Hello, Mr. Jack."
Tang Luo planted his foot on Jack White's injured leg to keep him from escaping, then picked up a revolver from the floor and opened the cylinder.
He pointed the muzzle upward and tipped the bullets into his palm.
He put one back into the cylinder and tossed the other two away.
Then he spun the cylinder.
Tang Luo cocked the hammer, aimed at Jack White's head, and pulled the trigger.
Death Roulette!
"Click!"
"Click!"
"Click!"
Three uneven clicks.
All three times, the hammer fell on an empty chamber.
"You're lucky, Mr. Jack," Tang Luo said to Jack White. "Now, let's talk."
He'd skipped the pointless step of asking questions first, only for the other man to refuse to cooperate.
"C-c-c..."
Jack White's teeth chattered. His body suddenly went limp on the floor.
A pale yellow liquid spread beneath him.
"What did you say?"
"Say that again!"
A few minutes later, Xiao Chu's voice rang out in accusation.
After going through Death Roulette, the "Lucky White" was very cooperative, telling them everything he knew.
Their conversation went very smoothly.
It was just that the results weren't satisfactory.
To be precise, the results left Zhou Zhenguo unhappy and drove Xiao Chu up the wall.
Jack White was a senior member of the Organization and its most important researcher.
The group had no special name. They were simply called "the Organization."
It had been formed by a group of powerful, well-connected nobles and other influential figures.
Their goal was to research immortality.
That was right—immortality. No matter the era, the word held a fatal allure for those in power.
The Organization used psychiatric patients for human experiments.
Most of the patients admitted to the hospital over the past few years had become test subjects.
That wasn't all. They also secretly abducted people for their experiments.
After all, the number of patients was far too small for the experiments they needed to conduct.
Nine out of every ten missing-person cases over the years had been connected to the Organization.
But—
The Organization wasn't the Jack the Ripper group Xiao Chu had suspected.
They did indeed cut people open, but not out in the streets or in alleys.
They did it in a secret laboratory beneath the hospital, performing experiments on both living and dead subjects, cutting people open.
When the doctor—who was also named Jack—heard them mention Jack the Ripper, he'd even scoffed dismissively.
He killed for the sake of glorious immortality.
He was above such lowly interests.
He was worlds apart from a pure madman like Jack the Ripper.
"Are you sure you weren't practicing on those people out there, honing your dissection skills?" Xiao Chu asked, unwilling to give up.
"Ha!"
When it came to his area of expertise, Doctor Jack looked positively radiant. "The Ripper's crude methods don't even begin to compare to mine. His wounds look just like bite marks left by a wild animal! Even a baboon wielding a scalpel could do a better job than him."
"My dissections are works of art!"
His tone and expression were feverish.
Doctor Jack was every bit as insane as Jack the Ripper.
But he wasn't the Jack the Ripper Tang Luo and the others were looking for on their mission.
Xiao Chu stood off to the side, looking miserable.
He had analyzed everything with absolute certainty, argued his case with total confidence, and then reality had beaten him senseless.
He'd once had a dream: to strategize from behind the scenes, plotting every move.
Now that dream was shattered.
His analysis had been as fierce as a tiger, but his actual performance had been a big fat zero.
It was true that this place was a den of danger, and that it was incredibly perilous, but it had nothing to do with the mission.
If Master Xuanzang hadn't literally turned the tables, even if they'd been lucky enough to survive, the outcome would have been disastrous.
Zhou Zhenguo also shook his head and sighed.
"Xiao Chu, don't blame yourself."
Tang Luo said, "Although we didn't catch Jack the Ripper, we did uncover an evil organization. Heaven means for us to wipe out these inhuman, antisocial fiends once and for all. So let me—your master—put an end to all this and restore peace and justice to the world."
"May this bring comfort to the spirits of all the victims!"
Punishing evil and promoting good would bring them merit.
Before you continue