In the middle of the factory building stood a massive vat of molten iron, its contents roiling and churning. The furnace beneath it was still blazing.
Even more shocking, a man hung above and to the right of the vat.
It was Li Zekun, who had been captured just before her.
He was suspended from a steel cable running through a pulley.
Someone below pressed a switch, and Li Zekun's body slowly moved toward the space above the vat.
When the man pressed the switch again, his body stopped.
The temperature of the bubbling molten iron exceeded two thousand degrees.
From where Li Zekun hung, another few meters to the left would bring him close enough for the heat above the vat alone... to kill him.
Li Zekun's head drooped. His clothes looked soaked, whether from the heat or the fumes, she couldn't tell. He seemed to have already endured a round of torture, and she had no idea whether he was still conscious...
"Last chance, Li!"
Someone below spoke in a low, heavy voice.
Song Ning quietly shifted her position to get a look at the speaker. He was a thin-faced man with a small mustache.
"Do you have it or not? Think carefully before you answer! If you fall into that molten iron and take a bath, there won't even be bones left!"
"Didn't... didn't find it! No... thing! Please, please..."
Li Zekun forced out those few words, then fell silent, seemingly too weak to say anything more.
The man below sneered. "Looks like you really didn't find it! In that case, there's no point keeping you around!"
With that, the mustached man waved a hand.
Someone beside him immediately pressed the switch. The steel cable carried Li Zekun inch by inch toward the space above the vat.