Mathieu exploded.
Literally exploded.
Lin Ze looked down at the minced meat on the ground that was still breathing hot air, and his whole body fell into a state of shutdown.
"Fuck."
He finally chose to curse in Chinese.
The word "fuck" echoed twice in the empty underground laboratory, bouncing off the stone walls and forming a buzzing echo that sounded like several people cursing at the same time.
Although Mr Delacour cannot understand Chinese, Lin Ze accurately captured the emotional core of the word from its tone and expression.
He frowned and looked down at the blood spots on the hem of his robe, and whispered something to the same effect in French.
"He's been cursed."
"The spell will trigger automatically whenever he attempts to reveal certain information."
"Tsk, these people are really cruel to their companions."
"Where do desperadoes get their companions?" Delacour shook his head.
Lin Ze ran up the stairs and dragged down the waterproof bags that Mathieu had dropped casually. After putting them away, Lin Ze opened the first waterproof bag.
There are three cages inside, each containing an animal.
The first cage contains a mouse.
With gray fur and a bald tail, he was shivering in a corner, holding his head with his two front paws, as if praying that this nightmare would end soon.
In the second cage was a hedgehog, curled up into a ball, with several thorns missing from its back, revealing its pink skin.
The thing in the third cage made Lin Ze's movements stagnant.
That's a toad.
He was quite big, probably as big as an adult's fist. He lay motionless at the bottom of the cage. His skin was dark purple, his back was covered with bumps, his belly was turned over, and his four legs were in the air, as if he had died.
Just like Fenwick, each animal has a metal ring on its body.
"Looks like these are wizards."
Mr Delacour squatted down and took a closer look at the toad with its belly upturned.
He stretched out his finger and poked it, but the toad didn't move.
"This one looks a little bit dead."
Lin Ze Continue to dig through the second waterproof bag.
The bag contained some Potions materials, several sealed glass jars, several bundles of dried Herbology tied tightly with hemp rope, and two bottles of dark purple liquid with an ominous sheen.
Lin Ze picked up one of the bottles and shook it, "Isn't this the kind of thing that can turn people into beasts?"
Mr Delacour took the bottle, uncorked it, smelled it, and quickly stuffed it back, "I guess you can't be wrong, these animals must rely on this Potions to maintain their shape."
"It seems that La Ciotat is a transfer station for Bados."
Lin Ze stuffed the Potions bottle into the inner pocket of his coat, preparing to take it back for study.
The two searched the basement again and found a dog-eared experimental record.
Lin Ze flipped through a few pages, and the content above made his stomach churn.
Experimental subject No. 37, female, 25 years old, experienced her first form fluctuation seventeen minutes after the drug was injected, and maintained the Animagus form for about four hours before organ failure.
Experimental subject No. 42, male, 30 years old, failed to inject the drug Transfiguration and died directly.
Every page has the same format, number, gender, age, reaction, results, and a column almost entirely marked with the final opinion of "failure" or "death."
The last few pages of the record book had been torn out, and the remaining pages were jagged.
"Now that our clues are scattered all over the place, how can we find that damn laboratory?"
Just when the two were at a loss what to do, the sound of two people talking came from outside the door.
The footsteps were getting closer and closer, mixed with the two people chatting.
"Mathieu That guy is late again. He promised to hand over at ten o'clock, but it's almost eleven o'clock now." A high-pitched voice complained.
"It's not like you don't know what kind of legs he has. He takes two steps and takes three breaths. It's strange that he can be on time." Another hoarse voice replied.
"I heard that Bados is in a bad mood recently, and another batch of experimental subjects has problems."
"You said we just left for a while, Mathieu is already here?"
Two wizards in dark cloaks wandered in from the door.
One of them, a tall and lanky man, had just stepped down the last step when laughter caught in his throat.
The picture he saw was really not very pleasing to the eye:
There was minced meat on the floor and blood splattered on the wall. Two strangers stood in the center of the laboratory, holding up their wands and looking at themselves with stern expressions.
"Good evening, you two, you must be the Maurice and Lambert that Mathieu said, right?" Lin Ze waved to them.
"Which one is Maurice? Which one is Lambert? Please raise your hand so we can tell them clearly."
The two wizards looked at each other, turned around and ran away.
But before they could take the first step, the spell of Mr Delacour had arrived.
Two red lights accurately hit the two people's backs. One fell to the ground and the other hit the stairs face down, knocking off a front tooth.
Mr Delacour didn't give them any chance to struggle.
He strode over, grabbed the collar of the wizard who had knocked out his front teeth, pulled him up from the ground, and put his wand directly on the man's temple.
"Legilimency."
The wizard's body twitched violently, his eyes rolled up, and he let out an indistinct whimper.
After a few seconds, Mr Delacour let go of his hand, letting him slide to the ground like a puddle of mud.
Lin Ze watched this scene from the side, frowning slightly.
This French Ministry of Magic senior official, who was usually unsmiling, had eyes as cold as ice at the moment.
Another tall and thin man Delacour followed the same example and Legilimency him.
After more than ten seconds, Mr Delacour took back the wand and took a deep breath.
The two wizards were slumped on the ground like puppets with their strings cut off, drooling from the corners of their mouths, their eyes were distracted, and they made incomprehensible grunts.
This is the result of being forced to Legilimency, and both of them became stupid.
Lin Ze looked at the two unconscious people on the ground, and then at Mr Delacour.
"You..."
"Okay, don't say anything else." Mr Delacour interrupted him, his voice as steady as ever.
"Bados's cruise ship is on the seabed about three nautical miles southeast of Old Port. The entrance is the cruise ship's chimney."
He paused and added, "These people don't deserve sympathy."
Lin Ze nodded, "Then what are you waiting for?"
Mr Delacour used his wand to draw a circle in the void in front of him, and the silver magic trace condensed into a communication mirror in the air.
The mirror flickered twice, and then the face of a witch wearing Auror uniform appeared.
"Mr Delacour?" The witch's voice came from the mirror.
"Notify Underwater Operations Team that the target location has been confirmed. The chimney of a sunken cruise ship is three nautical miles southeast of Old Port. Prepare all diving equipment within fifteen minutes. We will be there immediately."
"Yes!" The witch's face disappeared from the mirror.