After the last grain of yellow sand settled, the traces of the Osiris Temple vanished from the earth's surface, leaving only an ever-expanding giant sinkhole, staring emptily at the sky.
"Cough, cough, cough..."
A fit of coughing interrupted Lin Jie's brief mont of distraction. He turned his head and saw Julian half-kneeling on the ground, trying to pour a mouthful of water into William's parched, cracked lips.
The old soldier's condition was very poor. His chest rose and fell weakly, his face ashen from blood loss and internal injuries. If not for his tenacious vitality keeping him going, he likely wouldn't have survived the tumultuous escape just now.
Their core combatant was incapacitated, their knowledge expert was exhausted, and he himself, the temporary commander, was also nearing his limit.
This ace team was in an extrely dire predicant.
"Cough... don't... don't waste the water..."
William suddenly opened his eyes. Using all his strength, he slightly turned his head away, avoiding the water flask.
"William! You're awake?" Julian exclaid with surprise.
But the next second, when Julian saw the look in William's eyes, the joy in his heart turned into a wave of concern.
Those grey eyes, always so resolute, now held only intense pain and deep confusion—an expression Lin Jie had never seen before.
"My... my body... doesn't feel right..." William's voice was very hoarse, each word followed by a gasp.
William described the bizarre sensation with great difficulty: "Sothing is wriggling inside my body, like a slippery fish swimming between my organs."
"Forget about ." William coughed a few tis, his unfocused eyes struggling to focus on Lin Jie's face.
"...Leave here... you... go back... find... One-eyed Hassan and the others..."
"William!" Julian roared in disbelief, "Do you have any idea what you're saying!"
"I know perfectly well." A faint, tragic yet relieved smile appeared on William's face. "I'm already useless... Staying will only hold you back."
"Listen, Lin Jie... you're the commander... make... the right decision..."
He used the last of his strength to utter this final instruction, then could hold on no longer. His head lolled to the side as he fell unconscious.
Lin Jie took a deep breath of the scorching air. Suppressing the heaviness in his heart, he began to calmly consider their next move.
Although they had survived, the crisis was not over.
They had lost their riding cals, and their communication equipnt was damaged in the sandstorm, leaving them a lone force trapped deep in the desert.
With the ager water and food they had left, it would be difficult for them to walk out of this deadly place alive.
"Julian, check how much of our supplies we have left." Lin Jie's voice was hoarse but steady. In such a desperate situation, the commander's calmness was the pillar supporting the team's morale.
Julian nodded. Dragging his exhausted body, he began to inventory all the usable items gathered from their persons.
The results were not optimistic.
Less than half a flask of drinking water remained, along with a few crushed hard biscuits. While the bandages and basic dicines in the dical kit were sufficient, they wouldn't be of much help for William's internal injuries.
In terms of weapons, Lin Jie's [Serene Heart] had one shot left. The Colt pistol Julian had borrowed temporarily was empty. And William's high-powered [Church Holy Cannon] lay quietly to the side;
without its master to wield it, it was now just a pile of heavy tal.
"The situation... is bad." Julian's voice was dry. "If we ignore William's condition, just the two of us might be able to walk for a day. But now..."
He didn't continue, but the despair in his words was already clear.
Lin Jie frowned. What Julian said was true.
Had they struggled to escape the temple's collapse only to ultimately die of thirst or starvation trapped in this sea of sand?
Just as this sense of powerlessness was about to overwhelm him, a sudden wave of warmth spread across the back of Lin Jie's right hand.
The sensation wasn't abrupt, nor was it as scorching as during the previous spiritual energy outburst. Instead, it was a moist, comfortable warmth full of life, like soaking in a hot spring.
He instinctively raised his right hand. The [White Vulture's Mark] was emitting a soft, steady glow.
Faint golden streams of light were mixed within that glow.
Lin Jie was very familiar with those golden streams;
they were the sa essence spiritual energy that had dissipated from the [Scales of the Dead] earlier.
Lin Jie's heart skipped a beat. A bold, sowhat absurd idea surfaced in his mind.
Could it be...
He closed his eyes and cautiously extended his consciousness into the mark on the back of his hand.
This ti, he felt no resistance or rejection.
That haughty Regal Will now displayed a rare docility towards the visit of this "Master of the Nest."
The mont Lin Jie's spiritual energy touched those golden streams, an ancient flow of information flooded his mind.
It wasn't specific images or language, but a peculiar sensation.
It was the sensation of "death."
Death akin to the cyclical ebb and flow of the Nile's flooding and drying.
Death where, after all things wither, new life is nurtured anew within the decaying soil.
Death where, after judgnt ends, the soul is purified and thus gains eternal life.
It was the spirituality belonging to the Lord of the Underworld, Osiris.
In the final monts of the temple's collapse, while Yan Xilou was collecting fragnts of spiritual energy essence, a few faint specks of golden light, amidst the chaotic energy turbulence, had actively rged into the mark of the sa level on the back of Lin Jie's right hand.
They were like puzzle pieces separated for thousands of years, finding each other again in this mont.
Nekhbet, in her essence, represented the "Regal Authority of Upper Egypt" and "Life," the symbol of "life" in the mythological system.
And those few wisps of spiritual energy essence from the [Scales of the Dead] represented the "Judgnt of the Underworld" and "Rebirth," the cycle of "death" in the mythological system.
"Life" and "Death."
These two opposing yet mutually foundational forces ford a tiny, perfect, balanced cycle within Lin Jie's body.
The mark's "beastly erosion" that had been troubling Lin Jie was gently neutralized under this perfect balance.
The predator's instinct still existed, but it no longer attempted to forcibly assimilate him.
The trend towards emotional apathy was curbed, replaced by a calmness undisturbed by external factors.
And that intense, exclusive territorial consciousness transford into a purer, broader protective subconscious.
He was no longer just a prisoner of the "nest."
He had beco the balance itself, harnessing the two forces of "life" and "death" within him.
"Balance..."
Lin Jie murmured to himself. He opened his eyes, his gaze bright.
The words of the High Priest from the Karnak Temple echoed in his ears like a prophecy transcending ti.
"To pacify the violent divine nature of the Guardian Goddess within your body, the thod is to find an artifact of the sa level belonging to the Underworld Lord Osiris, achieving a balance of divinity within you!"
So the High Priest was telling the truth. This was the real way to break the deadlock.
In a sense, their mission this ti wasn't a complete failure. By a stroke of misfortune turning to fortune, Lin Jie had unexpectedly obtained the opportunity to achieve balance.
The changes brought by this balance weren't just on a spiritual level.
Lin Jie could sense the warm, life-filled energy flowing from the mark on the back of his right hand, coursing through his ridians to his entire body.
His body, pushed to its limit, was being rapidly repaired and nourished.
The feeling was like receiving sweet rain after a long drought.
In just over ten seconds, his depleted physical strength and spiritual energy recovered by at least thirty percent.
Though still weary, he had regained the ability to act.
"So that's how it is."
A complex smile, both bitter and relieved, appeared on Lin Jie's face.
He understood why Professor Petrie called him a "living holy relic."
His body was no longer rely flesh and blood.
It was a unique vessel capable of bearing and fusing the spirituality of a Calamity-class UMA.
And this trait might just be the hope that could lead his companions to survive in this deadly place.
"Julian!"
Lin Jie's voice was no longer hoarse;
instead, it was filled with confidence and strength.
Julian, who was worrying over the shortage of supplies, was startled by this transformation and looked up in surprise.
He saw a pair of different eyes.
Those black eyes held calmness and sharpness, but deep within their pupils, two points of light—one gold, one white—were slowly rotating, like miniature suns and moons.
It was the manifestation after fusing "life" and "death."
"Our mission isn't over yet."
Lin Jie stood up. He walked over to the heavy [Church Holy Cannon] and lifted it with one hand.
The weight that had once felt strenuous now felt light and convenient in his grasp.
"William's injuries can't wait. We can't just sit here waiting for death."
He turned his gaze towards the edge of the sea of sand, the direction they had co from, which might also be the direction where a path to survival existed.
"Yan Xilou managed to leave here safely, which ans sowhere in this desert, there's likely a pre-arranged rendezvous point or supply station he set up."
"And we are going to find it now!"
Julian was infected by Lin Jie's confidence. The despair in his heart was dispelled sowhat, but reason still left him puzzled.
"But Lin, which way should we go?" He gestured hopelessly at the boundless sea of sand before them, where nothing but gold t the eye, devoid of any landmarks.
"The temple's collapse completely changed the terrain here, and the cals are long gone. We're utterly lost. Now, forget about finding Yan Xilou's elusive supply station;
we probably can't even find the path we ca by."
Lin Jie shook his head and turned his gaze towards the deep, boundless starry sky that appeared after the sunset.
"That's true during the day," Lin Jie admitted. "But at night, we have a more reliable guide."
A look of sudden understanding dawned on Julian's face.
"The stars!" he exclaid. "How could I forget! Ancient Egyptian navigators and desert caravans, without any compasses, relied on the stars to determine direction!"
Julian quickly walked to a relatively flat patch of sand and used his finger to draw several complex geotric shapes on the ground.
Then, looking up at the starry river, he began chanting, performing so ancient and precise astronomical calculation.
Orion's iconic three belt stars twinkled on the night curtain.
Scorpio's curved tail was slowly rising from the eastern horizon.
"Found it!" After a mont, Julian stood up. He pointed decisively towards the northeast. "Based on the angle between Sirius and the North Star, combined with corrections for our current latitude. Over there, that's the direction we ca from!"
His vast knowledge had, in this mont, beco their most reliable compass in this sea of sand.
And so, the three of them officially embarked on their journey back.
This ti, it was Julian who walked at the front of the group.
The scholar displayed the bearing of an experienced desert guide.
His gaze constantly shifted between several "positioning stars" in the sky and the long shadows cast on the ground by the moonlight, calibrating their forward course in an ancient and reliable way.
And Lin Jie took on the role of the "physical laborer."
Carrying the heavy [Church Holy Cannon] and so supplies in one hand, he used his other hand to support William, closely following behind Julian.
The desert night was bitterly cold, the wind and sand constantly scraping against their cracked skin, but no one uttered a word of surrender.
They walked for an unknown length of ti.
Just as Lin Jie's steps began to grow heavy and the scene before his eyes started to blur with double vision.
A faint yet familiar sound of cal bells drifted from the dark horizon ahead.
"Ding-ling... Ding-ling..."
In this dead silent world with only the sound of wind, that noise seed especially loud and pleasing.
Lin Jie's body jolted.
For a mont, he thought he was hallucinating, so he quickly stopped and tilted his head, listening carefully.
"Ding-ling... Ding-ling-ling..."
The sound was getting closer!
"It's... it's reinforcents!" Julian heard it too.
He let out a hoarse yet joyful shout!
"—We're over here!!!"
Soon, a warm orange-yellow halo of light appeared on the dark horizon.
The halo grew larger and brighter!
Eventually, it turned into a large joint search and rescue team composed of over a dozen cals!
When Lin Jie saw the familiar, lean figure with only one eye riding at the very front of the search team, the nerve that had been stretched to its absolute limit finally relaxed.
It was the one-eyed guide, Hassan. This experienced Bedouin elder, whom Lin Jie had assigned to stay behind, had not chosen to flee alone.
After confirming that Lin Jie and the others wouldn't return in a short ti, he had imdiately made a decisive and correct decision.
He had a few loyal guides stay behind, guarding a portion of the supplies and cals as a final rendezvous point.
And One-eyed Hassan himself, along with Ethan and the remaining people, imdiately turned back, racing at full speed in the direction they had co from.
He spent a day traveling non-stop to reach the nearest I.A.R.C. secret outpost.
Then, using the ergency communication equipnt there, he sent the ssage "Mr. Lin and his party are missing" back to Cairo.
Old Abdul, upon receiving this news, imdiately mobilized all the forces he could.
Thus, this large-scale joint search and rescue team before them ca into being.
"Praise be to Allah."
When One-eyed Hassan clearly saw the three familiar, swaying figures under the moonlight, his remaining lone eye also revealed a happiness mixed with tears.
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