svetikya Chapter 24 Lu Lincheng
Chapter 24 Lu Lincheng
Beyond the Golden Screen: The Real World - Kassel College Square
The entire square fell into a deathly silence.
Everyone stared at the dreamlike scene on the screen—torrential rain, dilapidated streets, a mother and son's farewell. Qiao Weini's gentle yet desperate eyes, Lu Mingfei's heart-wrenching cries, and the words, "Live well, even if you're just an ordinary person."
Many female students were already secretly wiping away tears. Even some professors and male students had red eyes and turned their heads away.
That is maternal love, the purest and most selfless love. Even across time and space, even if it's just a video clip, it can deeply touch the softest part of everyone's heart.
"Jovieni..." Professor Guderian took off his glasses and wiped his eyes. "Was this how she protected Lu Mingfei back then?"
Professor Schneider remained silent, but his clenched fist betrayed the shock he felt.
Principal Angers stared silently at the screen, his silver eyes reflecting the departing figure of Jovini. He recalled many years ago, that girl who always wore a gentle smile yet displayed astonishing talent in the field of alchemy. When she married Lu Lincheng, all of Kassel offered their blessings. When she gave birth to Lu Mingfei, everyone said he was the future hope of the Secret Service.
Then, she died.
Her cause of death remains a mystery, leaving behind only a son whose bloodline was sealed and a husband who vowed to resurrect her.
"Lu Lincheng..." Angers murmured to himself, "Did you see that? Your wife protected your son until the very last moment."
At this moment, at the edge of the square, Chu Zihang's body trembled slightly.
His golden eyes were fixed on the dark red sky on the screen, on the dilapidated streets, and on the figure on horseback that was faintly visible in the rain.
Odin.
Although it was only a glimpse, and only a blurry outline, Chu Zihang would never mistake it.
That rainy night, on the No. 0 overpass, Gungnir, the Eternal Spear, his father Chu Tianjiao standing in front of him... all the memories were ignited in an instant.
"Odin..." Chu Zihang's voice was as cold as iron, "Qiao Weini's death...is it related to you?"
His father's dying words echoed in his mind: "Go find... Lu Lincheng's son..."
It turned out to be the case.
It turns out that her father had known all along that Lu Mingfei was connected to Odin. It turns out that this pursuit across time and space had already begun more than a decade ago.
Chu Zihang gripped Murasame tightly, the blade humming softly in its sheath, as if responding to its master's anger and determination.
At the other end of the square, Caesar Gattuso's expression was indescribably complex.
He looked at Lu Mingfei's crying face on the screen and at Qiao Weini's departing figure, and a strange sense of irritation welled up in his heart.
He had never experienced that kind of pure, selfless love in the Gattuso family. His mother died early, his father Pompeii was a dissolute, and his uncle Frost only groomed him as the family heir. Family, love, warmth... these words were as distant as stories from another world to him.
Lu Mingfei, that loser, that seemingly useless boy, actually had such love.
Even though her mother passed away early and her father was absent, that love was real and etched into her soul.
"Damn it," Caesar muttered a curse, though it was unclear who he was cursing.
His gaze involuntarily drifted towards the parking lot—Nono's car had long since left; she should be on her way to the airport to find Lu Mingfei in the real world.
That red-haired witch, that girl who was always as free as the wind and unbound by anyone, actually broke all the rules for a loser who hadn't even entered school yet.
"Lu Mingfei..." Caesar murmured, his eyes filled with complex emotions. "What kind of magic do you possess?"
Beyond the Golden Screen: The Real World, Siberia, Nameless Research Institute
Three hundred meters underground, deep within a lead-plated shielding layer, lies a laboratory filled with monitoring screens.
Lu Lincheng stood motionless in front of the main screen.
The screen was playing the scene from the golden screen—Qiao Weini bidding farewell to Lu Mingfei in the rain, then turning and walking into the darkness. Lu Mingfei's heart-wrenching cries echoed through the speakers, reverberating in the cold laboratory.
Lu Lincheng's fingers gripped the edge of the control panel tightly, and the metal made a slight deforming sound under his grip.
His face was expressionless, but his eyes burned with a raging fury.
That wasn't ordinary anger; it was madness that had been building up for over a decade, suppressed by reason for over a decade, and finally breaking free of its cage.
"Winnie..." he murmured his wife's name, his voice hoarse like sandpaper scraping, "My Winnie..."
On the screen, Qiao Weini's figure disappeared into the rain. Then there was Lu Mingfei, the son he owed so much to, curled up in bed crying silently, experiencing separation again and again in his dreams.
Lu Lincheng closed his eyes.
He could imagine Lu Mingfei's life over the years. Living under someone else's roof, growing up in loneliness, ostracized by classmates, forgotten by the world. And he, as his father, had done nothing but send regular remittances and offer a few pale words of concern.
Because they dare not.
Because before she died, Qiao Weini held his hand and said, "Lincheng, protect Mingfei... hide him... don't let 'they' find him..."
So he sealed away his son's bloodline, leaving him in a remote and ordinary small Chinese town, letting him live the life of an ordinary person. He thought this was protection, this was love.
But now it seems that it was just a selfish escape.
"Mingfei..." Lu Lincheng opened his eyes and looked at Lu Mingfei's sleeping face on the screen. "I'm sorry, son. Dad was wrong."
He turned and walked to the safe in the center of the laboratory. After three layers of encryption—iris recognition, fingerprint verification, and voiceprint confirmation—the heavy alloy door slowly opened.
There was only one thing in the safe.
It was a glass cylindrical container about thirty centimeters tall, completely transparent, filled with a pale blue liquid. Suspended in the liquid was a palm-sized fragment of bone that shimmered with a ghostly blue light.
The urn containing the bones of Leviathan, the king of the sea and water.
This was a treasure that Lu Lincheng had searched for for ten years deep in the Siberian ice, paying a huge price to obtain. Originally, he intended to use it as a medium to resurrect Jovini—Leviathan controlled the power of life and resurrection, and its bone vials contained the purest life force.
but now……
Lu Lincheng carefully took out the container. The bone vial was slightly warm in his hand, as if it were pulsating with life. He could feel the dormant power inside, a power powerful enough to unleash tsunamis and submerge continents.
"Leviathan..." he whispered, "Originally, I intended to use you to resurrect my wife. But now, I've changed my mind."
He walked to another wall, where a huge world map hung. On the map, the location of Kassel College was marked with a red circle, and the location of the small coastal town in China was also marked, with a red line connecting the two points.
Nono is heading to Chicago Airport to go to China to find Lu Mingfei.
The appearance of the golden screen signifies that Lu Mingfei's secret has been exposed. Those forces hidden in the shadows—the Gattuso family, the Chen family, and those madmen who follow Odin—will soon take action.
"Since this damned world is 'unjust'..." Lu Lincheng's eyes were as cold as the Siberian permafrost, "then don't blame it for being 'unjust'."
All he wants is his wife and children.
As long as Qiao Weini can come back, as long as Lu Mingfei can be safe, he can be an enemy of the whole world.
It can unleash Leviathan, it can break all the rules, it can... plunge you into hell.
Lu Lincheng pressed a red button on the control panel. The sound of machinery whirring echoed from deep within the laboratory as a massive piece of equipment began to preheat. It was the alchemical matrix he had secretly built over five years, originally intended to extract the power from the bone vials, but now… he had a new plan.
"Mingfei, hang in there a little longer." He looked at Lu Mingfei's face on the screen, his eyes both tender and frantic. "Dad will be here soon. This time, I won't let anyone hurt you again."
"And Winnie..." He looked in the direction where Winnie had disappeared, "Wait for me. I will definitely bring you back. No matter the cost."
The laboratory lights reflected on his face, creating a dim and luminous effect, much like his inner state at that moment.