Chapter 41 White Hole Prison (18)

Chapter 41: White Hole Prison (Eighteen)

The door was hidden amidst the bookshelves.

Everyone stood at the entrance, unsure what to do.

The sign on the door read plainly: "Warden's Office."

"This..." The lanky man hesitated. "Should we go in?"

Scarface frowned, swallowed hard, and wanted to say, "Let's go in and take a look," but something felt off.

The girl spoke up: "The thing is, we still don't understand the exact background of this main quest."

"Not to mention there's also that inexplicable hidden quest."

"So I was thinking," the girl glanced at the door and then at the others, "maybe there are clues in there."

A silence fell over them. Clues might be right in front of them, but danger could also be lurking within.

Shi Wu studied the door, then his eyes swept over the dust-covered wall beside it. Under the soft light, it appeared uneven.

"Hold on."

He raised his hand and wiped the dust off the wall.

Underneath the brick, a small metal plate was gradually revealed. The slightly reflective plate had clear lettering:

"On-duty hours: 9:00 – 21:00?"

Scarface leaned in for a closer look and murmured the words aloud.

The current time was still well before 21:00, because, according to the prison's standard schedule, there would naturally be a notification when the time came.

"Perhaps this rule hasn't changed," Shi Wu said, smiling slightly. "Since he's on the clock, wouldn't it be nice to go in and... say hello?"

"That makes some sense. Maybe we have some questions we need to ask the Warden."

Everyone exchanged glances and nodded in agreement.

Facing some danger was better than just sitting around waiting for something to happen.

*Click—*

The door opened with a soft click.

When it opened, there was no Warden sitting imposingly at the front, no gruesome or bloody scenes, and no eerie, dark little room.

Instead, what they saw was a long corridor, which seemed like a place that had abruptly materialized there.

At the end of the corridor, there appeared to be another plain, unadorned small door.

"Let's go have a chat with the Warden."

Shi Wu gestured and led the way toward the small door.

The door looked very old, without any ornate decorations. It was just a simple, worn wooden door with a grayish hue, its handle somewhat rusty.

It had a very familiar feel. Looking at the door, Shi Wu felt a strange pang.

If he had to compare the door's style to anyone, it would probably be tonight's Warden.

It shared the same plain, ordinary look.

He reached out and, under the tense gazes of the others, gently opened the door.

Inside was a room so plain it was almost bland: off-white walls, a wooden desk, an old chair, and a few boxes of yellowed file folders piled in a corner.

Everyone secretly let out a sigh of relief. There was no one inside.

The dust was exceptionally thick, as if no one had set foot in the place for a very long time.

Shi Wu took a couple of steps inside and was immediately drawn to a photo frame hanging on the wall.

It was a photograph, covered in dust, its frame mottled, seemingly having existed for a very long time.

He carefully took it down and gently wiped it.

In the photo was a black-and-white group portrait that looked decades old.

At the center of the image was a family of three. The man was a younger-looking Warden, his face almost identical to now, smiling gently and kindly.

He had one hand resting on a woman's shoulder. The woman had long, gentle hair and a quiet expression.

In her arms, she held a little boy about four or five years old, his eyes bright, smiling at the camera.

The scene of the three of them nestled together was heartwarming and utterly incongruous with this prison.

"The Warden... he has a family?" Scarface, standing behind Shi Wu, asked quietly. "But so far, we've only ever seen him alone."

"Perhaps," Shi Wu thought of the Warden's information he had seen earlier by the bookshelf, "the Warden has actually been alive for over three hundred years..."

The lanky man was astonished, but before he could press further, a sudden cry came from behind.

"Ah—!"

The girl's voice was sharp and urgent, as if she had discovered something terrifying.

The others in the main room immediately turned and rushed toward her. They saw her standing at the doorway of an adjacent room, completely frozen, her face deathly pale.

"What happened?!" Scarface pulled the girl behind him.

The room appeared to be a normal bedroom.

However, the most abnormal thing was that right in the center stood a large glass tank. Inside lay a pitch-black, grotesquely shaped "creature," motionless. Beside it was a strange-looking piece of flesh.

"This..." The lanky man stumbled back a few steps in fright. "Isn't this—"

"The kind of monster we encountered when we first arrived on the island," Shi Wu finished, his expression darkening.

"Only this one is... slightly different."

Scarface gritted his teeth and glanced at it with disgust. "What a bad omen."

They all retreated back to the main room, their expressions varied.

Shi Wu spoke first, briefly summarizing all the information he had gathered.

Whether it was the monster they saw, the prisoners' abnormalities, or the bizarre fact that the Warden had been alive for over three hundred years.

But he still omitted the existence of that "Snot-nosed Kid."

"So," the girl's pale face had regained some color as she asked, "Could the Warden live this long because of this kind of 'monster'?"

"But why would he do this? To—live? To live forever?"

"Is the 'Sanctification Bureau' he mentioned really just about 'cleansing away sins'?"

"Or... is this just a sacrificial ritual in the name of 'faith'?"

"Were the prisoners who kept disappearing mysteriously eaten by these 'monsters'?"

"And, us," the girl's voice trembled, almost unable to continue, "and the prisoners, are we just 'feed' for these monsters?"

The air fell silent.

"But, it seems, isn't all this a bit too simple and surface-level?" Scarface spoke after a moment's thought, scratching the scar on his face. "Actually, I think..."

Scarface fell silent, as if too embarrassed to go on.

"Why stop halfway? Scarface, you don't seem like the shy type," the tall, thin man teased.

Scarface grimaced, hesitated for a moment, then blurted out, "Actually... I don't think the Warden is that kind of person."

"Hmm?" Shi Wu's gaze turned to him, a hint of interest in his eyes. "Go on?"

"He doesn't seem like the type who 'pursues immortality.'" Scarface scratched his head. "How do I put this? Maybe it's just my sixth sense, my gut feeling."

Everyone: "..."

Shi Wu didn't laugh; instead, he looked at him very seriously. "Intuition is also a form of reasoning, especially in a situation like this."

Hearing this, Scarface finally relaxed a bit. He pointed at the photo wall in the room and the dust in the corners, then swept his gaze around. "Look, this room is decorated quite warmly, and that place that was originally a 'bedroom,' along with the photos of his wife and child."

"If I were pursuing immortality, why wouldn't I take my family with me? If my loved ones are dead, what's the point of immortality?"

"And, even if his wife and child were still alive, just not here, he should at least put up new ones."

Scarface touched the family portrait, showing them the dust now on his fingers.

"But the dust here is especially thick, meaning this place hasn't been lived in for a long time. If he really relied on monsters for immortality, even if he didn't guard it daily, he'd at least check in regularly, right? After all, it's a secret hideout, yet he hasn't been here."

As he spoke, he looked at Shi Wu. "And what you mentioned earlier about 902-3?"

"You mean, when he crawled out of the 'Sanctification' ritual, the Warden rewarded him?" Shi Wu continued.

"Exactly!" Scarface nodded. "If he really relied on this thing to stay alive, wouldn't he panic upon seeing a 'sacrificial feed' come back to life?"

"Why would he reward him now?"

A flicker passed through Shi Wu's eyes.

Scarface continued, "And those monsters on the island. If the Warden was really feeding monsters to achieve immortality, why would he send the Guard Captain to eliminate them?!"

"It just doesn't make sense logically."

The tall, thin man couldn't help but interject, "Are you saying... the Warden is actually killing those monsters?"

"My feeling is that the Warden despises those monsters," Scarface nodded.

"Right." Shi Wu nodded in agreement, but then he pivoted. "But—"

"He is also truly 'sacrificing' because he is a 'good Warden.' At the very least, his starting point has always been 'saving the prisoners.'"

Under everyone's puzzled gazes, Shi Wu spoke calmly, "There's a second type of monster in this prison."

"That monster is probably the source of everything."

"Let's search around here a bit more. Maybe we can find some clues about this second monster."

The sound of rustling and searching immediately filled the room again.

Shi Wu pushed open another door, and his nose was immediately met with a faint smell of aged paper and ink, mixed with a hint of mildew.

He glanced around, his gaze quickly settling on the low cabinet in the corner—or, more accurately, on the book atop it. The book seemed to possess an indescribable magic, drawing attention instantly.

*Pure Spirit Holy Words: The Cleansing and Unification of the Sinful Heart*

Shi Wu's eyes narrowed slightly.

The name sounded like a cult pamphlet, but it fit the prison's "propaganda tone" perfectly.

He had just paused his fingertip on the book cover when, the next second, he almost unconsciously opened it, landing precisely on a specific page.

"It lies beneath the island."

"It cleanses the sins of all beings with Holy Words."

"It peers into the filth deep within the heart, granting the forsaken a second chance at life."

The text on the page seemed infused with some kind of power, densely packed, repeating similar content. Each word carried a subtle sense of mental infiltration.

Shi Wu felt his eyelids grow heavy, but at that moment, he noticed a line of hastily scribbled handwriting in the bottom corner of the page:

"Pure feudal superstition. Contents not credible."

Shi Wu read it aloud softly, his gaze pausing.

This line was likely written by the Warden in his youth.

"Ironic," he murmured softly, a trace of complexity flashing deep in his eyes. "Then why did you come to believe it later?"

"And who made you believe it?"

As he pondered this, Scarface's familiar rough voice suddenly shouted from outside:

"Everyone, come look!!"

The voice carried urgency and excitement.

Shi Wu snapped back to attention, closed the leather-bound book, and quickly walked out of the room.

As soon as he stepped out, he saw Scarface squatting on the floor, holding a few yellowed pieces of paper that looked like they had been dug out from the bottom of some drawer after frantic searching.

"What is it?" He hurried over.

Scarface handed the papers over. "Don't these look like newspapers?"

Shi Wu looked down.

They were indeed "newspapers," the paper yellowed but the print clear. Most of the text reported on "White Hole Prison." One headline stood out prominently:

*Giving the Lost a Chance—An Interview with the Founder of White Hole*