After Verak returned to cell 208 and told Keating all the contents of his conversation with Lecter, Keating was so shocked that he could not speak. On the one hand, he was shocked by the massive amount of information in it, and on the other hand, he was shocked by Lecter's arrogance.
It has reached such a point that he dares to say such things openly in front of others.
"It seems that there is already a deep conflict between them." Lecter hesitated for a long time before speaking, "In this way, the feasibility of our backup plan has been greatly improved."
"Yes." Verak realized this when talking to Lecter. "Lecter is very interested in the position of warden, and Adel is unwilling to give it up. Now he can decide who of them can sit here.
The ones in the seats are us."
Keating, like Verak, also discovered something that had no answer and made no sense no matter how you looked at it: "Why is Adel unwilling to leave?"
"I'm thinking about this too." Verak originally planned to ask Keating what he had in mind, but Keating was also confused. "Lecter said that he was not interested in money, power or sex, and he refused Lecter's offer to him.
It doesn't make sense that he has a better job arranged. Could it be that he has feelings for this place?"
"It's hard to convince people to have feelings for such a place." Keating felt that there was a lot to it. "I think there are two possibilities. The first is that he knew that Lecter wanted to replace him, so he wanted to use Lecter's
needs in exchange for more things. Now he seems to be unmoved by money, power and women. In fact, it's just that the conditions proposed by Lecter have not met his psychological expectations. Secondly, what is there in Daimans prison that is at least suitable for Ah?
It is very important to Del, and because of this, he cannot give up the position of warden."
"Which one do you think might be beneficial to us?"
Keating said simply: "Of course it's the latter."
After thinking deeply, Verak analyzed the reason why Keating said this: "In the former case, Adel is a smart man. Even if he wants to maximize the benefits from his position as warden, it will not exceed the capabilities of Lecter, his father, so
It's not a problem that we haven't reached an agreement for a while. They will reach cooperation sooner or later, and then we will have no chance to mediate, right?"
"That's right." Keating said, "And if it's the latter, judging from Adel's series of performances, it should be that he will not give up his position as warden under any circumstances, nor will he tell the reason why he stays here.
. Then the conflicts between them will be irreconcilable, and will become more intense and serious as Lecter obtains more and more golden information from us."
"If that's the case, it would save us the trouble of actively inciting them and just continuously reveal the golden information to Lecter."
"However, at the moment, the situation is not so optimistic." Keating said worriedly, "Why do you think Adel has stopped taking any action since he met you once?"
Verak was just about to ask Adel why he was so calm. Lecter was still sitting steadily when the situation was very good. When Keating asked, he guessed: "If it is the first possibility, then Adel is indeed
There is no need to do anything, his focus should be on how to negotiate with Lecter. If it is the second case, it will be much more complicated if he has not taken any action. Either he has no way at the moment, or he already has other countermeasures.
Otherwise, he wouldn’t have come to see us and compete with Lecter for clues about the gold.”
"We have to test it out. Well, didn't you say that the investigation on the last clue will have results tomorrow? Then tomorrow, when the clues are confirmed and Lecter's trust in you has greatly increased, you can reveal part of the gold to him.
"Clues." Keating decided to find a way to find out what Adel was doing. "In this way, Adel gets the news. If the situation is the second possibility, he will definitely take action as soon as possible. By then, the worst outcome,
It’s nothing more than discovering that Adel and Lecter just haven’t agreed on cooperation, and the best result is the second possibility, and we can find out what countermeasures Adel has.”
"This is the best." Verak did not expect that he could use this method to stimulate Lecter and Adel in order to obtain more information and further intensify the conflict between the wardens. "Teacher, you are still better."
"It's just some testing methods. If the final conclusion is that they just haven't reached an agreement, then the difficulty of implementing the backup plan will suddenly increase." Keating was always worried about the first possibility, so his face lost the smile it used to have and was full of worry.
, "To prepare for the worst possibility, we have to make some progress on the frontal escape plan, otherwise both roads will be blocked and there will be no way out."
Verak nodded solemnly: "I understand, teacher. I also planned to get another piece of information from Dao En during the break today. Unfortunately, we were not assigned to the same batch today, and he seemed to be very cautious and did not dare to
I asked others to hand it over to me, and I can only wait until tomorrow to see if I can be assigned to the same batch for release."
"Okay." Keating began to reveal new information about the gold to Verak, so that Verak could change his words and report to Lecter tomorrow, "The gold was transported to Dunman in multiple ways, and there was a ship carrying gold on the sea route.
Because it was in disrepair, it was caught in a storm and sank in the shallow sea near the city of Carment. You can tell Lecter this tomorrow."
"But teacher, is this one too obvious? What if they fish out the sunken ship and find some clues based on the ship?" Verak did not rush to agree, but first tried to put himself in Lecter's perspective and think about what to do.
Take the clue revealed by Keating to the extreme. In his opinion, this clue can easily be grasped by Lecter to discover the location of the gold.
"It's not that easy to salvage the sunken ship. If they want to verify and use this clue, it will take at least a few months." Keating didn't take it seriously. "And, if we want to stimulate Adel, we must give enough weight this time."
If we can successfully leave within a month, it won’t be a big deal to give them this clue.”
"Huh..." Verak suddenly felt a heavy responsibility, and he solemnly said to Keating, "Don't worry, we will definitely go out."
——
October 16
Today, Verak and Dawn got their wish and were assigned to the first group of prisoners to be released. He first pretended to chat with Keating, who was also released, and then chatted with the prisoners he knew along the way. When he arrived, he was still lying alone.
Next to Dawn who was basking in the sun.
"How's it going?" As soon as Verak sat down, Daun, who closed his eyes to rest, spoke up.
"How did you know it was me?" Verak asked with a smile.
"No one else but you will take the initiative to talk to me during a break." Dawn opened her eyes and glanced at Verak beside her, "How's it going?"
Verak briefly revealed the difficulties and backup plans of the frontal jailbreak plan: "That's the way it is now. To be on the safe side, we can only choose two ways to advance. Finally, we will choose the right time to decide which plan to implement."
"This is the information collected over the past few days." Dawn stretched out her hands seemingly unintentionally and stuffed the folded paper under Verak's legs.
Verak raised his head slightly and looked at the sun, not paying attention to the prison guards around him. He pretended to lift his pants and quietly pinned the paper with the intelligence to his waist: "Do you really have no opinions to offer about frontal prison escape?"
His plan to escape from prison head-on has not progressed for several days. All forces that can cooperate must be gathered to work together to break the deadlock.
"Do you still remember the agreement we made when we first cooperated?" Dawn seemed to deliberately make things difficult for Verak, hoping that this young man who didn't know the heights of the world would retreat. "I am only responsible for providing you with maps and prison guard information. For other cooperation,
Unless your plan has made substantial progress and the feasibility is high enough, you don’t need to think about it.”
"Although there is no progress yet, what I can assure you is that this is the most promising opportunity to leave here ever." Verak advised seriously, "I hope we can all go all out."
"I've heard this kind of thing dozens of times." Dawn dismissed it, "Do you understand what I mean? You are not the only one, and you have never had a real chance to leave here."
Verak sighed: "Then I can only wait until I make progress to convince you."
"I hope you have." Dawn said.
"Let's go." Verak didn't know how to face this feeling of powerlessness. The prisoners who were supposed to be on the same front with him were either numb or cold, which made it even worse for him who was already struggling.
After returning to Keating, Verak pushed the wheelchair and inadvertently handed the love paper to Keating: "Teacher, please keep it."
"Don't worry." Keating has already had this experience and is very confident about bringing the intelligence paper back to cell 208 safely. "Lecter will meet you in the infirmary today, right?"
"Yes, he is currently focusing entirely on gold and the position of warden, so he waits for my report every day. Even if there is often no progress, he is still very interested in chatting with me." Verak said.
"Then I'll leave it to you at noon." Keating patted Verak's hand pushing the wheelchair.
Verak said "Yeah" heavily.
——
At noon, after lunch, Verak met Lecter in the infirmary.
Lecter was probably addicted to changing dressings. This time he called the doctor away and took full responsibility for changing Verak's dressings: "Come, lie down, and I will change your dressings later."
"Why are you interested in this kind of thing..." Even though Lecter changed his dressing yesterday and nothing happened, Verak still couldn't let go of Lecter, this madman.
"How interesting is this, treating the wounds you have made yourself!" Lecter untiedly removed the bandage for Verak.
Verak simply opened it up himself: "I want to report something to you. There is new progress in the gold clues."
"Oh? Say it first, and then change the dressing." Gold is the most important thing in Lecter's mind now. He didn't bother to remove Verak's bandage and change the dressing, and asked first.
"Mr. Keating told me about an incident when he was transporting gold to Dunman." Verak didn't listen and skillfully removed the bandage. "They used many methods to transport gold at that time, one of which was
It was a waterway, starting from the city of Carment and transporting gold to Dunman by ship. The weather happened to be bad that day and there was a storm. In order to rush for time, Mr. Keating forced the ship to set sail. In the end, the ship was in disrepair.
, not long after leaving the pier, it was overturned by the waves and sank in the shallow sea."
"So, there is a sunken ship containing gold in the shallow sea near the city of Carment?"
"That's right." Verak lay on the bed, waiting for the dressing to be changed, "By the way, you said yesterday that the last clue could be verified today. How is it now?"
Lecter memorized the important information in his mind: "Ah, I verified it clearly. It's true. It's just a pity that Keating did things very cleanly. We didn't trace the whereabouts of the gold based on that clue."
"What do you think of this new information? There should be many clues on that ship."
"Salvaging the sunken ship is not as easy as you think." Lecter had the urge to call his father immediately to inform him of the new information, but when he saw Verak lying down, he rarely had the patience to step forward and change Verak's dressing.
"I estimate it will take several months to find out."
"A few months is a bit too long. I'll try to ask for more new clues." Verak showed his kindness in front of Lecter, never forgetting to let Lecter relax his vigilance towards him.
Lecter was in a good mood and was no longer so cautious when taking the medicine: "This information is very crucial. Even if there are no clues on the ship, just salvaging an entire ship of gold is enough to achieve a great success."
"Then do I have any benefits?" Verak realized that this information could not only test Lecter and Adel, but he decisively began to strive for more things.
"What do you want?" Lecter said in a relaxed tone, not paying attention to Verak's request.
Verak didn't need anything for a while: "I haven't thought about it yet. When I think about it, I will tell you the same thing as before."
"Whatever, by the way, what's today's date?" Lecter suddenly changed the subject.
"October -" Verak just blurted out two words, and cold sweat immediately broke out on his forehead, "The middle of the month. Aren't new prisoners reported on the twelfth of every month? It must have been several days."
"It should be the 16th," Lecter said.
Verak breathed a sigh of relief and seemed to have resolved Lecter's temptation again.
Both he and Keating were secretly calculating the date. If Lecter, as the deputy warden, didn't know what day it was just now, but for him to say it easily as a prisoner, it would be hard not to arouse Lecter's vigilance towards him. He could only pretend to
Only when the time of the encounter has become blurred can he continue to show weakness and increase Lecter's trust in him.
"That's only a few days away."
"What?" Verak didn't understand what Lecter meant.
"October 20th is Peace Day, don't you know?" Lecter asked.
Verak knew that there was such a festival, but he had never been to it in the slums, so he never took it to heart: "I know, maybe there are some arrangements in the prison?"
"I think it's a rare good day. I happen to have itchy hands recently. I can arrange some large-scale event to celebrate the holiday." Lecter quickly gave Verak the medicine and asked him to sit up and re-tie the bandage. "You have