Chapter 1 The Pitch-Black Tunnel

The pitch-black tunnel, the heavy stench of blood, and the occasional shrill screams—all these ghastly sights were whipping and gnawing at the heart of the pirate Charlie. Fang Senyan had very unscrupulously made this man walk in front to scout the way, while he himself leisurely strolled along behind with his hands clasped behind his back. Fang Senyan also keenly noticed that the patterns carved on the castle walls were both old and new, and the new patterns looked like they had been freshly engraved in the last few years. If you separated them out, they looked very much like strange letters combined together. Although Fang Senyan didn't understand the meaning of the letters, he could feel an indescribable coldness from his touch! It was like touching… hell.

The ground suddenly trembled.

Light, but decisive.

You could feel that it was the castle as a whole that was shaking!

Fang Senyan immediately stopped, while the pirate Charlie immediately threw himself on the ground—which to some extent directly reflected why he had been captured alive earlier. But soon the second, more violent impact appeared. Fang Senyan could even feel a part of this huge castle collapsing, and then a faint, indistinct cheer rang out. It was easy to identify that it was the pirates' unique cheer, surging like a tide. And in the darkness, there was also a burst of angry and cold palpitations, most likely the original guards were engaged in anxious communication.

"This way!" The pirate Charlie suddenly jumped up from his previous daze and panic, and said in a ecstatic tone: "God, they defeated these damn heretics! Boss did a great job, he stabbed these snakes hidden in the darkness in the heart with a knife, he must have captured the treasure vault of Tortuga Castle as promised!"

Fang Senyan's pupils suddenly contracted. Capture the treasure vault? This group of pirates, already weakened and fragmented by himself, was actually able to achieve such a goal? He immediately realized that there had been some variables in his plan. This variable appeared when Scarface Henry volunteered to come, but in Fang Senyan's mind, it just felt like a bit of trouble. Until now, Fang Senyan suddenly realized that he seemed to have always underestimated this guy, Scarface Henry. This underestimation seemed to have started when he lost to himself in the arm wrestling match.

That insignificant failure made Fang Senyan ignore Scarface Henry's other identity—the notorious first mate of the pirate ship Bell and Mug! The second-in-command under Captain Armand! A seasoned powerhouse who had been fighting on the Caribbean Sea for more than twenty years and was still strong and sturdy!

The two continued to walk in the darkness for about ten minutes, and then saw a dazzling firelight coming from the fork in the distance. Then, more than twenty blood-soaked pirates strode out of the corner. Although these barbaric and crude guys were as tattered as beggars, their expressions were like kings. Everyone began to sing the hornpipe song, which was popular among sailors and pirates. It could be seen that seven or eight people in the center of the crowd were staggering with obvious heavy loads. They were carrying four huge, sturdy boxes with copper hoops, oak boards, and exquisite patterns on them, and of course, the ubiquitous two-headed snake family crest of the Fooke family. When Fang Senyan's gaze fell on the boxes, the prompt he received was "Sealed Wealth", and then there was no more information.

And Scarface Henry, whom Fang Senyan had just thought of, was walking in the front of the team. He clenched his fists tightly, his upper body was naked, revealing a body of knotted muscles, shining in the firelight as if coated with olive oil. His body seemed to be enveloped in a silver light, and the muscles on his face would twitch involuntarily from time to time. The surrounding pirates looked at this bald man as if they were looking at their god of war!

Obviously, Scarface Henry showed the powerful strength worthy of his reputation, turned the tide, and rescued these pirates who were fighting in the wrong place with the wrong tactics from hell—and also messed up Fang Senyan's plan along the way.

Of course, please note, it was messed up, not failed.

When Fang Senyan successfully persuaded Armand to let him go ashore, his layout had already successfully closed the net. Now, even if there were any changes, it was just the difference between earning a little more and earning a little less, and the word "failure" had been temporarily abandoned from his dictionary. When the pirates in front suddenly noticed two people emerging from the darkness, the subconscious reaction was first vigilance, drawing their knives, and then after seeing Charlie's face clearly, a special, rude cheer broke out among the pirates:

"Oh! Damn God, guess who I saw! It's our Charlie, you damn bastard, you haven't gone to hell yet! Seeing you really makes me fucking excited!"

The surviving pirates were undoubtedly Scarface Henry's confidants, so Charlie, who then grinned foolishly, received the affectionate treatment of being patted on the butt and having his head rubbed by his companions. But Fang Senyan, who appeared next, didn't have such good treatment. At this time, all the pirates knew that the tragic encounters they had previously experienced were probably related to this guy's wrong decisions! Of course, they would never give Fang Senyan a good look, and some rude guys even started drawing their knives, wanting to seek justice for their dead brothers.

"You idiot, you dare to appear in front of us?" a pirate roared. Then his roar was echoed by his companions, almost overturning the entire castle. Scarface Henry, who was surrounded by the crowd, also stood out. His huge size had a suffocating pressure in the light of the torches. Fang Senyan could even see the blood vessels near his temples swelling and throbbing, and the fine beads of sweat on his bald head were as dense as grass covering a plain, clearly visible in the firelight. This big man, who had always given people a hearty feeling, was as gloomy as a cloud—the kind of light gray cloud that shrouded his homeland, the Scandinavian peninsula, and this kind of cloud was usually regarded as a sign of an approaching blizzard.

Scarface Henry looked at Fang Senyan, his eyes like those of a bloodthirsty beast looking at its prey, ready to pounce and tear everything apart at any time! The big man suddenly stretched out his left hand. On his wrist were tied many old bracelets. The materials of these bracelets were varied, some were woven from grass, some were cut from canvas, very rough, and there were also spots of blood on them, full of a primitive vicissitude and sadness.

"These are what those brothers entrusted to me before they died, but there were even more brothers who didn't even have the chance to hand me their bracelets! And all of this was caused by your wrong decision! Sailor Rock! Your stupid behavior made our good lads fall one after another on the cold ground of this damn castle. You have failed the expectations of the great Black Sea Son for you!" While Scarface Henry was speaking, Fang Senyan noticed that the blood streaks in his eyes were dense, and at first glance, they were all crazy orange-red, and it seemed that even the pupils could not be seen. Coupled with the current environment, it really gave people a feeling of panic. As for the content of his impassioned roar, he chose to ignore it. For Fang Senyan, he had already considered the situation he was facing at this time and made full preparations as early as one hundred and thirty hours and nineteen minutes ago.

Fang Senyan fearlessly looked at Scarface Henry, and suddenly raised his right hand, stretched out his index finger and said slowly:

"I will not deny your accusations. But even a person who is about to be tied to the gallows has the right to say his last words! I only have one question, Henry, and I hope you can answer me honestly." The muscles on Scarface Henry's face twitched. Obviously, his physical condition was definitely not as good as it looked on the surface, but Fang Senyan's request was reasonable anyway. He could not refuse, and could not refuse, unless he immediately killed the guy in front of him!

"What else do you have to say?"

Obviously, there was still explosive anger in Scarface Henry's words. At the same time, he took out another bag of wine and drank it down, although this would only worsen the brain injury, but Scarface Henry couldn't care so much at this time.

"Since you accuse my plan of being wrong, then if it were you, what would you do before entering the castle?" Fang Senyan's answer was as spicy and swift as he had always shown, and he often used offense instead of defense! It was like a knife pointing directly to the crux of the problem! Scarface Henry frowned again. He realized that there was obviously a trap in Fang Senyan's words, but the severe pain of the concussion was like countless needles piercing wildly in his ears—struggling against this severe pain consumed most of his energy.

However, obviously the question Fang Senyan asked was quite targeted, because people often have a comparison mentality—for some representative famous events, almost most people will have the idea of "what would happen if I did this", and they may also indulge in it to get pleasure. By the way, this is also the fundamental reason for the rise of time-traveling historical novels—in the moment when Scarface Henry hesitated because of his headache, some pirates had already begun to answer Fang Senyan's question with a series of curses and slang:

"You idiot with maggots crawling in your head, of course everyone should gather together and search slowly. As soon as those rats hiding in the darkness pop their heads, we'll blow their guts out with matchlock guns! That way, not even half a person will die, and those rabbits will know that our knives and muskets are even better than sails!"