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At 11:39 P.M., Langdon and the others emerge from St. Peter’s Basilica into the blinding glare of media lights. The piazza is packed with screens, cameras, crowds, evacuating cardinals, and the sound of a helicopter waiting nearby. Chartrand urges the group to move carefully as they carry the wounded camerlegno down the basilica steps.

Glick and Macri, the BBC reporters, notice the scene and rush back toward the staircase with Macri’s camera running. Chartrand orders them to stay back, but the live footage is quickly picked up by the media screens across the square, broadcasting a close-up of the limp camerlegno to the crowd and the world.

Suddenly, the camerlegno opens his eyes and sits upright. The group loses control of the table carrying him, and the camerlegno slides off, lands on his feet, and staggers forward. When Chartrand tries to stop him, the camerlegno angrily orders Chartrand to leave him alone.

As the camerlegno moves toward the cameras, the torn cassock loosely covering his chest slips down. The crowd and cameras see the brand on his chest in gruesome detail, and the media screens enlarge and even rotate the image. Langdon recognizes the moment as an apparent ultimate Illuminati victory.

Looking at the broadcast image, Langdon realizes he had misunderstood the brand because he had been looking at the branding iron rather than its reversed imprint. Once correctly oriented, the symbols combine into the legendary Illuminati Diamond: Earth, Air, Fire, and Water unified in a single flawless mark.