Chapter 173: The Night of the Clown's Resurrection (Part 2)

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"So, Father saw something different in me and recommended me to The Godfather, to hire me as Evans' private tutor. Actually, they wanted me to solve Evans' problem?"

"I and Carmine can't be sure if the Court of Owls is still watching Evans. But now it seems that our vigilance was not wrong. They still see Evans as a key figure in the water source plan."

Father Daniel sighed and said, "This generation of the Court of Owls is far inferior to the previous one. They are too eager and have left too many flaws. I have lived in that church for decades and know every brick and tile there."

"The freezing of Gotham is not enough to crack the ground of the church that much. They are just controlling Alberto to test whether the wine is really mature."

"It seems that our attack on the Court of Owls with Batman didn't make them behave."

"That move was actually very effective." Father Daniel paused and said, "I should say it was the most effective in decades."

"But it's still not enough. Remember when I told you before, Falcone and I didn't know the answer? That was not our perfunctory words."

"The Court of Owls may be an important pawn, but it's not everything, not even the king and queen."

"Falcone and I have spent our whole lives and have never glimpsed the truth behind this darkness."

Falcone shook his head too. The light of his cigar gradually extinguished, and the old theater appeared even darker. He said, "I said I didn't find them, didn't wait for the opportunity. That's the truth. There must be something else behind the Court of Owls."

"If the real mastermind has always existed, then no matter how many Court of Owls we kill, it will be useless."

"I see the possibility of finding the real culprit in you and Batman." Falcone turned to Schiller, his eyes sunk in the shadow of his eye sockets, appearing dim and unclear. He said, "So, I want to establish a secret society, but the fundamental purpose of the society is not to deal with the Court of Owls, but to deal with the kind of darkness behind him or similar organizations."

Schiller leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. He said with some emotion, "I know, it's impossible for anyone who has lived in Gotham for decades to have no guess about this, but I didn't expect you to be so persistent."

"We don't care where you come from or what kind of secrets you carry." Father Daniel turned to Schiller, his eyes not as sharp as Falcone's, but always with a calm and kindness. He said, "If you, or anyone else, can find the truth one day, please don't forget--"

"There have been many people who have worked hard for this city, and the vast majority of them have not succeeded. Those who do not belong to Gotham will eventually leave here."

"A lawyer friend of mine once told me that in this world, you don't have to reach the finish line to win."

"Alright, we've finished telling our stories, now it's your turn," Father Daniel said with a smile as he looked towards the stage. "Our play is called 'Easter', but you named your play 'The Clown Returns', is there any special meaning behind that? Can you tell us?"

"The thing underground in the Gotham church isn't called the Wine Cellar, the substance inside is called the Dionysian factor. It can indeed make people immortal," Schiller said, shocking Falcone and Daniel. Schiller paused for a moment before continuing, "But it's not a cure, it's a poison, the deadliest poison in the world."

"He can create the craziest lunatics in the world. I prefer to call it 'the blood of the lunatics'," Schiller added.

"From the way you speak, it seems like you know a lot about it," Falcone said.

"There's not just one place in the world that has this kind of thing," Schiller replied.

"I almost forgot about your background. You've encountered this substance in other places before? You told me before that you were completely confident in ensuring Evans' safety, I hope you're not lying to me," Falcone said.

"Of course not, Your Godfathership. Don't worry, we have to go back to when Evans came to me," Schiller said.

"When he came to me for help, he seemed very troubled about his relationship with his father. At that time, Alberto was about to be resurrected, so I gave him some advice and suggested that he find a way to hide in a mental hospital."

"Although I told him it was to show a conciliatory attitude and ease the relationship between father and son, it was actually because I wanted to observe him for the long term. I needed more concrete evidence," Schiller explained.

"Did you sense something was wrong at that time?" Falcone asked.

"I had a hunch, but no evidence. Evans was not behaving abnormally at that time, but my intuition told me that something was off," Schiller replied.

"So, I had him come to the Arkham Asylum where I worked and shared a room with a clever guy. After those few heavy rains, his behavior should have been obvious, right?" Schiller added.

"Yes..." Schiller's voice gradually fell into a reminiscence as the three of them looked towards the stage.

In dark hospital room, moonlight filtered through the window and scattered on the floor. The metal handrails of the bed shimmered faintly. Schiller stood in front of Evans' bed, staring at him, seemingly sensing his emotions.

Falcone asked Schiller, "So, after you were certain of this, what did you do?"

"In fact, I didn't do anything because I knew he would show a flaw, and sure enough, he did."

The old curtain on the theater stage closed and opened again, causing a cloud of dust to rise. The scene on stage transformed into Shelden's office.

Schiller crouched in front of Shelden's desk, forcefully pulling out the bottom drawer, which was filled with magnetic tapes.

"What's that?" Father Daniel asked curiously.

"It's recordings of him eavesdropping on my phone conversations. He's already dead, so these recordings are useless. It's better for me to take them back."

Sitting on the closest chair to the stage, lights in the office reflected in Schiller's glasses again. Then he stood up from Shelden's desk, took a tape recorder from the cabinet, found a blank tape, and recorded his own voice onto it.

"Their number nine plantation's goods are transported through Old Wilkin's route, which passes through three streets in the East District. Their cargo is too large, so the delivery point is located in an underground nightclub. If you need it, I can talk to him..."

"Are you worried about this? You don't have to be. As far as I know, the underground chemical factory in the West District is also Falcone's..."

Then Schiller crouched down again and put the tape in the side of the top drawer.

Upon hearing his name, Falcone smiled and said, "Don't tell me you want to use this trick to scare off the police?"

"Quite the opposite. The police may be scared off by The Godfather's name, but there's one person who won't be. I'm providing him with a clue, and it's worth the trouble."

Schiller stared at the stage and said, "I waited a long time for Alberto to finally show his flaw. Maybe he was dissatisfied with Shelden's indecisiveness, or he felt he had the upper hand and wanted to silence him."

"Alberto probably made an excuse to speak with Shelden alone, and then pushed him down the stairs during the conversation."

"But he didn't do enough. If I hadn't tailed him, not only Batman, even the police would have found something."

On stage, Victor opened the corridor window and looked down to see Shelden's body. He hurriedly ran down to it.

But if he had looked up, he would have seen Schiller's busy figure.

"In fact, he did one thing right. He made Shelden call Victor to come early, and then timed it just right so that Victor became a witness and caught suspicion, confusing the police's sight."

"I didn't know Victor would come then. If I had known, I wouldn't have gone back to the mental hospital. I would have waited next to the administrative building."

"The mental hospital is far from Gotham University. How did you make a round trip in a few minutes?"

"That's not important."

Seeing Schiller's unwillingness to answer, Falcone did not ask again.

"After the police summons, I had to propose another possibility to confuse the police's sight, so that they wouldn't cause any more trouble. After all, the next stage should be Batman's."

"When the patients went crazy, did you guess that it was the effect of wine?"

"No." Schiller denied this point and said, "Actually, I didn't dare to conclude before I personally came into contact with this substance."

"But Alberto sent me an Easter egg and I confirmed that the substance was the same as that in the patients' blood. Then I knew what it was."

"So what did you do?"

Schiller shrugged and said casually, "I sent him an Easter gift."

The moonlight from the theater window fell on the old curtains. As the curtains slowly closed and then opened again, the stage gradually enlarged. A strong scent of wine emanated from the Gotham Church.

Batman looked left and right, and heard the crazy howling coming from the nearby dark alley, as if singing for a new life ceremony.

After that crazy laughter, Batman saw a figure crawling out of the green pool with a crazy smile, like an evil ghost just born from hell.

Batman's muscles tensed. He knew that the explosion just now was strong enough to kill Alberto, and now that he had crawled out of the pool again, it indicated that there must be something wrong with the green pool, and what was born inside might be a monster.

Alberto, who crawled out of the pool, had wet blond hair sticking to his forehead. He looked pale, grinned, and his green eyes were completely invaded by madness.

Batman took out his batarang again and loaded his handgun. He was obviously ready to face a fierce battle, but the development of the situation still exceeded his expectations.

After that strong smell of alcohol spread, countless crazy laughter rang out in the streets and alleys around the church. Then one after another, crazy figures converged here.

Batman looked left and right, there were at least hundreds of people, and each one was like Alberto, with a crazy smile on their faces, approaching him like walking dead.

"I told you." Alberto's voice became extremely hoarse, as if sawing wood with a blade, "I am resurrected and will live forever..."

Just as Batman silently stared at him, another familiar voice sounded behind him.

"Do you have any special feelings, Batman?"

Batman turned his head and, as expected, saw Schiller Rodriguez standing behind him, the psychology professor who insisted on calling himself an ordinary person.

Batman took a deep breath and said, "Don't tell me this is you again..."

"You have to answer my question first. What do you think of him?" Schiller asked.

Batman turned back and looked at Alberto, then said, "What about him?"

"Um... do you remember his laughter?"

"No, what does that mean?"

"It seems he is not the person you are looking for," Schiller said regretfully, walking up to Batman's side.

"What?" Batman turned to look at Schiller and he continued, "If you feel nothing when facing him, then he is not the destined opponent for you."

"Batman," Schiller's tone lowered, "If one day, the sound of maniacal laughter echoes in your mind, then you've found the right person."

"And this..." Schiller looked at Alberto and said, "He broke my Easter gift, now, beat him up."

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