Chapter 300: Three Detectives (4)_1

When Shiller recollected his umbrella, Batman and Gordon were standing on either side of him, looking down at the fallen Constantine. Gordon hesitated for a moment, then turned his head to look at Shiller on his left and asked, "Do you two have a grudge against each other?"

"No, but..." Shiller paused a bit before continuing, "If you see this man anywhere, no matter what he is doing at the time, you only need to do two things."

"The first thing is to cover his mouth, the second thing is to beat him up."

"Uh, why is that?"

"In addition to venting, it also ensures that you won't become his friend."

Gordon wanted to continue questioning, but at that moment, the Constantine lying on the ground suddenly started to disappear.

Gordon turned his head back, he widened his eyes to look at the ground, Constantine gradually turned into black ash from the feet up. Almost instantly, he had turned from a living person to a human-shaped heap of ash spread on the ground.

Gordon was about to say something, when the pile of ashes suddenly danced up, forming a mini tornado, which was then sucked into the black book in his hand. Gordon bent over to touch the book, but Shiller said, "Don't touch."

"Detective Gordon, when dealing with anything related to mysticism, you should never touch it lightly, because you don't know how many black magic traps and curses are hidden within."

Shiller sighed softly and said, "It's not surprising because that guy is a thorough liar and jerk. Saving the world? That's nothing to do with him."

Batman was about to say something when he noticed Shiller stiffen momentarily; Shiller then straightened up, his eyes somewhat vacant. After about two seconds, he suddenly showed a smile.

How to describe this smile? To put it simply, Batman unconsciously took a half-step back, and Gordon retreated a step.

Shiller tapped his palm with his umbrella and said, "...The happiest thing in this world is when a little trap that you set up unintentionally is triggered by a prey who voluntarily walks into the trap..."

"What do you mean?" Gordon scratched his head and asked. He found that since the appearance of the magic array, there were more and more things he didn't understand.

But Shiller simply turned around and headed for the door, saying as he walked, "Come with me, to my manor, I'll offer you a drink."

"Wait, what about this thing?" Gordon pointed to the demon trapped in chains on the wall.

Shiller, who had already walked out the door, backed up a couple steps and glanced at the demon fixed on the wall. The demon, seeing his gaze, tried desperately to retreat further into the wall. Gordon stepped forward, saying as he walked, "It seems like it can't cause much trouble in Gotham. Let's go."

Several children followed the three adults out. As Jason passed the demon trapped on the wall, he even spat at it.

Batman drove the children to his hideout first, then came back to pick up Shiller and Gordon. The three of them went to Shiller's manor. Upon entering the manor, Batman squinted his eyes and said, "It seems like someone has broken in here."

"But I just checked the lock and it wasn't broken, right?" Gordon turned around and looked around, saying, "There's also no sign of broken windows."

"Detective Gordon, just now, you saw a demon with your own eyes and saw a person turn into flying ash. Why would you think that the intruder would use the door or window?"

Gordon slapped his forehead and said, "Sorry, my thinking hasn't quite caught up. After all, the most common burglary scene in Gotham involves smashed doors and windows."

Shiller's destination was clear. He led the two straight to the second floor, then turned left, and went into the last guest room at the end of the hall.

As soon as the door was opened, Gordon saw a familiar figure lying on the ground. After they walked in, Gordon said, "Isn't this that Constantine from before? What is he doing here? And... what is that?"

Next to the prone Constantine was an overturned bottle of wine. The room was filled with a rich aroma of wine, which was somewhat intoxicating.

Gordon took a deep sniff and colorful halos began to appear in his field of vision. He involuntarily stepped back a few steps and rubbed his eyes.

But the hazy fog did not disperse, but became denser. After a brief moment of darkness, when Gordon opened his eyes, the first thing he saw was a globe slowly rotating on the table. Then he turned his head and saw Shiller holding an umbrella in one hand, pointing the tip at a blond man's neck.

The Constantine who had been lying on the ground was now standing in the middle of the room. He was backed off by Shiller's umbrella point, raising his hands.

"I imagine you're wondering why you stepped into a dream as soon as you touched that wine bottle...."

"So, why?" Constantine looked into Shiller's eyes. His expression was uncharacteristically serious, which usually only happened when he lost control.

"Before that, shouldn't you tell me what those tricks you've been playing are all about?"

Constantine lowered his eyelids. His rare serious expression gave him a melancholic and decadent attractiveness.

Constantine slightly lowered his head, then looked up at Shiller from under his lashes. He said, "I had heard of the professor's reputation long ago, but I didn't expect that you would be even more formidable than I thought."

Both of them had a similar height and build, and they were both wearing long trench coats and ties. From the perspective above the room, the two of them stood in confrontation; their auras, stark different yet somewhat similar, clashed fiercely with the umbrella as the dividing line.

Shiller reached out his hand with the umbrella and the tip of the umbrella directly hit Constantine's Adam's apple. Constantine raised his hands and said, "Don't do this, I admit, I screwed up this time, so I'll tell you everything…"

Shiller held this position for a moment, then suddenly opened the umbrella with a "pang". The black umbrella blocked Constantine's face. When Shiller closed the umbrella, Constantine saw that Shiller's head had become a slowly rotating globe.

With a snap of Shiller's fingers, the room's scene quickly faded away. The floor changed from wooden to ceramic tiles, the walls were covered in a pale white, and with a "clang", an iron chair fell into the center of the room.

Constantine, dressed in a straitjacket, sat in the chair. His legs, waist, and neck were all strapped down, and above his head hung a dazzling white bulb.

Constantine leaned his neck against the back of the chair, tilted back his head and said, "Can I have a smoke?"

Shiller sat behind a table, one hand held a medical record, the other a pen. The hand with the pen snapped his fingers again and Constantine felt a cigarette appear in his mouth. He took a deep drag, the smoke spreading around his mouth and nose.

He struggled a bit, feeling the constraints of the straitjacket on his body. He sighed somewhat contentedly and said, "It seems we not only share a common interest in music, perhaps in other things too…"

Gordon was momentarily stunned. He put on a slightly disgusted face, but Shiller remained unmoved and said, "Go on, tell me everything."

Constantine moved again, made a "puff" sound from his mouth, blew some cigarette ash, then settled into a comfortable position, leaning back in his chair and said, "Well, it all starts with a romantic, profound dream…"

"It was a winter in Liverpool, I had just watched a football match and bought a bottle of alcohol on my way home. But I didn't make it home before it was gone. I lay by the side of the road, feeling tipsy, then I had a dream…"

"It was a really vivid dream, something that I hadn't had in a long time. Most of the time, my dreams are chaotic and dark, filled with so much noise that they turn my mind to mush."

"But that day, a man appeared in my clear dream. He claimed to be a "Dreammaker", and said he was a believer of the "Dream God"."

"I've seen my fair share of strange events, so I wasn't surprised. He said he wanted to invite me to Dreamland to awaken the dormant Dream God…"

"He claimed that I had a minor reputation in the circle of mysticism. You know, the kind of baseless flattery. I asked him what he could offer me, and he said that the Dream God would reward me when the time came."

"Even though he sounded like an absolute fraud and a cultist, I agreed to his proposal, because I really wanted to ask the Dream God why I've never had a good dream since I was born…"

"And so, the two of us embarked on the journey, traveling deep into my dreams. We faced many difficulties and obstacles, witnessed a variety of dream worlds, and eventually arrived at the bottom of the Dreamland, where he said the Dream God resided."

"It was a beautiful place, filled with magnificent sights that could never be described by human imagination. It was there that I met the Dream God."

"He was perpetually asleep in Dreamland, and the Dreammaker woke him up. When he woke up, he told me that he could fulfill one of my wishes."

"But I didn't come here to make a wish. I asked him why he had never given me a good dream, the kind of sound sleep that every ordinary person has…"

"Faced with this question, the Dream God fell silent. He asked me to make another wish, and I said, I want to sleep with him."

"Cough cough…" Gordon was startled and started coughing violently, with one hand against the wall. He never expected such a surreal and bizarre story to end this way. He looked at Constantine and asked, "Didn't the Dream God strike you dead?"

Constantine ignored him, instead, he looked up at the light bulb above his head and said, "If he can't give me a good dream, then I'll settle for an erotic dream."

Batman also fell silent. He couldn't evaluate such kind of person. Even though Bruce was also a renowned playboy on the surface and he had flirted with every beauty in Gotham, clearly, he had some standards for a partner - at the very least, they must be human.

But it seemed this man, Constantine, was not picky, not distinguishing between humans or ghosts.

"Then, the Dream God agreed."

"Cough cough…" Gordon again started to cough violently.

"We kissed in the sanctuary of the Dreamland, and he whispered in my ear that his name was 'Morpheus'."

"The image of the Dream God in people's minds changes according to their imaginations. He turned into the most beautiful thing I've never seen…"

"So there we were, in the sanctuary, he beep-, and I beep-, I told him beep-, and the two of us beep-, and his beep- beeped-, and I beep-…"

Gordon widened his eyes and asked Shiller, "What's with the beeping?"

Shiller glanced at Batman, then turned his head and said, "Don't you see there's a kid present?"