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74.3% Days as a Spiritual Mentor in American Comics / Chapter 3187: Chapter 2233: Gotham Music Festival (35)_1

章節 3187: Chapter 2233: Gotham Music Festival (35)_1

"Call me Black Canary." The girl spoke up, "It's simple. I got into trouble with drug traffickers, they wanted to kidnap me, but Oliver saved me. I owe him my life, so I have to help him."

Shiller leaned against the wall with his head bowed, seemingly struggling to breathe. Finally, Black Canary couldn't hold back any longer. She said, "There should be a medical room on board. Are you sure you don't want to check it out? You look... you look like you're about to die."

"Thanks for the kind words, miss, but believe me, stabbing Amanda with a knife won't do any good because everyone on this ship is hers."

Black Canary pursed her lips and said, "I know what this is about. They set a trap for Oliver in Mexico, causing a misunderstanding between him and his longtime partner. I almost witnessed the whole thing, but by the time I thought of helping, it was too late."

"In fact, I met him too late and didn't fully understand the situation. Otherwise, I could have helped. To make up for everything, I followed him all the way back to Gotham."

"He didn't agree."

"Right, because of his damn machismo. He thinks it's dangerous and I should stay in a safe place waiting for him to sort everything out himself, even though he might not be able to."

Realizing she was getting too emotional, Black Canary took a deep breath and said, "Alright, this is between the two of us, so let's not talk about this now. I really didn't mean to kill that woman, I just wanted to distract her, I have to help Oliver win."

"I know it seems reckless and impulsive to you, but you don't understand what Oliver is up against. He can't afford to lose, not even a single game."

"Oliver is already under enough pressure. If he loses another round, nobody knows if he'll fall into the abyss. He's human, not a god."

Black Canary turned her face away, a look of sorrow appearing on her face, and said with meaning, "Too many people don't realize this, and here, I have no choice but to act, no matter the risk."

"Admirable, but it won't work on Amanda."

Black Canary tightened her lips and said, "I'm not sure you're in any condition to keep up with this conversation. Are you sure you don't need to rest for a bit? If you're really Oliver's friend, you should know that if something happens to you, he'll be truly... "

"I'm fine," Shiller used the heel of his hand to wipe his mouth and said, "I suffer from a mental illness, physical pain exacerbates it, and I need medication to stay clear-headed, but the medication can cloud my consciousness."

"When I achieve a balance between the two, I can control myself, but those moments are few. I'll hurry up and tell you everything."

Shiller took out his inhaler, and Black Canary glanced at it. Shiller, leaning against the wall, stood up straight and said.

"Amanda Waller, the darling of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, I can imagine the kind of trap they set for Oliver in Mexico. It was simply a dilemma between career and comrades, and there was no right choice for him."

Black Canary's eyes widened slightly, but Shiller spoke before she could ask, "I've worked for them before, I know what they would do. It's not a new trick, but it's surprisingly effective."

"What I want to tell you is, they've had plenty of time to prepare thoroughly. Once Oliver is forced to leave, there's no going back, and any resistance will only backfire."

"Inviting Amanda aboard the cruise ship was Oliver's way of breaking the game, but Amanda has also had time to prepare countermeasures. She brought enough people, and you alone can't possibly kill them all."

"But, but Amanda isn't the owner of the Dakotazo, right? How did her people get on board?"

"How did you get on board?"

"I knocked out someone with a similar body size... All right, they're a Special Agent Organization; they can always find the right manpower. About how many people do they have?"

"Not all, but a significant number," Shiller said with his eyes closed. "They have people on the first and second floors, and they're already watching you."

The last line clearly unsettled Black Canary. Shiller noticed this as the effects of the medication began to wear off, his vision started to shake again, and he could hear the fledgling cries like that of an eaglet from the girl.

"Get rid of the weapon," Shiller said.

"No, I can't..."

"You know you don't need it."

Black Canary stood frozen, then grew more frantic, but in a different way. She looked at Shiller and tentatively asked, "...Did Oliver mention me to you?"

"You can think that if you want. Hurry, they will be coming in soon."

Black Canary immediately broke the blade she was holding in half and flushed it down the toilet. She adjusted Shiller's bandage and tossed the Lavalier microphone she had removed into the trash can.

"Where should I find you?"

"There are corresponding symbols on the cabin doors."

Black Canary didn't say more and turned to leave. As she was leaving the bathroom, she brushed past a man. She saw him glance at her, but it wasn't the teasing look one might give seeing a woman come out of the men's restroom.

Shiller soon left the restroom and rejoined the crowd. After this episode, most of the gaming sessions had ended, including Oliver's.

Oliver had lost, evidently, and in a manner reminiscent of Rhomann, drawing 10 strong cards but unable to make a Straight Flush, while Amanda almost took all the spades. Although she didn't make a Straight Flush either, she had a flush that still trumped Oliver's straight.

Oliver reacted just like Rhomann, with shock, frenzy, panic, fear, and the heavy, almost palpable unwillingness on his face.

Shiller did not continue to pay attention to that table. He knew Black Canary was smart and wouldn't act rashly with even a slight understanding of the situation.

Shiller returned to the area where the Octopus group was, their last session had just ended, the last of the night. After the winner was announced, the round table was raised again, and Shiller, as if relieved, leaned on the table, somewhat struggling to regulate his breathing.

Before the VIP room's glass, Stark, with his arm around Natasha, watched Shiller's figure and said, "Why is he darting around like that?"

Obviously, both of them recognized Shiller, but neither could understand what Shiller had been up to, wandering in the crowd.

Natasha shook her head and said, "This is completely different from the Doctor Schiller we are familiar with, so I don't know either."

Stark glanced back briefly and then said, "Then let's stick to the original plan. Go."

Natasha nodded, turned around, and headed for the door through which the waiter had come. After a while, she returned with more drinks and distributed them again. When she passed Stark, she gave him a gesture.

Soon, Stark stood up and headed for the restroom. Upon arriving, he pushed open the window, activated his new battle suit, and flew out at top speed, directly into the next window.

This was an employee-only corridor. Clearly, a cruise ship that could accommodate thousands of passengers would have passages connecting several floors to facilitate the staff's service delivery. These passages also led to various important facilities on the ship, Stark's intended destination.

When Natasha passed by the restroom and saw no one inside, she knew Stark had succeeded. She turned to go to the VIP room to collect the dishes but felt a touch on the back of her hand again.

Natasha turned to look and saw a pair of deep brown eyes, youthful, robust, and somewhat tender.

Natasha licked her lips and without waiting for the person to reach out, smoothly seated herself on his thighs, pressing her shoulder against his chest and even playfully kicked his ankle wrapped in a suit sock with the tip of her foot.

This time, it was his turn to stiffen up. Why so proficient?

Natasha looked at him with eyes brimming with laughter, raised her head to expose her neck, and whispered in his ear, "Your flirting methods are too cliché, boy."

The two quickly stood up and headed toward the restroom, leaving other people in the VIP room in stunned silence.

Natasha didn't wait upon arriving; she directly snatched off the man's mask, and indeed, it was the familiar Batman, the same young Batman she had encountered before in the Battleworld.

Beihan was about to speak when Natasha started undoing the buttons of his suit. By the time he realized and tried to stop her, three buttons on his shirt were already undone.

"Wait a second!" he raised his voice and shouted, "What are you doing?! Let go of me first!"

"What am I doing?" Natasha said as though she found it slightly amusing, "Didn't I tell you earlier what I intended to do?"

"Hey, hold on, now's not the time for this! Haven't you noticed..."

"I've noticed you!"

"This ship is not normal, and just now... don't take off my pants! Let go!"

After struggling with Natasha, Beihan finally managed to free himself. The strength of this crazy woman was devilishly strong. How did the other Batman cope with her before?

Natasha leaned against the wall with a look of disappointment and said, "All lust and no courage, not even lasting three minutes."

"I told you, now's not the time for that," Beihan said helplessly, "Aren't you afraid of any danger?"

"The dangers I usually encounter are far more perilous, what's there to fear?"

Beihan decided not to argue with her. He started buttoning up his shirt again and said, "You must've seen Schiller, right? That's what I needed to talk to you about. Remember the game we participated in?"

Natasha frowned, knowing by Beihan's serious expression that he was about to discuss some real business.

"Remember, what about it?"

"In the hospital sequence, I encountered many of Schiller's ghosts, and their personalities differed from the two personas you and another Batman described to me. They were even more morbid."

"I know, that's Schiller's morbid side. What about it?"

"But you don't know their specific attributes, do you?"

After thinking for a moment, Natasha said, "I only know they're extremely mad and eerie, with a certain malevolence I can't quite describe."

"They each have their own characteristics," Beihan revealed his thoughts, "There was a morbid persona who once explained to me that their madness varied, following different rules."

"If I'm not mistaken, the persona currently controlling Schiller downstairs should be the one with the black shirt named Hunting."

"How so?"

"Schiller wasn't just wandering aimlessly," Beihan took a deep breath and continued, "He was constantly trying to get behind that woman wearing the Gunfish mask. He tried several times but kept getting interrupted."

Natasha slightly opened her mouth, recalling the events, indeed finding it to be true. In fact, she was among the New Yorkers who knew the most about Schiller's morbid personas.

But they were never good at understanding these spooky affairs, and Natasha was no different. They didn't have the high spiritual sensibilities of Gothamites. In fact, it wasn't until Beihan spoke that Natasha realized there seemed to be some differences between them.

"What would happen if he got behind her?"

Beihan swallowed hard and stared silently at Natasha.

Natasha felt uncomfortable under his gaze.

"Is he going to kill her?" Natasha asked.

Beihan remained mute.

He didn't tell Natasha that his mind was consumed with the vision of that red fish bouncing endlessly on the ground.


next chapter

章節 3188: Chapter 2234: Gotham Music Festival (36)_1

The second round of the game began.

But before the game started, the doors on both sides of the room opened, and another group of masked individuals walked out of the room, proceeding to the tables corresponding to the patterns on their masks.

Shiller noticed a strong man standing opposite him; in his blurred vision, he counted nine tentacles on the other's octopus mask, signifying this man as Shiller's opponent.

The invitation given to the challenged had written on it who had challenged them, but Shiller's invitation didn't have a specific name, just a single word—"ocean".

Now this Ocean stood before him. Shiller could only lean on the table with his arms to adjust his balance as best as he could, almost without looking at him.

When the second round began, the round table was removed again, and the oval table for the gambling adversaries rose into position, with Shiller and Octopus No.9 standing at opposite ends.

Suddenly, the staff placed a strange machine in the middle of each table. The upper part of the machine was a clear spherical shape, while the lower part was a metal base. On the side facing both players were two tubes connected to a pump, in front of which was a thin tube leading to a needle.

The spherical part was large and seemed to be made of highly transparent glass. However, many tubes spiraled along the sphere's wall, with nine outlets on the top and nine on the bottom.

In the very center of the sphere was a smaller spherical framework, made of metal, inside of which hung metal balls of various sizes and heights like scattered stars, each engraved with a rune.

Everyone discussed animatedly, clueless about what the strange machine was for until the staff began to explain.

"The name of this gambling game is 'Blood Lottery,' and soon professional medical personnel will insert the blood drawing needles into the arms of both parties. Please do not worry; we have special methods to ensure the process is hygienic and safe, and nobody will die from improper injections."

"Needles positioned for blood drawing, bets placed by both parties, a minimum of one coin, a maximum of all in, flip a coin to decide who goes first."

"Once started, participants will use a remote control to decide the number of milliliters of blood to be drawn, with a minimum of 100 milliliters and no upper limit. The blood will flow into the pump in front through the tube, while also deciding which of the blood outlets to use, with the top nine outlets numbered 1 to 9, and the bottom nine outlets also numbered 1 to 9."

"Once decided, the other party who is not being drawn will use a joystick to spin the metal balls to adjust the target, after which the blood-drawing party will pump and shoot. The first blood target hit is considered a hit, and the rune will be recorded."

"Within the 20-minute game time, the number of valid runes hit is not limited, but in the end, seven runes must be selected and arranged in sequence. After 20 minutes, the winning numbers will be announced, and the player with the most matching runes wins, taking all the coins on the table and all the blood lost during the game."

After the explanation of the rules, the room was in an uproar.

Wasn't it just a poker game before? How did it turn into a life-and-death gamble now? A minimum of 100 milliliters at a time, and the lottery requires seven runes, meaning at least 700 milliliters of blood is needed.

This amount is not fatal, but losing 700 milliliters of blood at once can be dangerous, especially for the elderly and children.

More importantly, after one's own blood is drawn and an outlet is chosen, the opponent will surely make the target hard to hit. If they miss on the first try, the required amount of blood jumps to 800 milliliters.

Although this is not at the limit of human blood loss, this is not a one-off deal, you're not to play and then drop dead. If you win, you can retrieve your own blood, but what if you lose?

This round might not be the end. By then, the winner will have the coins and their blood back in good condition, while the loser, having lost 1000 milliliters of blood, might find it difficult to even stand. How could they possibly continue to gamble?

Everyone complained that it was too harsh to jump from a regular card game to this kind of game. Was the leap too great?

They finally truly realized that the legend of the Dakotazo was real; this was a ship for gambling with life, where risk was proportional to reward.

Naturally, some people began to feel afraid, wanting to quit and not wanting to play anymore. But unfortunately, whether challenger or challenged, once the game began there was no turning back—even those who had boarded the ship voluntarily found it too late for regrets.

"Is this what you wanted?" Christopher asked Tupac on the other side, "To fight with me to the death in this way?"

"You don't understand anything," Tupac turned his head aside and said, "This is a good thing."

"You're crazy," Christopher finally couldn't bear it and slammed the table hard, "Do you hear what fucking madness you're spouting?! You've sent us both into a deadly situation!"

"On the contrary, I've taken us both out of a situation destined for death."

Christopher stared at Tupac in silence, his gaze intense. He needed Tupac to give him an explanation.

Tupac lowered his head and muttered, "Recently, the rap industry on the East and West Coasts has been doing well with Dr. Dre discovering newcomers, and the East Coast with Gotham Boy. Do you think this situation will last?"

Christopher frowned.

"No, of course not," Tupac murmured, lost in his thoughts, "Don't you get it? Rap has given black people too strong a voice; they won't allow this to continue."

Tupac's Adam's apple moved as he said, "They've always been doing this, all of them. They did it to my parents, to me, to all of us."

"What the hell are you talking about?" Christopher demanded.

Tupac gripped the edge of the table tightly and said, "I had no choice but to come on this ship because someone wants to kill me."

"Who?" Christopher asked.

"That doesn't matter; what matters is they will make everyone think you killed me, because of the conflict between us."

"Then they will have someone kill you, posing as my fan seeking revenge, and both of us will be dead."

"So I had no other choice but to sneak onto the ship myself, then figure out a way to pull you aboard, so at least one of us could survive."

"What is going on, exactly? Tupac." Christopher leaned forward, staring intently at his former buddy. "Tell me what's happening!"

Tupac took a deep breath, looking very tense and anxious. He said, "You should know about the new album I'm preparing; I've been writing lyrics for it for several months now."

"I... I've been focusing on Mexico, do you know where my name comes from?"

"Where from?"

"I wasn't originally called Tupac. My parents changed my name, a transliteration of a Spanish name, from the pioneer of the Latin American indigenous liberation movement, Tupac Amaru II, whose greatest achievement was leading the Latin American natives in a brave resistance against the Spanish colonists."

"Speaking of my parents, you might not know, but they were members of the Black Panther Party, devoted their lives to the struggle for national independence and liberation, but that's not important anymore, it's all in the past."

"They dismantled us, and now these movements have all but faded away, while I keep raising my voice."

"A month after the broadcasting studio incident where our conflict erupted, I was accused of shooting a white police officer three times, when in fact, I only helped a black man during a university riot."

"You might think this is all coincidence, just a series of incidents that happened one after another in my life, and at that time I thought so too, thinking I was just unlucky, having a bad year all year round."

"But soon I realized, more and more incidents targeted me, someone was always watching me, appearing wherever I was, I couldn't avoid them, couldn't get around them, couldn't hide from them. It sounds like the rants of a lunatic, but I knew I was not, I knew someone was watching me."

"I thought I was crazy, I even went to the doctor, they said I had anxiety and panic attacks, told me to relax, I thought that was all there was to it, until a few months ago... someone entered my house."

"What did they do?" Christopher immediately became anxious.

"They didn't do anything," Tupac shrugged and said, "But they took something, not valuables, just some song lyrics I wrote a few months ago."

"What did you write?" Christopher started to understand.

"Mexico, Peru's hero Tupac, and his famous quote, 'It's time to end the division, to unite like brothers'."

Christopher's Adam's apple moved. Dropping his gaze, he said, "…you know best what they don't want to hear, and you wrote it all."

"I've been writing about these things all along," Tupac looked at Christopher and said, "That's why they're keeping an eye on me, and they must be watching you in the same way too, because we're both writing, and they don't want to listen, don't want anyone to listen, they dare not let anyone listen."

"They're used to playing the old game," Tupac stared at the table and said, "It's not trendy, but it's very useful. They orchestrate conflicts, divide into two factions, then disguise their assassinations as grudges between the two factions. They have no idea how many united people they've split up, silently ending their struggle."

Christopher's throat kept trembling as he said, "I didn't know, I didn't feel it, I didn't feel..."

"They're not watching you in the way of the streets." Tupac stretched out his hand and made quote-signs with his fingers, saying, "Don't forget who they are; they own an entire country, they won't follow you like some street thugs. If I were some poor black guy born and raised on the streets, maybe I wouldn't have noticed either, but I'm not."

"My birth parents, my stepfather, my godfather, my aunt, all of them were high-ranking members of the Black Panther Party. I witnessed what those people did to them, so I was always sharp enough to notice."

"When I realized the drafts of my lyrics were gone, I knew my end was near."

Tupac finally showed an agitated expression, angrily smacking the table as he said, "What I can't stand the most is that they chose you, the two of us being the only two influential black singers on the East and West Coasts. They wanted to kill two birds with one stone, have us annihilate each other, and I absolutely cannot let them succeed."

Tupac clenched his teeth, a fierce expression on his face Christopher had never seen before. He said, "I knew the rumors about this ship were true, my elders fulfilled their wishes here."

"So I challenge you, one of us must win; one of us must be able to fulfill our wish. As long as one wishes to forever evade persecution, not to die oppressed, we could at least keep one voice alive."

Christopher closed his eyes.

"Now, what do you think?" Tupac asked him.

"What was that again?" Christopher opened his eyes and asked seriously.

"What?"

"The one with the same name as you, what did he say?"

Tupac was taken aback.

"It's time to end the division, to unite like brothers."

"…It's time."


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