I, V, Gotham Legend

"Bang!" Valerie knocked the back of Falcone's head to the floor, forcing him to be quiet.

"Listen, old man, you make the so-called Court of Owls sound so magical, but do you know what it sounds like to me?" Valerie's pale blue eyes sparkled, "Just a bunch of cowards hiding in hiding."

"No! You're not from Gotham! You don't know anything! The Owl is always hiding in the shadows watching all of us! Always ready to grab our heads off with its claws!"

"In fact, you are the one who knows nothing! Who do you think I am?"

Valerie lost interest in communicating with the frightened man and stood up.

"The Court of Owls is nothing but a bunch of gutter rats. They call themselves natural enemies and think they are invincible. But in reality, rats are always rats."

Valerie kicked the fishing stool out of the way without looking back.

"Now I'm going to go get rid of these rats, and you better stay here and pray that Malone is okay."

NO34. Gotham is a metropolis with a population of six million

The Tower of Miracles is the tallest landmark in Gotham. It is located in the middle of a park. As long as you are in Gotham, you can see it.

The black sword in the stone rushed all the way and finally crashed into the wall of the Tower of Miracles Park.

After physically parking the car, Valerie stepped off the Sword in the Stone.

The last time she came to the Tower of Miracles was when she beat up Shiva last year. She just didn't know why that guy had to come here.

Valerie walked into the lobby of the Tower of Miracles. She turned on the scanner and looked around silently, trying to find clues such as a secret door.

If you can't find it in the lobby, you can only take the elevator to the top of the tower. Valerie knows about the environment of the Tower of Miracles, and its elevator can only go directly to the top floor.

But the rats could be hiding anywhere, halfway up the tower, or underground.

Valerie felt it was more likely that they were underground, as the cold and damp environment was more in line with the identity of this group of rats.

The longer they delayed, the more dangerous Malone would be. Valerie was too lazy to take the elevator, so she made a bazooka and aimed it at the ground below.

The rocket exploded on the ground, and the floor tiles and dust looked like water splashed by a stone.

The space beneath the smoke was not a basement, but a cement foundation, but Valerie could understand that mice always thought that the deeper the hole they dug, the safer it would be.

She reloaded the ammunition expressionlessly, and the explosions continued for dozens of minutes.

Until a pure white underground passage finally appeared in sight, Valerie switched to scanning mode. She did not see any familiar voiceprints and confirmed that there was no sewer below.

As expected, mice love to burrow in the ground.

Valerie jumped right in.

...

In the magnificent room, Malone sat silently. Although he was not tied up, he remained motionless.

A man in green armor stood in front of him, staring straight at the door.

"Poor child... What's your name?" Malone looked at the man and sighed sadly.

The man did not answer him, like a statue.

Ma Long waited for a while, but still received no response, and couldn't help but sigh again.

He could guess the man's identity. Legend has it that anyone who disobeys the Court of Owls will have their head hooked off by sharp claws.

If nothing unexpected happens, this man should be "Claw".

"Tat-tat-tat..."

Just before Malone tried to bring up the topic again, a series of crisp footsteps sounded from outside the door. It sounded like there was more than one person.

"Take him to the meeting room."

A hoarse voice came from outside the door, and Malone became alert.

Claw immediately turned around, raised his arm, and sprayed white spray into Malone's eyes.

Malone didn't know what this thing was. He had been sprayed with this thing before in a bar. Afterwards, he fell into a state of confusion and couldn't think. When he came to his senses, he was already here.

It's like having a blackout after being drunk.

This time was the same. When Malone came to his senses, he was already sitting in a long and thin birdcage that looked like a standing coffin.

The cage was swaying as if it was suspended in the air. The space was so small that Ma Long had to curl up his legs even when sitting.

It was dark outside the cage and I couldn't see where I was.

What is creepy is that in the pitch-black environment, pairs of eyes light up, as if staring into the abyss.

"It seems that you have woken up." A dull voice sounded, and Malone couldn't tell who was speaking.

The sound of the voice echoed in the air, and it seemed that the room was very big.

"Although I've always heard about you, it's still surprising to actually see you." Malone stood up and scanned the eyes in the darkness through the cage. "You went to so much trouble to invite me here, aren't you just going to kill me?"

"You are able to find the [Claw] and it is commendable. After discussion, we believe that you are qualified to become an [Owl]."

A dull echo echoed, and it seemed that he was the most senior person here.

"I will not join an organization that abuses children." Malone's eyes were hidden in the shadows.

"This isn't abuse, they're just giving of themselves to the real Gotham, just like us."

The man's voice was full of matter-of-factness, and Malone clenched his fists in anger.

"I only see disgusting evil," Malone said with disgust.

"Haha, you sound like you're a good person." The voice in the darkness clearly knew a lot about Malone. "You should understand this from the bottom of your heart, right? We are Gotham. It doesn't matter whether we are guilty or not, because the will of the court is absolute."

Ma Long swallowed hard.

Originally, like other citizens of Gotham, he thought that the Court of Owls was just a fictitious legend used to scare children.

Until an orphan in his orphanage was kidnapped, and he hired V for the first time to rescue the child.

Ma Long originally thought that this was just a simple unlucky child who was targeted by human traffickers after his family was destroyed.

But when Malone examined the child, he unexpectedly discovered that his back molars had fallen out.

This is normal. The child was abused when he was kidnapped. It is just a lost tooth and it can be restored.

But before installing a new back tooth for the child, he accidentally discovered a strange inscription just to the side of the child's broken tooth.

Malone was keenly aware that something was wrong, and using the inscription as a clue, he began to dig into the story behind the incident.

The more he investigated, the more frightened he became, as if he had accidentally broken a glass and discovered that his previous life had been lived in a mirror.

The Court of Owls would regularly adopt orphans and train them to become humanoid weapons [Claws] that serve them exclusively.

But that was just court doctrine. In fact, rather than adopting orphans, the court preferred to first find children with potential and then turn them into orphans themselves.

This child is the "claw" they are targeting, and this inscription is the "quarantine mark" they carved without the knowledge of the child and his family.

The Court of Owls has controlled Gotham for nearly three hundred years, which is longer than the history of the United States. Malone simply couldn't imagine how many people had lost their families and homes in these three hundred years because of their extraordinary talents.

He tried to expose the case to the court, or find some capable people to investigate further, but the court moved faster than he imagined.

Before he could take any action, he was interrupted by a sudden gang war and he was abducted here.

"You know what? Matches?" Another person in the darkness said Malone's long-forgotten name, "We have actually been keeping an eye on you for a long time. You have been doing things that want to change the existing order in Gotham, which makes it difficult for us to deal with you."

"The existing order?" Malone realized. "You mean, the current Gotham is what you want?"

This city is clearly rotten.

"We are just following the rules set by our ancestors. It has been like this since three hundred years ago."

NO35. You are nothing more than this

Malone seemed to see a sharp claw covering the entire Gotham, kneading the city according to his previous mood.

He finally understood that in the past few years as a good guy Malone, he had been trying every way to make the city a better place, but no matter what he did, he was powerless.

So everything was controlled by this big hand in the shadow? I never thought of it!

Ma Long's hands gripped the bars of the cage, the feeling of weakness making him physically and mentally exhausted.

But he was not completely defeated, he at least had a chance to get out of here...

"You seem to still have some hope. Do you think you still have hope? We can also think of it. It's that V, right?" But the voice in the darkness broke his hope, "That's why we invited you to this room."

As if to shatter all his hopes, a light appeared in the dark room.

It was not a light or something like that, but a projection that came out from the middle of the owls, passed through the birdcage where Malone was, and hit the wall behind him.

The dim light of the projection illuminated the owls. They were all wearing white masks and gorgeous dresses. They stood on the high stands, looking elegant and calm.

Below the cage where Malone hangs is an open space built of concrete, covered with uneasy stains of dried blood, reminiscent of the Colosseum in ancient Rome.

Malone turned around and looked at the wall covered with projections.

Those were split screens, which should be the camera images, but they showed the same pure white space.

Ma Long saw one of the pictures at a glance, and there stood the familiar blue-haired beauty.

"V..."

"She walked right into the trap we set for her."

The owls whispered to each other, explaining to Malone what the initial sound was.

"Have you experienced this? [White Metal]."

Malone was guessing in his heart what he was talking about. If nothing unexpected happened, it should be the spray that was sprayed on his face when they brought him here.

In the picture, Valerie is walking around, seemingly without any purpose, just staring blankly at the ceiling.

"Did she come down from the ceiling? Huh, hh, she can't find the way back?" The owl's voice was calm, as if everything was under control.

White metal can make people lose their sense of direction and even their memory. It can also cause metal poisoning, which can cause their physical strength and energy to decline very quickly.

Although the effect of contact with solid metal is not as good as inhalation, the effect is almost the same as long as you stay in the body for three or four days.

"Your patron is such a foolish woman, she actually used precious rockets to dig the ground... She must have run out of ammunition, and now she can only wander helplessly in the white maze, slowly waiting to die of exhaustion and hunger."

The screams of owls echoed in the room, they were about to tear all of Malone's hopes to pieces.

"Of course, she's also a respectable warrior. It's a pity that non-Gothamites can't join the court, otherwise she would definitely be our best claw. But that doesn't matter. After she becomes exhausted and can only kneel on the ground and beg for our forgiveness, we will send out the claws to chop off her head... and yours."

The Court of Owls issued a cruel execution sentence. They seemed to have already won the case and easily arranged the fate of two big figures in Gotham.

Everything seemed natural, they had taken off countless heads like this.

Unexpectedly, after hearing the court's verdict, Malone relaxed completely.

"To be honest, you really scared me before." Ma Long sat back on the ground, but his tone was no longer heavy.

"what?"

"If this is all you know about V, then you have nothing to fear." Malone leaned against the pigeon cage. "Is it the shadow of the ballads you listened to in your childhood? Or is it that your previous self-promotion was too realistic? It really made me nervous.

But you seem to be no more than that.”

The contempt in Malone's tone surprised the owls so much that their whispers became louder and more chaotic.

"Do you know what you are talking about?" The initial voice turned cold.

There's clearly nowhere to escape, are you just bluffing?

The leader, who was standing inconspicuously among the many owls, frowned under his mask. He really couldn't guess where Malone's sudden confidence came from.

He looked up at the projection. The stupid woman was still wandering around, obviously having lost her sense of direction.

It's clearly the end of the road...

Just as the leader was about to speak again to suppress Malone's bluff, he suddenly noticed that the woman in the picture looked at him.

The powder blue eyes were beautiful, but they made him feel like he was falling into an icy cave.

The cameras in the white maze are very hidden, and from a human perspective, they are completely invisible in the pure white space.

Is it an illusion? Just a coincidence?

The owl leader comforted himself in his heart, but the pent-up sense of uneasiness in his heart became heavier.

The woman started walking again, and she had almost walked around the entire maze.