Days as a Spiritual Mentor in American Comics-Chapter 5540 - 4566: Blackest Night (55)

"What is this?" Jack picked up the letter and looked at it, then said, "It doesn’t look like something someone would send to me."

"Indeed, it isn’t." Barry still had some conscience and didn’t plan to deceive Jack. He briefly described several cases and continued, "This letter must contain some useful clues, but no one dares to look at it. The power of spiritual pollution is terrifying..."

Before he even finished speaking, Jack had already started opening the letter. He tore off the wax seal in a few moves, took out the paper, and glanced from top to bottom. Barry appeared very nervous but didn’t dare to approach, afraid that some monster might jump out from the letter.

Jack showed a knowing expression, then said, "It’s a trap."

"What do you mean?"

"It’s left by the so-called victim," Jack said. "He wasn’t polluted by the letter, but rather, he wrote this letter after being polluted."

"How is that possible? Didn’t Brainiac identify this letter as being written in 1873?"

"Maybe she really wrote it in 1873," Jack shrugged and said, "It’s not strange for problems to appear on someone who has been polluted. There are indeed some clues in here."

"Explain carefully."

"He wants me to look through a window to the east at the twilight bordering. He claims this will allow one to see the truth of the world."

Barry paused, then said, "No wonder Jenna said he looked out the window. You mean he didn’t die immediately after looking out the window, but left this letter."

"Yes, and the process could be very long, perhaps a few days, enough for him to prepare the envelope and wax seal."

"Brainiac," Shiller called out, "find out if Lady Jerryta bought anything similar."

"I’ll investigate," Brainiac said. "I can be sure he didn’t buy from official stores, but possibly from someone’s stock. However, the East District has a dense flow of people, so witnesses should be found quickly... Ah, found it, he seems to have found some stock from a local bookstore merchant."

Shiller nodded and continued, "Let’s study why she wants us to look east. What’s there?"

"The docks," Barry said, "East of Gotham are the docks, further east is the Atlantic Ocean. Where is the issue?"

"It could be anywhere. Now we need to determine if all the victims looked towards the east."

Barry utilized Divine Speed and made a trip to Brude Haven. Unsurprisingly, that apartment also faced east. And Brude Haven’s east side is also the sea. This confirms that at least two victims on the East Coast looked east.

"Are there similar cases in Europe?" Shiller asked.

"An outbreak occurred in Austria. I’m trying to get in touch..." Barry fiddled with his phone, then said, "Oh, Brainiac sent the data over, let me see... Indeed, they looked to the west."

"The problem lies in the Atlantic Ocean," Shiller immediately concluded, "They looked through the window towards the Atlantic, and then something happened. There must be an issue with the Atlantic."

"Wait!" Master of the Dark Night, Jim, stopped Jason and said, "This letter was found among the dead’s belongings. Aren’t you afraid there’s pollution on it? What if the Evil God wrote it?"

"No," Jason said, "This letter should be written by the deceased."

"How do you know?"

"The envelope is folded by him, not professional at all." Jason turned the envelope over and said, "See, the crease here is heavier than this side, and this side is a bit crooked. This proves the letter writer couldn’t get other envelopes and had to use plain paper to make one. Many servants in Windsor Castle aren’t allowed to leave the castle, so they can’t go out to buy, hence they fold their own. The Evil God wouldn’t fold envelopes himself."

Doctor Sophocles took the envelope and looked at it, then said, "This sort of resembles the memo paper used by Windsor Castle’s security department. The wax seal also seems to be from candles in the castle, not professional sealing wax."

"But even if the victim wrote it, he might have put some traps inside."

"They would only be verbal traps. If he could use magic, he wouldn’t end up in such a tragic situation." Jason had already opened the wax seal, took out the paper, and then said, "Indeed."

"What does it say?"

"It tells us to look west. Which way do Windsor Castle’s windows face?"

"They face in all directions. But Brainiac recorded his recent activities and found he often went to the corridor on the castle’s southwest side."

"Brainiac," Jason shouted, "Draw the direction pointed by Windsor Castle’s southwest windows on the globe, be precise."

Soon, Brainiac projected a globe and marked Windsor Castle’s window direction on it. Meanwhile, five other lines appeared on the globe, crossing the Atlantic from around the world, finally converging in one place.

"Gotham," Jason said, "Gotham’s in trouble again."

The final convergence point of those five lines was indeed the East Coast of the United States, specifically the shores of Gotham.

No one felt surprised; they even felt slightly relieved. As long as it’s Gotham, it’s fine. They were already very familiar with the entire process.

"Do we need to go back for a trip?" Jim looked at Jason and asked.

Jason shook his head and said, "If something happens in Gotham, someone there will handle it. But now the disaster is global, so we must first solve the royal family’s troubles. Doctor, can I visit the library at All Souls College?"

"Sure, but what are you going to look for there?"

"Reports of anomalies in the Atlantic," Jason thought for a moment and said, "Such a global disaster could not possibly be the first outbreak on Earth. People in the past didn’t have the resources to investigate, but someone must have recorded some pieces of information. If we can find similar eyewitness evidence, we can outline the truth."

Amanda pushed open the door on the second floor, and upon seeing the completely unfamiliar room, she also felt incredulous.

"Gotham actually has a place like this..." Amanda whispered, "What are they doing here?"

Amanda cautiously walked to an adjacent bookshelf, picked up a dust-covered journal, untied the string on it, and glanced at it, only to find it full of incoherent Latin words that she couldn’t understand.

She then looked for a book that seemed proper, but its content was equally obscure and difficult; she barely recognized a few English words, let alone Italian and Latin.

Amanda skimmed through several books but understood none, so she decided to give up. She found another door beside her and walked in, arriving at a strange study.

Amanda’s gaze was drawn to the chandelier resembling planets above her, as it was the only lit object in the darkness. She stared at it for a long time but couldn’t determine if those planets really existed. Thus, she could only focus on something she could comprehend, like the globe in the center of the room.

Amanda approached and gently touched the globe. Suddenly, many beams of light appeared on it, seemingly marking different locations. Amanda softly turned the globe, and the light spots followed its rotation, flickering mysteriously.

Brude Haven, Amanda suddenly thought. She reached to rotate the globe to see whether there were any light spots there. But the moment this thought appeared, all other light spots extinguished, leaving only a faint beam of light on the East Coast.

Amanda looked closely and discovered it seemed to be Brude Haven. She walked around to the other side of the globe but saw the originally pitch-black area outside the door illuminate with weak light.

She pushed the door open again and walked out, seeing a journal on the bookshelf light up. Amanda tiptoed over, picked up the journal. Although she still couldn’t understand much, it was better than before, and she realized it might be referring to an event over a hundred years ago.

Amanda returned to the globe, intending to take another look at Gotham-related matters, but when she tried to touch the globe again, she suddenly felt a sharp pain in her head. She staggered and bumped into the wall behind her.

Once she recovered, Amanda took out her gun, but there was nothing around; nothing had just attacked her. She suspected that using the globe was not without its cost, and someone like her might only be able to use it once.

Nonetheless, this was good enough. Amanda wasn’t greedy; she just wanted to leave this bizarre ghost place quickly. She picked up the journal and sprinted down the stairs.

"Take a look at this," Amanda tossed the journal in front of Constantine, "I can’t understand it, but it seems to talk about something from over a hundred years ago."

Constantine didn’t look at it right away; he said, "What matter?"

"If I could understand, I wouldn’t have come to ask you." Amanda spread her hands, "The words in this are completely chaotic and incoherent. If it hadn’t been for the year marked in the opening sentences, I wouldn’t even be able to guess the general idea."

"I’m not willing to look either," Constantine said, "I’m afraid this can only rely on you to decipher it, miss. And don’t let others do it either, otherwise, you don’t know who might be polluted by this."

Amanda scrunched her features together. She wanted to curse Constantine but didn’t know what to curse him with. She knew from the start that he was a scoundrel and should have known better than to rely on him.

Amanda took the journal back to her office and didn’t let her subordinates in when they knocked on the door. As Constantine said, what if they got polluted by this thing?

However, Amanda was cautious. She specifically consulted Constantine about whether Brainiac might be polluted, and the answer was negative. Electronic Life seems naturally immune to the effects of mysticism.

Logically, it would be best for Brainiac to send a physical form to explore dangerous areas. But practically, it doesn’t work. Because if he operates the robot, it cannot activate the globe at all. It equates to being immune to negative effects but unable to interact with the scene. Sanity Points locking may not be advantageous either.

But he could help Amanda decipher these things without being affected. However, precisely due to the lack of intuition or inspiration, he could only use the Exhaustion Method to forcefully decipher the scrambled words by recombining them. The deciphered content was fragmented, far from restored.

Nonetheless, it was sufficient for Amanda. Because a portion of crucial information had been extracted—1873, total solar eclipse, the day of etchings, under the ocean, the arrival of eternal night.

"Did a total solar eclipse occur in 1873?" Amanda asked.

"There are no records," Brainiac said, "All astronomical recordings about total solar eclipses point to the one that occurred near the Indian Ocean and Malay Peninsula in 1868. But that was five years prior."

"Five years prior..." Amanda murmured softly, "Wait. Wasn’t there a total solar eclipse five years ago from now?"

"Currently searching... Yes. In March 1997, a rare ’century rendezvous’ occurred at the northernmost tip of China. A total solar eclipse and the appearance of the Hael-Bopp comet both emerged...