Chapter 98: April

On that night, only three people did not dream.

A bat circled above Gotham, gazing at the city that had fallen into slumber for the first time completely; on this night, with no crimes, no battles, and nothing to do, he still circled the sky again and again, carefully observing every corner of the city until dawn broke, then vanished into the first ray of morning light.

And an elder, as always, silently kept watch in the Batcave, spending this quiet night alongside him.

As for the third person, it was Ma Ma Zhaodi.

He wore no black cloak, carried no shovel or sapling, and walked alone to the Gordons', the Harveys', the Clintons', and beside the dwelling he and the animals had built for Grandy in the woods, confirming they all slept peacefully.

Finally, he arrived at the edge of the woods by the suburban cemetery, watching the small trees shimmer under the moonlight, standing silently in stillness.

He had long wanted to do this; when wearing the cloak, he was the Planter, but in truth, he more wished to stand among the crowd, joining this ritual of mourning, to grieve slightly for the unfortunate souls sleeping eternally in the cemetery.

Perhaps he truly was unsuited to be a saint. Ma Ma Zhaodi thought this, looking up at the moonlight piercing through the clouds; from there, no shadow of a bat seemed visible.

"I wonder if that bat had a good dream tonight."

The next day, after everyone in Gotham City awoke, they all felt somewhat melancholy and somewhat surprised, for they discovered the dream they had last night seemed to be the same.

Gordon and Harvey both remembered the events they encountered in the dream; members of the Falcone family also remembered that in the dream they did not go to work but returned home to spend St. Patrick's Day with their families; the families of the deceased clearly remembered those people who returned in the dream.

After that day, citizens went to the edge of the woods by the cemetery to mourn as usual, yet all discovered the Planter never appeared again; he was like an illusion, a shadow, a non-existent person. Only the small trees left behind in that spot proved to the people that this experience was not a dream.

Everyone felt Saint Patrick had manifested, but no one dared to press the children on this matter; in fact, ever since this dream St. Patrick's Day, this group of children held a somewhat extraordinary status in Gotham; both Falcone and Maroni began using their territories in the city to build real, long-term shelters for them—the requirement being that they hoped the children would continue this ritual indefinitely.

Anyway, Gotham City in the future would always have homeless street children.

Jason had no objection to this; although these houses were still not theirs in a legal sense, the large number of homeless children could finally, for the time being, stop huddling in crumbling, wind-leaking ruins or abandoned shacks; this was already a rare good thing.

And more importantly, the Gotham City Police Department's record list of homeless children had been quite detailed; someone had already been eyeing that list recently, because many people gradually noticed that the health status of this group of children had improved significantly.

So many healthy children, with complete limbs and normal development, were themselves a fortune; whether for human trafficking or organ trafficking, whoever obtained this list and acted upon it could extract a huge profit from it.

Moreover, it was possible to question them about the secret of how the entire group recovered their health in just a single winter.

But now, no one dared to target them anymore. Because Santa Claus might be a legend, but Saint Patrick had truly revealed miracles, and the guns of the Romans and Maroni were even closer at hand; most importantly, all of Gotham had witnessed everything these children did as the Planter's helpers; in a sense, these children had also become an inviolable part, along with the Saint and the mourning.

No one would want to risk offending all of Gotham by harming them; everyone knew that in the future, it would be these children who planted trees for the dead, and this tradition might be preserved forever—people also hoped it would be preserved forever.

—

Between moonrise and sunset, time passed quickly; Gotham City finally woke from that green dream, and people returned once again to their daily lives they had to face.

Ma Ma Zhaodi happened to organize and upgrade his panel and skills during this period; by now, a considerable amount of time had passed since he arrived in Gotham; during these days, he often found time to practice shooting, parkour, and physical exercise; although the actual training effect was not strong, it indeed gave him a reason to upgrade his skills—in the eyes of some people, his rapid progress in these skills was all due to the credit of these practices.

But in reality, Ma Ma Zhaodi was an ordinary person; he did not possess the cheat-like ability improvement speed of those superheroes or super-villains, nor could he integrate so many skills in a short time.

Besides, to avoid his pretentious magic truly touching certain taboos in this world, he even specially ran to a bookstore to buy several books on the occult—not necessarily to know what could be done, but to slightly understand what could not be done.

But Ma Ma Zhaodi did not know that those several books, which spoke with such solemnity, actually had no connection whatsoever to real magic.

Finally, there was the renovation and perfection of the Zen Garden; although buying a garden in an emergency only required 10,000 Asset Points, subsequent cultivation and facility perfection truly consumed quite a few Asset Points; without the friendly sponsorship of the Falcone family, Ma Ma Zhaodi would most likely already be in a state of zero assets.

Asset Points: 10,627 USD

Panel: Intermediate English Mastery, Intermediate Motorcycle Driving Mastery, Intermediate Tracking Mastery, Intermediate Lockpicking Mastery, Intermediate Swordsmanship Mastery, Intermediate Physical Enhancement, Intermediate Blowgun Mastery, Intermediate Natural Language Mastery, Advanced Wheelchair Driving Mastery, Advanced Culinary Mastery, Advanced Car Driving Mastery, Advanced Firearms Mastery, Advanced Stealth Mastery, Advanced Climbing Mastery

Items: Ghost Fire Wheelchair, Indestructible Pumpkin Lantern, Sanity-Draining Pumpkin Mask, Horn of Plenty, Eight-Faced Han Sword, Hacker Two-Piece Set, Eavesdropping and Locating Lighter, Snowman Crystal Ball Music Box, Assassin's Blowpipe, Portable Garden (Golden Watering Can, Plant Fertilizer *8, Insecticide *10, Phonograph, Gardening Gloves, Mushroom Garden, Aquarium, Flower Pots *20), Pumpkin *2, Frozen Mushroom *1, Ice Shooter *1, Doom-shroom *1, Sunflower *10

The infinite water area-type watering can, fertilizer for plants, insecticide, phonograph, etc.; the Mushroom Garden and Aquarium are two new spaces that can be used to place fungi and aquatic plants.

The pumpkin shield for survival, the frozen mushroom for controlling the entire field, the Ice Shooter for combat assistance; the Sunflower is for producing sunlight, and it can subsequently be used directly to purchase plants that have already been bought once with Asset Points.

As for the Doom-shroom, this cost the largest sum of Asset Points, but its power will also be the most terrifying; if possible, Ma Ma Zhaodi does not hope to use it—because its performance in the game really looks like a nuclear bomb.

Just like that, time unknowingly arrived at April.

Today is April 1st, April Fools' Day.

(End of Chapter)