Chapter 1478: Flying Birds and Returning (End)

In the studio of the BBC headquarters building in London, England, Bruce took a cup of hot coffee from his assistant and smiled at him.

A blonde female producer walked over, shook hands with Bruce, and said, "Thank you so much, Mr. Wei En. If it weren't for you, this variety show project would probably take another five or six years to meet the public."

"No need. It is precisely because I had similar ideas long ago that I set up this black diamond puzzle many years ago. Being able to cooperate with the BBC, seeing global outstanding talents, and competing for the title of millionaire is considered fulfilling my wish."

The female producer smiled, shook Bruce's hand tightly, and said, "It is my honor to cooperate with you... oh, the script is ready, let's start."

Bruce nodded, finally adjusted his suit, looked at the camera lens under the guidance of the director, and revealed a standard smile.

"Hey, audience friends, hello everyone, I am Bruce Wei En."

"That's right, the 'rich bastard' you often talk about. I don't think anyone wants to see me on such a beautiful morning—but what if you add the one million dollars behind me?"

"Good news, folks, I've long wanted to see you poor ghosts fight for money, so a few years ago, I cut a precious black gemstone into a thousand pieces and buried them all over the world. In this show, you will see experts from all walks of life use all kinds of tricks to compete for this one million dollars."

"The conditions for victory are very simple. Find the fragments and bring them to me. Whoever brings back the most fragments wins. But the premise is, one thousand fragments, not a single one can be missing."

Bruce stood up, walked to the camera, lowered his voice, and said.

"According to the rumors when I obtained the gemstone, there is a terrifying curse on this precious black gemstone. Only the boldest adventurers can participate. Because of this, don't think about faking it, I won't be deceived by your little tricks."

"However, I can't afford the responsibility of you being cursed, and no one wants to see you explode and die on the show, so anyone who touches the black diamond with their body—you are eliminated."

"Cooperation, competition, or frankly... fighting, you decide. Now, the game begins!"

"Click", the TV was turned off. Red Hood, sitting at the table, covered his face with his hands and sighed long, saying, "I often feel that Batman is a bit too old-fashioned, but this one... he's a bit too trendy!"

Then he said with some doubt, "I remember the variety show 'Millionaire' was only broadcast on TV in 1998, right? Well, it seems he spent a lot of money to bribe people at the TV station."

Schiller, sitting by the window, closed the book in his hand, pointed to the seat opposite, and said, "You've also studied for a few days, how is it? Are there any parts you don't understand?"

"Regarding the techniques of conversation guidance, I think I've learned quite well, but the macro part..." Red Hood frowned and shook his head. He gestured with his hand and said, "Most of my life experience in the first half of my life came from practice. Although I also like to read some miscellaneous books, I rarely learn techniques from books. If possible, Professor, I feel I might need some practical guidance."

But the next second, the thick blood mist scattered, and Mary and the blood clan in the bar disappeared in an instant. Bennett used his power to dispel the runes on Zatanna's arm, and Zatanna immediately wept bitterly.

Red Hood grinned and revealed a brilliant smile. Only then did he reveal some of the innocence of a young man, like a bird nestling beside an eagle, trying to puff up its fluffy feathers.

"How about this, I'll take you to Hell, you can see how I communicate with the demon kings of Hell, how about that?"

Red Hood nodded hard, but soon he asked with some hesitation, "I heard you intend to teach Bruce magic this time?"

Schiller closed the book, stood up, glanced at the turned-off TV, and said, "If he had half your diligence, he wouldn't have graduated until now."

Schiller walked to the cabinet, took out a piece of paper with a string of numbers left by Constantine. After Schiller dialed this string of numbers, the phone emitted a burst of light.

Then Schiller picked up the glowing receiver and dialed Constantine, saying, "John, open the channel to the Dream World, I'm going to take Jason to Hell... Yes, right now, okay, goodbye."

After Schiller put down the phone, he took a bottle of wine from his wine cabinet and said to Red Hood, "Theoretically, we can go to Hell through a magic circle, but that's a bit slow. Before when I went to Hell, I left beacons in many places. Constantine has the permission of the Dream World given to him by the Dream God. Walking through the dream world is a bit faster."

"Come on, drink the wine, I'll take you to meet an old friend that one of my personalities met in Hell."

Red Hood knew that Schiller's saying "walking through the dream world will be a bit faster" should be unexpectedly fast, but he didn't expect that after he drank the wine and felt a burst of dizziness, what followed was a terrifying sense of weightlessness. He lowered his head and found that he was in free fall above a demon king's castle.

"Bang!"

"Ouch!"

Red Hood fell heavily to the ground. It didn't hurt, it was just quite scary. The overall feeling was a bit like dreaming, but he wasn't woken up by this high-altitude falling scene.

After he climbed up, he found that Schiller was already waiting for him in front of the demon castle gate.

The two walked from the drawbridge into the magnificent gate, and the blood-red war flag hanging on the city wall was written in demon common language: "Long live Azazel".

Azazel was a black mist floating in the air, with countless eyes emitting golden light in the black mist. When he saw Schiller bringing Red Hood into his throne hall, he asked in that vague, low tone.

"Schiller, what are you here for?"

"Of course, to talk to you."

"I don't need a Pope, don't trade power, don't start wars, have no revenge to take, no jealous demons or angels, and have no interest in anything outside my palace."

If Azazel had a head, it should have been shaken into a rattle by now.

Schiller just wanted to open his mouth, Azazel's several pairs of eyes stared at him in unison, and then said: "If you say you or your student wants to be my Pope, I'll call Lucifer now."

"No wonder you can live so long and share Satan's power from Lucifer, Your Majesty Azazel."

"Don't praise me, you should leave quickly if you have nothing to do."

"I really have some things." Schiller began to pace in Azazel's palace, lowering his head and saying, "Back then, Lucifer came to Hell, seized the position of Satan, and handed over power to two demon kings in Hell to form a new trinity, and these two demon kings were you and Beelzebub."

"Later, the ancient demon monarch Belial was unwilling to accept this, and even wanted to monopolize the position of Satan, and that idiot Grand Duke Astro even started a protracted war in Hell."

"Everything is in the past." Azazel said in a low voice, "Thanks to you and your student Batman, Hell is now incomparably peaceful. Therefore, no matter what conditions you offer, I have no need to negotiate with you. I enjoy my current power and status very much, no need to go further."

"Is that so? But you have quite a few agents in the human world."

Although Azazel didn't have eyebrows, Red Hood could still see that Azazel's mood immediately became unpleasant as soon as Schiller said this.

"Are you threatening me? But I didn't break the agreement between Heaven and Hell. All my agents signed contracts with me voluntarily, and I didn't treat them badly. At least compared to those demons who like to torture believers, I am tolerant enough."

"Of course, Your Majesty, but have you ever thought that you are a bit too tolerant?"

The eyes in Azazel's black mist narrowed slightly. Schiller stopped his pace, turned to look at him, and said, "I know what you have done to humans. You keep lowering the threshold for contracts, borrowing more and more power, making power more and more adaptable to the human body, constantly expanding the base of mages, just to collect more interest."

"This is indeed a good way. You are making the magical world more and more dependent on you. The longer this continues, the lower the autonomy of the magical world and mages will be. In the end, they can only kneel at your feet and pray to you for power."

"Do you want to stop all this?" Azazel's tone became lower and lower, even threatening.

But unexpectedly, Schiller shook his head easily and said, "No, I want to help all this."

Azazel's countless eyes hidden in the darkness widened, and then he heard Schiller say.

"If I'm not mistaken, this plan of yours has already fallen into a bottleneck period. If the number of mages continues to expand, it will attract the attention of angels. And in your contract with Heaven, it should be written that you cannot interfere with the normal order of the human world."

"What exactly is normal order is determined by angels. In this regard, you have no initiative. Once you cross the line, they have reasons to strike you at any time. The church is the best knife in their hands."

"Your Majesty Azazel, you invested a lot of power in the early stage to expand the basic base of believers, but now, because of the agreement with Heaven, the number and scale of believers have reached a bottleneck period. And if you want to recover the costs of early investment, what will you do?"

Azazel was a bit dizzy from his roundabout way. It wasn't that Schiller's situation was difficult to understand; Azazel knew Hell's predicament better than Schiller.

Since the appearance of humans, demons have always been beaten as villains, so it is much harder for them to expand believers than angels. Demon kings spent a lot of money to open up this shortcut of the magical world.

Mages not only don't feel ashamed of borrowing power from demons but are proud of borrowing more and borrowing faster. This is an important stronghold for demon monarchs to compete with angels and cannot be lost.

But as Schiller said, the number and power level of the magical world are basically saturated now. If it expands further, it is very likely to be cleared by the church. The witch-hunting movement back then was the consequence of demon kings testing the bottom line.

On the surface, demon monarchs have no way to compete with angels. The human world is still the church's territory, and demons can only do some private transactions. If they don't give stronger power, why would people believe in you instead of the church?

Demons can only buy horse bones with thousands of gold. This is also why the church always forbids people from studying forbidden power. Although the forbidden power provided by demons is evil, it is truly strong.

The war started by Grand Duke Astro back then also cost demon monarchs a lot of strength. On one side is the output of human power, on the other side is the internal war. After so many years, the accumulated demon monarchs are also a bit stretched.

But there is no good solution to this situation. Most demons can only consume it like this, only fighting over whose family foundation is thicker. But in this way, Hell's living strength will be constantly consumed, which is exactly what those angels want.

The human world is like a chain pulling demons, and also like a thorn stuck in their hearts. Sooner or later, all power will be drained by this blood transfusion vessel. Azazel can see such a future, but is powerless to change it.

"What solution do you have?" Azazel had to ask. He knew how dangerous it was to cooperate with Schiller, but he had no choice.

"Your Majesty Azazel, I suppose after your painstaking management over the years, your basic base of believers in the human world is stable, right?"

"Of course."

"So to speak, your believers are very pious to you?"

"You could say that."

"Then why don't you harvest them?"

Azazel's countless golden eyes stared fixedly at Schiller through the black mist. He observed the expression on Schiller's face that could be called indifferent, was silent for a long time, and then opened his mouth to say.

"Do you know what you are saying? You want me—a demon—to take away the souls of your own kind?"

"That would be too low-level, Your Majesty. Souls can only be harvested once, but if you only bestow them a little power, but let them seek other power for you, you can harvest more."

Schiller looked up at one of Azazel's eyes and said his true purpose in an icy tone, like pulling out a sharp dagger that had been hidden for a long time.

"Or, we can also unite all the demons in Hell, harvest the entire magical world, the monopoly step has been completed, and the next step is refusal to deliver, breach of contract, and collective price hikes."

Azazel stared fixedly at Schiller. Schiller also looked at him and said: "Belial and Astro are dead, Beelzebub is on our side, and the remaining demon monarchs are not a climate."

Schiller lowered his head to look at his palm, and a low voice echoed in the throne hall.

"As long as you give an order, the demons will collectively breach the contract—the noble birds in the magical world who are accustomed to flying will never be able to endure being clipped wings and crawling clumsily on the ground, letting the mud dirty their feathers."

"When the time comes, they will prostrate themselves at your feet, begging you for power at any cost, repaying the price they deserve to pay for being weak creatures who dared to covet a place alongside the gods."

In the rainy night of Gotham, a female figure carrying a cello case walked slowly on the street. She heard the variety show advertisement coming from the store window, but didn't stop for it, only because the cold and sadness made her want to return to the rented apartment quickly to enjoy the warmth of the fireplace.

And just as she hurriedly opened the door, the phone that had been enchanted floated up and made a harsh ringing sound. She put down the cello case in her hand, walked over, and picked up the phone.

"Zatanna! Little Za! It's me, it's your Uncle Scott!" The phone came with a scream that didn't sound like a human: "Little Za! The Stross Grand Duke I contracted has breached the contract! I can't use magic anymore! I've become an ordinary person!"

The man on the other side's tone was trembling uncontrollably. He was almost crying as he said: "And your Uncle Polk, Aunt Stewart, and your cousin and nephew, the magic family is finished! We are finished!"

"The demons have collectively breached the contract! The magical world is completely finished!!"

"Bang", the phone receiver fell to the floor, and there was no figure of the magician lady in the pitch-black apartment room.

London tonight, no one slept. ===== CHAPTER 1479 =====

London tonight, no one sleeps.