Chapter 3386: Miracle Doctor (Part 41)

Arkham Batman told Shiler about his experience of exploring the mining area in order to find the target person.

Shiler's side is playing "Two Point Hospital", while Arkham and Natasha are playing "Tomb Raider", because the labels they chose were "Action" and "Combat". The whole process is parkour, platform jumping, and combat, mixed with a little puzzle-solving element.

These two are both hexagonal warriors without weaknesses. Whether it was the treacherous terrain encountered on the way deep into the mining area, the enemies that popped up from time to time, or the puzzle-solving of finding keys after finding stone slabs, they all handled it with ease.

Shiler already planned to watch their clearance recording after going out. It might be able to compete for the best action movie of the year, provided there are no extra actions. But Shiler knew that judging by Natasha's style, this was impossible.

Arkham Batman and Natasha went deep into the bottom layer of the mining area and discovered some unusual traces there. This proved that this mining disaster might not be an accidental oversight, but possibly man-made.

Walking along the mine tunnel all the way inside, they encountered a dead end. They remembered the direction of the mine tunnel, and when they looked at it after returning to the surface, they found that the mine tunnel pointed directly to the hospital.

The two split up. Arkham Batman continued to investigate outside, while Natasha went to explore the hospital. It's just that unlike Wanda, she didn't fall into the operating room where Shiler and the others were, but went to where Pride and Batman were.

Shiler was thinking about the information brought back by Arkham Batman. Thor walked past him carrying a patient, and Shiler hurriedly made way. Now there are two dump trucks rushing around in a small hospital lobby, and this is obviously not a good place for thinking.

Shiler took the medical record and walked to Loki, handed the medical record over, and asked: "Why did you and Thor come to the

Loki wrote a medical order while saying, "We two are Asgardians, so we chose tags like 'Myth' and 'Magic.' We didn't expect to end up here."

"Myth and magic? I can understand magic. What does what you are doing now have to do with myth?"

"Do you know what the magic system of this world is like?"

Shiler shook his head. He really couldn't imagine it, because his understanding of magic was roughly divided into two types: one was the magic of American comics, which simply put, was "borrowing debt"; the other was the magic of Harry Potter, which had no cost and whose upper limit relied entirely on imagination.

But this world was clearly neither of those. Their magic power was not borrowed, but it was not without cost either.

"The magic energy of this world is like the oil used by humans in the real world," Loki said without lifting his head. "Sources of magic energy are distributed deep or shallow beneath the surface. As long as you mine them, you can obtain a steady stream of magic energy, which can be used in every aspect of social life."

"If you compare it to oil, it is obvious that this thing will inevitably lead to competition. That is indeed the case. This continent has gone through several wars and eventually became what it is now."

"That's getting a bit off track. In short, the Westchester Duchy where we are now is located at the junction of two great empires. One empire excels in steam technology, and the other excels in magic energy development. The Westchester Duchy uses both."

"Can it really be compared to oil?" Shiler questioned. "Hundreds of years ago, some people carved up the magic energy under Magic Hub Town and even turned themselves into Archmages."

"It wasn't that they carved up the magic energy and turned themselves into Archmages; it was that the countries and forces behind them carved up the oil fields. To make them take the blame, they were given the title and treatment of Archmages."

"I see," Shiler said. He thought of the man who looked like a noble he had seen in Manna's dream. He should be a representative of one of the forces behind it.

"But you still haven't said what your main mission is."

Loki shook his head and said, "It's basically completely unrelated to your mission. What we need to study is the true source of the magic energy on this continent."

"Similar to something like the World Tree of the Nine Realms?"

"Something like that. This continent was not formed naturally; it is highly likely that it was created by gods. And what we need to do is find where the entrance to the 'Long Staircase to Godhood' is."

"You want to become gods?"

"The short-term goal is to become Archmages."

"I can understand you wanting to be a mage. What's going on with Thor?"

"By your human classification standards, Thor is also a mage. Because he uses divine power, which also counts as a kind of magic. Even if the way he uses it is to use fists made of divine power to pummel people, that is still a way of using magic..."

Shiler didn't want to listen to his nonsense anymore, so he simply took the medical records and went to Pride's psychological clinic. He wanted to know more about why Pride and Batman also became doctors.

The two of them definitely wouldn't have chosen the "hospital" tag. Shiler was very clear about that, because this scenario didn't give them much room to perform. If it were Pride, he might have preferred to choose "university."

Pride was not seeing patients, but was sitting at the desk organizing notes. He looked up at Shiler who was walking over, then lowered his head and continued writing.

Shiler walked to the sofa next to the desk and sat down, picked up a book from the side and placed it on his lap, and began to tell Pride about the situation of the several teams.

When he finished speaking, Pride had also finished writing. He put down what was in his hand, stood up, walked to the opposite sofa, sat down, and said, "I did consider the university theme. But Batman said we shouldn't just default to a modern university in a scientific society; it could also be a magic school, or simply an alien school."

"The mission might have nothing to do with teaching, it just happens to be in a university setting. If that's the case, the school is actually not a good choice, because there are too many people and the situation will become more complicated."

"So what did you two choose?"

"Paranormal contact."

Shiler's hand holding the cup paused, and he said, "You specifically look for haunted dungeons? What is the point of this?"

"Because he wants to know if psychoanalysis is useful for ghosts."

"Damn it, and you agreed?" Shiler said helplessly. "Batman should know that this has nothing to do with the form of life, right? As long as it is an intelligent creature, it can naturally be analyzed."

"He prefers to understand psychoanalysis as some kind of brainwave communication. You know them, they are brave enough to explore every possibility."

"That's a high-EQ way of putting it," Shiler sighed. Then he continued to ask, "So your theme is ghost hunting?"

"To be precise, it's studying ghosts." Pride took a notebook from the table next to him, handed it to Shiler, and then said, "We are members of the Mage Alliance. You can understand us as theoretical mages. This is the project we are working on."

Shiler opened the notebook and saw some knowledge about the development of magic energy sources written on it.

"You came here to investigate the magic energy source of Magic Hub Town?"

"More specifically, we are investigating some abnormal phenomena during the development of magic energy sources, including magic power outbursts, evil spirits, plagues, etc. And Magic Hub Town is clearly a typical case."

"Then how did you enter the hospital?" Shiler's fingers tapped lightly on the cup and said, "Manna has certain requirements for the choice of doctors. You two don't meet the conditions."

"I think you should first talk about what the owner of the dream, that is, the little ghost girl, is actually doing."

"Is this part of your research?"

"You could say that." Pride crossed one leg over the other, placed his hands on his knees, and then said, "This involves some infighting between the Mage Alliance and the Steam Guild; it's all old, stale stuff. But it mostly has to do with our ultimate goal. I must collect such clues."

"Fine, it's not a very fair exchange of information. But I can give you a discount," Shiler said. "Our mission process should be the shortest among you. We can leave after completing it. So what you do later won't affect us. It doesn't hurt to tell you."

"The plague was not caused by Manna. She doesn't have that ability. But she does control this hospital. This is an agreement she reached with Dr. Foster."

"Many years ago, that is, in the era when Dr. Foster was practicing medicine to save people, he discovered the abnormality of Magic Hub Town, which was that a great plague would break out every once in a while, taking away many people's lives."

"He realized that the situation was not normal, but he had no way to solve the problem from the source. So he built a hospital to treat people's illnesses."

"But obviously someone didn't want him to do this. The hospital had many problems and almost couldn't stay open. Dr. Foster had no choice but to find Manna and use helping her take revenge as a condition to let Manna control this hospital."

"Dr. Foster certainly knew that as an evil spirit, Manna couldn't possibly save people. So the purpose of this hospital's establishment was actually to protect certain specific people when the plague broke out, so that they would be spared from the harm of the disease and could successfully survive."

"Dr. Foster drew up a list, mostly of mining industry practitioners, including miners, geologists, prospectors, mechanical engineers, mining equipment operators, and even manufacturers of high-power lighting fixtures. They were all the objects to be protected."

"Manna didn't understand the meaning of doing this, but after she told me these things, I guessed that Dr. Foster might have realized that the problem appeared in the mining area. He wanted these people to survive so that when the plague ended and everything was waiting to be rebuilt, they could go to the mining area to explore and solve this problem from the source."

Pride listened silently to Shiler's account and asked his own question: "If so, why does the hospital have to set such complex rules to kill these doctors?"

"This is a screening mechanism," Shiler said. "Dr. Foster doesn't seem to want any dead weight in the team. He wants a team that is capable, quick to react, and mutually supportive."

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 3386 =====

"That's not entirely it either. It can only be said that without this hospital, these patients wouldn't survive either. According to Manna, the plague won't stop until a certain number of people have died."

Hearing this, Pride understood a little, and he said, "This must be some kind of sacrificial ritual, right?"

"I'm afraid so." Shiler nodded and said, "This is why those big shots in Westchester have such a strange attitude toward this place. They hope the ritual will be completed, but they don't want people to know the truth. That's why there's both blockades and cover-ups."

(End of Chapter)