Chapter 4590: Day of the Brightest (57) [4590

Although Deathstroke didn't know how Shiler had hoodwinked the Halls, it was of course best to complete his mission as soon as possible; he was still in a hurry to go find the Justice League for reimbursement.

In the evening, having nothing to do, Deathstroke imitated the conversation he had heard earlier between the Halls, recorded it with a tape recorder, and sent it to an intermediary who specialized in decryption investigations.

Having worked in this line for so many years, Deathstroke had also accumulated many connections, because he basically didn't engage in undercover investigations; most of his intelligence was provided by employers. And in order to execute missions more efficiently, he would find people to help him confirm the authenticity of the intelligence. And intelligence often covers various languages and various information, at which point he had to find specialized intermediaries to ask them to invite experts to decrypt it.

This type of person actually doesn't exclusively serve mercenaries or killers; most are internal personnel of transnational translation organizations and have dealings with the vast majority of linguistics experts in the world. As long as it is a language or script that exists in the world, they can find a way to decrypt it.

However, the waiting time this time was exceptionally long. Deathstroke had slept until the middle of the night before the other party sent over a long string of information. He had thought it was the decrypted content, but it turned out to be all guesses and explanations.

The information fed back by the other party was that this was not any common language in the world, and not even a dead language like Latin; it sounded a bit like Coptic, but a certain dialect of this language was only used in the Christian churches of Egypt and was already nearly extinct.

Furthermore, this only dialect in use had a very large difference from what they were saying. They had searched the world for experts and had been unable to decrypt the specific meaning, so they could only rely on the pronunciation to guess.

Among them, one syllable was repeatedly mentioned, and this syllable happened to be somewhat similar to a certain syllable in Arabic. This word meant "priest" in Arabic.

Deathstroke suddenly felt something was wrong. He didn't think that daily conversation between a married couple would involve such vocabulary. Could these two be some kind of cultists?

Actually, under normal circumstances, who the Halls were didn't have much to do with Deathstroke; after all, he was just taking money to run errands. However, now was a troubled time. If he really invited dangerous people to the Justice League headquarters, and now the Justice League didn't have Batman, and everyone was busy with their own things, the defense was very empty. If something really happened, Batman would definitely come to trouble him after returning.

He had also spent so much on clothing and equipment maintenance fees, yet he had botched the job. If this matter got out, his title as the "King of Orders" with a 100% completion rate wouldn't be preserved.

You have to know, he had already planned to transition. Transitioning inevitably has a period of growing pains, and business might not be as good as before. If his reputation was damaged again, it was very likely his entire career would plummet. This was something Deathstroke absolutely could not accept.

Deathstroke suddenly couldn't sleep. He scrambled up, and while urging that intermediary to find more experts to decrypt what they were saying, he went next door to wake Shiler up and told him about what he had investigated.

"You think the two of them have a problem?" Shiler thought for a moment and said, "The place they are going to is the Justice League headquarters. If they really were cultists, they wouldn't go throwing themselves into the net, would they?"

"That's not necessarily true. What if they are aiming to cause destruction?" Deathstroke felt the more he thought about it, the more suspicious it was. He said, "Why is it such a coincidence that as soon as I came to find them, they were assassinated? And when dodging bullets at the time, I pulled that Mr. Hall—you know how much strength I have; I can directly grab an adult's arm and throw him out—but at that time I actually didn't manage to pull him. This is clearly not normal."

"Are you sure it wasn't your illusion?"

Deathstroke shook his head. His brain, with its overdeveloped cerebral cortex, had one obvious advantage: he wouldn't filter out unimportant information like a normal person's brain, but rather chose to remember everything. Therefore, he could clearly recall every detail of the scene he had witnessed. He was certain that when he went to pull Mr. Hall at that time, it was just not right.

"No." Deathstroke began to put on his gear. He said, "I have to go to the art gallery again to figure out what is going on with these two. Are you coming with me?"

"I can keep watch for you, but I won't go in. So as to avoid you failing your infiltration and being discovered, and me having to suffer the consequences along with you."

Deathstroke rolled his eyes: "Then you are underestimating me too much. Although I don't often infiltrate, I wouldn't mess up such a small matter."

"As you wish." Shiler picked up his gun.

There was no public transportation at night, so the two could only walk. Fortunately, it wasn't particularly far. When they arrived at the Maple District, Shiler waited at a distance from the art gallery, while Deathstroke climbed over the wall into the courtyard.

Deathstroke only wore a bodysuit; he neither wore armor nor carried a greatsword. His weapons included an AR-15 and a small pistol; for cold weapons, he had a Kukri knife.

He climbed over the wall and landed in the courtyard. He had originally intended to wander around the art gallery to see if he could find a secret room or something similar. But as soon as he landed, on the right side of the art gallery courtyard, he saw a pair of glowing eyes.

A lithe figure pounced over like a wild beast. Deathstroke was startled, subconsciously rolled to the side, and drew his pistol to aim at the opponent. Borrowing the moonlight, he saw the opponent's appearance clearly.

That was a fairly strong man, wearing a set of golden light armor, the style of which was very retro. Deathstroke felt he had seen it somewhere, but couldn't remember. He wore a metal helmet, with a small wing on each side of the helmet, and the man also had a pair of large wings on his back. What was even more terrifying was that these wings were actually functional.

After rolling and falling to the ground, Deathstroke turned around and fired two shots at the ground, "Bang! Bang!", but the man didn't land at all, directly skimming at a low altitude and kicking up a gust of air. The cold, gleaming sharp claws headed straight for Deathstroke's face.

Seeing the light flashing on those claws, Deathstroke felt something was wrong. He didn't choose to take it head-on, but instead rolled again to dodge and kicked the opponent's arm. The power of this kick was immense, directly causing the man to lose his balance and tumble in the air.

Deathstroke pressed his advantage, the cold light of the Kukri knife flashing. He slashed at the opponent's wings, but those wings didn't seem to have grown out of his body. One slash down, apart from two feathers falling off, it didn't affect his flight ability at all.

Deathstroke crouched down to observe carefully. He had originally wanted to look for the opponent's flaws, but when his gaze landed on the opponent's face, he froze.

The helmet this man wore only had a half-mask; that is, the upper half of his face was covered, and the shape of the entire helmet was a bit like an eagle, but the lower half of his face was exposed. Batman's cowl covered him much more tightly; at least he only exposed a chin, while this man had his entire lower face exposed.

This is clearly Dr. Hall. Deathstroke sneered in his heart. Being a cultist and learning from others to expose half a face. Do you really think they don't dare to expose Batman because they didn't recognize him?!

Deathstroke wanted to shout his name to expose him, but after thinking about it, his voice during the day hadn't been disguised, and if he spoke now, he might be recognized by the opponent. He simply didn't speak, and slashed again with his knife. The opponent was directly sent flying by his immense strength.

The strangely dressed Dr. Hall seemed to realize he was no match for him. A sharp cry issued from his mouth—a bit like an eagle's screech. Then, another figure flew out from the window of the art gallery.

Deathstroke looked back, and oh boy. Husband and wife of one heart, their sharpness can cut metal. Isn't this Mrs. Hall? You can fly too?

Mrs. Hall flew over and scratched Deathstroke with a claw. Then the two of them began to communicate using that language again. Although Deathstroke couldn't understand it, he could remember it. With more samples, perhaps he could decrypt what the two of them were saying.

Deathstroke turned around, preparing to fire. After Mrs. Hall saw his image clearly, she was obviously startled, and then hurriedly pulled Mr. Hall away. Deathstroke had wanted to fire a couple of shots to try his luck, but considering he might not hit and it would attract the police, he simply gave up.

Walking out and seeing Shiler again, Deathstroke couldn't help but complain: "I have never taken on an easy job. I originally thought this time was just running errands, but it turned out there was another hidden story. I'm really fed up!"

Deathstroke told Shiler about what happened in the art gallery. Shiler didn't show any surprised expression. He said: "Since you have already appeared before their eyes in the image of Deathstroke, you can't go to pass messages to them anymore. Have you considered transferring the order?"

"Is transferring the order the issue right now?" Deathstroke sighed and said, "Before I figure out what is going on with these two, I can't take them to the Justice League. Otherwise, if something happens, it will all be counted on my head."

"I didn't see that you were such a responsible person."

"If Batman were never coming back, I wouldn't be so cautious." Deathstroke rubbed his forehead hard, "But we all know that even if he fell into a black hole in the center of the universe, it's impossible for him not to come back. I can't give him a chance to trouble me."

"Then what do you plan to do?"

"It might take some time." Deathstroke said, "I have to figure out who they are and what they are doing hiding here before I can determine whether to take them back."

"My time is very precious." Shiler said in a flat tone.

Even now, Deathstroke still didn't have the habit of listening carefully to every word Shiler said. He should have developed it earlier. If he had, then the next morning, when he observed the Halls' private art gallery with binoculars and saw Joseph among the visitors, his cursing wouldn't have been so loud.

"Fuck! What the hell?!" Deathstroke was completely shocked, "How could Joseph be here?! Shouldn't he have already returned to New Orleans?!"

Could it be that his graduation trip to Egypt was ruined, so he decided to come to Midway City for another trip? Hadn't he mentioned before that he was interested in the Great Lakes region?

This slightly naive speculation was quickly overturned. Because Joseph's method of blending in was much more clever than Deathstroke's. He quickly won the favor of the Halls and went upstairs with them.

Deathstroke didn't even have time to change his gear. He didn't even have time to take the stairs down, directly jumping down, and after swinging up with a grappling hook, landed on the roof of a building not far from the art gallery.

Just as he was about to jump into the art gallery, he saw Shiler standing on the street below. Shiler made a gesture at him, Deathstroke's movement paused, and Shiler had already climbed onto the roof.

"I'm the one who called him over." Shiler said, "As soon as he heard you couldn't complete the mission, he rushed to Midway City at the fastest speed. It's truly touching."

Before he finished speaking, the greatsword was already held against his neck. Deathstroke glared at him and said: "You know very well that those two are dangerous! He can't deal with them at all..."

"I have discovered that your perceptions of each other are not very accurate." Shiler shook his head, "The filters are truly too thick."