Chapter 64 Chapter 64 You've heard of the "foundation of the world"...
"And you just left?"
"What else?" Elio casually set down his glass, and a soft, crisp sound echoed from the bar. "I'm an assassin, not a convergent."
It was Batman who picked up Harvey Dent's body and quietly buried him in the Gotham Cemetery.
Perhaps he also notified a few of Harvey's close friends, and perhaps Commissioner Gordon also rushed over after hearing the news, silently gazing at the tombstone in the rain. Perhaps it was written on it, "After sentencing the last criminal in his life, he died as an upright and courageous prosecutor."
But in any case, these are not the things that the Assassins care about. In their doctrine, death ends everything and death heals everything.
"That's not what I'm asking, but whatever." John paused. "Wait, what did you say you were?"
Elio smiled at the amateur detective, who claimed to have "a little bit of magic," and turned away nonchalantly, asking the bartender for a sticky note. The assassin quickly wrote his name and phone number on it and handed it to John.
"Elliot Smith, assassin," John picked it up and read, "Three fives..."
“If you need my expertise,” Elio said, gesturing briskly with his index finger and thumb, “just give me a call. But that won’t be until ten years from now.”
"I'm a very compassionate person, just like you said," John put the note away. "I'd never commit murder for hire."
"Oh, so you usually do it yourself."
John rolled his eyes at him but handed over his card anyway.
"John Constantine," Elio read. "Exorcist, expert on ghosts and spirits, and...master of the dark arts?"
"You'll need me, boy."
John gestured back, his fingers swishing through the air. Elio barely saw the pattern, but he felt a surprising sense of relief, as if a long-held burden had been lifted by the swift gesture. He looked down at himself in surprise, then at John, who sat beside him.
"What did you do?"
"You inherited your father's magical gift," John said, "some ability sealed within your soul. It should have been a powerful seal, but it has been broken somehow, and you don't know how to use it."
As he spoke, one shoulder slumped. His dark red tie, seemingly unwashed, hung loosely below his open shirt collar, looking awkward. But as he spoke slowly and calmly about this matter, the master of the dark arts still held a mysterious and convincing tone.
"It'll attract bad things to you." John glanced at Elio's finger pointedly. "Evil things. If it gets too serious, the devil will crawl out of hell to play with you."
Elio also looked at the ring on his finger. Ever since he launched his plan against Two-Face, the Ring hadn't spoken to him in ages, quietly playing dead. Elio couldn't tell if it was truly silent or just recharging its power.
"You said 'devil,'" Elio asked, with a faint hope. "Was that a metaphor?"
"I hope that's just a metaphor, dear." John gave him a pitying look. "That's why I said you'd need me. Oh, I just got rid of some things for you. Don't thank me too much, just consider it after-sales service."
"I do feel a lot lighter," Elio murmured.
The bartender glanced at them, a look of pity, "What kind of old-fashioned scam?" Elio, his head bowed, scrutinizing his fingers, hadn't noticed. Only John noticed the look, but he didn't bother arguing with those lucky enough not to have been cursed by the Dark Arts. He simply turned away, finished his drink, and placed a bill under his glass, enough to cover both drinks.
"Okay, let's go," John stood up and brushed off his windbreaker. "Don't dawdle here."
He winked cryptically at Elio. The assassin, receiving the signal, followed obediently. One after the other, they passed through the shimmering blue lights and the swaying men and women, exiting the bar through the back door. The cool, fresh night breeze ruffled their coats, and Elio, gazing at the Gotham night of ten years ago, let out a soft breath.
“If you could go back ten years,” he asked, “what would you do?”
John didn't answer immediately. When Elio turned to look at him, the master of the Dark Arts remained silent. He seemed to be deliberately shifting his weight onto his left leg, lowering his shoulder, and shoving his hands into his trouser pockets.
"Who knows." He didn't look at Elio.
They were silent for a while, until the door behind them rang again, and a drunk stumbled out, leaning over a trash can and vomiting.
"…This world operates according to its own laws," John began to walk forward, "believe it or not. Ordinary people can't inexplicably go back ten years, or even ten years into the future. Even if they somehow manage to do so, the world won't tolerate them staying there for too long. Five minutes at most."
"But I..."
"I haven't talked about it yet, don't worry."
As he spoke, John pulled out a crumpled cigarette case from inside his windbreaker. He'd just taken out a cigarette and was about to fumble for his lighter when a flicker of flame suddenly appeared before his eyes. It was Elio's lighter, and the boy's green eyes, catching the flicker of light, silently urged him to speak.
"…But there are exceptions to everything." John chuckled and lit a cigarette with the torch Elio handed him. "Have you heard of the saying 'the foundation of the world'?"
He hadn't expected Elio to have heard of such a thing. But the assassin's eyes flickered, and it was clear that a memory had been awakened.
"I've heard of them." Elio spread his fingers. "You mean those gems with special powers? I used one of them once."
John accidentally choked on the smoke and started coughing. Elio looked at him in confusion, but reached out and patted his back considerately, but John waved him away.
"That's not..." John finally caught his breath, "That's definitely not what you think. The cornerstone is the cornerstone, and the gems are gems, do you understand? If you have used those gems, you will find that their power will be easily consumed. For someone like you..."
Elio raised an eyebrow.
"For a fighter," John finally found the right word, "they're practically disposable. If you use even a little bit of force, they'll snap before they can even unleash their full power! You've never experienced this, have you?"
"Not yet," Elio said. "I used it once and then gave it away."
John stared at him in amazement. "You what?"
"Give it away." Elio wondered, "What happened?"
"... Never mind. It's nothing." John exhaled a puff of smoke. "You must have given it to someone very important. Forget about it. You won't be asking for it back anyway. Let's get back to the topic just now. Gems are 'imitations' of cornerstones, disposable consumables. They have only learned the basics of cornerstones. If the highest magic grade of gems can reach A, then cornerstones--"
"It's 'Super A Grade'."
John's vision was blurry behind the smoke, and for a moment, Elio thought, he looked like he was about to say something, but then seemed to swallow it back.
"Don't underestimate that 'super'. Just think about the difference between 'superman' and 'human'! It's the difference between flattening a car and being flattened by it." He held a cigarette between his fingers and pointed at the ring on Elio's finger. "In this world, there are only three sets of cornerstones, and they are always guarded by specific people. They are the Vongola Ring, the Mare Ring, and the Rainbow Child's Pacifier. The world consciousness often shows leniency to the guardians of these cornerstones, allowing them to stay for a while at different points in time."
But the one in Elio's hand clearly didn't belong to any of them. It didn't even have a gem. Aside from a flashy little magic trick where it could "make words appear in flames," it looked like an ordinary golden ring, devoid of any other decoration.
"But those cornerstones, and their guardians, weren't there from the beginning." John's windbreaker brushed against the brick walls of the narrow street. "You might not know it, but they were man-made."
Elio didn't put in a word. He didn't know what was so surprising about that.
"Oh, you're not religious, are you?" John just remembered this and breathed a sigh of relief when he saw Elio shake his head. "That's good. In the beginning, it was God who maintained the balance of this world, and it was God who created the gadgets that maintained the balance. The one in your hand is one of them. As for what happened later..." He paused and thought, "Have you ever played games?"
"Very good. You can think of it this way: the gods are the 'administrators' of this world, and humans took over the 'management authority' from them," John said. "Anyway, that's pretty much it. The world consciousness still remembers your ring, so it'll be lenient with you, but the longer you stay here, the greater the impact will be. So let's quickly begin the ceremony to send you back."
John paused. Before they knew it, they had arrived at the spot where Elio had landed in Gotham a few days prior. He gave Elio an urgent look, while the assassin was still absorbed in the story woven from this information and clues. John likely didn't know about the past conflict between the Isu and humans, but Elio did. It was practically a required course for any assassin.
So it's very likely that the Isu were once regarded as gods by humans - they really were, and many ancient myths were derived from them - and they used the Artifacts of Eden to rule humans and maintain world order.
But later, humans created their own magical weapon, the "keystone" that John just mentioned, and fought for their freedom. The story of "The Lord of the Rings" may have taken place at that time, when humans took it from the Isu and threw it into the crater in a desperate attempt.
Elio thought that perhaps there was some influence from the apocalypse that had destroyed all the Isu people and most of the human race, but still left a spark of civilization.
But no matter what the story was, Elio had no way of knowing it now. He only knew one thing now, that is, from then on, humans had undoubtedly become the masters of this world.
"Hurry up." John urged, "This is roughly where you arrived now, right?"
Elio came to his senses and looked around. Only a few days had passed, and the homeless man sitting in the corner still remembered him and nodded lazily. Elio smiled, but not entirely because of that.
“Didn’t I mention it?” Elio turned to John and said, “When I first got here, I was in the sewers.”
-----------------------
The author has something to say: *The cornerstones of the world, the "Vongola Ring", the "Mare Ring" and the "Rainbow Child's Pacifier" are from "Katekyo Hitman Reborn".
**The "apocalypse that destroyed all Isu and most of humanity, but left a vestige of civilization," comes from the Assassin's Creed setting. The Isu once faced such an apocalypse, and nearly all of them perished. In 2012, the apocalypse struck again. If it weren't for the sacrifice of the protagonist, Desmond Miles, the disaster would have happened again; but human civilization would have survived, and he would have become a prophet and mentor, guiding the few remaining people forward. But he chose not to survive and become a hero.
***The author's thoughts:
This little chapter is finally coming to an end (big sigh of relief)! Although it is indeed very important, I didn't expect to have so many chapters...
In the previous chapter, a reader’s comment discussed Oreo’s growth and change of mentality. I was very happy [scatter flowers][scatter flowers][scatter flowers] Thank you to the reader named “A thousand recitations of the Tao Te Ching cannot save me” for seeing this!
Unlike Alote who appeared as a fully mature character in the previous book, I decided that this Oreo would be a "growth-type" before writing it, but I didn't expect to encounter so many difficulties.jpg (I deleted and revised a lot while writing it, and when I wrote 100,000 words in the early stage, the scrapped manuscript had 50,000 words, which was quite scary...) I also complained to my friends at the time that I would definitely not write a growth-type book in the next book. Why is it so troublesome? But now I think about it, it's because Oreo has been growing and changing all the time. At the same time, I am also groping forward with Oreo.
In my folder, I've divided Oreo's story so far into three parts: "Who Did I Provoke?" (approximately chapters 1-20) and "I Provoked Everyone at Tempura" (approximately chapters 21-40). The first two titles should be self-explanatory: "Oreo Faces Trouble" and "Oreo Fights Back." He suffered at the hands of Tempura, then fought back. But what happens after that? What remains after he's finished fighting this fate-forged battle? When he no longer has to toil and worry about his own life, the lives of his family, and his friends, where should he go?
What kind of person is he? What kind of person does he want to be?
The first question probably doesn't need further discussion. But Elio was also perplexed by the second. He had been completely cut off from "ordinary people's lives," so where could he go from here?
This is the question I've been wanting to discuss for the past twenty chapters, roughly 41 to date. For example, after finishing Watch Dogs 1 and achieving revenge, the protagonist, Aiden Pearce, felt a profound emptiness. Killing his enemy didn't save his family. After the flames of revenge burned out, only ashes remained. (Of course, after that, Aiden continued his work as a "vigilante," trying to do good for the city.) If Oreo had simply killed his enemy himself at the end of Chapter 62, he would have felt a moment of satisfaction, but then the emptiness of revenge would have followed. I imagine he would have fallen to his knees, tears streaming down his face. (Oreo, you're such a tear duct-welling, emotionally charged child...)
But after the fall of the Knight of Light in Chapter 63, Oreo's mood became remarkably calm. Serene, even. "Peace and tranquility"—that's probably what it means to be.
“Violence is never the only answer to a problem,” he had said to a little boy earlier. He had done it himself.
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com