Days as a Spiritual Mentor in American Comics

The pale knight had made a good estimate, and bigger trouble soon appeared.

On his way back into the city, Bruce had been silently memorizing the map in his mind. Although the city was not as large as Gotham, it was not a small town either. There were many main roads and the terrain was somewhat complex. If he couldn't quickly become familiar with the road conditions, it might be hard to escape unscathed later on.

After running through the downtown loop, Bruce stopped to refuel the car. He didn't head to a gas station; instead, he used the fuel left over in the ambulance. It was just enough to fill the tank, but now their fuel supply was gone.

The pale knight found this action a bit strange. He said, "Didn't you say to save some fuel for later?"

He had discussed the next steps of their plan with Bruce previously, which had included saving some gasoline. Gasoline could be used not only to drive, but in critical moments, it could also be ignited, serving as a great obstacle and a means to cut off pursuers.

But Bruce had suddenly poured all the fuel into the tank, an abnormal behavior that made the pale knight think he might have realized something.

Bruce said nothing, shook his head, got in the car, and hit the road again. It didn't take long for the pale knight to realize something was wrong—they were being followed by a team of vehicles, taking turns in their pursuit.

I'll say it again, American police are pretty useless at everything. Despite their daily fugitive chases, their skills in setting up blockades and pursuit are mediocre, heavily relying on the visual advantage of helicopters.

If they couldn't handle this rough action-packed job well, it was even less likely for them to be adept at tailing someone. Vehicle trailing isn't an easy task.

To prevent the target from detecting them, the pursuer had to change vehicles after a while, keeping a distance and avoiding too frequent lane changes. But if the timing of the lane change was off, the target could slip away from view—it was a task requiring patience and technical skill.

American police never had much patience and weren't known for technical prowess. The ones skilled at tailing were the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which was not part of the local police system.

After watching for a while, the pale knight noticed that those following them were quite professional—to the point where they had begun tailing without him noticing.

At this realization, the pale knight couldn't help but shoot Bruce a glance that seemed to say, "Why are you so skilled?"

People without professional training simply couldn't notice they were being tailed, especially not on a straight road with no complex road conditions. Who would bother checking the rearview mirror for no reason?

Even those who were professionally trained, if they lacked enough experience, would have a hard time determining who was driving normally and who was following. Such tasks particularly required the accumulation of experience.

So the pale knight couldn't help but wonder, where the hell had Bruce accumulated his experience?

He would believe that Batman had plenty of experience with tailing; after all, investigating clues often required stalking skills, and Batman didn't always make a grand entrance. Often, he conducted his investigations silently.

But as for tailing Batman's car, the pale knight pondered and felt that, aside from himself, there probably wouldn't be anyone else doing such a thing. Moreover, he only followed Batman's car to investigate what Batman was up to every day.

He really wanted to know how Batman managed to be busy day and night, traveling tirelessly yet seemingly achieving nothing.

The Pale Knight admitted that his curiosity was a bit too intense, as if he were a mouse wielding a knife, actively seeking out cats.

Bruce continued to drive steadily, seemingly with no intention of speeding up to shake them off. But the Pale Knight knew that with the performance of the car and Bruce's driving skills, it would be a breeze to lose those trailing vehicles that had foregone performance for the sake of low-profile.

The Pale Knight began to rethink all of Bruce's actions.

He then realized that Bruce might be fishing.

They both had entered the Silterk laboratory, and although it was Greed controlling the lab at the time, after all, in the setup, he and Old Sirteck were family, and Old Sirteck definitely had a hand in the establishment of the lab.

Old Sirteck might be able to control the lab, then he could possibly pull up the surveillance footage and see who had entered the lab. Naturally, he might recognize both Bruce and the Pale Knight as the strangers who had appeared in the village.

And the first thing Bruce did when he entered the city was to rob a bank ostentatiously, even though he didn't actually get away with any money, there were inevitably surveillance cameras in the bank.

He went in without a mask, and as soon as the police arrived, pulling up the surveillance would reveal both their faces.

With the Sirteck family's operations in the city, it wouldn't be surprising if the bank were their property too. If Old Sirteck learned of this incident, he might also have seen the two of them through the bank's surveillance.

The Pale Knight felt that Bruce must have known this in advance, yet he didn't wear a mask, probably to allow Old Sirteck to see them.

Old Sirteck must have done some unsavory things in the village, and even if he hadn't, he definitely wouldn't want the current situation in the village to leak out. Knowing that there were survivors who escaped, he would certainly want to commit murder to silence them.

A thought struck the Pale Knight, and he figured out Bruce's intention.

If they had worn masks, though the police would have fewer leads, they still would have had to investigate vigorously, if only to save face, which could bring unnecessary trouble to both of them.

But by showing their faces, specifically to Old Sirteck, he would certainly try to suppress the incident because if they weren't caught, it might not matter, but if they were caught and exposed the situation of Faralines, it could potentially interfere with Old Sirteck's plans.

With the Sirteck family's influence, covering up a bank robbery where there was no actual loss was simple. As long as they weren't officially wanted, they would have plenty of freedom to move around.

"But that means he also knows we kidnapped that person, right?" The Pale Knight asked, seemingly out of the blue, but Bruce followed his line of thinking.

"That's exactly what we want him to know," said Bruce with a smile. "He won't worry about the guy hiring someone to kill, but he'll be more concerned about us telling him some things that shouldn't be told."

"I understand," The Pale Knight nodded. "To prevent information leaks, Old Sirteck might send someone to silence us, but if that attempt fails, the guy will know it's come down to a life or death situation. If Old Sirteck wants him dead, then he certainly won't hold back and will inevitably hire you."

"There's one more thing," Bruce added. "If Old Sirteck thinks he might spill the beans and the assassin he sends out knows this, if by accident it's revealed during the kill, then the guy will realize Old Sirteck is trying to shut him up. He will definitely investigate what Old Sirteck doesn't want to leak out."

"And Old Sirteck's trip to Faralines can't be hidden," Bruce continued, "As soon as he starts investigating, it's easy to find out what Old Sirteck has been up to recently. Once he sets his sights on that small village, Old Sirteck is going to panic."

The Pale Knight looked at him, wanting to say something, but ultimately shook his head and said, "Alright, I admit, you're not as ignorant as I'd imagined. I'm finding it more and more difficult to picture what your Gotham is really like."

"Feel free to come see for yourself," Bruce said with a smile.

Just then, Bruce made a smooth turn and left the highway at high speed, while the car that was following him reacted too slowly and missed the exit, forced to keep going straight ahead.

In this way, they shook off their pursuers with ease. Bruce took the outer ring road back to the villa area, and in his mind, he said to the Transcendent, "Hey, can we use the free channel when there's no one else around?"

"No…"

"Greed!!!"

"Okay, okay, keep it down, and only when there are no outsiders around," the Transcendent said reluctantly.

"We need to make sure that guy stays alive," Bruce said, "But we can't show up ourselves, it would be too deliberate."

"What do you plan to do?"

"The police are pretty useless, but at least there are a lot of them," Bruce said. "We need to cause a stir to attract the police here, set up a few more roadblocks in the area. That way, even if Old Sirteck's hitmen come, it'll be hard for them to act without drawing attention."

"Cause a stir?" The Pale Knight looked around. They were practically in the suburbs, surrounded by beauty and tranquility, fresh air – not at all the kind of place one would expect a ruckus.

The Pale Knight felt he had been freeloading for a while, and he ought to contribute something. He said to Bruce, "I have an idea that might work."

But it seemed Bruce hadn't heard him, as he was focused on reversing the car into a parking spot.

The Pale Knight was at a loss for words. You'd say Bruce has a sense of justice, as he's willing to take on anything, but you'd call him unethical for needing to park within the lines. And he wasn't planning to dive right in but instead, he meticulously side-parked his car.

"Don't complain about me wasting time, when you get to my Gotham, you'll have to do the same," Bruce said. "Guess why I drag race with the Four Heavenly Kings every day?"

The Pale Knight gave him a puzzled look.

"James recently cracked down on illegal parking, but there's never a spot to park near the Wayne Building. If you park on the street for more than five minutes, you get a ticket, and they even chase me with tickets when I'm already in the car. Could I let them stick it on?"

Wait a minute, something felt off, thought the Pale Knight. No, no, there were too many right things.

"Doesn't the Wayne Building have an underground parking garage?"

"Sure, but it's always full when I go there."

The Pale Knight was flabbergasted, "The entire underground garage is full and then you go to work???"

Wasn't Batman known to wake earlier than chickens, sleep later than dogs? At least the Batman he knew would fight crime until dawn, not even going home, but heading straight to Wayne Building to play his role as Bruce Wayne. The Pale Knight was almost driven mad by him.

"Work? I don't work; I just visit occasionally."

"Then who's running Wayne Enterprises?"

"Tim, don't you have this person in your cosmos?"

The Pale Knight looked at Bruce with an increasingly bizarre expression and said, "If you're not Batman, and you don't manage Wayne Enterprises, what exactly is your main occupation in Gotham?"

"Pursuing a PhD."

The Pale Knight just let out a sigh of relief, and then felt something was wrong again, "Haven't you finished your PhD yet?"

"Yeah, drop that contemptuous gaze. If your professor was Shiller, you wouldn't be any better off than me."

The Pale Knight recalled the whole process of dealing with Shiller and couldn't find words to retort. Then he said, "Then don't you have a private parking spot?"

"Yeah, but it's been occupied."

"Then evict the guy who's taking your spot."

"Can't evict them."

"How come?"

"Their English isn't good, and I can't understand what they're saying. Plus, they're super temperamental and ready to fight over anything. It wouldn't look good going to meet Tim with injuries, would it?"

The Pale Knight was now completely confused. The problem wasn't that there was something wrong; he understood every single word, but put together, it all sounded like whispers of an Elder God.

At last, with the car parked, Bruce said.

"The point is even if I were to meet Tim with injuries, he wouldn't help me, just tell me to endure it to prevent us both from being booted out of Wayne Enterprises. Alas, misfortune at home."