Night of the Return of the Joker (Part 1)

"Father, you've arrived."

Schiller stood up from his seat, went to greet the Old Priest, and shook hands with him. The Old Priest looked up and surveyed the theater, and said with emotion, "I haven't been here for a long time. I never expected that someone would invite me here now."

As he spoke, he followed Schiller to sit in the first row of seats closest to the stage. There was another person who had taken his seat earlier, namely the godfather Falcone, who was sitting in the innermost seat.

He simply turned to look at the priest and said, "Do you remember? In our time, this place was brightly lit, and my favorite opera back then was 'The Lady of the Camellias'."

"My favorite is still Louis. Back then, both shows were incredibly popular, and the theater was packed. You couldn't even get a ticket."

The three sat in the empty old theater. On the dilapidated stage, thick dust had turned the curtain a dark, blackish red, and the gold threads on it had lost their luster. Even most of the light bulbs around the edge of the stage were no longer lit.

"But I still prefer today's play. What should we call it?" Schiller turned to the two men. Falcone, holding a cigar, exhaled a puff of smoke as the flame flickered, and said, "How about 'Easter'?"

"I think 'It' would be more appropriate to call it Return of the Joker."

"Why? The Joker? You mean the kind in the circus? There have been circuses performing in Gotham City, but that was a long time ago."

Schiller shook his head and did not answer.

He said, "I invited you two here because I wanted to hear your stories."

Falcone sighed, and the Old Godfather said, "Let Daniel explain it to you."

Falcone and Schiller looked together at the Old Priest sitting in the middle.

The Old Priest smiled and said, "I used to be a member of the Court of Owls, but that was a long time ago."

Old Priest Daniel's voice carried a hint of nostalgia as he said, "I've said it before, when I came to this land, it was vibrant and full of life. I was kind to people, so I had some prestige in the underworld, and many were willing to give me face."

"At that moment, the flock of birds approached me. They were far less powerful than they are today. They told me that they were willing to share the secret of immortality with me. I showed great interest and then joined them."

The Old Priest leaned back in his chair, raised his head slightly, and looked up at the stage above, where the moonlight streaming through the windows was exceptionally bright. His voice traveled far and wide through the falling moonlight.

"Back then, they didn't have these Assassin; it was just a gathering of powerful people. But later, they discovered something very special in Gotham."

"It's 'Fine Wine,' isn't it?"

"That's right. They discovered that beneath Gotham, there is a mysterious water source that smells like Fine Wine, intoxicating people, and those who smell it have their wounds healed and even become younger."

"Immortality and immortality, what wonderful words! No one can resist such temptation. So, the Court of Owls launched a plan to uncover and crack the secrets of this water source, and then use it to obtain true immortality."

"It's called the Water Source Plan."

"But at that time, the plan did not go smoothly. People who risked drinking the liquid went crazy. In the end, they had no choice but to try to decipher it from a religious perspective, so they came to me."

"I knew from the beginning that they just wanted to use me, but that's okay, I wanted to use them too."

The Old Priest made the sign of the cross on his chest and said, "At that time, I felt that I was following the Lord's will to let His glory save this land. If I couldn't do it in the ordinary way, I could do it in another way. The Lord will forgive me."

"They used that group of Europe nobles to help me build a church on the land of the water source, and then the Court of Owls killed them."

"The manor you live in now is what they left behind."

"So they didn't move away, but were killed?"

"That's right. The Court of Owls lied and said they left, but in reality, no one who wasn't involved in the church's construction could leave here alive. The Court of Owls wouldn't allow the secret of immortality to be exposed in any way."

"So I settled down in the church, stayed there, and watched the people of Gotham come and go, generation after generation die."

"You never get to the point," Falcone said, flicking his cigar. "This isn't a church sermon."

"Don't say that, Father. It's Easter today, let's be patient." Schiller gestured for him to continue, and the Old Priest smiled and nodded at him.

"Later, I cracked part of the secrets of the Fine Wine and used it to gain special abilities."

"So, you noticed my difference when I first went to church?"

The Old Priest shook his head and said, "Actually, my abilities are not as great as you think. Perhaps they were in the past, but now I am old. If I am not in the church, not standing above the Fine Wine pool, I am just an old, ordinary person."

"But that was true back then. When you first came to the church, I was slightly tipsy and saw something unusual, which is why I suggested to Falcone that he ask you to help with his son's problem."

Schiller squinted as he looked toward the stage. In his line of sight, the old curtain slowly opened, and the Old Priest stood in the center of the stage, with the crucifix of Jesus in the cathedral behind him and the pool of Fine Wine rippling beneath his feet.

He stood in the center of the church, the aroma of Fine Wine in the air giving him a slight buzz. As Schiller walked in through the Old Godfather's hazy vision, he blended perfectly with the setting sun.

The golden rays of the sun burned the eyes, and after the light disappeared, a Shade of the sun remained behind Schiller, only the deepest black after sunset.

Schiller smiled, lowered his head and said, "Actually, I've always been a little curious as to why His Falcone would ask me, a dangerous individual, to be his son's tutor. After all, no one would want me to have contact with their offspring if they saw my resume."

"You mean your investigation into the serial killer? Even without Daniel's recommendation, I wouldn't care about that. It's commonplace in Gotham. There are all kinds of lunatics here. I'd rather have a lunatic than a fool."

"Let's talk about Evans. To be honest, I was a little worried about him when he came to see me because I could clearly sense that something was wrong with him."

Falcone sighed and said, "I think you should have realized that he has two personalities."

"To be honest," Schiller looked at Father Daniel and said, "Before this, before Evans came to me this time, I had absolutely no idea that he had a second personality. How did you manage to do that?"

"Because at that time, Alberto was indeed dead, and only Evans was left, so of course you wouldn't feel anything. The personality you felt later was Alberto after his resurrection."

"Do you think Alberto is the primary personality?" The Godfather had barely finished asking when he answered himself, "No, Evans is indeed the primary personality; he is my son."

The Godfather sighed again, feeling he had been sighing too often lately, but he still said, "When Evans was six years old, his mother died, and I was so immersed in the grief of losing my lover that I neglected to take care of him."

"One night, he secretly ran away to play, and when he came back, he was no longer himself."

"... Was this done by the Court of Owls?"

"How do you think the Court of Owls has become what it is today?" Falcone retorted. "Just because of their cult-like theories? Not everyone buys into that."

"That's how they lure the descendants of some upper-class people, wash away their personalities, erase their memories, and then build a more extreme personality that will eventually surrender to them."

"That's Alberto?"

"Yes, my child disappeared and became an owl's henchman, but unlike those ignorant fools, I won't mistake this change for my child's rebellious phase."

"This is a common tactic they use. No parent would suspect that their child has been replaced; they would only think that the child's change is due to getting older."

The Court of Owls has one major flaw, Falcone, taking another puff of his cigar. "They've crafted a perfect persona, a perfect candidate to be the Godfather," he continued.

"I can understand what they want to do. They have prepared a perfect successor for me. As long as he takes over the position of Godfather, Falcone and the Twelve Families will be theirs. They are very confident that Alberto will satisfy me."

"But that's exactly what made me very suspicious, because before this, Evans seemed more like his mother than me."

"It sounds a bit absurd, doesn't it?" The Godfather cracked his knuckles and said, "Back then, I thought I was crazy too, to suspect that my own son had been replaced..."

"I finally despaired when he raised his knife to stab me."

"I was in immense pain, but I couldn't find any evidence. From a scientific point of view, I couldn't explain this, so I could only turn to faith."

Then, Father Daniel's voice rang out. "When Carmine came to the church, I saw a distraught father telling me about his pain, and I didn't think it was a joke."

Daniel sighed, his tone tinged with guilt. He said, "The method for erasing memories and replacing personalities comes from the water source beneath the church. That's the method I found, and to achieve my goals, I handed it over to the court."

"But after seeing Carmine, I knew I had made a huge mistake."

"Those claims that I joined the court to spread the glory of the Lord are nothing but excuses for my being tempted by eternal life."

"When a desperate father stood before me..." Daniel's voice began to tremble. He said, "The father saw his son nailed to the cross, blood flowing everywhere, and I became an accomplice, Judas with a money bag in hand..."

"I know this can't go on any longer; I have to stop it all."

"So you used the same method to erase Alberto's personality and regain Evans' personality?"

"Fine Wine has another use, which is resurrection. I didn't just restore Evans' personality, I resurrected him."

"So..."

"Alberto was also resurrected."

"Remember the Water Source Plan I mentioned earlier?" Father Daniel turned to Schiller and said, "This project is more than just that."

"Over the years, the Court of Owls has been polluting drinking water or rainwater, leaving many people with very diluted Fine Wine in their blood."

"The heavy rains a few days ago awakened them."

"Why did they choose this time to launch the Water Source Plan? Although some people did go mad during that heavy rain, their numbers were far from enough to shake the city."

"They must have other plans."

"There's another question: what was the funeral all about? If it was just a personality swap, there was no need to make such a big fuss, was there?"

"That was my idea for him. I know the Court of Owls very well, and I know how they control the city. They have a special metal that can resist the effects of Fine Wine," Father Daniel said.

"I suggested that Carmine sabotage the transportation of their raw materials to prevent the Batch of Goods from arriving on time, thus depriving many people of the effective umbrella."

Are you trying to fool the court?

"No, we know that forging a brother's identity can only fool ordinary people, not the Court of Owls."

"I'm just warning them," Carmine said, puffing on his cigar. "I know their tricks and I'm not afraid to kill. What If...? they keep pushing, then we'll fight to the death."

"If they dare to touch my son again, I will turn Gotham into a ghost town."

In the Godfather's tone, Schiller heard the ruthlessness of the Gotham King of Gotham's Underworld during that glorious era, and the resolute determination of a father.