"Shermane?"
Leonard asked with confirmation.
The freckled girl with brown curly hair raised her eyebrows in surprise, feeling a little surprised to be recognized so quickly.
"Can't I just be some bold girl trying to strike up a conversation with you?"
She asked while suppressing a smile, her expression lively and lively, making this face, although not beautiful, or likely to be forgotten after turning around, very attractive.
"Intuition."
Leonard smiled mysteriously without explaining too much.
There are many abilities that can change the appearance. As the captain of "Red Gloves", he knows that a certain Sequence of "Seer" Pathway can change his face, height, body and other external characteristics at will, and some Hypnosis and implied abilities can also do this.
However, judging from Pallez's previous reminder, Shermane probably did not change her appearance to Sealed Artifact as "Faceless", but used some kind of ability that made her become "strange" in the eyes of others, and this power was ineffective against Pallez, who had returned to the strength of Angel.
Seeing that he could not deceive Leonard, Shermane stretched out his right hand from under the cloak, with the back of his hand facing him, showing off a silver-white ring on his finger with many complicated patterns engraved on it.
"It's called 'Madness Ring'. Not only can it detonate other people's negative emotions in battle and make them fall into 'Madness', it can also make the wearer present an extremely ordinary face that is easily ignored and forgotten. Otherwise, whether I want it or not, it will be too easy to attract other people's attention when I don't cover my appearance."
At this point, she frowned, as if she was troubled by this matter.
I don't know how many nobles Miss are willing to give everything to look like her, and even if she wears this ring, she still has a different kind of charm, like a girl next door, or a childhood sweetheart, or... Leonard A bunch of things suddenly popped up in her head. The poems she had memorized forcibly when playing "Midnight Poet" were mostly sentences that might cause misunderstanding when read out. She pursed her lips and suppressed her desire to sing. Instead, she called the waiter and ordered Shermane a cup of her favorite milk coffee, double sugar.
"As the war continues, Backlund's coffee shop business is getting worse and worse, their coffee types have also become smaller, and the taste is not so fresh..."
During the interval when the waiter left, Leonard took another look at the copy of "Backlund Daily" on the table and felt inspired.
"East Borough Prices have also risen sharply. Bread has increased by half a penny per pound. It is already twice what it was before the war. Even if I use overtime as an excuse to pay more wages to the cannery workers and distribute the scraps from canned luncheon meat to families with children, they will have to live hard to support a whole family..."
Shermane also glanced at the newspaper and whispered.
"Not only East Borough, but the entire Backlund, or all cities in Loen are the same. When Intis hits the hinterland of Loen, this situation will become more serious... Even if you sell your cannery and replace it with food, you won't be able to feed many people."
Leonard sighed, not very optimistic about future development.
As a Beyonder member of the church, his income is not so sensitive to material shortages and soaring prices for the time being, but he can still feel an increasingly tense atmosphere. Even if a curfew is implemented and all police forces are dispatched to patrol, the viciousness in various urban areas The number of cases has also reached five times that of previous years, and most of them are vicious cases such as home invasions, robbery and murder. The number of cases involving the power of occultism is increasing day by day, giving all Nighthawks and Mandated Punishers a headache.
Especially now that Intis is participating in the war, Church of Steam's "Machinery Hivemind" is restricted from movement, and the number of official Beyonder has been reduced by one-third, it is very difficult to maintain the stability of the entire Backlund's more than four million people relying solely on the power of Evernight and Storm.
Thinking of this, Leonard asked:
"Is your cannery operating well? I saw in the newspaper that many East Borough factories have been unable to operate due to lack of raw materials, which in turn has caused greater material shortages."
"There is no problem for the time being. Our raw materials come from the Rhoside Islands and are sent to Backlund by the fleet of Helene on a regular basis along Tussock River. But we don't know how long it can last. Feysac's maritime offensive is becoming more and more fierce, and now we have to add Intis's The fleet... and every time the supplies arrive at the port, they will encounter difficulties from the staff. If my cannery is not supplying the military, these raw materials may not be delivered to the factory... In addition, Miss Angelica recently spent a large amount of money, asking me to find a way to buy some when those factories are under operation, try to maintain production, and prevent those workers from losing their jobs..."
Suddenly took out a large sum of money... No, the one who went to the sea to catch "King of Immortality" Agalito and his whole family to take the reward could not be Angel... Leonard's expression changed slightly, and he asked curiously:
"Helene? Red-haired Helene?"
He had seen the information about this female Beyonder with red hair in the internal information of "Red Gloves". The other person was "Hunter" Pathway Beyonder who had only been active in the Rhoside Islands in the past six months. Now he is probably Sequence 5, and he has multiple Mid Sequence Beyonder under his command, which is enough to enter the official Beyonder's sight.
"It's her. She, like me, belongs to Miss Angelica. This 'Madness Ring' was given to me by her. Of course, it belonged to Miss Angelica before... Speaking of which, maybe Helene thought the negative effects of this ring were difficult to deal with, so she gave it to me."
Then she might also be Angel's "Minor Arcana Brand"... Leonard thought about it and was attracted by another keyword:
"Negative effects?"
"Well... it will cause the wearer to accumulate physical and psychological desires until it becomes difficult to control and falls into Madness.
"Such as the desire to eat, drink, talk, and..."
Having said this, Shermane paused and did not continue. Instead, he picked up the coffee and took a sip, hiding his eyes that contained certain emotions behind the mist.
And what?
Leonard was startled, then reacted when he saw Shermane's reddish face, coughed slightly, and quickly changed the topic:
"I invited you here this time to learn about the movements of East Borough's 'Mr. K' of Aurora Order. The battle situation on the front line has been tense recently. Intis and Feysac's spies, Beyonder continues to penetrate into Backlund. Nighthawks and Mandated Punishers are preparing to join forces with the military's intelligence agencies to conduct a large-scale operation to eliminate those dangerous factors... To put it simply, Mr. K can close the network here."
Thanks to Shermane's information, Nighthawks had already mastered the Underground Gathering held regularly at East Borough, and by tracking the participants, he located the whereabouts of more wild Beyonder. Now as the number of vicious Beyonder cases in various districts continues to increase, the benefits of keeping the other party are no longer lower than the harm. Therefore, the "Red Gloves" people are ready to find an opportunity to put an end to these illegal gatherings, especially the large party held by Aurora Order's Oracle Mr. K is at the top of the list.
"That Mr. K hasn't done much out of the ordinary recently, and he has stopped even buying information on followers of 'Fool' at high prices. However, he has become keen on contacting those good-looking attendees, both men and women... Of course, he has also contacted me and asked me if I want to join a powerful and mysterious organization. Everything in it The people were very enthusiastic and kind, and it was obviously some kind of lame excuse... and there were many strangers at the conference who were throwing a lot of money at his place, buying all the Mystical Item and Extraordinary Bullet they could buy, and attacking Charm. I suspect they are the Beyonder spies you mentioned."
Shermane said with a frown.
No, that is not an excuse, it may be true, but the organization he is talking about is "Aurora Order"... Leonard recalled Red Gloves's internal files about Aurora Order, and thought thoughtfully about how they like to develop people with looks far above average into new "True Creator" believers.
After a moment, he nodded decisively:
"Close the net at the next gathering... I will lead a team of 'Red Gloves' and carry the appropriate Sealed Artifact to capture them in one fell swoop or kill them on the spot... You can attend the party as usual to avoid being locked as a leaker afterwards, but do not participate in the battle and just follow other wild Beyonders to escape from the party location."
Shermane solemnly agreed, and then said with some worry:
"He is very powerful, you should bring more people with you."
"Don't worry, a whole team of 'Red Gloves', plus Sealed Artifact, as long as the opponent is not Demigod, we can solve it."
Leonard smiled, puffed out his chest and answered.
East Borough at night looked extremely eerie under the mist, and pairs of armed patrol officers passed by on the streets from time to time, symbolically maintaining the seriousness of the curfew.
But in the alleys they couldn't see, countless homeless people were sitting casually in corners, lying next to garbage piles, wrapping themselves in dirty clothes and stuffing old newspapers into the gaps between their clothes to resist the chill of winter nights.
Deep in Broken Axe Lane, Shermane watched Leonard knock on the secret door of the gathering place. After standing for a few seconds under the scrutiny of the internal guards, the door was opened and a deep voice said:
"Come in."
Fortunately, for this day, I had asked a subordinate with a similar build to Mr. "Star" to join the party long in advance, leaving an impression on the guards... Shermane thought, and waited for two minutes before entering the party venue as usual. He took the cloak handed by the attendant and put it on his body to cover his appearance that was easily noticed, and came to Reception Room.
She noticed that "Star" was already sitting on the single sofa in the center. She quickly looked away pretending not to recognize him, found a corner and sat down, waiting for "Red Gloves" to attack.
And this will most likely start with Mr. "Star" dragging Mr. K into a nightmare... Shermane, who has had a similar experience, thought with great anticipation.
But until the blackboard on the side was filled with the contents of the transaction, each item was successfully traded, Mr. K announced that the party was over, and she was led away from another secret door by the waiter. None of the "Red Gloves" people showed up, and Mr. "Star" sat calmly, and even bought a box of pistol bullets with Exorcism Effect.
If he hadn't discussed how to carry out the arrest operation during the day, Shermane would have almost thought that he just brought the other party to this party.
After leaving Broken Axe Lane, he went to North Borough adjacent to East Borough. After meeting in the agreed alley, Shermane asked Leonard with a solemn look in confusion:
"What happened? Why didn't you start taking action?"
"I was originally going to pull Mr. K into Dream Invasion, but once I started taking action, the other 'Red Gloves' hidden outside the gathering place would also start taking action simultaneously." Leonard, wearing a windbreaker and black leather gloves, replied in a low voice, "But when I was about to do this, I discovered that... there was a Demigod in the party venue who was watching everyone!"