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"What a pity!" Makima said, her face full of disappointment.
Beep beep beep.
Akira's phone rang. He took it out and saw it was his home number. 'Has Matt woken up?'
He answered the call, and a series of meows came through.
"Meow, meow meow meow meow meow, meow meow meow!"
A black line appeared on Akira's forehead. He said irritably, "Hajime, speak human!"
"Meow, that was for the secret signal! Akira, that man is awake, come back quickly!"
"Don't do too many strange things. I'll be right back."
Hanging up the phone, Akira said to Makima:
"Matt is awake. We need to go back. Is there anything else you want to buy?"
Makima shook her head. "No, Denji, we're going home." She squatted down and ruffled the Golden Retriever's head.
---
"Why can you talk?" A weak voice came from Matt, who was lying on the sofa, with an astonishment that even his weakness couldn't conceal.
Hajime was very obedient and didn't move or speak idly. It thought with its small brain, then pretended to say casually:
"Everyone can talk except for mutes, right? You can talk too!"
Hajime now wanted to pretend to be an ordinary person. Anyway, the person in front of it was blind and couldn't see it at all.
"But you're a cat!"
Matt felt his worldview was once again impacted. Although he was indeed blind, it didn't mean he couldn't "see" the cat in front of him. His senses even allowed him to read physical books, so he could clearly perceive that what was swaying in front of him was a cat, and that cat had even made a phone call just now.
"Huh! How did you know I'm a cat? You're not faking being blind, are you?"
Seeing that it had been exposed, Hajime no longer hid it, directly admitting and starting to doubt whether Matt's eyes were truly blind.
Matt felt that strange things kept happening after he met Akira. First, there was the other party's peculiar origin and strange power, then he encountered ninjas who could resurrect, and now even cats could talk.
"Hey, why aren't you talking? Has this cat exposed you?"
Hajime jumped onto the sofa and scratched Matt's face with its tail.
"Stop messing around, I'm thinking."
"Tch, still thinking? Why don't you go sit on the toilet!" Hajime scoffed at Matt's excuse.
It jumped off the sofa, picked up the TV remote, returned to the sofa, found a comfortable position to curl up, pressed the power button, and started watching TV.
'It can even watch TV!' Hajime once again refreshed Matt's perception.
"With the help of an informant, the New York Police Department cracked a child trafficking case, recovering 63 missing children…"
Feeling bored, Hajime pressed the remote to change the channel.
"Tony Stark has been missing for three months. Hogan, what do you think of Stark Industries' stock?"
"I sold all my Stark Industries stock in the first month Tony Stark disappeared. We all know that without Tony Stark, Stark Industries is finished."
Hajime had heard Akira buy stock in this company, but it was just a cat and didn't understand, so it changed the channel again.
"Rand Corporation's heir, Danny Rand, announced his return. Fifteen years ago, Danny Rand and his parents were in a plane crash…"
Matt, who had been silent, suddenly spoke up, "Wait, that—kitty, can you switch the channel back to the previous one?"
"Meow, do you like watching talk shows? Right, you're blind, so you can only listen to talk shows!"
Hajime switched the program back to the talk show discussing Stark Industries.
"This cat!"
A black line appeared on Matt's forehead. "It's the news!"
"Oh." Hajime pressed the remote.
"Director George, there have been multiple missing person cases recently. Are they related to the child kidnapping case that was just cracked?"
The microphone was handed to a middle-aged police officer in uniform. "The New York Police Department is fully investigating the missing person cases and will soon provide an explanation to the citizens."
Another disappearance. Could it still be The Hand's doing?
Matt fell into thought again.
"Woof! Woof!"
Matt's ears twitched. He heard dog barks and conversations, one of which he was very familiar with was Akira's voice.
"Ah, Denji, don't bark loudly in the residential area, you'll disturb other people's rest!"
"Why is there a woman's voice?" Matt wondered.
The door opened, and Akira and Makima returned with two dogs.
"Yo, Matt, you're finally awake!"
"Pochita, Denji, go play with Hajime!"
Akira patted the two dogs' heads and handed them over to Hajime, who had activated its spine state.
"Meow, why did you bring dogs home?"
Matt tried to get up, but because his injuries hadn't healed, he struggled a few times and then gave up.
"You almost died, so you'd better lie down! I have to say, Matt, you're quite hard to kill!"
Matt finally knew who this cat had learned its way of speaking from.
"This is…?"
Matt directed his empty gaze towards Makima, asking Akira about her identity. The content he wanted to discuss with Akira was not suitable for ordinary people to know.
"This is Makima. She's my family and comes from the same place as me. You can trust her." Akira briefly introduced Makima.
"Hello, I'm Makima!"
"I'm Matt Murdoch."
When Akira first sought out Daredevil Matt Murdoch, he had presented himself as a superhuman from a parallel World who had come to this World by accident. In his original World, he had heard of Matt, who was also Daredevil, and thus sought his help.
If Matt continued to ask, he would say that Makima had crossed over to this World with him, just at a different location, and they had only recently reconnected.
Matt didn't speak, seemingly deep in thought.
After a long while, he finally said:
"I don't know how long I was unconscious, but it shouldn't have been more than a day. Yesterday, I returned to my apartment but encountered a strange old woman inside. She felt like one of The Hand's ninjas, but even stronger. After only three moves with her, I was knocked down, then crashed through the apartment window and fell into a dumpster. She was either very confident in her strength or just wanted to teach me a lesson, as she left without checking if I was dead."
Akira made a checkmark on his chin and said to Matt:
"She probably thought you were dead, so she left. An ordinary person with injuries like that would have died in the dumpster long ago."
Seeing Matt didn't speak, Akira continued:
"I think I know who that old woman is. In The Hand, the only one capable of beating you like that is Madame Gao, one of the Five Fingers."
"Madame Gao?" Matt seemed to have heard that name before.
"Madame Gao is one of The Hand's Five Fingers. Like the other Fingers, she has lived for hundreds of years. They are actually the true leaders of The Hand."
"Hundreds of years?" Matt's attention was successfully drawn by the age Akira mentioned. This was even older than the age of the U.S.
Makima also became interested. In her World, ordinary people could not live for hundreds of years unless they made a contract with a special devil. Although it couldn't compare to the age of devils, it was still a very long life. Devils like her wouldn't die unless killed, and she was curious how those people lived so long.