Two people took the lead, while the three unarmed ones followed behind. Barbara clutched her laptop, Vico held the microphone, and Pete, with a pale face, carried the camera at the back.
His steps were unsteady, his expression dazed, like a zombie in the rainy night.
Su Ming thought this was a bad omen, as if it foretold that opening the underground facility would unleash a horde of flesh-eating monsters.
He drew his dual blades and slashed twice on the barbed wire, sparks flashing briefly in the rain, drawing an X shape. Then he bent the wire, forming a hole large enough for a wheelchair to pass through, and moved Barbara through first.
Barbara nervously gave him a smile, then focused her attention on the pitch-black surroundings.
The abandoned cars were mere shells, stripped of engines, spark plugs, batteries, or anything valuable, piled here like discarded corpses, forming small hills.
In the night, the shadows of these black mounds occupied every direction around the group, no matter the angle, they all looked the same from afar.
Neither Barbara, Vico, nor Pete had ever come to such a remote place at midnight.
Every Gothamite knew what lurked in the darkness; some pursued it, while others avoided it like the plague.
Su Ming keenly sensed someone watching him. He looked up and saw a wanderer in the distance among the abandoned cars, observing them through the non-existent car window of an empty driver's seat.
He wasn't initially concerned until the woman started making strange noises.
"Coo... coo..."
"Bang!"
Su Ming immediately raised his hand and fired a shot, stunning Barbara and the others. This unexpected killing, was this the true nature of a mercenary on a mission?
However, what they thought was a sure shot was dodged by the strange woman in an unbelievable way. She suddenly shrank her neck like a boneless creature, her head retreating into her body, and the bullet grazed over her head.
When she emerged again from the abandoned cars, the wanderer's guise had turned into a masked figure with round glasses.
She suddenly stood on top of the car, dressed in a black leather uniform with gold decorative patterns and incongruous lace trims, resembling the formal hunting attire of a Middle Ages aristocrat.
The round glasses on her head, resembling the eyes of an owl, overlooked Su Ming's group from above.
"Protect them."
He left behind this sentence, drew his dual blades, and leapt onto the nearby abandoned car, quietly confronting the strange figure.
"I always thought their existence was just a legend..." Cindy also drew her weapon, standing in front of the group: "It seems just as Su said, Gotham hides too many secrets."
Vico, of course, wouldn't miss such an opportunity. She quickly directed Pete to use the raincoat to shield her, took out her notebook, and used the camera's light to start recording.
"So, Miss Cindy, it looks like you know the masked figure across. Could you explain her identity to us?"
Cindy glanced at her, knowing that the people Su Ming brought were likely not ordinary figures even in a Parallel Universe, but here, Vico was just an ordinary person, and excessive curiosity would surely be her downfall.
"You just need to know that they are assassins from a very ancient force in Gotham, and if you know too much, it could cost your life."
"That's okay, being a reporter, I've always been mentally prepared for that. Please tell me, tell the citizens the truth!"
Unexpectedly, the threat of death seemed to trigger a switch in Vico, her face flushed with excitement as she pressed for more, biting her lips, her eyes wide with excitement.
Cindy shook her head, unsure if it was in agreement or not, and she recited a nursery rhyme widely spread in Gotham, rumored to have been recited by playing children decades ago on any street.
"Beware the Court of Owls, lurking beneath your feet. Watching Gotham from the shadows, hidden on attic peaks. In your house with you they stay, under your bed they creep. Never speak their name aloud, or talons will pierce your neck."
Vico paused for a moment, but her keen journalistic instincts recorded the words to investigate Gotham's history if given the chance, hoping to uncover something.
Su Ming was the first to react. Being a Transmigrator in Gotham, this city of the Bat, during such a stormy night, hearing the hoots of an owl, he immediately sensed something was wrong.
The woman disguised as a wanderer was an Assassin from the Court of Owls, a Sharp Claw.
Until Su Ming transmigrated, DC Comics still hadn't fully explained the details of this mysterious Court of Owls. He only knew it was an alliance of Gotham's oldest families, influencing Gotham through various means.
No one knew their identities; all members wore white night owl masks and had a unique ring as a token.
Sharp Claws were assassins trained by them to eliminate dissenters in the city.
Before the gangs took power, after the Four Great Families, Gotham did experience a brief period of governance by the Court of Owls, but internal strife from power struggles severely weakened them.
Falcone and other gang bosses seized the opportunity to drive the owls back into hiding in the darkness.
Perhaps Batman or Falcone might know intelligence of this level, but Su Ming, coming from another world, knew even more.
The Court's origin dates back further, to humanity's Stone Age, with the Bird Tribe, Wolf Tribe, Bear Tribe, and Bat Tribe, considered the origin of DC Universe's European civilization.
Batman is a descendant of the Bat Tribe, while the Court of Owls originates from the Bird Tribe.
Most critically, all members of the Court of Owls have been brainwashed and controlled by their Owl Priest (chi hu), swearing unconditional allegiance in the Dream Realm to the Dark God Barbatos as the Dark Multiverse's minions.
In some respects, Barbatos is the Bat God and Dark Dragon of the Dark Multiverse, the one True God, making them devoted followers, albeit to a deity who only sought light Cosmos for entertainment and disregarded his followers as disposable tools.
But this was no excuse for Su Ming to relax; the Sharp Claw appearing here meant the Court would soon be informed, and then Barbatos would soon be aware too!
The danger level would rise at a mad pace then.
He must keep this Sharp Claw here as long as possible to delay the Court of Owls' knowledge.