After receiving the consultation results from Greed, Bishop immediately contacted Peter and asked him to try to leave the hotel.
Peter had just woken up not long ago. He rubbed his somewhat swollen eyes, got out of bed, picked up his gear, and headed for the elevator.
With a ding, the elevator doors opened, and he saw a woman standing inside. However, he did not look closely, keeping his head down as he walked into the elevator. In the moment the elevator doors closed, he felt a cold sweat trickle down his back.
What was that???
Peter took a deep breath; what had he just seen?
He searched through his memory, then caught a glimpse of something in the corner of his eye—that thing on the woman's neck, what was it???
Peter swallowed hard and sent a message to Shiller.
"Doctor, I think I just saw a woman's neck not with a head on it, but with cluster after cluster of tentacles. However, when I took a closer look, it disappeared."
Peter couldn't help but look back at the woman, but she acted completely normal and even smiled at him as if everything Peter had just experienced was an illusion.
Shiller, having received the message, immediately realized that things might also be starting to deteriorate at Peter's end. If the hotel could indeed be left, now might be the last chance.
"Don't panic, Peter. Forget those anomalies ever happened, and don't mention them to anyone."
Shiller, now staying Inside Wayne Manor, could neither speak nor communicate with others, so texting Peter was the only thing he could do. He tried his best to calm Peter and told him not to be afraid.
Peter made an effort to calm himself, deleting those mentally contaminated images from his mind. The elevator came to a stop, but not on the first floor. When the door opened, a man carrying a toolbox walked in.
"Sorry, the elevator is broken. If you want to go to the lobby, you'll have to take the stairs," the repairman said while standing at the doorway, obviously expecting Peter and the others to leave.
Peter didn't really want to go, but a quick glance with the corner of his eye made him see that the repairman's toolbox wasn't a toolbox at all, but a rotting human head.
Peter stepped right out, no longer caring about the woman or the repairman, rushing out of the elevator towards the end of the hallway.
There were basically no guest rooms below the fifth floor, the third floor was a business area with reception rooms, conference rooms, and a souvenir shop.
Peter kept running, passing by two large conference rooms, and eventually stopped at the door of the pantry.
Hearing the door open, he turned back and saw a group of people in suits coming out of the conference room, one after another.
His vision blurred again, and he saw fins growing out from behind each of their ears, their eyeballs bulging out, and slime dripping from their mouths. But when he looked carefully, they were all gone again.
Peter felt somewhat panicked, but he could still move. He followed the signs to the emergency exit and ran toward the stairwell, only to encounter an unexpected person—Jerome stood at the corner of the stairwell, watching him.
"You've realized it, haven't you? The nightmare is about to end."
"Nightmare, are you saying this is all a nightmare?"
"Not entirely," Jerome said. "Where do you think we are right now?"
"Obviously in the hotel," Peter said with certainty, though he also felt a bit uneasy. He couldn't make heads or tails of these eerie things, but his instinct told him something was off.
Jerome shook his head, walking down the stairs with Peter and said, "Did you know? About 20 years ago, Wayne Hotel underwent a massive renovation. They claimed it was for hotel refurbishment, but it was actually to conceal something."
"What thing?"
"Truth be told, I don't know either, so I was hoping to invite you to take a look," Jerome said. "I think it will be astonishing."
"I want to leave the hotel," Peter replied bluntly without beating around the bush. "I need to go to Wayne Manor."
"You can't leave the hotel right now, or rather, there is only one way out of the hotel, and that is to go with me to check out the hotel's basement."
Peter stared at him for a long time, trying to find traces of lying on his face. He wasn't foolhardy; he knew this could be a trap set by monsters, and the Jerome in front of him might just be luring him to Hell.
When Jerome realized he couldn't persuade Peter, he changed the subject and said, "Did you go to the library?"
Peter sighed and nodded. In the library, he didn't find anything particularly important, but he did come across a book about the history of Gotham.
Peter didn't really like literature and history books, so the more he read, the sleepier he became. Overwhelmed by drowsiness, he had to return to his hotel room for a nap, during which he had many bizarre nightmares, awakening with a throbbing headache.
"Haven't you ever wondered why you suddenly can see 'them'?" Jerome asked, using his fingers to make quotation marks in the air as he mentioned 'them'.
Peter knew that Jerome was referring to the monsters that appeared in the corner of his eye, but he truly didn't understand why. Jerome looked at him and said, "Only on the brink of a mental breakdown can you see the true nature of this world. To maintain this state, I've had to exert quite a bit of effort. You really are quite lucky."
Peter didn't feel like he was on the verge of a mental breakdown; he thought he was still pretty rational, but he indeed couldn't explain why the world he saw had changed into something else.
Peter tried to catch a glimpse of Jerome using his peripheral vision, but he truly didn't see any monsters on him. Scratching his head, he said, "I also don't think that right now I could just walk to the first floor, push the revolving door, and leave, but you must tell me what's underneath the hotel, otherwise, I won't go with you."
Jerome seemed to be weighing his options. He sized up Peter again and then said, "I see a kind of exceptional talent in you, hard to describe, but I believe you and Bruce Wayne are cut from the same cloth. You are both naturally entangled with certain things."
"I don't think that's anything to be proud of." Peter thought of the black sun. He suddenly realized he could return to the dense fog at any time and place, and might even be able to take someone with him. In that case, there would be a way out in dangerous situations.
Feeling a bit more emboldened, Peter said, "Since you think I can be of help, then you can't withhold all the information from me; otherwise, I won't collaborate with you."
Jerome looked at Peter with a hint of surprise, thinking the guy was too naive. Looking him over, he could not discern anything special, yet his intuition told him that Peter was indeed extraordinary.
Out of curiosity, Jerome said, "Beneath the Wayne Hotel lies a passage that leads to Wayne Manor, which was part of the hotel's renovation back then. Nobody knows why it was made."
"You surely know." Peter's straightforwardness surprised Jerome. He said, "I think we can't afford to waste any more time. It's better to be open with each other."
"Alright, it seems I can't keep it from you, but we have to start from a job I had one day. A few years ago, I joined an insurance company and became an investigator."
"You can understand that I had to look into those insurance cases to rule out any fraud, fighting for my company's interests."
"It was not an easy job. At first, it was fine; I could easily detect those people's lies. Because I did well, the company would send me first to deal with tough cases."
"At first, the company thought it was just a series of murders, and so did the police. But after encountering certain things, I was on the verge of a breakdown, and that's when I saw the true nature of this world."
"As the investigation went on, I discovered a certain mysterious pollution spreading through the city. Tracing its origins, I found that this pollution was not a recent phenomenon; all clues led back to 20 years ago."
"What happened 20 years ago?" Peter asked.
"Someone who should have died was still alive," Jerome said with a reminiscent look. "Back then, Gotham City was not dominated solely by the Wayne family but comprised of the Four Families and some other tycoons. Their relationships were unstable."
"Each family wanted the top spot, and the Wayne family was no less ambitious. Back then, the family's helmsman, Thomas Wayne, was hailed as the most brilliant business mind of the century. Ever since he took over the family's business, Wayne Enterprises flourished."
"The details of what happened next are unclear to me, as it seems someone is intentionally hiding them. All I know is that Thomas Wayne had an accident, but he did not die; he survived."
Peter sensed what Jerome was implying. He asked, "Do you think Thomas was supposed to die in that accident?"
"That's what I do," Jerome said. "Assessing various accidents, determining if someone is trying to commit insurance fraud, I can say with responsibility that, based on the files I investigated, that accident should have taken Thomas Wayne's life, but he didn't die."
Peter, being very smart, immediately realized, "Is the man who survived still Thomas Wayne?"
"That's exactly the point," Jerome nodded. "Not only that, but within three months of the accident, Thomas Wayne reappeared in the public eye, announcing a series of reform measures which solidified the current status of Wayne Enterprises."
"Does that differ from his usual form and style?"
"Not entirely, it's just more aggressive than before," Jerome shook his head. "At the same time, his wife, Martha Wayne, also had an issue. Six months after the accident, Martha became pregnant. But since then, she rarely went out, and her previous friends hardly saw her anymore."
"It's understandable that a pregnant woman needs rest."
"No, it's not that simple. A few months into her pregnancy, Wayne Manor began renovations, which is very odd, right? Who would renovate their house when there's a pregnant woman at home?"
Peter nodded, but still hesitantly said, "Maybe the manor's environment wasn't suitable for a newborn. They're so wealthy; they must have many houses, so moving elsewhere would be normal."
"That's just it; they have so much property, yet they chose not to move. Martha Wayne, alone, stayed at the Wayne Hotel while Thomas was still making waves in the business world."
Peter visibly disagreed. He said, "It sounds like Thomas isn't a responsible father, but this is someone's private family business, after all."
"But what's stranger is that they chose to live apart during that period. Everyone was speculating whether they were headed for divorce, but as soon as the child was born, their relationship repaired itself. They became affectionate again and were seen together at dinner parties, turning into the model couple of their circles."
"Maybe it was postpartum depression?" Peter also felt he couldn't convince himself, "If it were really depression, shouldn't it have taken some time to heal after the child's birth?"
"The matter is incredibly suspicious, so I investigated further." The two had already reached the lower half of the stairway on the second floor, about to reach the first floor, and Jerome continued.
"I found out that though the Wayne Hotel and Wayne Manor are both Wayne family properties, back then Whole Gotham's largest construction company belonged to the Kane family, which is Martha Wayne's maiden family."
"If there were no surprises, the Kane family would have been involved in the renovations of both places. As for what they did, we must go underground to check."