Chapter 40 The Pigeon Deliveryman's Brilliant Plan

Nina went to school, just like many times in the past. Once again, she believed her uncle's promise to her, believing that her uncle would be waiting for her at the store when she came home from school.

Or maybe she didn't believe it long ago, but she still stubbornly pretended to believe it.

Duncan stood behind the window of the antique shop on the first floor, watching Nina's trotting figure quickly turn into the street at the end and disappear from his sight.

Uncle Duncan would be waiting for her at the store when she came home, he had promised.

"Ayi, come here."

A thought flashed in his mind, and a stream of green flames suddenly streaked across the air, and the figure of the pigeon appeared in front of Duncan.

The bird tilted its head, looking at its owner with its beady green eyes.

Through the connection established by the Spirit Flame, Duncan could clearly sense the position of the pigeon, and sense its condition—although he couldn't yet fully share all five senses, this level of perception was enough to do many things.

Duncan lowered his head, looking at Ayi's small eyes: "You're actually very smart, you can completely understand what I'm saying, and you can do many things, right?"

The pigeon immediately patted its wings proudly: "Loyal beyond words, loyal beyond words!"

"Then I have a bold idea now, and I want you to try it." Duncan smiled, then took out from his怀里the sun badge that had now become a "cultist approach alarm."

He carefully wrapped the badge in a cloth to prevent it from being exposed to ordinary people, and then carefully tied it to Ayi's back with strips of cloth.

The pigeon was exceptionally cooperative from beginning to end, even helping Duncan tie knots in the cloth strips with its beak. It seemed to completely understand what its owner wanted to do. Apart from not being able to express its thoughts accurately, it was as smart as a human.

"Just fly around the city. When the badge heats up, search for the location that resonates with it, preferably specific to a building," Duncan instructed the pigeon seriously. "I'll sense your position… By the way, operate near the Lower District and the Crossroads District first. Don't go to the Upper District. I'm not familiar with that area, and I can't pinpoint the address with just the location."

The pigeon flapped its wings and tilted its head: "Some fries?"

Duncan wore a stern expression: "If you can locate even one, I'll bury you in fries."

Without saying a word, the pigeon flapped its wings and rushed towards the door, as if afraid that its master would go back on his word.

Duncan watched with a smile as the pigeon flew farther and farther into the sky, while in his perception, he clearly tracked the pigeon's current position and the general environmental conditions around it. Then he returned to the room, took a map of the Pland City-State and placed it on the counter, looking at the map while recalling the plane details of the Lower District in his mind, and tracking Ayi in his perception, constantly confirming the bird's location.

This was even simpler than he had expected—the connection established by the Spirit Flame was even more stable than at first, and Ayi's flight path was almost a clear and bright guiding line in his mind. With the assistance of the map and his memory, it was not difficult at all to locate the bird.

This was a good method.

Duncan breathed a sigh of relief and leaned comfortably against the counter—he had promised Nina that he wouldn't go out "looking for danger," and he naturally had to do it.

But he could let the pigeon out to hunt, and he could write tip-off letters at home…

In all fairness, this was actually a better plan. A flying pigeon was much more efficient at searching than he was, driving around the city—of course, there were also disadvantages to doing so, namely that after finding a cultist hideout, he couldn't infiltrate it to gather intelligence anymore, leaving only the value of tip-offs.

But Duncan didn't care much about this regret. After all, based on his experience in attending the gathering last time, those cultists who could be easily found were essentially just a group of small minions who were gathering information at the grassroots level, and their intelligence value was limited. And if Ayi really sensed something "big fish"… he also had a follow-up method to "fish up" the big fish separately.

After all, Ayi's ability wasn't just carrying a sensor around—its main job was to deliver packages…

If he really discovered a big fish, he would let Ayi open a door on the spot and teleport the person to the *Ghost Ship*. His main body was on the ship, which would make it easier to question them in detail.

It just so happened that he hadn't tried letting the pigeon teleport humans yet. He couldn't use innocent citizens for this kind of experiment—but those cultist priests who killed and gouged out hearts for fun were different.

When necessary, they could be "expendable materials."

Duncan leaned back in his chair, sensing Ayi's position while planning his scheme in his mind, and he felt more and more that this was a perfect plan—his draft of the tip-off letter, the interrogation draft, and the search and teleportation process were all planned, and now all he needed was a two-legged money bag called "Sun Believer."

Currently, the only thing that needed to be considered in this entire plan was how to explain to Nina when the authorities issued a bonus if his tip-off letter really worked—he had promised the girl that he wouldn't go out "hunting."

Duncan thought for a long time, and suddenly remembered something—

In this world that had developed to the industrial age, there was such a thing as a "bank."

This was an inevitable result of economic and productivity development, and a necessary condition.

Although this world's banking system was far less convenient than on Earth, and not as widespread, it still had the most basic account functions.

The city-states on the Boundless Sea had even built an interconnected financial system based on this—although maintaining this system was far more difficult than on Earth, they still built it.

The original owner of this body didn't do very well, and didn't have an account with the city-state bank—this was very normal in the Lower District. Under normal circumstances, only the decent people in the Upper District could reach the "level" where they could deal with the bank, but the bank itself was open to all citizens.

There was a bank in the Crossroads District.

Duncan had a plan in mind. He decided to go to the Crossroads District in the next day or two to establish his first "bank account" in this world, so that if his activities in the human world expanded in the future, it would be more convenient in terms of capital flow—and even if he didn't consider the future, he could save the step of leaving an address when writing tip-off letters in the future, and just leave an account number.

Of course, whether this was feasible would have to be tested at that time, after all, the original owner of this body didn't have much experience dealing with the city-state security department (or strictly speaking, not much positive experience), but Duncan thought it was reasonable to do so.

In this not-so-safe world, anonymous reporting should be a normal choice for many enthusiastic citizens who are cautious.

As for today… he still decided to stay in the antique shop peacefully.

This wasn't entirely because he wanted to strictly abide by his "agreement" with Nina, but because this was the first time he had let the pigeon fly so far and then used the power of the Spirit Flame to locate it, and his lack of proficiency in the operation required him to concentrate his energy, so he needed a stable environment.

Another reason was that he really should do a day's "business" seriously—the store hadn't opened since it came into his hands.

Duncan stretched and stood up from behind the counter. He slowly came to the door and hung the "Open for Business" sign outside.

He now had some plans again, and new schemes, and the beginning of all this was just because he had made an agreement with a seventeen-year-old girl, which was really… an interesting experience.

…

Near the Crossroads District, inside a dilapidated abandoned factory, church guards wearing long black coats with silver trim had already set up a cordon around the area. In the company of two Deep Sea Priests, Inquisitor Vanna, wearing light armor and carrying a blessed greatsword, passed through the sloping staircase and came to the abandoned space on the underground floor of the factory.

Everything here was still in its original state—after the first group of guards received the tip-off and discovered this gathering place, they had sealed off the scene until now.

In the huge basement, the nauseating stench of blood was particularly strong, mixed with the pungent smell of chemical substances after being roasted by fire. The corpses of the cultists were scattered all over the place, but apart from these corpses of solar heretics, no traces of any "attackers" were found at the scene—no extra corpses, not even extra pieces of clothing.

Vanna frowned slightly.

This was a one-sided crushing battle. The attackers' strength far exceeded that of these cultists, who were basically ordinary people, and it looked like things happened extremely suddenly, so much so that a considerable number of these solar heretics were directly killed before they had time to resist.

Who did it?

Wild transcendents who had personal grudges with these cultists? Another powerful heretical cult? Or some kind of uncontrolled bloody sacrifice, the gang of heretics who sought their own death summoned a monster from the "depths" that they couldn't control at all?

The young Inquisitor fell into deep thought.