New Gods of North America.

Chapter 340 "Rogue"

Doug's owl came around 2 a.m., and Wayne took the note Doug had written out of the small tube tied to the owl's leg, and put his own note back in.

Then after the owl flew out, I found that Doug was actually waiting on the roadside not far from the dormitory.

It was estimated that at this time, the investigation team had just completed a preliminary investigation of all the people in the college. Doug finished his work and happened to pass on the message while passing by. He also happened to see the small flower pot placed on the windowsill.

After a night of investigation, we found quite a few people with problems in the college.

Apart from the "fallen" who had been registered in the college church, there were nearly twenty people who were initially suspected of being related to the "lucky coin".

Students are considered a "minority" inside, and there are more "staff members" of various types.

There were six people who directly possessed the contaminants, that is, the problematic 5-cent coins, and the rest, according to the church's definition, were victims who were "contaminated" again by them.

The separate treatment and questioning of these people are still ongoing. The college has also helped to find excuses to minimize the impact of the incident. It is said that some students were secretly called out of their dormitories after the crowd in the dormitory dispersed.

Wayne asked Doug to find an opportunity to dig up the small backpack as soon as possible, take it back to the detective agency and hide it, then divide half of each potion and send it to the cathedral overnight, asking Tom Hagen to arrange for someone to identify it.
David Mills is already busy enough now, and last time I gave him the potion that needed to be identified, I heard that he actually sent it to the cathedral for identification. It would be better to skip the middle link directly.

The next afternoon, Wayne left early and went to the college church to attend a meeting of the local exorcism department.
The class he skipped was a theology and philosophy class. The professor seemed to be familiar with David Mills, who popped his head out of the back door of the classroom, pointed at Wayne and quietly signaled,
After seeing this, the professor did not even interrupt his lecture. He just nodded slightly while continuing to speak, and then ignored Wayne who was quietly packing up and slipping away.

The person in charge of reporting the situation at the meeting was an exorcist priest.
Wayne knew this guy. When the exorcism department came to the detective agency for exchanges, he was not even a "low-class horse" to balance the average combat power of each group, and was classified as a "cheerleader".
However, everyone has their own specialties. This person's extraordinary ability is more inclined to target evil spirits. He can enhance the effects of various so-called sacred items through the "resonance" of sound.

It's probably the classic exorcist image from horror movies, holding a holy emblem or something like that, reading the Holy Scriptures loudly to the victims who are possessed by evil spirits.

The basic conclusion at present is that the source of contamination called "Lucky Coin" can be preliminarily determined to be deliberately spread by "people".

After collecting more samples, we basically ruled out the possibility of special evil spirits or extraordinary items by statistically analyzing the patterns of their appearance.
Coin owners may respond to questions about the origin of the coins by saying "I don't want to talk about it" or "I don't remember". However, as long as the questions are asked enough and clever enough, some small details can be slowly dug out.

For example, special evil spirits or extraordinary items are unlikely to run around in the academy. Not only do you have to get the same coins specifically, but you also have to complete the "communication" with so many people in a short period of time - evil spirits and the like are usually not too picky, and they will "contaminate" anything they can.
Even if such a thing really exists, judging from its activity patterns alone, it would be a very dangerous and active high-level evil spirit or sealed object. It is impossible that it has always existed within the academy. It is also more likely that it was suddenly "released" here by someone.

So no matter how we speculate, there must be "people" involved behind this incident.

And it is basically certain that he is not a good person.

"The motive of the criminals' crime this time is still unclear. Judging from the characteristics of extraordinary abilities, these 'pollutions' have obvious 'parasitic' characteristics. The holders of the pollution can initially use the characteristics of the pollution by continuing to spread the pollution, but they themselves will also be polluted more seriously.

"We can now conclude that the extraordinary power comes from the field of 'knowledge' or 'wisdom', and the ability tends to be of the mind control type and is contagious. "From the characteristics of the ability and the inferred strength, if such a degenerate has a criminal record, it is unlikely that he will remain unknown. We are investigating the criminals who have been reported by the church to see if we can find more clues, or try to find a way to arrest the criminals through existing similar successful cases."

After listening to the meeting,
Reverend Pycelle seemed quite relaxed at the moment, and even seemed to be in the mood to take everyone on a tour of the interior of the academy church.
Wayne could understand him. Regardless of whether the criminal could be caught or not, at least the possibility that the criminal "had been in the college before" had been ruled out, so it could not be considered as the college church's dereliction of duty or oversight.
It is a situation where if it plays a role, it is "merited" and if there are no major problems, it is "not faulted".

Wayne followed the group and toured the church like a person entering the church for the first time. Everything he saw seemed new to him.
In fact, it was the first time that Wayne "saw" the interior of the college church with his own eyes, rather than the simple lines.

Compared to last night, the atmosphere inside the college church seemed a little different.
The "burning" feeling was slightly more present, but the "suffocating" feeling from lack of oxygen seemed to have disappeared.

Huh?
Is it because you knew a lot of people would come for the meeting today, so you ventilated the room in advance?
Reverend Pycelle seemed to look at Wayne occasionally, intentionally or unintentionally. Wayne was relatively open-minded and tried his best to act normal, trying not to let him pay attention to him all the time.

Then Reverend Pycelle took everyone to pass by the door of his office.

Good guy,
At this time, his office had been turned upside down, and the secret door had been completely destroyed, so it was wide open.

The safe inside had been opened and was now completely empty, with only some messy documents and papers left inside.

The medicine cabinet next to it was even more interesting. The glass or crystal on the surface of the cabinet had been smashed, and inside were glass shards left after various medicine bottles were broken, as well as a hodgepodge of medicines flowing and mixing together on the various layers and bottom of the cabinet.

There were two clergymen from the college church nearby, tidying up and cleaning the office.

hiss……

This wasn't the way it was when I left last night.

At that time, I even helped you move the chair that was used to hold up the door back to its original place.

David Mills was also a little surprised when he saw this scene. "Reverend Pycelle, what happened here?"

Reverend Pycelle turned his head away, looking old and frail, as if he had not intended for everyone to see this scene:
"I suspect the criminals' target was actually the college's church. When we were investigating last night, someone took the opportunity to sneak into my office, opened the secret door, and vandalized it.

"We are sorting it out to see if the other party has stolen anything from me or secretly put anything in."

Wayne was also in the crowd watching the scene and commented, "That's really abominable."

(End of this chapter)