Chapter 613 Public Display
Wayne followed the guide and the ruffian, spending almost a whole day touring several communities where the Ireland people resided.
They didn't have time for detailed house-to-house investigations, only prioritizing visits to families involved in accidental deaths.
As the sun was about to set, and the laborers' normal "day shift" was nearing its end, they headed towards the pre-arranged meeting spot with Father Merlin and the Detective Agency.
The Ireland Violent Group's reaction was more restrained than Wayne had imagined; apart from encountering another group of hooligans in a different district that morning, they didn't encounter any further reinforcements for the rest of the day.
The number of captives paraded by Sanders specifically for public display changed from "one" to "three"; the rest were sent back, leaving only genuine gang members.
The meeting point was chosen next to a scattered market in the Dock Area, where there was a small square. This was a place where the City Hall, the church, or politicians would give speeches, post announcements, and organize temporary gatherings.
Many laborers, on their way home, would bring their daily wages here to buy food and daily necessities, making it somewhat like one of the "commercial areas" in the Dock Area.
When Wayne arrived, Inessa and her people were already there. Father Merlin and several monks had already begun preaching to passersby.
Connal and the Agents from the sales team were still busy, tying their captured prisoners one by one to a row of broken streetlights.
Sanders' eyes widened slightly. He led his captives over and immediately asked Connal, "How did you catch so many people? There must be almost twenty of them, right?"
Connal, however, showed no sign of guilt. He raised a hand, pointing at the captives, and explained to Sanders:
"According to the agreed plan, we will publicly punish gang members who obstruct the investigation. That row over there consists of Sailor Gang members we specifically captured. As for this pile here, we're not quite sure yet; they were all secretly put to 'sleep' by Ms. Lina and the intelligence team. They weren't showing themselves publicly, we just brought them all back."
Wayne listened beside him with a dark expression. What the hell was "sleep spell"? Several of those captives had bumps on the back of their heads, clearly having been ambushed or something.
This method was intentionally too crude; even the big spiders probably didn't bite people…
Compared to Lina's less-than-chivalrous approach, Father Merlin's preaching seemed more formal.
They were all dressed as monks, and although not all residents of the Dock Area necessarily believed in the Holy Spirit, their attitude towards the clergy seemed more respectful than towards City Hall staff.
One group was located not far behind Wayne, where a monk was explaining to a circle of laborers and residents gathered around him:
"Investigating the plague is beneficial to everyone. We will only lightly punish these individuals; we will not take them away or hand them over to the police, nor will we fine them. We will simply restrain them here for 24 hours, during which they are allowed to drink water and relieve themselves."
"However, this also represents the attitude of the church and the City Hall: no matter who it is, no matter who stands behind them, we will not allow anyone to obstruct the plague investigation work. This is both a punishment for these individuals and a warning to everyone in the Dock Area—the church does not advocate using violence to solve public problems, but it also does not fear violent confrontation."
This was the solution Wayne came up with after "tricking" Father Merlin into agreement.
Not taking people away or handing them over meant the matter could be contained within the Dock Area, reducing potential variables.
And the punishment of public display for 24 hours, while sounding humiliating, was not actually debilitating; it could achieve the publicity effect Wayne wanted, making things clearer to ordinary citizens, without giving gang members criminal records or causing the gangs personnel and financial losses. This should prevent an overreaction from the gangs and the big figures in Richmond.
On this basis, as long as the Detective Agency maintained proper discretion, the gangs would probably not openly fight the "Red Armbands" to the death, at most attempting some limited resistance in private.
And such unlimited combat "Arenas" were precisely the Agents' comfort zone.
—At least, that was Wayne's plan.
He moved closer to Inessa, and the two began to discuss the day's investigation results.
Wayne hadn't done much serious work today, but he wasn't entirely without Gains: "That dock accident seems to have deeper issues. The actual number of deceased is higher than what the police reported, and some bodies were not transferred. Even if we speculate in the most harmless direction, their bodies likely bear obvious signs of homicide, otherwise there would be no need to dispose of them secretly."
Inessa nodded, "I will follow up on this lead and inform Father Merlin later. We haven't made much progress today in investigating the plague. Although we've placed rat traps in some districts, we haven't found more problematic rats yet. They probably won't become active until after dark, and their numbers might not be as high as we imagined."
"Have you encountered similar situations during your time at the Hunter Association?" Wayne asked.
"Quite a few," Inessa recalled briefly. "Since the 'sheep eating people' enclosure movement began, there have been many cases of Windsor nobles collaborating with hidden organizations, artificially creating plagues or disasters to drive people into cities. The situation even spread to Ireland and the Old Continent at one point. Since the Windsor Royal Family and the State Church do not openly encourage such behavior, the methods of hidden organizations are very varied, and we are currently unable to pinpoint a target."
"However, conversely, precisely because their methods seem sufficiently covert, those problematic rats look more like the work of an experienced hidden organization. They might just be those 'Old Continent outsiders' that Bishop Tyrrell told you about on the spot."
This was not good news for Wayne; after all, when doing private work, the fewer variables the better.
He thought for a moment, then continued to ask, "According to your speculation, what kind of conspiracy might they be specifically planning now?"
Inessa pondered slightly: "I went to see those problematic rats caught by Father Merlin today. In the food they gnawed and the water they drank, there were only trace amounts of extraordinary power remaining, which dissipated quickly, but it didn't seem to cause the food to spoil or mutate, nor did it infect other rats. I suspect their role might be more direct, for example, they might directly bite living people—we've already experimented with healthy live rats today, but unfortunately, we haven't seen any abnormal reactions yet."
Wayne was more concerned about the Black Death. "Is there anything wrong with the blood of those problematic rats?"
"We also conducted experiments with injecting blood, and temporarily, no abnormalities have appeared either."
Hmm…
If it doesn't spread the plague through contaminated food and blood, then it doesn't quite resemble the Black Death.
If the mad rats bite people… *hiss*… It couldn't be rabies, could it?
Wayne's heart tightened slightly. "Last night, Doug brought the owl over to catch rats. It shouldn't have secretly eaten any, right?"
Inessa shook her head, "No, the owl was fed before it was brought over. And the birds Doug raised normally only eat food fed to them by hand."
That's good.
Otherwise, if the owl went mad too, it would be hard to catch.
No wonder Doug would occasionally remind him to feed the peregrine falcon; so that's what that was about.
