Catwoman braked sharply without warning, and Connors, who was sitting behind her, was thrown forward by inertia.
"Ugh—" Selina was bumped and felt a bit disoriented, but luckily she hadn't forgotten the reason for stopping.
"Can you ride a motorcycle? You go in front," she said to Connors, who still didn't know what had happened.
Connors didn't refuse, nodding in agreement: "No problem."
Sitting in front, Selina's soft body immediately pressed against his back. Fortunately, his physical fitness had greatly improved, and Connors also understood why "Catwoman" Selina Kyle wanted to switch places with him:
It was too cramped sitting in the front!
The seat space was too small, and two people were squeezed together. Coupled with the poor road conditions, Selina was extremely uncomfortable from the constant bumping. However, after switching places, it was Connors' turn to be uncomfortable.
Back then, Monkey King could carry two large mountains on his shoulders and travel without changing his expression. These are just two snow mountains, Connors thought, shifting his attention from Selina.
Although the Melon Eating task hadn't rewarded him with driving skills yet, due to his Human Limit reaction speed, even when Connors twisted the motorcycle's throttle all the way, he rode much more steadily than "Catwoman" Selina.
The speed was incomparable; the journey that was originally nearly an hour was shortened to forty minutes.
Wayne Manor looked majestic and mysterious in the night.
Not far from the manor, they hid the motorcycle, and the two quickly approached one after another until they reached the wall of the castle.
Selina pulled out a rolled-up map from the outside of her thigh, marked a room on it, and said to Connors:
"This is a map of the manor I got from a plumbing worker. The target this time is this room. It contains a painting that Bruce Wayne bought at auction last month."
"I've been here once before. The painting in that room is kept separately in a glass case. Once it's opened, it will trigger an alarm."
"I'll be responsible for the theft, and you'll be responsible for transferring the painting. When the glass case is opened, you'll meet me at the ventilation duct, and then you don't need to worry about me. Just wait for me on the roof of the Joseph Jewelry Store."
"I'm confident I can escape."
She's clearly well-prepared, Connors thought noncommittally.
"Catwoman" acted first, taking a grappling gun from her waist, aiming it upwards, and firing it silently. Then, her body agile like a wild cat, she leaped up.
When she stood on the castle wall, ready to throw down a rope to pull Connors up, she saw him easily open the castle's main door and walk in leisurely.
"..." Selina was momentarily confused. How did this person open the door so easily? It was as if he was returning to his own home?
Could the door be broken, and the alarm system disabled?
Thoughts raced through Selina's mind, but she still didn't follow Connors through the main door. Instead, she quickly moved across the rooftops, heading towards the room containing the painting.
"You saw me come in, huh? I thought I could hide it from you," Connors said with a smile, answering a phone on the wall after entering and listening to Bruce Wayne's voice.
"...If you wanted to, I think you could easily infiltrate this manor," Bruce Wayne said from the other end of the phone.
"I'm not that capable," Connors said modestly. He didn't have true invisibility, and his Little Trick had no room to play in front of the ubiquitous cameras inside the manor.
"I've already had Alfred go to meet you. Please come to the Batcave," Bruce Wayne said in a low, hoarse voice, as if speaking in his Batman persona.
Butler Alfred arrived even faster than Connors expected.
Just a few minutes after the call ended, the white-haired but sprightly butler opened a door leading to a part of the manor:
"Young Master Patterson, please. Young Master Wayne originally intended to invite you yesterday, but the people at Arkham said you went there and slept."
The old butler's first words upon seeing Connors were still teasing. Connors didn't mind and followed him to a study, then took a hidden elevator down to the Batcave.
Bruce Wayne was still wearing his exoskeleton brace, facing several large screens.
The screens displayed surveillance footage. In one frame, "Catwoman" Selina was clearly shown attempting to open the ventilation duct of the room containing the painting.
"Did you come with her? Is the target just this one painting?" Bruce Wayne asked, pointing at the surveillance footage.
"Yeah," Connors admitted frankly. "Strictly speaking, I came with her to watch the show."
"What's there to see? If you want it, I'll give you that painting," Bruce Wayne said, as expected of a tycoon. He was ready to give away a painting he had bought for over three million US dollars last month.
.....
Connors, who had never seen three million US dollars combined in two lifetimes, paused for a moment. "Can I cash it in?"
"?" Bruce Wayne was a bit slow to follow Connors' train of thought for a moment.
Connors had just said it casually. He walked over to the Master's side and looked at the monitor:
"If you keep chatting with me here, she's going to steal your painting soon."
Bruce Wayne said indifferently:
"It's fine. The moment she entered Wayne Manor, based on her route, I knew the map was obtained from a plumbing worker who had worked here."
"That was deliberately leaked, and everything in this room was placed there specifically to deter thieves."
This is the Master, the Justice League's eternal brain, Connors admired in his heart, but said aloud:
"What if the thief gets a taste of success and comes back next time?"
Before he finished speaking, he saw "Catwoman" Selina in the surveillance footage successfully enter the room.
Alarms immediately blared, especially after "Catwoman" smashed the glass case and took out the painting inside. Countless black muzzles instantly extended from the walls in all directions.
"This will teach them a profound lesson," Bruce Wayne said in a low voice.
"It's certainly profound, but according to the plan, I have to go and meet her. What do you say?" Connors asked the owner of Wayne Manor how to proceed with the plan to steal his treasure.
This scene was a bit surreal. Even Batman almost couldn't maintain his deliberately lowered voice, coughing twice as he reverted to his magnetic voice before turning away.
So he's pretending not to see, Connors understood. He took the elevator out of the Batcave and quickly approached the room where "Catwoman" Selina was.
Pointed at by countless muzzles, Selina stood still, clutching the picture frame, terrified that the guns would fire immediately.
But being in such an environment, it was impossible not to be nervous. At this moment, Catwoman's soft hair at her temples was soaked with sweat, and she couldn't help but feel parched.
Feeling parched means needing a drink. Connors walked into the room carrying a cup of hand-ground coffee from Alfred.
He placed it in Catwoman's hand.
"Catwoman" Selina stiffly accepted the coffee, still not daring to move. Then, she watched Connors do something she couldn't understand.
He pressed each of the extended muzzles back into the wall one by one.
"Let's go quickly. Bruce Wayne said he's not treating us to dinner today," Connors said to the bewildered Selina as he pushed the guns back into the wall.
Seeing that "Catwoman's" brain seemed to have frozen, he simply stepped forward, bent down, and reached out.
Holding her feet with one hand and her butt with the other, he forcefully threw Selina into the ventilation duct.
Her two little feet combined were about the size of one of Connors' hands, incredibly tender, but the other hand holding "Catwoman's" butt sank right in, as if it had no bones, extraordinarily soft.
[Today's Melon: A Novel Way of Stealing]
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