The letter had been written with great seriousness.
Its contents were polite and gentlemanly too.
Only the signature at the end was a little more stimulating than expected.
Of course, to Ian, receiving approval from the original inspiration for the character was unquestionably a form of recognition for his astonishing talent.
Other people had yandere girlfriends.
He had a yandere fan.
That was still a beautiful little tragedy worth celebrating.
If Ian could really cash the ten-million-dollar check in his hand tomorrow, then he would force himself to believe that he had merely run into a fan with the same exact name.
Everything was fine.
Batman did not need to get involved.
"I told you, I'm not the kind of person who likes tattling."
Since it was so rare for someone to finally appreciate his writing, Ian decided he would carefully treasure the letter in his schoolbag.
Someday, when he had time to visit Gotham, this would be the best passport he could possibly have there.
Seeing Ian so happy, Jordan could not help getting curious and leaning in a little.
Ian blocked the letter in his hands.
He knew very well who the true king of tattling in this house was. Guarding himself against his second brother, Ian opened his bag and tucked both the check and the fan letter safely inside.
"I bet it's a letter from some girl you like!"
Jordan craned his neck, trying to catch some detail, but his gaze was immediately drawn to the bloody bull head inside Ian's bag.
"Whoa. This figure looks insanely realistic. It moves too? Battery-powered?"
Jordan first voiced his praise and naturally assumed the demon head in Ian's bag was just some kind of toy figure.
Then,
when Ian did not answer, he suddenly asked another question, his expression thoughtful and impressed.
"Ian, where did you buy this thing?"
The only answer Jordan got was the sound of Ian zipping his bag shut.
"Don't call me Ian. Call me your rich bastard little brother. That's the true traditional American virtue."
Ian looked at his worthless poor brother.
He always had excellent control over immersion.
"What the hell?"
Jordan looked totally confused, having no idea that a rich man had already quietly infiltrated the family.
Meanwhile, Ian had already started calculating how much tax he would need to pay this time.
"I know you've always had more money than me and Jonathan, but... wait, no, when did you get so much taller?"
Because Jordan had been slumped on the couch this whole time, the realization only hit him now.
He stood up in complete shock and discovered that Ian was almost as tall as he was.
That was not because of Ian's boosted physical stats.
"I knew it. I kept feeling like I was forgetting something. Damn that custom drink!"
Ian froze for a second too. Then he hurriedly pulled off the tall boots he was wearing.
!!!!!!!!
Under Jordan's stunned gaze, Ian then removed the red high heels that had been hidden inside the boots.
The reason Ian had kept falling while climbing walls earlier was not because his balance was bad. Nobody would believe in a Batman who was only five-foot-seven, but he also could not exactly break his own legs just to gain six inches of height.
"My eyes!"
Jordan looked like he had just been struck by lightning. His mouth opened and closed a few times before he finally forced out a sentence.
"What are you doing!? Oh my God, should I be grateful you weren't wearing stockings too?"
The words had barely left his mouth
when he watched Ian pull three pairs of stockings out of his pocket and toss them into the trash.
"There's a reason for it, but I don't really dare explain it to you right now."
After changing back into slippers, Ian instantly felt much more comfortable. He did not care about Jordan's twisted expression at all. The world always misunderstood his particular style of superheroism.
Especially family not understanding. That was an old American tradition too.
"If Mom and Dad get back, tell them I already died somewhere outside. Whatever it is, they can talk to me about it tomorrow."
Ian still had serious business to take care of upstairs.
That left Jordan standing alone in the living room, staring at the direction Ian had vanished for quite a while before finally lowering his gaze toward the trash can holding the stockings and high heels.
"Jonathan's like that, and now Ian's like this... do I... do I still have a chance to turn out normal?"
Jordan's face was heavy with worry as his quiet murmur echoed through the living room.
He was questioning his life.
And fearing the future.
It was the most typical mindset of adolescence, and at that moment it was being displayed to the fullest by Ian's second brother.
...
Back in his bedroom,
Ian shut the door.
After thinking briefly, he dragged the wardrobe in front of it too.
He was not betting on whether his father had the power to break the door down. He was betting on Clark's beautiful virtue of thrift.
"I'm such a smart little ostrich."
After finishing his safety measures, Ian sat down at his desk. He set the thermos on top, and if one looked through the opening, Mr. White could be seen crouching inside with his head buried down.
A special person deserved to collect a special real-life figure like that.
Though Mr. White might have been the true ostrich here.
"Mr. White, don't worry. For the sake of my No. 1, No. 2, No. 3, and No. 7, 8, 9, and 10 compounds, I definitely won't hand you back over to the reapers."
Ian tried to comfort him.
Mr. White's soul only trembled even harder.
Surely he was moved. There could not possibly be anyone in this world who found a fourteen-year-old boy scarier than reapers and the destiny of ending up in Hell.
"Now, let's take a look at my trash can."
Ian pulled the bull-headed demon's head back out of his schoolbag. The clown makeup still had not been removed, but the demon's mood looked much more stable now.
"If you scream, I'll piss in your mouth."
Ian was not very good at threats yet. He was still learning. But surprisingly, once he removed the rag, the bull head really did refrain from cursing him out again.
"You're Clark Superman's son?"
The bull-headed demon asked in its deep, hoarse voice. Clearly, while Ian had been carrying it on his backside earlier, it had noticed a few things.
Even in Hell,
Superman was very famous.
"Clark is my father."
Ian chose to answer in a slightly different way.
The bull-headed demon fell silent for a moment.
"You want to learn magic?"
It still remembered the conversation between Ian and Rachel Raven earlier.
"More precisely, I want to learn demon lord summoning."
Ian wanted to summon demon lords and then sacrifice demon lords. With the progress of the times, it was only natural that the mystical side should finally develop its own assembly line.
"I can teach you."
The bull-headed demon sounded unsurprised and gave the answer in a low voice.
"Demonic temptation? That's it?"
Ian suspected the creature was trying to trick him.
As far as Hell creatures were concerned,
not even a punctuation mark could be trusted.
"I really can teach you. I may not be powerful, but I carry my ancestors' bloodline. I possess abundant magical knowledge."
The bull-headed demon sounded extremely sincere.
Ian, however, was unmoved.
This thing's attitude had changed far too drastically. There had to be something fishy going on.
As for exactly what was fishy about it, Ian had no interest in figuring it out.
Mostly because if he thought too hard and still could not figure it out, it would damage the prestige of his intelligence.
(End of Chapter)
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