A man who came with his own background music!
Wait… where was the music coming from?
After staring blankly for a while, Diana finally realized that Duke had been humming the tune himself.
For some reason, even though it was only about seventy or eighty percent similar to the original, it still carried the grand, epic feeling of sailing across the open sea.
But then…
“Hey, what are you doing?”
“Don’t bother me. Let me quietly enjoy this moment of solitude,” Duke replied, waving his hand.
He wasn’t really a man who came with his own BGM.
The melody of “The Calls” was simply something he was humming himself.
Diana raised an eyebrow.
Solitude?
If she had been a transmigrator, she probably would have known the term “chuunibyou.”
On the other hand, Du Chen Carlos thought Duke looked incredibly stylish at that moment.
Steve, meanwhile, wore the expression of someone suffering from constipation.
In his eyes, everyone on this boat had something wrong with them…
Well, except himself.
Then thick black smoke suddenly rushed toward them.
The “solitude” instantly lost all its charm.
The diesel ship towing their little sailboat belched out a cloud of smoke that nearly blasted Duke in the face.
Cough!
Cough!
Duke immediately jumped down.
“I don’t like London.”
“Neither do I. It’s ugly. Won’t the people here be poisoned?” Diana frowned.
The sky was gray.
The city was gray.
Everything felt gloomy and oppressive.
Smoke drifted everywhere, making the city resemble a battlefield covered in the haze of war.
“They’ve probably… gotten used to being poisoned,” Duke shrugged.
“You can actually get used to something like that?” Diana asked in surprise.
“People adapt. Never underestimate humans, Diana.”
A mischievous grin appeared on Duke’s face.
He suddenly remembered a joke from his previous life:
If a zombie virus ever spread across the world, every country would fall… except China.
Chinese people were just built differently.
Growing up drinking melamine-tainted milk for breakfast, eating fried dough sticks cooked in gutter oil and sulfur-treated steamed buns, topped off with Sudan Red salted duck eggs…
Lunch came with pesticide-covered vegetables and pork laced with clenbuterol…
Then at night they’d curl up beneath quilts stuffed with recycled black-market cotton…
…and still sleep soundly.
After getting ashore, Diana didn’t ask the silly question of why couples held hands.
Duke had already explained to her that women couldn’t just casually hold hands with men.
Du Chen Carlos, however, looked around with endless curiosity.
If Duke hadn’t kept an eye on her, she probably would have wandered off.
Unlike Diana, whose cloak helped her blend in somewhat, Carlos still wore traditional Amazon attire beneath a simple cape, with two swords strapped to her back.
Dual-wielding?
In the end…
They still went shopping for clothes.
There they met the chubby woman—Steve’s secretary.
“Thank goodness you’re alive.”
“I honestly thought you were dead until I got your call,” she laughed before extending her hand toward Diana.
“I’m Etta Candy, Steve Trevor’s secretary.”
“What’s a secretary?” Diana asked curiously.
“I do whatever he tells me to do. I go wherever he sends me.”
“Where I come from, that’s called a slave.”
“I like her already,” Etta said, shooting Steve a glance.
“Alright, ladies first.”
“It’s basically slavery… except we’re paid. A different kind of manual labor.”
In the end, Diana changed into clothing very similar to what she wore in the movie, covering up all of her beauty.
Carlos dressed similarly, though her outfit was tighter and more tailored.
Straight-leg trousers made her look even more capable.
Duke wasn’t a fashion expert.
He knew almost nothing about women’s clothing in 1910s Britain.
Fortunately, compared to modern clothing, there wasn’t actually that much difference.
The streets were filled with vintage British fashion anyway, and Duke adapted without any trouble.
After causing quite a scene during the military meeting, the group finally met Sir Patrick…
The man secretly known as Ares, the God of War.
Suddenly, the system sounded an alarm.
Warning!
Warning!
Warning!
Host, a target with demigod-level strength has been detected.
Your current power is completely insufficient to defeat him.
Recommendation: Evacuate immediately… or surrender.
Surrender your ass!
Run?
Hell no.
If he ran now, he’d definitely attract Ares’ attention.
Duke maintained a perfectly polite smile.
“So this is your superior?”
“How can he say something like that? Can you actually believe him?”
For the first time, Diana completely lost her temper.
“And you.”
“Was your mission really just to hand them that notebook?”
Steve sighed.
“No.”
“You didn’t stand by your beliefs.”
“You didn’t fight back.”
“Because we can’t change anything.”
Steve looked frustrated.
“I’m only a captain. Against all those generals, my opinion means nothing.”
“But this is Ares!”
“He’ll never negotiate!”
“He’ll never surrender!”
Diana looked at him with utter disappointment.
“Maybe Duke was right.”
“You only used me so you could leave Themyscira.”
With that, she turned to leave.
Du Chen Carlos snorted.
“We should’ve killed him back then.”
Duke heard his name being mentioned.
He frowned before quickly saying,
“I’ll take you to the front lines.”
“We’ll probably die.”
“Oh… this is a terrible idea.”
“We’re going to need help.”
He immediately walked away to find his old companions.
Diana hesitated briefly before following him.
“So what now?” Carlos whispered.
“I think Diana has started to like that spy.”
“You’d better work harder, Duke.”
She had never liked Steve.
Back on Themyscira, she’d been one of the people suggesting they simply kill him.
Duke scratched his head.
“What are you talking about?”
“Come on.”
“We’ll follow them for now.”
At this point, Diana’s only goal was to kill Ares.
Meanwhile, Duke had no connections whatsoever in the year 1918.
Getting to the battlefield alone was nearly impossible.
Of course, he could simply tell Diana that Sir Patrick was Ares.
That would immediately trigger the final battle.
But whether they could actually kill Ares was another matter entirely.
The bigger issue was that everyone else would think they had gone insane and attack them instead.
If innocent blood were spilled…
That wouldn’t be a good outcome.
For now…
Following Steve remained the best choice.
Soon enough, they arrived at a noisy tavern.
There they met two familiar faces.
Sameer, the master spy fluent in countless languages.
And Charlie, the “legendary” sniper.
“This is Diana.”
“Carlos.”
“Sameer.”
“Nice to meet you.”
“And this…”
Steve paused.
“…is Duke.”
“A nobleman from the East.”
“Hello.”
Sameer instinctively sensed that Steve didn’t like Duke very much.
Nevertheless, out of courtesy, he still reached out to shake Duke’s hand.
At that exact moment, the system’s voice rang out once more.
Congratulations, Host.
You have obtained the Talent:
English (Mastery)
French (Mastery)
…
Duke froze for a second.
Well…
What a pleasant surprise.
Sometimes the best rewards really do arrive when you least expect them.