Chapter 3783: Peril in the Dark City (9)

In the end, the agent still dragged Greed and Arrogant into the elevator. As expected, no one stopped them. The elevator smoothly ascended to the top floor, then reached the surface of consciousness.

They didn't seem to have the dissociative identity disorder of legend, thinking "this is me, that is not," or fighting over control of the body. They were still one person, with only one state of consciousness.

Currently, the agent's traits were dominant, but occasionally, thoughts related to Greed or Arrogant would pop up from within. It was like the multifaceted nature of a person's personality. For instance, someone who is mostly calm and rational might have lively thoughts when encountering something they like.

The moment consciousness returned to the body, intense pain struck. Shiller's vision went black for a moment, but just as consciousness reached the blurry edge, more and more colorful lines appeared in his sight. The illusions came as expected, also making him understand the current situation.

Though the time flow in the real world and within thought is different, their discussion took quite some time. Currently, Shiller was no longer in the hallway of the municipal building. He should have been captured, with numerous patrol personnel around.

Shiller lay on a bed, his body fixed by machines. The person closest to him was Lady Siwa, who was standing back to him doing something.

"You're awake?" Lady Siwa turned around and sneered, "How does it feel? Does it hurt so much you want to die?"

Shiller opened his mouth but was not accustomed to the state of having lost half of his facial muscles. He tried to make a sound, which came out very hoarse, almost like a low moan from Hell.

"Was it you... who gave Death Angel the technology to turn Batman... into that? Why do you... hate him so much?"

Then Shiller seemed to suddenly realize he had said something he shouldn't have and quickly shut his mouth.

"How do you know?" Lady Siwa narrowed her eyes and said, "Did that damned fool tell you all this?"

"He just wanted... to gain Batman's approval. He succeeded, he turned Batman... into someone like him. It's a death without regrets..."

Even though it was Shiller who spoke, he seemed unable to take it anymore. The intense pain made him burst forth with tremendous strength, his right arm yanked hard, breaking the chains that bound it. He rolled to the right and punched Lady Siwa in the abdomen.

Then, using force with both hands, he broke the left hand chain, pulling down the restraint on his waist, followed by the shackles on his feet. It only took him a few seconds to accomplish this.

Lady Siwa, who was just holding her stomach and getting up, looked like she had seen a ghost. In fact, Shiller's appearance now wasn't much better than a ghost — the left half of his face, the left sternocleidomastoid muscle to the clavicle, then to the right side of the femur's greater trochanter, the skin layer was almost entirely gone. While there was still some muscle on his abdomen keeping his viscera from falling out, the shoulder and arms showed bones, and the remaining facial tissue made him look almost skeletal.

Normally, the reduction in muscle mass would mean a decrease in strength, but because it hurt more when he moved, the restrictions were more thoroughly lifted, so his strength wasn't significantly weakened.

As the saying goes, "No matter how high your skills, you're still afraid of a knife." In the original, Lady Siwa was the world's top martial artist and even defeated Batman several times. While there was a slight difference in their level, it wasn't much. However, the strength difference between Lady Siwa and Shiller now was quite large.

Shiller didn't use any fancy techniques; just like in the hallway before, he charged forcefully. Lady Siwa was directly sent flying. Then, without using any weapon, he used his right hand to fiercely pound on her chest five or six times until his arm was cut by rib fragments. He inserted his hand into the broken chest and ripped out the heart.

After confirming the opponent was thoroughly dead, Shiller quickly took out a Cure potion and injected himself. While this state was indeed powerful, it hurt too much. Unlike the morbid, who relished in pain, he preferred to end it quickly.

The Cure potion quickly worked its magic. While the injuries looked severe, they were actually just external wounds, healing in a matter of seconds. Taking advantage of this state to kill the strongest among them, Lady Siwa, was more than worth it.

At this point, Shiller began to observe the situation in the room. It was evidently the laboratory beneath the Cathedral, though not the one where Batman was held captive, but another room.

What surprised Shiller was that on the far right side of the room, there were many liquid tanks, each over two meters tall, connected with numerous tubes, likely used for mixing liquids. He approached and noticed that each tank was labeled with a different number.

There was no information on the tank bodies. Shiller circled the room and found a chemistry ratio process document, but all the chemical materials were replaced by numbers, showing no clear use.

He glanced outside the room. The illusion in his vision hadn't completely faded, but he could roughly judge that there were two pairs of patrolmen in the hallway. Shiller seized the gap, quietly following a group into the next room.

This room appeared to be someone's quarters. Based on the religious motifs in the decor and the pile of crosses on the table, Shiller thought it might be the room of Death Angel Paul.

He rummaged through the room and found a photo in a drawer. Using the torchlight raised by sect members passing by outside, Shiller saw that the person in the photo was Bane.

Shiller squinted slightly. He remembered in the original comic, it was Death Angel who killed Bane. But since he killed him, why keep this photo?

Shiller opened the drawer below and found more photos: Two-Face, Riddler, Scarecrow, Mad Hatter, Killer Croc... all famous super villains of Gotham.

At the bottom of the drawer, Shiller found a photo of the Joker.

Looking at the stack of photos in his hand, Shiller began to think. The original comic only mentioned that Death Angel defeated Batman and imprisoned him, but it didn't say where these super villains went.

Generally speaking, super villains wouldn't allow anyone to harm their beloved Bat Baby, let alone imprison Batman like a display piece. Take the Joker for instance; he would never allow anyone to treat Batman this way. But these people never appeared in the original comic.

Although the comic plot in this universe follows "Knightfall," since it's not the Prime Universe, the events preceding "Knightfall" may not have occurred here, and the status of the villains can't be generalized. Where did these super villains go?

With the photos in hand, Shiller still followed them quietly, taking advantage of the patrol team's absence, and checked the rooms on this floor, but found nothing useful. He then walked down the hallway to the place where Batman was originally imprisoned, which was still in chaos and unkempt.

Continuing forward, there was a room at the end that looked different from the others. Shiller stealthily approached the entrance of this room. Apparently confident in their defenses, the door to the room was unlocked, allowing Shiller to slip in.

This place looked like an archive room, with many materials preserved. Shiller searched through them one by one, reading by the doorway light, and then discovered the shocking secret hidden behind this dark universe.

Death Angel did not turn Batman into that state to torture him—he was conducting an experiment.

More precisely, Death Angel led the Saints Order and Lady Siwa led the Assassin's Union in experimenting on Batman. They wanted to merge the powerful genes of all the super villains into Batman.

Scarecrow's fear gas, Mad Hatter's hypnosis ability, Bane's immense strength, Killer Croc's atavistic ability, Joker's undying ability...

They extracted these criminals' powerful genes and tried to transplant them onto Batman. Meanwhile, Batman retained his most crucial asset, his wise brain.

The jar of liquid Shiller saw in the previous room was used to cultivate the genes of super villains. This entire base was built to conduct this mad experiment. Batman wasn't entirely driven insane by torture, but more likely was losing his mind due to being injected with too many mad genes from super villains.

Shiller read through the experiment logs. He found that since the Saints Order took control of Gotham 15 years ago, this experiment had been ongoing, but it never fully succeeded or only partly succeeded.

The super villains' genes conflicted with each other and with Batman's own genes, causing many physical mutations and even instances of loss of control. That's why Death Angel turned Batman into such a helpless state, to ensure that even if he lost control, he wouldn't cause too much trouble.

The experiment logs showed that the genes of several super villains were successfully transplanted, but they succeeded individually, meaning one could not coexist with the other. To gain something new, the previous must be extracted.

The most recently successful super villain was called the Joker.

Shiller's gaze locked on the Joker's name. He realized why, even after having his spine shattered and only his head left, Batman could live for so long. It wasn't some Zenith Star technology; it was purely the Joker's undying ability at work.

"Could the Broken Bat not be dead?"

Shiller's expression darkened. He hadn't anticipated this hidden truth. If the Broken Bat wasn't surviving on the energy of the nutrient liquid but knew he was undying, he shouldn't have hurriedly called the sect members, nor stepped into his own trap, unless that was part of his plan. What was he up to?

Shiller couldn't determine whether the current Broken Bat was Batman or the Joker. But it was clear he wasn't as foolish as he seemed; he had his own plan.

If he entered the trap intentionally, then what was his goal? Shiller thought for a moment, considering that even if he didn't gather those people, the Broken Bat might still die—either at their hands or feigning death from nutrient liquid depletion and energy exhaustion.

In other words, he wanted to die, and in front of these people, making everyone believe he was dead. But if he had the Joker's undying ability, even a smashed head couldn't ensure death. Was he attempting a false death to escape?

This complicates things. Shiller thought, if he's the Joker, he could decide who the new Batman would be; if he's still Batman, then Shiller's mission hasn't failed, because he's still alive and Shiller must go save him.

Shiller thought of a way to determine if the other is Batman or Joker: find the Joker from whom the gene was extracted. If the previous Joker is still alive, the other is Batman; if that Joker is dead, then congratulations Gotham—the Mad Laugh unique to this Dark City has returned.