Chapter 580: I, Joker (End)
Two hours ago, in the bat cave.
“You are a clever person, you should be able to understand my plan.” Feng Bujue told Joe as he put on the batsuit.
“I can understand it, but… is it really necessary?” Joe was doing the same thing. “From how I see it, a Gotham without ‘supervillains’ is already chaotic enough.”
“Ah~ That is why you still have much to learn.” Feng bujue replied. “Gotham who has been under control by The Bruce with religion for so many years will not change overnight. To have the people get used to the new batman, you need time, patience and…” He opened his arms. “…fear.”
“But how is that different… from what the Bruce is doing now?” Marya questioned.
“There is a big difference. He has been using sacrifices without any power of resistance.” Feng Bujue answered. “But I shall… present you with actual competition.”
“You need friend to succeed.” To everyone’s surprise, it was Xiao Tan who offered the best advice, “But to reach your full potential, you need enemies.”
“See, even he knows it.” Feng Bujue shrugged and smiled.
…
Now… A slow and easy footsteps echoed down the empty corridor in the bat castle. A figure in batsuit walked down the corridor and moved towards the central room inside the castle. At that moment, the large castle was immensely quiet because dead bodies would not make any noise.
…
“Hmmm… most of them were killed by guns, from the wound positions and the shape, 90 percent of them died under Soulie’s guns…” Feng Bujue did not spare his attention when he was walking. His eyes wandered about to capture all the useful information. “Along the way… the visible death count is only 81, the number is much lower than the one given by Klibon, looks like most of them have chosen to surrender or escape… Tsk… what smell is this?” When Brother Jue turned the corner, he was hit by a stench. “Oh… it’s a leaking stomach…” he saw a dead body on the ground at the corner. “He should be killed by Ruoyu. The bone and muscle fibres were cut very cleanly, the blade qi entered from the side and sliced through the lungs, heart, stomach and intestines…”
While Feng Bujue was conducting his observation, he already came up with such information, what he was doing could not be called ‘thinking’ anymore. In current Brother Jue’s eyes, the data world of Thriller Paradise was already different from before, it was as if… it had changed into the world that he could when he was under the status of Descent of the War Demon. Now whenever he focused his attention on something for more than long enough, he could see minutely into the following code; when he walked into a chaotic environment, he could categorize each object neatly in an instant; when he came to this kind of crime scene situation, with just a glance of the body, he could swiftly reconstruct the crime committed in an instantly, in fact with enough information and clues left, he could rewind the whole murder before his eyes if he wanted to. If someone was standing next to Feng Bujue now, they would realize… there were light flowing through his eyes, making him look like… those Anomalies. But the data flow in the Anomalies’ eyes were white but the data flow in Brother Jue’s eyes was black…
“Please enter the entry password.” When Feng Bujue reached the door of the castle’s main lab, the electronic door rang out with the following.
“All hail the bat.” Brother Jue took out the Pocket Watch of Deceit from his inventory and announced in the Bruce’s voice.
“Command accepted, analysing voice pattern… identification successful, welcome back, Mr. Bruce.” The electronic door answered and opened. After he walked into the room, before Feng Bujue could say anything, Ruoyu cut to him first, “What took you so long?”
“Hue hue… why, did you miss me already?” Brother Jue replied with a smile.
Ruoyu ignored this meaningless question and said seriously, “The system just announced that we have completed the hidden quest, if Joe has successfully killed the Bruce while you were wasting the time, then we were only left with several minutes.”
“Actually it does not matter.” Feng Bujue said, “Even if we just return with the resource we found at the bat cave, we have gained quite a lot from this scenario already.” When he spoke, Brother Jue joined the group and asked Klibon who was busy beside the experiment table. “Prof, how is the progress coming along?”
“These are formulated programming, I have already done them many times, it is very simple.” Klibon did not stop working, he grinned with the cigarette in his lips and said, “The facial reconstruction will be done in about 5 more minutes and regarding the brain chip…” He gained at the electric cupboard on his right hand side. “These are the batches that I have created in secret, they do not come with tracing function and the knowledge and the personality will be 95 percent similar to the original, they will also wipe out fully the personality and the memory of the host, hah ha…” He chuckled. “I call these cute little things as ‘Devil’s Souls’.”
“Very nice.” Feng Bujue walked forward and stopped next to Klibon and looked at the Robins who laid on the lab table before them. He chuckled, “you are indeed a great professor, Professor Klibon… your talent is truly unrivalled.”
“Hue hue hue… he he he… ha ha ha ha…” The two stood there and laughed maniacally like the villains would do in a cartoon. At that moment, more than 10 captured Robins laid before them. Soon these people would stop being Robins, they would be changed into The Joker, Two Face, Penguin, the Mask, Poison Ivy and so on…
“Brother Jue, I do not get it…” Xiao Tan said, “We have already gotten so many things from the bat cave and have completed the hidden quest… why should we do these unrelated things? Or Joe really cannot take up the role of the batman without these supervillains?”
“Hah… Regarding the reason…” Feng Bujue said, “Just keep watching and you’ll see…” he said as he raised his hand to point at the screen on one side of the room. On the screen, a fight was being broadcasted live…
…
On the other side, on the platform of the castle. The Bruce’s batsuit had already been completely ruined in battle and lost its mobility support but the effect of Wayne’s Blood on Joe had run out as well. In the light and dark, there were only 2 normal men in normal batsuit, competing in the most savage and basic battle.
“The effect of the ‘hyper stimulant’ in your body is almost over, right…” When Joe said that, he waved a punch at Bruce’s face. Bruce was hit and a teeth flew out along with a burst of blood but he insisted on staying upright. “Ha ha… you’re about right…” he laughed coldly and then suddenly launched into a side kick. Joe quickly used his hand to block before his chest. He was bounced back after blocking this attack. “Your devotion is inspiring…” He gasped, “But you should know, even after you beat me, you will not become God again.”
“I know…” The Bruce wiped at his mask, his ‘mask’ was bleeding because actually that was not his mask but his face… The Bruce accepted the surgery from Klibon many years ago, to ensure his face wold not appear old, he directly joined the mask to his face.
“But you still want to fight.” Joe added.
“Hah…” The Bruce laughed. “I am helping you, Joe…” he raised an arm to point below them, “Only by showing more strength that you will be able to make these idiots cower under your faith.”
“I do not need them to supplicate towards me!” Joe gathered his breath and rose into another series of attack, “I just want to stop all this!”
He roared and lunged at the Bruce like a soccer player tackling his opponent. He knocked the Bruce off his feet and pressed him against the railing at the edge of the platform. At that moment, The Bruce was already at the end of his line. The side kick had exhausted his last energy, he could not resist any more.
“Then kill me. He… ha ha ha ha…” The Bruce laughed. He had lost his cape, with a nudge from Joe, he would fall to his death. At that second, dawn finally arrived. The first ray of the day shone down the horizon. The king of Gotham who was covered in blood turned around to look at—the city that he had fallen in love with.
“No!” To his surprise, Joe let go. He stood up and replied firmly, “I will not kill! I will never kill! Because… I am batman.” Joe of course still remember the gaze that ‘Joker’ tossed them before the fight and the words that he said.
“Gotham will witness… the birth of Batman.” Joe said as he picked the Bruce up. “The dark knight is a guardian, not an executioner or a tyrant.”
“bastard, kill me!” Rage suddenly coursed through the Bruce. Rage translated into power and suddenly he used the fins on the front of his arms to slash at Joe’s neck. And Joe… was flustered, he was not expecting a man who had lost all intention to fight in his eyes would suddenly ambush him at the last moment.
Tsk—
The timing was again perfect. A lazer shot out from behind Joe, and hit The Bruce on his body.
“Argh!” A scream. In the warm daylight, a billow of smoke rose from the Bruce’s head that was shot and his body fell from the edge of the platfrom…
“Hah… hah…” Joe gasped for air as he recovered from the brush with death. He turned back to look. It was none other than Marya who landed on the roof not too long ago who fired at the Bruce, it was her who saved his life again.
“The game is over.” The system narration said, “Seeing the Bruce fall from the platform, the crowd sunk into a strange silence. The scene signified the end of an era and also represented… the beginning of another legend. A god had fallen and then… the mobs went insane.”
“The bat!””The Bat””The bat” The people in the city started to scream.
“No! I am a man, nothing more nor less than a man!” Joe raised both of his hands and shouted at the camera. He wanted to stop their litany and stop they do— but only to trade old chants for the new. But this chant did not continue for long because…
“Ha ha ha ha ha… ha ha ha ha ha…” Feng Bujue (Joker)’s face appeared on the big screen again, he laughed and said, “People of Gotham, looks like the game is over, the new batman has been birthed….” He suddenly changed his tone, “But… don’t you guys think this ending is rather boring?”
Then more than 10 metallic rockets flew out from the sides of the bat castle. These capsule like cabins were like tornadoes and they down the horizon.
“Batman.” Feng Bujue no longer called Joe by his name. “Guess what I have just transported into the city?”
Joe looked at the big screen with complicated emotions in his eyes but silently.
“Hue hue hue…” Feng Bujue raised his voice and continued in a maddening cadence, “…they are the people on this screen!” The next second, the big screen was split into more than 10 smaller screens and each one had the face of a supervillain on them (of course, not including the Joker). The public went panicking again. They once again called upon the bat, to pray for protection and salvation.
“You people should know that… I am not a liar like the Bruce.” Feng Bujue’s face soon appeared back on the screen. “My game is far more interesting than his ever will be… He he…” He pointed at his face and said through a big grin. “In the past night, you have witnessed the revival of the bat and in this dawn, you will all bear witness to my and… their revivals!” He he… ha ha ha… ha ha ha ha ha!”
Using his quintessential laugh, he ended his speech. The laughter echoed through the air and started a new chapter at the city of Gotham…