Chapter 241: Gotham's Madness, Always Hard to Distinguish Superiority

PS: The second chapter will be finished shortly.

Boom!

The sound of the fist striking the abdomen was dull yet loud.

"Pfft!"

The Riddler's nearly paralyzed body twitched slightly; this blow made him spew fresh blood again. Everyone could see that this hit hurt terribly.

Even without the boosts from the ring and gloves, for the Riddler who was already beaten to near death, every punch Chuck threw now reawakened his previous injuries and internal bleeding.

"This punch is for kidnapping me!"

Boom!

"This punch is for my ex-wife!"

Boom!

"This punch is for my son!"

Boom!

"This punch is for Kane!"

Boom!

"This punch is for Jessica!"

Kite Man struck the Riddler blow after blow. Zsasz watched, somewhat puzzled, and quietly asked Poison Ivy: "Who is Kane?"

Poison Ivy did not reply, but Batman, standing nearby, knew what Chuck was talking about—Kane was the red-clad boy who had lost his father and was rescued by Kite Man that day; and Jessica was his mother.

"Spare me! Spare me! Stop hitting me! Spare me, I beg you!"

The Riddler pleaded desperately on the ground, yet Chuck did not stop.

Mundy Paul, Seth Freeman, Steve Howood. With every name Chuck spoke, his anger grew, for these names were no longer people he had saved, but people he had failed to save.

Men and women, old and young; every name represented a life. Now, their lives had been cut short, reduced to nothing more than names on a tombstone, with nothing else remaining.

When Chuck flew into the war zone to save people, he had witnessed lives slipping away before his eyes. Thinking of his dying son and the corpses he had buried with his own hands, the rage in his heart became even more piercing and bone-shattering. His fists rained down without stopping, blow after blow, splattering blood everywhere, beating the Riddler until he was barely human.

"Enough, Chuck." Batman suddenly spoke: "If you keep this up, you'll kill him."

Yet Chuck did not hear him; he had completely lost his reason and knew only to swing his fists at the culprit before him.

"I said, enough."

Batman's figure shifted, dodging past several super-villains to reach Chuck's front—of course, this was also because they no longer blocked Batman.

He bent down, grabbed Chuck's fist, and finally stopped him from continuing: "You are a good man, Chuck, an upright man. You are not cut out for killing, nor should you bear the sin of murder."

Chuck, held back, looked around with vacant eyes. At that moment, he finally began to regain his ability to think.

He saw Batman shaking his head at him, saw the Riddler beneath him covered in gore, saw the Joker lying on the ground watching this cruel scene with interest, and saw his own hands stained with blood.

He lowered his hands, remained silent for a while, then stood up and walked to the side.

Batman then crouched down and, under the guise of checking the Riddler's pulse and heartbeat, secretly fed him a quarter of a fruit candy.

The Riddler could not die, and the fruit candy must not be exposed; he had to balance Chuck, Ma Ma Zhaodi, and the Riddler.

"That's it." He turned around and said to Firefly and Zsasz nearby: "There is no need for you to fight anymore. The Riddler and the Joker are finished now. If I were you, I would obediently return to Arkham."

"What kind of joke is this?" Zsasz sneered: "There are only three of you, maybe four if you count that traitorous pervert on the bicycle. On what basis do you think you can take down all ten-plus of us?"

"..."

Whoosh—!

Batman was about to answer when he suddenly felt wind behind his head. He crouched low, dodging the Riddler's sneak attack punch, then turned and knocked the Riddler, who had just gotten up, back to the ground.

"You are tough, Nygma," he said. "But if you don't want to keep getting beaten, you'd better stay on the ground."

"No!"

The Riddler swung his fists, but he was not looking at Batman; he was looking behind him.

"Batman, move aside, don't block me. I want to see the Joker's face! Is he smiling? He is smiling, isn't he?!"

Batman frowned, stepped aside to reveal the Joker behind him: "I'm not sure—you see for yourself."

Two-Face then stepped aside as well, though the gun in his hand still pointed at the Joker.

The Joker, who had been pinned to the ground, pouted, stood up, and brushed the dust off his tuxedo. At this moment, he still wore that gloomy expression.

So the Riddler let out a hysterical roar.

"No!"

"You fool! Why aren't you smiling! Why aren't you smiling! You should be smiling!"

"Why? This should... this should have been enough! I started a war, kicked you, kicked Batman, kicked Gotham City out of the game, and then lost to, lost to what kind of trash was it?"

"Kite Man!"

"I was defeated in front of you, beaten up, all because of a worthless piece of trash, a Kite Man. Do you know how much effort I spent creating such a failure?!"

"I had to investigate him in advance, I had to pull him into the game, turn him into an informant, kill his child, and get Batman to bring him to fight me."

"I also had to know you would come here, I had to know your backup plan... and then I get beaten by anyone—Batman or Kite Man—and then I beg for mercy! And it has to look flawless!"

"This should... this should have been very funny!"

The Riddler grabbed the Joker's collar and shouted at him in anger: "You! Should! Smile!"

Yet the Joker, looking at the furious Riddler, just scowled and let out a bored "Hmm."

"Enough."

Batman's cold voice sounded behind Nygma. At this moment, the anger in his heart began to burn fiercely, no less than Chuck's just now.

"This has nothing to do with you, idiot!" The Riddler shouted angrily at Batman: "You were never the protagonist of this story—not every story has to revolve around you!"

"Do you think I really have no way to deal with you? Do you think you are truly a trouble to me? I can kill you very easily, kill everyone around you! If I want to, they will be lying in the gutter tomorrow!"

"I let you live for my reasons. You were my first opponent when I first started out, like a child's first riddle. But now it has been a year; the child has become an adult, and the puzzle has become utterly easy for him—and you have become completely unchallenging to me!"

"I kept you only because you were the first riddle to trap me; you are interesting." The Riddler sneered, then turned his gaze to the Clown: "But you, you who mock everything, can no longer laugh now. This is an opportunity."

"I can unravel the Clown's mind and brain; I can solve everything of yours!"

(End of this chapter)